Age of Apocalypse Villain Review 

Your high praise of the box has me intrigued. As I got the box on release day and have yet to find the motivation to get very far in. It might just be life being distracting, but I just have not been that inspired.

Excellent, excellent review. You articulated my thoughts on this box perfectly, even the Unus/Beast ranking at the end. For me it ends up square in the middle, under MG, SM and MTS but above the rest.

This should be a new updated buyers guide too if you review the box as a whole compare to other box

Box is fantastic all in all. Unus is the biggest surprise for me. I think he really is going to be my go now when I want to play one of the more straight forward be em up scenarios. I love the Gene Pool side scheme situation, like I can use an ally to block but there's a drawback that's not game ending but could start a snowball to a loss, so maybe I shouldn't use an ally to block. Love it.

I also dislike the four horsemen in solo. They feel very oppressive in a not fun way and it just makes me play a rush strategy against them to defeat them as fast as possible. Just like with the four horsemen, the final Apocalypse gets better and better as the player count gets higher. I played him in 3 player and we had villain phases where he flipped 3 times in a single phase which can get out of hand very fast when he can deal 4-6 indirect damage to everyone just from flipping, or putting 4-6 threat on every scheme in play, etc. I also like the final Apocalypse as a new deck tester to replace Klaw finally hahaha. I also agree that this is a fantastic box. The only miss was the Missions. That's not a big deal and I hope they keep trying new designs like the missions and don't get discouraged by them. Otherwise, the heroes and villains were amazing. Love this box.

I completely agree on your villain order. Apoc 1 was great! I love the story villains like Magneto. Dark Beast was great. I do enjoy simpler villains in-between the complicated ones, plus I am excited to try other environments like Mojo's with his. I two handed the horsemen and while they weren't bad I am not a huge fan of constant penalty villains. Didn't help the on my first turn after discarding the ten cards for both heroes I lost two of Magik's upgrades and Limbo and Bishop's uniform and gun. It is funny how this feels like the opposite of GMW. That had two heroes who didn't stand out to me, the worst villains but the best campaign system here we had two great heroes, some great villains but the worst campaign system. The idea behind the missions was ok except for the rewards that were given out, except for the campaign heroes, are just meh

I’m surprised that you didn’t complain about the permanent side scheme of keep forgetting to put it out haha. I play a lot of solo and 3-4 players. This box definitely is harder in multiplayer which I like because x-men multiplayer package is strong. The ritual scheme has only pop once. The infinites in 3+ multiplayer is crazy difficult, it’s impossible to control. Either way, here’s my ranking Apoc 1 > Horsemen > (Infinites Modular) > Dark Beast > Unus > Apoc 2

As a primarily multiplayer player, I can say the 4 Horsemen are the WORSE! When we played them, my group (who are primarily casual players I admit) were threatening to quit the game by the second or third turn. The fact that the Horsemen's special ability triggers just from them attacking you, whether they damage you or not is just too OP. Villains that deconstruct your characters, which the horsemen do by both removing upgrades/supports and then discarding cards from your deck, just generally suck, They force you into an event driven deck & basically a rush strategy which is not as much fun and makes them feel more like a grind. After the Horsemen the final 3 villains felt like a breeze and were much more fun. I generally like the box as a whole, the heroes & the other villains are good, but the chalk up the Horsemen as a big miss, not looking forward to ever playing them again.

The individual scenarios are great but the campaign is terrible. I much prefer to play them all in standalone.