Thinking Outside the Box

This event is similar to BYOT events, except that players choose two teams that are automatically crossed-over during the game. Players may only play with characters from, or cards that reference, one or both of those teams. You may not play with "generic" cards. This includes ALL cards in your deck, so plot twists, locations and equipment must also reference one of the two teams you are playing with!

The past few events have been great in terms of participation! Over the past two months I don't think we've had an event with less than 10 players signed up, and to me that is just awesome. I love seeing the group grow and change with the addition of new players, deck ideas, and friends. For the multi-player game night last week, it was a little odd. I was running a little late and had had a rather long day before heading down to Trilogy, and wasn't quite prepared to be greeted by a dozen beaming faces all waiting to play some cards. I hadn't expected quite that many players, and had only brought one Galactus set and one Starro set, which wasn't enough for that many players. What we ended up doing is something we've done once before, and while I'm a fan of it, I am sure some of the players aren't quite sure what to make of it. We ran two 3-player games, and one 2-on-2 game, for three rounds. The way we determined the winners for the tournament wasn...

Another really good tournament has come and gone, this time with 11 players coming out to compete in our Clone Saga event. There were a few gimmes, and a few surprises among the characters chosen; including Darkseid, The Joker, Captain America, Dr. Doom, Captain America, Brainiac 13, Silver Surfer, Rha' al Ghul and more! I wasn't able to take a close look at every player's deck, but I was very impressed with the creativity shown in some of the builds. From those that did have a chance to look at I think the Captain America and Silver Surfer decks had some really good potential, with the Cap deck coming in second only to Doom. Once again Scott walked away with top prize, smashing all comers in an impressive 4-0 tournament win. We'll have another Ultimates play mat and the final three MUL cards up for grabs in an upcoming event. Next time however, we're going to play some multi-player games. Depending on the number of players we'll either play some 2-on-2 te...

Ok well this isn't so much about what I think of the individual cards we've seen previewed on various spots online, but an overall impression so far. Maybe. First and foremost, I am sad that with Evolutions being a direct follow-up to Universe we see an end to the previous Marvel / DC alternating release schedule. I know that many other players share my fear that DC may no longer be represented in the game. I admit to leaning more towards the DC camp when it comes to what characters I enjoy more, but this really isn't about personal preference. The fear for my player group is that over time, we will lose players who play more DC cards, or DC exclusively. That's not a good thing, and I hope it won't happen should DC sets truly be out of the picture. So along comes Marvel Evolutions, the first time ever that we've had two Marvel expansions released back to back. Unfortunately, I feel there are a lot of things going against this set. I can't really prior...

We had an amazing turn-out for this weekend's tournament; 11 players total. That is really sweet as far as I'm concerned...since the only time we've ever broken that number was for our DC Legends release celebration back in December! Since I put a 30 minute time limit into place a little while back we've be able to play tournaments with four rounds rather than our previous three. I think this is more fun and certainly gives the players a chance to see more of the decks the other bring in. For some reason the first match of my four has totally evaporated from my memory, beyond the fact that my search-less Darkseid's Elite won out in turn six. The second and third matches were up against Heralds of Galactus and Avengers respectively. The Heralds player was new to the game and had a terrible draw. Overall I'd say that he only pulled four or five plot twists through the entire 8 rounds we played; and the Avengers just didn't have the oomph to survive all th...

I've been meaning to make a Darkseid deck for quite some time now, and finally did so about a week ago. I've been able to play 4 or 5 games with it and am very happy with how well it's been performing. The first game was a three player game and Kanto was a serious threat for both of my opponents to face. I was able to use his power twice; once to remove a 7-drop Defenders Hulk, and the second time to remove an Iron Man equipped with four pieces of extremely nasty equipment! There was a lot of swearing in that game... :) Darkseid has also had success against an X-Men build running Sage and Bad Press (thank god for resource row manipulation!), Gotham Knights and a Secret Society team up. There are a few cards I'd like to switch in, but I need to hop online to buy them. I'll post a deck list up after tomorrow's "Luck of the Draw" tournament. I think that my next project after this one will be something involving the League of Assassins. Oh and in o...

Another fine tournament event has come and gone. Last Friday we held our City Championship event. We had an 8-player pool with a diverse field as usual. I played my Fearsome Five / Infinity Gauntlet deck through four rounds. In the first round I was up against a Thunderbolts deck piloted by newcomer Dan. I was able to hit every drop as planned and draw into a fistful of gems. By turn six I had Thanos on the board against his 5 and 6 cost characters. Dropping a Power Gem and a copy of Armageddon on the table ended the turn, and the game, in my favor. Round two saw me up against an Insanity deck. Ben hit his one-drop Ratcatcher and caused me a few rounds of grief by burning me for all the stuns I was causing. By turn four I was able to get my team-up out and the New Baxter Builder and Moondragon combo running. I had to go to turn seven this time, but Thanos, a Power Gem and a copy of Armageddon cemented the win. Round three is where it started to go downhill for me. The first ...