The Pawns Go First

After what feels like a VERY long wait since they were first revealed, we finally know the contents of the new Brotherhood box. In this article I'm going to give my first impressions on everything that's inside!

As he's the lowest threat value character in the box, lets start with Avalanche.

I feel like I say this in every review article, but yet another nod to AMG for the fantastic artwork on the cards, it's such an improvement on the old card art. Anyway, at 4,3,3 defences, this is about average for what we see on modern 3 threats, but the 6/5 stamina spread is probably above average. The 6 health on his healthy side is a nice little bonus. His medium move and small base is also fairly standard.

Seismokinesis is a fairly standard beam at a strength 4 and range 3 gaining a power after each attack. The stun is a nice little addition to this but in reality your probably not going to be triggering it often on 4 dice.

Epicenter of Destruction is the only other attack listed on his card, and for a 3 power cost this is an area 2 attack but only 5 dice - this does have an auto stun though which can be crippling, especially if multiple characters can be targeted. I'm a bit surprised to not see a spender on his card as is tradition with most characters, but I think his attacks are fairly respectable on a 3 threat given multiple characters can be targeted with both attacks. He's not going to be hitting like a truck, but he's got other things on his card which are going to make up for that which I'll discuss now.

Landslide is where Avalanche really shines, the ability to displace a Size 4 character is excellent, and for just 2 power he's almost always going to have the power to do this every turn. He's also going to be able to do this on Turn 1, provided he can either attack or get a power from elsewhere. The push is away though which is a slight negative, but most of the time this isn't going to be a problem and can be worked around.

Beware Falling Debris is a cool little synergy with Magneto and his leadership and is a respectable 3 power. It does only trigger on an advance though and there's a lot of ways for your opponent to potentially play around this, but it's always something they are going to have to have on their mind. It's also extra damage output for Avalanche as well as generating power for the rest of your squad under Magneto. A well thought out addition to his card.

Overall I'm really happy with Avalanche, I think he suits the Mystique game plan more in that he's a low threat model with Size 4 displacement but he does have synergy with Magneto with the terrain destruction - a good addition overall to the affiliation for both leaders.

From the lowest threat character in the box, to the highest, it's Exodus (or Cable in disguise). There's no shocks with his 4/4/4 defence spread and his 7/7 health - this is probably what we'd expect to see now on a 5 threat - as well as his medium move and small base.

Psionic Vampirism is an excellent builder, and another Mystic attacker is always welcomed in an affiliation who has been predominantly physical. 6 strength and Range 2 is respectable, and the auto heal after every attack is going to be really frustrating for your opponent. The Sap Power is also a nice little addition and is going to help with his power generation for the many things he's going to want to spend his power on.

Psionic Concussion is his ranged option, this is only 5 dice this time but this counters the fact the attack is Range 4. This is a gainer though, so he has got an option to just auto generate a power through this attack and not rely on doing damage through the builder. This does have a Size 4 pull - which as mentioned with Avalanche, Size 4 displacement is never to be sniffed at - it is towards this time though which can have it's downsides - but it does potentially pull the target in range of his builder provided you hit the wild trigger.

You Can Do Nothing But Fall is the final attack - and this time it's an Area 2 Energy and at 7 dice this has the potential to be very nasty for your opponent if multiple characters can be targeted, especially as it auto incinerates at the end of each attack.

Moving onto his superpowers then, with My Faith Can Move Mountains - being able to throw size 4 terrain is always good - especially under Magneto where your also generating power for your team. I'm a big fan of terrain throws that let you spend according to the terrain size your throwing, it means you don't have to overspend for throwing smaller terrain pieces.

Teleportation lets Exodus place himself within range 2 of himself for 3 power. It's a good thing to have access to and lets him get in range for his builder or area attack without wasting an action moving, but I'm a little disappointed he cant also move other allied characters given the fact Magneto likes a wheelchair.

The addition of Telekentic Shield is going to help him protect the squishier characters in his affiliation - whilst also adding to his own level of tankyness and gaining the extra power each Power Phase from Psionic of the Highest order is going to get much of his kit online quicker.

Now for the real spice. Not only does Exodus heal 1 every time he uses his builder, he's also got Healing Factor 1, so with a double builder and HF1, he's healing 3 health a turn. Add this to the fact he's 4/4/4 defences across the board with the potential to add 2 extra defence dice, he's going to take some real effort take off the board. The immunity to Poison also guarantees that he's going to generate 2 power a turn, so this is a nice little bonus.

Overall, Exodus shares a lot of similarities with Cable - in fact his superpower kit is almost identical. He's going to feel very different on the table to Cable though with access to all of the healing and access to the displacement on Psionic Concussion. He's a bit more of a tank with the ability to displace opposing characters than the more offensively focused Cable. Exodus is another good addition to the affiliation, though I think he's probably going to see more table time with Magneto. He very much feels like the 5 threat of choice for him over Juggernaut - who synergises more with a wide Mystique list. Though I do ultimately like how Exodus plays on the table, I do feel like he's maybe a bit of thematic miss though, he doesn't really feel like a character that gets more powerful as people put faith in him, I would have liked to have seen some more mechanics centred around this.

There's a reason I've left Lady Mastermind until last and that's because there's A LOT going on with her card. Again like the others, she has a fairly standard basic stat line for her threat level at 3/3/4 and 6/5 health with a small base and medium move.

Deadly Illusions is where the jank begins and is nothing like we've ever seen before in the game. Range 5 is a really long way but this attack isn't really going to be pumping out the damage unless the target already has at least two conditions before the attack. Two flat damage for the condition removal means you don't need to rely on your dice here aside from rolling wilds to then place more conditions on the target, however you're probably going to want to run lots of characters that can easily give out conditions to get maximum value from this attack - she pairs really well with Pyro who can give out Root and Slow fairly consistently with Firewall - as well as Incinerate on his attacks, and Avalanche and Mystique both have reliable ways to give out stun.

Mass Hallucinations has the potential to displace a lot of targets with the area attack provided you hit the trigger - and is without a doubt the only normal non janky thing on her card.

And if Deadly Illusions wasn't janky enough for you we have Reality Is Whatever You Want It To Be. This essentially gives Lady Mastermind a third action with an attack that uses an enemy characters attack value. Now, a point to note here, this only lets you use the type, the range and the dice pool, it doesn't let you use any of the additional text on the attack (like a place, a push a throw for example) - and the fact you pay power according to the characters mystic defence instead of threat level - is not only bonkers good, it's also super thematic. Paying 3 power for a 7 dice Hulk builder on a 4 threat model is really naughty - even if she doesn't generate power or get the push from it.

We also have Brain Fog, which is the same superpower we see on both Mystique and Emma Frost, who both also happen to be Brotherhood affiliated. A potential team of those 3 where your opponent cant use reactive superpowers or tactics cards for 3 turns could be very frustrating.

I like the addition of Mental Lock giving her an added element of defensive tech - putting attacks on to her Mystic defence unless your opponent pays 2 power. I don't know how often your opponent is going to do this given it's a choice between 3 or 4 dice when she's only a 5 health model, but it's a nice to have just innately anyway. This doesn't apply to dodge rolls though so she's still eating terrain on her 3 physical defence anyway.

Lady Mastermind is going to struggle to generate power with no access to a builder so Try A Little Harder helps with this. If she's within 3 of a few allied characters this is probably going to generate a fair bit of power for her to use on the rest of her kit. This is a really clever and thematic way to get her generating power.

I think Lady Mastermind is really hard to judge on paper given we haven't really seen anything like her in the game before. She feels like she's going to be fun to play and Your Reality Is Where You Want It To Be feels like the best thing on her card, but the power level of the superpower is going to depend on the characters your opponent is fielding, it feels much better rolling a Hulk attack than it does a Toad's.

I think we got 3 really solid to good characters from this box, but the tactics are where this box starts to fall down for me.

The Pawns Go First is hard to judge on paper given the fact we've never had an "End Phase" referenced before - which is likely going to need some clarification moving forward. If this card happens before scoring, it feels much stronger than a card that can only be used afterwards - as a character than can move out of activation onto a secure before scoring feels much more impactful than a character moving once scoring is done. There is also a fair amount of restrictions on the card that make it highly situational - only characters that are 3 threat or less can pay power for the card and they must be Brotherhood affiliated - only those characters get the benefit of the short move and only characters that are 5 threat or more can benefit from the extra power or the healing. On top of that, characters that pay for the card must be within 3 of the target character to use the heal or the extra power. It just feels like there's a lot of situational things that need to align for this card to work and multiple characters need to pay towards it to get full value from the card.

Genetic Superiority is a card that can only be played when Max Eisenhardt (Magneto) and Exodus are in play together and essentially powers up your 5+ threat characters as your 4 threat or lower characters take damage. This feels like a reasonably good effect, but again relies hugely on team composition to either play or get full value from.

Fault Line lets Pyro and Avalanche pay a power and increase their beam attacks up to a B5 for that round. Again though, both Avalanche and Pyro both have to be in play and both have to spend the power for this card to be played. This card cant be played if only one of Avalanche or Pyro are on the table, both need to be present.

Mirage is a character TTC for Lady Mastermind. The effect of the card feels strong being able to modify and potentially reduce incoming damage to an allied character and reducing the targets power, but the negative of that character then being able to advance omnidirectionally short is a hard tradeoff - especially as you dont know the full effect of the card given it's a dice roll. The card also only effects a single attack rather than a characters whole activation or a round.

In summary, I think the character additions are all positive, they are all useable and will all see time on the table though I don't think they necessarily take the affiliation as a whole to the next level. I'm however disappointed with the tactics cards, Brotherhood already had a good suite of character tactics cards and felt like they needed more usable affiliated cards to take them to the next level but instead we got more cards that were tied to team compositions and characters. Overall though, I'm happy with the new additions, and look forward to adding them to my favourite affiliation in the game.

As always thanks for reading, and keep being Omega.