Marvel Champions - The Card Game Core Set

Marvel Champions is easily the best LCG out there. So much variety. So many play styles. So many heroes and villains that change up gameplay. This game is making a Marvel lifer out of me. FFG knocked it out of the park with this one. May the expansions and hero packs never stop coming.

A solid pick for multiple nights of play

LCGs (living card game) really give life to card games. With new content regularly being released, it means more heroes, more villains, and more ways to play. Marvel Champions takes a formula similar to LOTR but goes above and beyond making the game approachable and enjoyable to players new to the LCG format, as well as providing countless deck customizations to players yearning for more from the base set alone. While the base set appears to cost 60-70, additional hero packs range roughly around 15, and expansions are around 40. Each expansion includes additional heroes, and a campaign against multiple villains that can also be played against as a standalone. Add in modular encounters, and you could face the same villain with multiple options to increase difficulty, ... MoreLCGs (living card game) really give life to card games. With new content regularly being released, it means more heroes, more villains, and more ways to play. Marvel Champions takes a formula similar to LOTR but goes above and beyond making the game approachable and enjoyable to players new to the LCG format, as well as providing countless deck customizations to players yearning for more from the base set alone. While the base set appears to cost 60-70, additional hero packs range roughly around 15, and expansions are around 40. Each expansion includes additional heroes, and a campaign against multiple villains that can also be played against as a standalone. Add in modular encounters, and you could face the same villain with multiple options to increase difficulty, or just add new things to watch out for. This is a co-op game for 1-4 players (it actually works out very well playing solo), so you work with your team to take down the villain presented. With pre-constructed decks (precons) that offer instant customization, you always feel like you are at the wheel, driving the hero to success (or failure) in different scenarios. Overall, with every hero pack and expansion out (Jan 2022) look to spend 300+ to complete the set for groups looking to have access to everything possible. No one needs to really spend that much, since some heroes will be overlooked by groups favoring their top picks versus something less popular, but with deckbuilding consisting of heroes and 4 different playstyles per hero, there is a deck for everyone with modifications to the deck themselves. Fantastic game, worth picking up, but if you have a collector mentality or compulsively like to invest in new games, this one gets a bit costly, but is worth every penny. I highly recommend the game to anyone who likes deckbuilding and working together to beat up Marvel villains as a team of heroes everyone can easily identify.

Culmination of FFG's Co-op LCGs

The Marvel Champions Core Set is a complete, self-contained product that can provide, on its own, dozen of playthroughs of the game lasting as many (or more) hours and offering a bunch of levers you can rely on for replayability. It also actually fully supports, within this one box, its full advertised player count. This is the first time any of this can be said about FFG's LCG offerings, even their co-operative ones. In comparison to the Arkham Horror or LotR LCGs, where you wanted at least two (but ideally three) core sets to get your gaming group completely outfitted to play the game at its highest level, Champions gives you more than enough in this Core Set to feel good running a four player squad of heroes.The game itself feels like a mixture of LotR LCG and ... MoreThe Marvel Champions Core Set is a complete, self-contained product that can provide, on its own, dozen of playthroughs of the game lasting as many (or more) hours and offering a bunch of levers you can rely on for replayability. It also actually fully supports, within this one box, its full advertised player count. This is the first time any of this can be said about FFG's LCG offerings, even their co-operative ones. In comparison to the Arkham Horror or LotR LCGs, where you wanted at least two (but ideally three) core sets to get your gaming group completely outfitted to play the game at its highest level, Champions gives you more than enough in this Core Set to feel good running a four player squad of heroes.The game itself feels like a mixture of LotR LCG and Arkham Horror LCG, and you can tell that FFG is taking the learnings they gathered in creating those products to apply it here. While the story, experience, and decisions you're making don't feel as complex as the ones you might have in Arkham, neither does the game feel as fiddly, plodding, and oppressive as an Arkham campaign can sometimes be. It's more similar to LotR, in which each round feels like a particular puzzle to solve. However, unlike LotR where multiplayer can often feel like you are playing a game NEXT TO someone rather than WITH someone, Champions makes player collaboration and interaction a central (maybe even necessary) part of the multiplayer experience.I don't think this game is for everyone (and, admittedly, I think the game itself doesn't have some of the highs that you can get in an Arkham campaign), but the Core Set is a fantastic self-contained product that immediately knocks games like Sentinels of the Multiverse or Marvel Legendary out of the collection. It also sets the standard as being the LCG that I am most likely to introduce people to for casual play. There's so much to love here, and, if you're a card game player, you're doing yourself a disservice by not trying it out.

Excellent system

I'm not a huge non-X-Men Marvel fan, but I heard enough good things that I needed to try this game. I keep hoping to find an LCG that hooks me.This is almost certainly the LCG that does it for me. It plays so quickly. The recommended decks are a breeze to put together. Each character feels vastly different from each other. Changing the difficulty of the villains is so easy (literally just swapping two cards in most cases) yet changes up the game dramatically.Thematically I never really felt like I was a superhero. Yes, Captain America's mechanisms were that of a leader, etc. but overall the game is definitely that of a puzzle rather than a thematic overload. But honestly, that's fine with me as I'm not in love with the theme anyway.Five heroes and three ... MoreI'm not a huge non-X-Men Marvel fan, but I heard enough good things that I needed to try this game. I keep hoping to find an LCG that hooks me.This is almost certainly the LCG that does it for me. It plays so quickly. The recommended decks are a breeze to put together. Each character feels vastly different from each other. Changing the difficulty of the villains is so easy (literally just swapping two cards in most cases) yet changes up the game dramatically.Thematically I never really felt like I was a superhero. Yes, Captain America's mechanisms were that of a leader, etc. but overall the game is definitely that of a puzzle rather than a thematic overload. But honestly, that's fine with me as I'm not in love with the theme anyway.Five heroes and three villains is plenty to start with. By all means pick up any heroes that might be your favorite, but don't feel like you have to have everything right away. There's a ton of goodness in this box.EDIT: Captain America doesn't come in the base box, but you get the point.

Great Game, Great Value!

FFG's latest LCG is their easiest to pick up and play. Each hero has its own deck, that can be modified, but doesn't necessarily have to be in order to play. This set contains 5 heroes and 3 scenarios, with tons more heroes and scenarios that can be added with the other sets. Very thematic and great to play solo or with multiple players.

It's ok

I hovered between 3 and 4 and finally gave it the benefit of the doubt.I primarily play Marvel Legendary, but I wanted to branch out a bit and try something different, and since I typically play solo "VS" (also by upper deck) didn't appeal to me so I decided to give Champions a shot. I'm still trying to figure out if I like it, and EVERYTHING about my rating is "as a solo player" as I haven't had a chance to play group (and haven't had the initiative to try playing 2 handed).Pros:Setup is WAY faster than legendary. Like most more complicated games, there's a learning curve (I feel like my first game took hours to set up and play through) but now I can set up in a couple minutes. Setup time is WAY faster than Legendary.Deck customization is much better - ... MoreI hovered between 3 and 4 and finally gave it the benefit of the doubt.I primarily play Marvel Legendary, but I wanted to branch out a bit and try something different, and since I typically play solo "VS" (also by upper deck) didn't appeal to me so I decided to give Champions a shot. I'm still trying to figure out if I like it, and EVERYTHING about my rating is "as a solo player" as I haven't had a chance to play group (and haven't had the initiative to try playing 2 handed).Pros:Setup is WAY faster than legendary. Like most more complicated games, there's a learning curve (I feel like my first game took hours to set up and play through) but now I can set up in a couple minutes. Setup time is WAY faster than Legendary.Deck customization is much better - legendary you can't really customize the deck (only what you choose to "buy"), so there's some replay value in tweaking combinations, adapting for scenarios, etc.Turn speed is FAST.Game is MUCH simpler than legendary, so it's a bit easier introduction.Cons:The Rhino "tutorial" module is hard and ridiculously swingy. Initially it's tough to get a bead on what the good strategy(s) is . While I've been trying to change things up, I feel like I largely do roughly the same things and I alternately complete decimate and am completely decimated by Rhino.Some heroes seem to be functionally impossible to play Solo - I was having a tough time with Iron Man and the general consensus online is "he's icky solo, play him in a group" (although there were a few suggestions that might make him play better). Shame cuz I was really looking forward to him.A LOT less selection in terms of heroes. A "big box" usually only comes with a couple heroes, and individual hero packs cost as much as a full expansion (5 heroes, plus villains, plus scenarios) in legendary. A typical launch seems to have a box set with a few heroes then 4-ish "related" heroes in a hero pack wave.. so altogether you're paying about $100 to add 6ish heroes to your collection where in legendary it's closer to $15.Replay value is inhibited by the fact that the villain/scheme combos are tied together, which makes more story sense but creates less options (I have at least 200 schemes and 50ish masterminds in legendary, which is 10,000 combos of that alone NOT COUNTING hero and villain permutations... functionally infinite as in "I will die of old age long before I've tried a fraction of the possibilities").Main box comes with 5 heroes and 3 villains/schemes, that's only 15 permutations. Legendary the starting box is 6 schemes with 4 masterminds, plus 8ish heroes, for about the same price.Overall:Champions is kinda fun. I have some disposable income right now so I'll probably pick up a couple expansions here and there (I bought Sinister Motives with it, but am trying to get through the main box content before I crack that open), but I don't feel like I'll get to the "must preorder everything" level I am with Legendary.

Marvel Champions Core Set Review

The biggest shortfall of Marvel Champions (MC) is that it's not Arkham Horror: The Card Game. That said, MC is far better at picking up and playing. The pre-build decks are better than FFG's other co-op LCGs, and deck construction has a lower accessibility threshold as 15 of 40 cards are automatically set for each hero. With modular encounter sets, the scenarios feel more repayable than FFG'S other co-op LCGs too. That said, the MC base box has no campaign support at all.

Marvel Champions LCG: Core Game

Extremely fun. You can do a certain amount of deck construction if that's your thing, or just go with a pre-constructed deck (or a deck from marvelcdb) and beat on the bad guy. The replayability is extremely high if you mix and match "aspects" for the heroes (basically, a kind of theme to your deck), which villain you go up against, and which modular set you include in the villain's deck. (The modular sets let you mix up the minions and various bad events that take place.) Just the core box will give you many hours of playtime.

Playing Together vs. Against

Not everyone in my family enjoys competition all the time. This card game allows us to fight something together. The rules start to click after spending a little time on it. It has 1 player up to 5 player. Youre playing Marvel heroes (vs. creating your own) but that is fun too.

Turned up quick and in excellent condition

Thought I would try a new boardgame and so decided to pick this up, the bundle arrived within the week with all components in amazing condition with additional peripherals bought to increase their durability as well as organising the game boxes. The bundle came with a sizeable number of add-ons beyond the small number of playable characters present in the base game. Due to work I haven't been able to fully play it yet but the numerus instructions and guides accompanying the game components make the rules easy to understand as well as the mechanics.