Pool Aspect Review - Marvel Champions the Card Game 

First, I always appreciate your opinion and don’t mean to sound like a jerk at all! But, you seem to be really missing the upside of these cards. Laser swords and the player side scheme can be absolutely great. The Meta game cards are very good. The icons you’re adding with these cards do not have the same impact on the game as they normally do (which I’m not saying you don’t know that). Secondly, I feel like a lot of the people who are down on the pool aspect view every addition to the game as something that has to follow a path that makes the card pool stronger in a min-max’er way. I mean, just sit down and enjoy the “game” man.

2 things to remember: you don't have to play the bad and memey cards, you can just stick to the powerful ones and have it be fine, and there are always the basic cards. A deck with just the triple resources, some of the one-off and good unique cards and the rest just basic cards is still really good. It's a shame that most people will just discard like half the aspect cards, but is that really any different from the other four aspects?

At this point it seems very clear that the aspect is an acquired taste. If you are someone who wants to live a little bit more on the dangerous side, the aspects for you. If you're somebody who just wants to add a little bit of a knowing wink at the game, the aspect may be for you. But I understand that from the perspective of a lot of players, this is not going to be their cup of tea. Just like Protection or Aggression may not be someone's cup of tea.

Don't know if this has already been mentioned, but Magik will be perfect for Rock, Paper, Scissors since you'll know what the top card is

I love Pool on Spiderwoman. It's a cool addition to the game, probably not something that will shake deckbuilding too much and won't work for most heroes but that's fine, not everything must be versatile and serious. Some branching like this is great for the game.

I think your taking this aspect too seriously.

Rock, Paper, Scissors are crazy. I built my deck to have half science and have wild (hero cards). Since it doesn’t cost anything and have become 1 cost avengers mansion

I played the aspect with my buddy. I went first, trying to play it as I believed was intended with Venom, putting the icons out, and it was awful. He played it after and abused the heck out of the non-icon Pool cards, and has had good results, playing the Metagames and others well. He likes it, I don't. It seemed like it was a concept that barely got playtested. Designers need to recognize players play the games to construct decks that don't lead to aggravation and half his cards are just that. Ironically, I do find the non-icon cards work well to introduce a new player the game too, because they are simple, light-hearted, and value a new player's learning curve. If they want to continue this, they got the chaos part down pat, what they need are more powerful cards that benefit the team, where they provide an effect but the effect is way better when an icon is out. For instance: 2-Cost Attack Event, deals 3 damage to an enemy. However, if Crisis icon is out, it deals 6 and Confuse instead... it doesn't solve the Crisis issue, but it solves a different problem which is crushing enemies and delaying the punishing chaos. That is the solution, imo.

Good perspective! I haven’t tried it yet but agree it will probably not see a ton of regular play. I’m not opposed to it being a one off, quirky thing though. For most players I think it’ll be good for mixing it up occasionally.

They could add a different treachery set with each different “pool” character. Gwen pool has different crisis to deadpool for example. I don’t mind the pool aspect but I fully agree it’s better with spider women and other heroes who can bulk out the deck with other cards.

I’m having fun with it. Definitely needs more options though. Hopefully they continue to expand and support it!

I don’t think i can bring myself t use the pool aspect with anyone except Dead-pool and maybe Spider-ham…. Just doesn’t feel right?

My guess is that they are done with the pool aspect. Maybe a few years down the road, they release a new 'pool character with another suite of cards. But I don't see them ever just releasing a few cards

Tic Tac Toe would be 7 damage go down column 1 then down column 2 and it doesn’t pop till you put the last one in column 3. I’m not sure efficient 7 resources for 7 damage and 7 healing is though. Good for longer games where you just burn your last dead card at the end of a turn.

Some of the cards are too much on the silly side, like Blackout or TicTacToe. But some have theme potential, like sacrificing allies with Get in Front of Me. If they would have taken a darker road with this 5th aspect (given the first 4 are already on the heroic route) that would have been a great addition to how each heroe as in you're fed up and ready to lose it, wanna take the dark path.. be a bit more villanous. And I could see some dark risky cards coming up in the future, even play with boost icons who knows. Something like that to me would be a more aspirational 5th aspect than this Pool gimmick. It also feels a bit flat to me: risk/rewards are only bound to the Pool cards and don't interact much with the hero core kit. I would have tried to explore that a bit like, take this huge risk to ready a Hero upgrade, lets say. Something that could adjust to the different heroes to bring more flavors to deck building. Then finally on the execution, the color is so off to me. Pink doesn't convey risk at all. If should have been black to symbolize the darkness/wrongness/taboo/risk taking. But Barbie pink? That's what makes it feel too silly to me. Pink is associated with childish things, the Pink Panther, jigglypuff. Is not menacing. I dont think it would make sense to have a 6th aspect in the future now so.. all and all, it's a missed opportunity to me

I hope that the pool aspect is just to prep people for DETERMINATION Aspect. Like I won't really use pool aspect just because it always feels i'm behind xD

I could be wrong, the video makes it sound like da bomb and pool inspection max out at four icons but those along with laser swords aren't counting unique icons right?

They said that only if they will release Gwen pool in the future they will support it but they don't know yet

I’ve been trying a Black Panther pool deck from the database against standard Red Skull. It’s not going well.

I do wish it was less cards that pulled you out of the game and more cards with downsides that have more explosive effects.

Not going to lie the pool aspect feels so weird. Maybe call the aspect chaos.

One of these days, I'll pickup Deadpool and give his cards a try. But for now? I'm good

Anyway... In 8th cycle they will be bring more x force anyway

It. Is 100% a meme at this point and that's ok; I'm already getting to the stage that I'm done with the aspect and it will only come out every now and then

Deadpool is arguably the worst hero they've added to the game. Not because he's bad (he's not), but what he did TO the game. - His pack brings ZERO X-Force cards to support ending his Cycle. I can't even use Negasonic because she is Pool aspect. - His pack brings no Basic cards WHATSOEVER except the Team-Up I already got in Next Evolution. - His pack had no other Aspect cards packed in the back. - The only stealable card is Live Dangerously, and as a Cable Main I can tell you I looked at this card for 8 seconds and NOPED OUT. The Pool aspect itself is just not worth the trade-offs. As you already mentioned Gamora and Spider-Woman can find some gems, but that's like a raccoon going through the trash to pick out the food that's not rotten and trying to dust it off. For a 5th aspect this is not worth supporting. It's a "party" aspect. I wouldn't be upset if they added a card in the back of future hero packs to slowly pad this out, but all in all this whole concept is a bit of an L for me.

So does this work with the abilities of Adam Warlock?