Getting closer to Marvel Super Heroes, I was not overly excited. I don’t know if it is a combination of Marvel burnout, Spider-Man being initially fun but getting a bit the same, or the fact that TMNT and Secrets of Strixhaven were so much fun, but I wasn’t ready for the world of superheroes in Magic again yet. Then spoiler season rolled around. I started seeing cards that had me excited; next thing I knew, I was signed up for four pre-release events last weekend. Whoops, it turns out I was excited; I didn’t know it yet.
So how Marvel-ous is this Marvel set?
For anyone who is a little burned by Spider-Man, you will be glad to know this is a full set. Marvel Super Heroes isn’t just a full set, but full on set with all the ancillary products to enjoy as well. Now a quick note; while I may be digging on Spider-Man a bit, there was a LOT I liked about the set. There were heaps of fun cards and mechanics, but it being a small set not originally designed for draft, it did get old fast. Marvel Super Heroes on the other hand, is a fully built-out set, which, based on early vibes, I may enjoy for the full draft season.
Thematically, they have done a heap of fun creative stuff that feels true to characters and built much fitting into this game. The best example of this is Squirrel Girl. She is widely known to be both a meme and one of the strongest superheroes. Well, her card allows her to make a silly number of squirrels. So in Marvel she beat the mad titan Thanos, and in MTG there is a long-time joke about the absolutely humongous Emrakul being able to be beaten by 15 squirrels. In a weird way, this is an example of the two properties merging in the silliest and best way possible.
Squirrel Girls is cool, but what’s it like to play?
This is an interesting set. There are a bunch of fun new mechanics, but a lot of the power is in the uncommon slot, which will make for a super spicy draft format. Do you want to take that good rare card? Or that insane uncommon. A lot of the uncommons have power that could well be deserving of the rare slot. The other thing that is of note, is that for the first time in a while the set has been built with a full 10 archetypes instead of one. This means that there is a lot more variety to play with, and there is way more bleed over between mechanics making cards potentially great in multiple decks.
Power-Up is a great new mechanic. Here you can play a creature for its mana cost and then use a power-up ability later to do something extra, like making it bigger with +1 counters or even more. Best of all, the power-up mechanic gets discounted by the creature’s mana cost if it came in this turn. This means you can cast it late in the game for its full cost for awesomeness. This also works well if you can blink a card and pay the discounted rate to get the effect again. I totally didn’t do this with The Mind Stone and Kang the Conqueror to get infinite turns at pre-release. OK, I did; it was gross, and I loved every second of it.
Teamwork is a cool form of kicker, where when you cast a spell, you can tap creatures with a certain amount of power to get something extra. This can turn an OK card into a great card. Pairing this with a card like Captain America, which lets you untap them, you can get the best of both worlds.
Plans are a new enchantment that has some benefit when things happen, and once they happen enough times, it gets sacked for some other effect. For example, Construct a Cosmic Cube has you create a token when you draw your second card in a turn. Once you have done this seven times, you get to control your opponent on their next turn. Gross, right?
Then there are some returning card types. There are some double-faced cards like Bruce Banner, who can transform into the Hulk, but if it is late in the game, you can cast it as the Hulk for the full cost. This is going to do some gross things with airbending from the Avatar set where you can airbend it, then cast it straight to the Hulk side for the reduced cost. Connive is an all-time classic mechanic that is back, where you get to draw and discard a card, and if you discard a non-land card, you pop a +1 counter on the creature.
The mechanics work well together, which seems to make this a limited set I will continue to have a lot of fun playing with.
The Source Material
As usual, the Source Material cards mostly consist of a bunch of older cards, with OG Marvel art on it. There are some insane cards here like Archangel of Thune but with Captain Marvel art, which is fantastic. I may be a little biased, as Captain Marvel is one of my favourite superheroes, and her fantastic art has been put on a card worth over $50. Even still, I was buzzing when I pulled her in a prize pack from the pre-release. For the most part, they have actually chosen some fantastic artwork to go on these staples. Though I don’t understand how Iron Man looks like a badass in Counterspell. It looks cool, but the Ephemerate looks so good with the Photon art on it.
One of the coolest things they have done with this bonus sheet, though, is the Commander cards. As many will know, they did a Marvel Secret Lair a while ago with some unique commanders that sold out faster than I could type this message. Well, in the bonus sheet are the unique commanders with art from comics. So you can pull from Play and Collector boosters, these hard-to-find unique commanders, which I rate. It’s a cool way to make it more available, leaving the unique secret lair cards unique but making it more accessible. I haven’t nabbed one in a play booster yet, but I will be picking these up at some point.
Then there are Commander decks!
When Spider-Man was released, especially with the hero and villain themed cards, I wished at the time there were two commander decks to go with it. Well, Marvel Super Heroes has come with four of them, and one is Villain-themed.
I have been playing with the Avengers-themed deck called Avengers Assemble. This is led by the main Commander Captain America, and so the deck is Jeskia, a.k.a red, white, and blue, because of course it is. Captain America, Team Leader, has heroes coming in with Haste, Vigilance, and a bonus +1/+1 counter on them, and Cap gets a +1 counter too. This is a fun and thematic bit of flavour as Captain gets stronger with his team. The alternative commander is Director Nick Fury. He makes it cheaper to cast hero spells, and you can look at the top 4 cards of your library and you can put a hero card from among them into your hand. Again, flavour wins as he finds and assembles the Avengers.
Playing it feels great. It’s a straightforward plan: play heroes, make heroes big and win in combat. In some ways that’s perfect, as it’s both an easy mechanical theme for new players to get to grips with and fun as hell. This deck has some seriously valuable cards like Kindred Discovery and Raise the Palisade, which both work well in the deck. On top of this is the Plaza of Heroes land, which is fantastic for colour fixing if you plan to cast a lot of legendary heroes, which you will be doing with this deck.
I haven’t played with the other three decks yet, but the Villain deck is Doctor Doom themed, Black Panther themed, and The Fantastic Four-themed. All of the decks except The Fantastic Four-themed ones have a Battlebond land in them, which to be honest, all Commander decks should have, as they are expensive dual lands that enter untapped if you have multiple opponents. So perfect for Commander but expensive. I was so excited when I saw one in my deck, and as the Doctor Doom deck is the next one I am eyeing up, I am glad to see it in there too!
One minor change is that the only one of the two Commanders is a full-art card. For a long time both were full-art stunners, but in the Avengers Assemble deck, Captain America is a stunning full-art card, whereas Nick Fury isn’t.
So many Avengers products!
Surprise, surprise, the way to get cards are Play Boosters and Collector Boosters. Play Boosters are the best way to play the game and get lots of cards. But if money isn’t the issue, then the expensive Collector Boosters come with way more cards with the special treatments, as well as some exclusive treatments like the comic art, or the super rare versions of the soul stone. Collector Boosters also include rares from the expanded products like the scene boxes, commander decks, or Jumpstart, which is fun. I love cracking Collector Boosters, even if the value is rarely there.
To buy larger quantities of cards, you can buy boxes of boosters or, better, things like bundles. Draft Night is a box that includes the lands, packs, and a Collector Booster to run a draft at home. There is also a bundle. This includes nine boosters; a giant spindown dice; a bunch of lands; including full art lands, and a cool alt art version of Scarlet Witch, all in a nice hard storage box. There is an upcoming gift bundle that will include a collector booster as well and a different promo card.
This set also includes a beginner box, which looks like it is similar to the Foundations one that will walk a complete newbie through their first game, then provide some bits to play a few more games after that. I haven’t played with this one, but the Foundations one was fantastic. There is also a new Jumpstart set where you get a half deck, you buy two boosters, mix them together, and play against someone who has done the same. I consistently enjoy Jumpstart as a fun way to play, and this one is no exception. There are some fantastic cards in here too, so when you are comfortable playing the game, they will fit into some great decks.
Then there are the scene boxes. These come with a set of six cards, which all lined up make a cool scene, and three play boosters. I like having scenes in my binders, which I usually collect from play boosters, but these ones come with a full scene, which is awesome. There is a hero scene, and a villain scene, and both look dope. These ones can be surprise hits with their exclusive cards as they tend to be good, or in the future a new set has a mechanic that synergises with them making the cards worth a surprising amount. Looking at you, my beautiful LOTR scenes.
If you are wanting to crack packs, then the bundles are usually my favourite way, as well as a cheeky collector booster here and there at my LGS. If you are wanting to play, then Jumpstart is a great starting point, and the commander decks are fantastic!
Should you check out Magic: The Gathering – Marvel Super Heroes?
I am loving this set way more than I expected. People that love Marvel, pick up some packs and give this game a try! People that love fun limited formats, come give this one a try. While I am still torn on the way the theme mashes with Magic, fundamentally the main thing for me is how the game plays. And it plays so well!
Time for some airbending Bruce Banner shenanigans in Standard!
How is this set so good? Fun cards and stunning art absolutely trounce any thematic clash issues to make this one way better than it should have been!
