Since its release almost five years ago, Marvel Champions has put out a near-constant stream of new content. As of this list, there are a whopping forty-one different scenarios among the core set, campaign expansions, and one-off scenario packs, with another five to be released in the upcoming Age of Apocalypse box. Impressively, almost all these scenarios are good—some are better than others, but I would happily play almost all of them. With so much available content, I thought it would be fun to rank my favorite scenarios in the game, from the core set to the latest campaign release (NeXt Evolution at the time of writing this article).
This list is not only highly subjective but also reflective of how I play Marvel Champions—almost exclusively solo, with a single hero. That means some scenarios I love will be much less fun at higher player counts, whereas some well-liked villains may be missing from the list because I hate them solo. With that in mind, let’s take a look at some of the delightfully devilish villains on offer…
Honorable Mentions: Ultron (Core Set), Red Skull (Rise of Red Skull), Juggernaut (NeXt Evolution)
10. Hela
Where to Find: Mad Titan’s Shadow
Hela is one of the community’s most-loved villains, and I understand why. Few other scenarios manage to evoke the epic scale that Hela does, with your heroes trekking through Hel itself to rescue the imprisoned ruler of Asgard, and the side schemes you progress through really help sell that. The encounter cards also create some interesting wrinkles, like devastating attachments that only go away if you hit Hela hard enough, and treacheries that get worse the closer you get to winning. The only reason it’s not higher for me is a lack of variety. Using two modular sets helps keep things interesting, but you still must progress through the same sequence of minions and schemes every time, which makes the scenario a bit repetitive.
9. Escape the Museum
Where to Find: Galaxy’s Most Wanted
Galaxy’s Most Wanted is easily my least favorite boxed expansion, but I do have a soft spot for Escape the Museum—or as I like to think of it, “the good Collector scenario.” It’s the first scenario in Marvel Champions to have an alternate win condition, and while the balance is a bit wonky, it manages to evoke the smash-and-grab escape theme perfectly. In a way, Escape the Museum feels like the prototype for the Hela scenario; you must thwart through a series of schemes to win, and attacking the villain is only useful for secondary benefits. But, while Escape the Museum may be less well-designed, it’s also looser and wilder in a way that I enjoy more.
8. Project Wideawake
Where to Find: Mutant Genesis
Marvel Champions gets some flak for being less thematic than its LCG brethren, but I’ve always found it to be extremely evocative of classic comic stories, and the scenarios have only grown more immersive over the years. Project Wideawake is a great example. An alternate loss condition forces you to re-evaluate some basic Marvel Champions strategies, and a slew of side schemes lets you put powerful allies into play, which makes the story feel dynamic and multi-layered without adding many rules. The Project Wideawake setting is also excellent—when your allies get captured permanently and your hero is desperately hiding from a wave of Sentinel minions, you feel like you’re being hunted. My only issue with Project Wideawake is its scaling. A couple bad treacheries can automatically lose you the game with a single hero, and that’s especially annoying with a scenario with more set-up and teardown than most.
7. Klaw
Where to Find: Core Set
Klaw comes the closest to being a nostalgia pick for me. With so many other scenarios out there, it sometimes struggles to distinguish itself on a mechanical level; Klaw’s special ability is impactful but unexciting, and the scenario’s encounter cards are generally quite tame, with quite a few generic minions and non-threatening treacheries. That said, I do think Klaw still has something to offer. The other half of Klaw’s encounter cards have interesting effects to deal with, and Klaw’s general balance makes him a good scenario to test a new deck on, which is a valuable thing. It’s showing its age, but is still a lot of fun, and is great for new players as well.
6. Mansion Attack
Where to Find: Mutant Genesis
Multi-villain scenarios in Marvel Champions are a mixed bag for me, frequently too fiddly, too easy, or both. However, Mansion Attack is an exception and manages to provide a fun experience without too many complications. The replay value here is a big part of its charm. The four villains and the three main schemes come out in a different order, which means each play presents slightly different decision points. Even with just one villain at a time, though, you still feel like you’re fighting a group, thanks to encounter cards that bring the other villains out as minions and punish the player for leaving them unchecked. It runs a little too long on higher difficulty levels, but aside from that it’s an excellent set piece.
5. Sinister Six
Where to Find: Sinister Motives
Sinister Six is the other exceptional multi-villain scenario, and it could be my absolute favorite scenario in Marvel Champions, if not for the lack of replay value. That may sound strange because the scenario has a lot of variety in its villains—as you could expect, there are six of them, and which ones are in play at which time changes the vibe of the scenario. The theme is also pitch-perfect, with multiple villains ganging up on you, and spawning out of nowhere even as you take others down. The alternate win condition also creates a sense of urgency that is sometimes lacking in other scenarios. Unfortunately, the scenario requires you to use the same exact modular set each time, which detracts from the replay value in a big way—modular sets are the hidden star of the game in my opinion, and it sucks that you can’t really add them to the Sinister Six. Still, the scenario is so good on its own that I can look past that.
4. Mutagen Formula
Where to Find: Green Goblin Scenario Pack
Mutagen Formula proves that, sometimes, simpler is better. You won’t see much in the way of gimmickry here, but the constant onslaught of minions really evokes the feeling of a zombie (or goblin) horde. Each new villain stage also throws a mountain of encounter cards to each player, which creates a fascinating, if occasionally frustrating, story each time you play. When you do win, it feels like you’ve weathered a wave of brutally unfair adversity to save the day, which is Marvel Champions at its very best. It fits with Klaw as a “rock-solid but unexciting” scenario, but I think it does more to sell its theme and provide a tough challenge.
3. The Hood
Where to Find: The Hood Scenario Pack
The Hood is an incredible showcase of Marvel Champion’s greatest strength—the modular sets. Most scenarios only add one or two modular sets, but the Hood requires a staggering seven, which leads to wild interactions that could never show up in any other scenario. It also makes the difficulty highly granular, since the sets you choose have a greater impact on the difficulty in general. The “budding crime empire” theme of this one is cool, too, and comes through strongly as new groups of baddies come into play. Of course, that craziness also leads to some huge swings between games, and the Hood’s ability to hand out an endless amount of encounter cards does grate as often as it excites. Still, if (like me) you love watching modular sets tell their own story within a narrative, the Hood is a fantastic scenario for that.
2. Magneto
Where to Find: Mutant Genesis
For me, Magneto is a pitch-perfect scenario. The theme is distinct and well-realized, the difficulty is as tough as it can be without being unfair, and Magento has so many different things to throw at you that you need a well-rounded deck to weather the storm. Additionally, your hero’s strengths and weaknesses have a big impact on how the game plays out, which adds even more variety. The constant assault of magnetic cards can be overwhelming when I just want to relax into a game, but as a design I have almost nothing I dislike about it. It makes for an excellent scenario for testing a new deck, too—and until very recently, was the scenario I would usually pull out first whenever I returned to the game.
1. On the Run
Where to Find: NeXt Evolution
How do you beat a perfect scenario? Well, you send it off the rails. On the Run lacks the fine-tuned balance that I enjoy in the Magneto scenario, but it makes up for it in sheer, unrelenting variety. You face off against one of seven possible villains, each with their own special abilities, and the scenario uses two modular sets instead of just one, which makes it excellently customizable. The villain you play against also affects the impact of the encounter cards, because some cards have more damaging effects when a specific enemy is in play. And, just like Mansion Attack, the unused villains still pose a threat in the form of minions, which gives the feeling of facing off against a team rather than just an individual. It’s a bit easy for my tastes, but the dynamism of the scenario more than makes up for it, and it’s one of the very few scenarios that I feel like I haven’t “seen everything” for. It’s everything I want in a scenario and proves that the game still has plenty of years ahead of it.
Source: Board Game Quest
