This is week's card review finishes up the last of the Characters and Locations in the initial Marvel Origins set. While most of the cards here don't have a team affiliation, there are also the two "bonus" teams represented here. Because I want to keep the cards together, I'll be breaking from format just a bit.

I won't be arranging the cards into sections, but I will still be ranking the cards as "Great", "Good" and "Needs Help". I've split the cards into "Great", "Good" and "Needs a bit of work". Cards that have a tremendous effect, but that have a similarly tremendous cost or restriction on being played will not make it into the Great category. This doesn't mean they aren't game breakers when they're used or brought into play, it just means that they're fabulous effect is balanced by the difficulty in playing it. I'll be rating the cards in general and trying to call out which decks cards are best for. Now that we know the ground rules, let's get started.

And now the cards . . .

Annihilus - 16/16, Ranged and Flight. Based on his stats, he's a good 7 drop, but his ability to outright stun a character is great. You definitely want initiative on the turn you bring him out, though, so you can stun a character before they get a chance to whack you wtih him. This means your opponent will be able to move his characters around to make sure his prize characters aren't in the attack row, but if you also have Blastaar in play there's nowhere for your opponent to hide his characters. Speaking of Blastaar....

Blastaar - 12/12, Ranged and Flight. He's an average 6 drop, but he's also got the ability to stun a character is also great. A good way to use him is to bring him out when you don't have initiative and your opponent has put his good cards in his support row. Then, all you have to do is make sure you protect Blastaar until your attack step comes around. If you don't have Negative Zone in play, Blastaar's downside isn't immediately crippling, but it tends to lead to a slow and painful endgame where you have few if any opportunities and are at the whim of whatever you get from your Draw Step. It's better than losing 15 endurance a turn from Annihilus, but it's only a little less crippling. Speaking of Negative Zone...

Negative Zone - It's a re-usable Finishing Move, but requires you to discard some cards from your hand. You need to have something to feed your hand to use this. If you've got Blastaar or Annihilus in your deck, you need it. Otherwise, it's a costly card in general unless you've got a really good card drawing engine.

Skrull Soldier - He's a weenie, but his ability isn't team specific and he gets better the more of them there are.

Super Skrull - His stats are a little low, but you can take care of that by tossing a card. His ability to ready front row army Skrull characters is a great bonus.

Apocalypse - Apocalypse is one of the best characters that will actually see play. He beats out Dr. Doom, beats out Magneto and KOs opponents resources. The part that puts him into the great section is being able to target specific resources to KO.

Arcade - Arcade's also got good stats for a 3 drop, but he'll need help to KO the premiere 3 drop, Wolverine: Logan. Works well with some good Plot twists to pump him, but he's only pretty good.

Black Tom - Black Tom's got a good ability that you don't want to use. If you don't recruit a character, you're behind the curve which is bad. He's very good for a 3 drop, but the good and bad of his ability keeps him from being great.

Dark Phoenix - Dark Phoenix is the best card that will never see play. Best stats in the game, Flight, Ranged. She's unstoppable (except when Mojo and his supporting cast come to play). She's also nigh impossible to bring into play in a two player game (I've seen turn 8 a few times, but never turn 9). She's great, but right now it's not reasonable to think you'll be able to play her.

Juggernaut - The Juggernaut's the biggest 7 drop in the game and he needs to be. If he can hit a support row character, the damage is going to get through to your opponent . . . which is good, because he isn't going to be around for next turn so you better use him for all he's worth.

Lady Deathstrike - Lady Deathstrike is a little light for a 5 drop. She gets really big against cost 6 characters, but she gets taken out by any other 5 drop. She needs help making it to turn 6 where she can shine.

Mojo - Mojo's either a wimp or a monster depending on your board position. If you've been pumping out Random Punks quick enough, Mojo can smack down the biggest character your opponent can bring (Mojo + 7 punks can take down Dark Phoenix). With the right supporting cast, Mojo's a Star!

Mr. Sinister - Mr Sinister's ok for a 7 drop and his anti-stun ability is good. The problem with him is by turn 7, paying 10 endurance to keep him from getting stunned could put you over the edge. Good character, but not great.

Onslaught - What's better than being able to stun all your opponent's team characters? Onslaught suffers from the Dark Phoenix syndrome. A great card that I have yet to sees played in a two-player game.

Puppet Master - The Puppet Master isn't a powerhouse attacker, but he can turn the tide if you can get your opponent short on characters. Another good use for him if you're on the ropes is using him to tap one of your opponent's guys, recruit another copy of Puppet Master, then taop another of your opponent's guys. Best used when you don't have initiative and are trying to eake out another round.

Random Punks - These guys are interesting. They've got good attack for a 1 drop and can fit into any deck that thinks it can win the endurance race with its opponent. The one thing that keeps them from getting over the top is that they can't participate in a team attack. They're still pretty good, but not great

Spiral - 4 cost with great stats and Nightcrawler-like teleporting makes Spiral very good. Her ability to self-cycle makes her great.

Base of Operations - The only Location that isn't associated with a team, this is a great location that helps you cycle through your deck to get to the cards you need. There's a contingent that says a deck that draws unwanted cards is a poorly constructed deck, but unless you're using the Tier 1 Skrull Soldier deck, you're not always going to draw the card you want. Base of Operations drawback is in comparing it to Night Vision in that you can only look at your top card once per turn. It's still a very, very good card.

Bonus section

Here's a pretty good Non-Aligned deck. It's given some other decks a good run, but I wouldn't call it tier 1. Feel free to ask the Metagame folks to tune it up, though and let me know what they say! The idea was A) to test out the Non-Aligned characters and B) to see how well some of the lesser used Plot Twists work

3x Lady Deathstrike
4x Negative Zone
4x Annihilus
4x Blastaar
4x Acrobatic Dodge
4x Betrayal
2x Burn Rubber
4x Overpowered
4x Overload
4x One-Two Punch
2x Apocalypse
3x Arcade
4x Random Punks
3x Black Tom
4x Mojo
4x Puppet Master
3x Spiral

Big Finish
Next week I'll be covering Plot Twists and Equipment that I haven't gotten to with the rest of my reviews (and hopefully next week my week won't be crazy and I'll be able to get my article in on Thursday :-).

Let me know what you think of my opinions and feel free to share yours.

nice review as allways, but uhm.. are you sure this is the last charachter review? i dont think you did a sentinel one yet. poor killing machines, they dont get any love.:(

how and on super skrull, i have to say that he may be one of the best 6 drops in the game- period!

I agree, I may have missed the Sentinel post/article, or maybe you just didn't do one.

Looking forward to the plot twists and equips though, since im not sure whats over and under rated.