Just When You Thor-t It Was All Army Characters…

So, we’ve had two previews come up now, the first being the real version of the S.H.I.E.L.D Helicarrier:

Not pictured: This Helicarrier is in fact on it’s side having been hacked again, and speeding towards the ground.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t crash and burn into New York City like it should do, but I think we can just about forgive it, due to that rather tasty card-text. Popping three of your S.H.I.E.L.D Agents/ 2 Agents & Squirrel Girl back into your hand, which makes them ready to recruit all over again is a small price to pay for the ability to attack the support row, and have that sometimes-vital +2 ATK, whilst the card is safe and sound of course.

The cost may seem slightly restrictive, but on Turn 3, you can flip this card over once there’s three resources, pick up your 3-cost combination of past characters, and then recruit them all over again for endurance burn, saving you some characters for later turns. Let’s not forget Squirrel Girl allows you place a 1-cost S.H.I.E.L.D Army character into play alongside her, which means you’ll potentially have 6 endurance burn for the start of the turn, as well as the extra character on the board. It’s a small bonus, but I’ve learnt never to turn my nose up at the small bonuses.

The next card is:

Is it really smart to wear a metal helmet during a lightning storm if you’re a robot?

An odd card this one. The effect in the card-text doesn’t really scream “7-drop” to me. And to be honest, by Turn 7, you shouldn’t, in my opinion, have a very large hand. At this stage in the game, most Plot Twists should be spent, characters used for +1/+1 boosts etc. So, this card to me has rather limited potential, especially as it’s not all the cards you discard, but just the S.H.I.E.L.D characters you discard that go towards the ‘X’ amount.

From the looks of things, S.H.I.E.L.D will have two strategies to play around with; the off-curve swarm, and a more standard on-curve featuring the ‘big names’, as I have no doubt Nick Fury will see at least one other version, and Iron Man’s down for legend status, so I’d guess a 6-drop as well at the very least.

We’ll just have to wait until tomorrow’s preview to see how things pan out, so adios for now.

Whilst We Wait…

…for today’s preview, which is coming from The Fallout Shelter guys over at VS Realms, I thought I’d speculate on what today’s card could be:

It could be, you never know. 😉

Worst Deck Idea Ever

Ahem…

60 x S.H.I.E.L.D Agents.

I then remembered that you only draw so many cards a round, and this wouldn’t work, but the premise is like this:

Every time you recruit one, your opponent loses 2 endurance. So let’s look at the maths:

Turn 1: 2 Endurance

Turn 2: 4 Endurance (6 Total)

Turn 3: 6 Endurance (12 Total)

Turn 4: 8 Endurance (20 Total)

Turn 5: 10 Endurance (30 Total)

Turn 6: 12 Endurance (42 Total)

Turn 7: 14 Endurance (56 Total)

So, with seven turns of gameplay, you could whittle your opponent down to 0 endurance, without ever entering into combat. You’d always have more characters than them by Turn 3 or 4, and can simply reinforce with no problem. Finally, you’ll never miss your drop.

So, what’s needed is to add into the fray a way to get cards into your hand as quick as possible, by Turn 4, as that’s when you start to drastically get diminishing returns. Something like Birthing Chamber would help, as would Damocles Base.

There’s some danger to be had from Scarecrow, Chiroptophobic, but whilst that reduces board presence to nothing, it also fills my hand up again, ready to place the cards into play again.

Once I have more of a concrete idea of what cards are in Marvel Universe, I’ll be sure to come back to this, as it seems like a great win-condition to pull on an unsuspecting opponent.

“Bushy 16-year-old tail for the win!!!”

First off, for those of a politically correct nature (and located somewhere where the age of consent is more than 16) the 16-year old comment is about how long Squirrel Girl’s been in the comics business for (1992-2008), so don’t get on any high horses. 😉

Now, on to business! The next wave (no, not that Nextwave) of Marvel Universe previews is up, and it was worth waiting until 2am to get them:

Iron Man realised next time he should put boosters somewhere more…useful next time.

The first one, Stark Armory, obviously works well in synergy with Iron Man, and will form part of his Legend tretament. However, rumblings are already afoot for the fact it looks like it can easily slot into a Doom Patrol/Horsemen of Apocalypse deck, and help 5-drop Apocalypse from reaching his much-wanted twenty +1/+1 counters. There’s also, yet again, the possiblity of using Mystique, Shapely Shifter to adopt the Iron Man name, and take advantage of some hitherto unavailable +1/+1 counters. With Stark Armory being playable from Turn 3, that’s two counters that can go on Mystique for the combat phase of Turn 4, which is nothing to be sniffed at, as she’ll be 10ATK/8DEF, comparable to a 5-drop. Plus, on Turn 5, she’ll get a third counter, giving her yet again, just a slight edge, which sometimes can make all the difference.

“This is my moody chair. Do not disturb me whilst I am using the moody chair.”

Nick Fury’s up next, and though he had a card in Marvel Legends, this one panders more to the Nick Fury character himself, being concealed to emulate his behind-the-scenes activities, and his ability to place troops into the battlefield without question. Already, the prospect of a Golden-Age team up with Multiple Man and Sentinel Mark IV is looking very appealing, as well as a team-up with the modern X-Men for some instant Fastball Special goodness.

She was never this scary in the comics. Well, unless you were Dr. Doom or Thanos.

This is one card that I know some people were fervantly wishing for in this set, and they weren’t disappointed. This preview, and the one following came from Rian Fike’s awesome Full. Body. Transplant. and I know he’s been waiting for this card for a long time. Squirrel Girl continues what appears to be the S.H.I.E.L.D theme of amassing the board with Army characters, and if this vein continues with such great cards for doing so, some games are going to need wider tables. A shame there wasn’t any humorous flavour-text, but I’m not going to complain, especially if this card means the rest of the Great Lakes Initiative get to appear.

“Quick! Fire ineffectually!”

Finally, what looks to be the base-unit for the S.H.I.E.L.D Army tactic comes with a nasty little twist, namely in the form of endurance burn. Whilst 2 endurance may not seem like much, it can make a difference during the game as a whole, and if S.H.I.E.L.D can reach the late-game, then I can’t imagine a better victory than dropping 7 or 8 of these cards for 14/16 endurance burn, which by that stage is normally enough to push your opponent into minus figures. After they’re in play, there’ll be so many of the little buggers in play, you can simply reinforce against the opponent’s attacks, and win yourself the game.

Having seen these tasty cards, I’ve finally decided what team I’ll be concentrating on when Marvel Universe arrives, and it’s definitely S.H.I.E.LD, possibly teamed up with Nextwave. (Yes, that Nextwave this time.) That is, unless Messiah CompleX/House of M characters make an appearance here too.