Analyzing Nightcrawler's New Aspect Cards! 

I can't wait to play Black Panther vs Ultron using Change of Fortune

Rogue is going to be awesome. Rogue touching the Wolverine ally will get his attack and then he can heal that one damage.

For Under Control, you mentioning exhausting to defend, but that is not strictly necessary. Jump Flip and Side Step could give you the Defend and the damage reduction to not take any damage. Still probably not a super efficient nor reilable combo, but thought I would call it out.

Thabks for sharing your thoughts, always glad to hear them. Regarding the Astonishing Xmen side scheme, since player side schemes can be thought of as special side missions, completing the side scheme is like calling them in for a brief appearance during which they distract the enemies, causing the stuns and confusions, before heading out to deal with Magnito ot whoever.

Yeah Shadowcat was where my mind went when Change of Fortune was revealed!

Change of Fortune will be amazing for decks like Quicksilver, Black Widow, Rogue and many more which ready, or heroes like Vision who can keep the minion around as he wont take damage etc. Thore will love this card. I can't wait for the card and show the power of PROTECTION 😁 So many options for new cool protection decks 🤑

I think the Rogue ally is one of the most exciting and interesting cards we’ve seen in a while, and potentially one that is meta defining for Protection. She just really lets protection decks focus on what they do best while filling the holes defensive decks can have with thwarting or attacking. I’m thinking of characters like Peter Parker, who has often struggled with defeating minions, all the sudden you have a 4 attack ally in exchange for a damage. Pete can take the occasional damage since he doesn’t often take it when he defends, and his economy is great to play Rogue and things like Med Team to keep her around. Another boon of having her around is that we all know What Doesn’t Kill Me is one of the best cards in the protection aspect. It’s an interesting design because often in protection healing the 2 damage as part of the cost is not free. One of the reasons my favorite deck to play in the game possibly is protection Venom with a perfect defense package, since he can generally guarantee playing What Doesn’t Kill Me every turn by using his ability in both phases. Rogue does something similar by allowing you to control some damage on yourself to be able to play cards like that. Proactively using her damage to ping something with Energy Barrier is nice, or ready yourself as X-23. I feel like there’s just a ridiculous amount of possibilities, I think she has potential to be one of the better allies in the game. Kind of want to print some proxies to test her out.

Cyclops playing Rogue but not having to be protection is also great. Can use all the leadership X-men stuff, danger room training, inspired, lead from the front, game time. Can use the Suit Up card to fetch rogue and some of the stuff to equip her with too, or if shes in play fetch Triage and another thing to put on Rogue. Uncanny X-men of course is great here for both effects it gives, and Utopia can untap her some more as well. Cyclops stats are not as good as others, but his ability to play this green ally in arguably the best x-men ally buffing aspect (leadership) is unique to him. Then make Wolverine cheaper and heal him with his own effect while using the stat boost on Rogue, or do the same with Professor X. Could even do a Suit Up to fetch out Phoenix ally, and start getting full value from Cerebro and searching for the specific allies you want to abuse with Rogue each time. Lots of tool box style options available in a well built deck that way I reckon.

First hit is now a card to use with change of fortune. So I feel like if a new card makes a very old card viable then I see good fun. I want to say stand together is now playable but still expensive outside of Ronan.

Much like her hero version, the Rogue ally gets a boost in multiplayer because she has more targets. An aggression player could have out the Hulk ally for example.

I'm glad we are seeing cards like Astonishing X-Men. It shows thematically how an entire team can be called upon by any Protection hero to assist! You're actually calling up the whole team to help out! Awesome. I wouldn't be surprised to see similar cards for other aspects from other teams, like web-warriors, avengers, guardians, etc...way down the line with some reprints. Or hopefully something like Fantastic 4 and Defenders soon!

I don't think Psychic Misdirection works with Change of Fortune. I don't think "You" are defeating the enemy. The source of damage is still the original's. You are merely changing the target of the source's damage. IE: It's not "prevent all damage and then you deal an equivalent amount to a different target". But, with PM you can still trigger your "perfect defenses" etc. which may well defeat something. And... "Rogue shenanigans" get levelled up! Yeeha! Another Posse! I had already put Hope in for that too.

I like the idea of getting to play more in the villain phase, but I'm currently not that excited to run a Change of Fortune deck until we get more cards for the archetype. It would be cool if there were cards that triggered effects at the start of the villain phase like "remove 1 threat from the main scheme for each minion in play" to incentivize keeping minions around more. I'm so excited for the Rogue ally. There are so many fun ways to use her, and you can throw several of them into one deck to improve her reliability. I'm going to start working on a Bishop deck, since he can afford her and the style of sacrificing health for big numbers really suits him. I just wish I could play Sidekick on her.

I think it's correct that the type of deck that likes these new defense cards isn't going to suit all heroes, but anyone who already likes perfect defense should at least give them a look. Change of Fortune is a single card, and if you have a deck where it works I think it's worth making space for. Under Control is trickier, as you probably want to run three. Maybe it's possible to cut down on something else to make room for it? It could also work well in a deck that reliably stuns the villain, which frees you up to block a minion instead, and if you're getting four damage plus some perfect defense goodies out of it that could very well be worth it. I'm definitely going to try out both of them in my Black Widow protection deck!

I think Ally iceman is a great shout, and pinned down too. (What a card! We did an episode a while back and quite like it) But this is going to be great for Shadowcat and the retaliate heroes who can passively kill minions.

The first two conditions on Under Control are the same as Relentless Assault and that's good (or used to be). Leaving minions alive isn't usually hard. Sometimes it has consequences but it isn't difficult. Blocking all the damage on a minion isn't usually too difficult either so it's only really the actual defending that's a big cost/complication. That's not the same for Punches, powerful or counter. You usually want to know you have access to these so might hold onto them, which increases their effective cost. This is presumably why the reward from Change of Fortune is so great, it offsets the premium on those attacks. It seems so good that if you're already playing them you should add in Change of Fortune. I'm not sure anyone does but still. Ghost Spider and Shadowcat are the obvious candidates for casually adding to existing decks. For others you still have to have a plan for the villains but maybe chumping the villain and using perfect defence on the minions to trigger unflappable etc might be a thing. As you say it's likely to be better MP with more minions and where tapping drags them onto you which feels like it's giving more value 😂. Puzzling this out will be the most interesting part of Nightcrawler to me. Rogue has big numbers - not really interesting though she'll be really strong, good with Game Time. Gambit's deck manipulation is intriguing too.

Great video! I love these analysis videos

Fantastic overview.

I'd like to try under control and change of fortune with x23. She likes to defend the villain, take a bit of damage and then ready so she could then defend a minon for under control and use Grim Resolve or what doesn't kill me or honey badge to ready in the player phase. She has retaliate and puncture wound to take down minions for change of fortune or she can build up her atk and then use a counter punch.

Always fun to be reminded of how many heroes I need to revisit, and I do love me some protection, appreciate the overview!

Fascintating insights as always!

I'm hyped for Change of Fortune mostly because of heroes with Retaliate.

Rogue ally... brilliant, just brilliant addition to the game.

Here’s a counter argument for Change of Heart. Protection usually doesn’t have good way to deal with minion especially old hero like spiderman. I find myself spending more resource and exhaustion (hero & ally) to remove a minion especially those with more than 2 hp. Having 1 ER that handles the problem instantly is a game changer. I think you need to run a bit more ally so you can chump block the villain when this happens. I actually have put pinned down a lot more in my deck because it can be attached to elite minion. So in a lot of AoA box, you can straight up ignore them and built out more

Thematically I think Astonishing X-Men works if it's a huge "Cavalry's here!" moment, and the X-Men come in and severely delay and distract the enemy with stuns and confuses, but yeah, I definitely get what you mean, just not a deal breaker for me when I think of it that way with Captain America or another hero.

I'm not crazy about protection and Change of Fortune feels a little niche. I'm more excited about Rogue ally, and I agree that the ally is more thematic than the hero. I was kind of disappointed that the Rogue hero didn't come with a more detrimental cost to do her powers.

What are the rules with unflappable when when an ally defends damage or no damage. Does ally defending trigger all cards that happen when you defend or it has to be your character. If a minion or villian says do x after attacking you or something but an ally defends or another player who takes the negative effect?

I think Change of fortune is a weaker Unflappable not because it's difficult to defeat the minions in the villain phase but simply because there usually is too few minones (At least when I play it's usually only 4-6 minones per player per game) and as far as I can see no good way to get more like in Aggrasion I can't wait to play a multiplayer Psylocke always Betsy Braddock deck with the Rogue ally where she requires Professor X every turn and heal Rogue with X-Mansion

When Phoenix goes unleashed and her upgrade says she gets -2 thwart, would Rogue still get the full printed 3?

with Astonishing X-men could you just thwart the threat off there? or can you only remove threat using the response

So if Rogue touches Phoenix while she's unleashed would she still end up at 5 thw? Could be a neat way to keep access to Jean's good thw after unleasing

I think you are way, way, way off on Astonishing X-Men. That card is flat broken. 5 flat threat in a 4P game is absolutely nothing, and even if all you get is one stun/confuse out of it, that's still incredible value, especially with the "side scheme defeated" trigger built in. People will be drawing off Skilled Investigators, and you've just smashed half the villain's activations for 2 ER and a bit of thwarting. That's insane value.