Here’s the list for easy reference in the future! In Easy I have: Risky Business, Absorbing Man, Rhino, Tower Defense, Crossbones, Master Mold, and Drang In Normal I have: Magog, Ebony Maw, Taskmaster, Sandman, Wrecking Crew, Mysterio, Hela, Spiral, Collector 2, Sinister Six, Mutagen Formula, Sentinel, The Hood, and Klaw In Hard I have: Ultron, Mojo, Collector 1, Kang, Red Skull, Venom, Sabretooth, Mansion Attack, and Zola In Very Hard I have Thanos, Nebula, Magneto, Loki, Venom Goblin and Ronan All from generally a solo perspective on Standard with recommended mods 🙂
Back to this great resource again, thank you for making these! I'm curious where would the Next Evolution villains rank in here for you? Ive heard everyone saying they're easy, but Stryfe gave me a good smashing the first 2 games against him and Sinister gave me a great fight too.
@@Mr.Bassman that’s a great question! Unfortunately I’ve only had time to play through them all about twice. Once with a super charged Scarlet Witch deck that ran through non-campaign mode pretty easily. And once with Drax in campaign mode who’s finding standard a good challenge but not overly difficult. So I can’t really say for sure but my impression is on Standard Morlock Siege would end up toward the bottom of easy, On the Run a decent ways up from there but not quite middle difficulty , Mister Sinister and Stryfe somewhere in the Red Skull/Zola range, and Juggernaut a bit harder than that. But super unofficial lol
Pretty fun ranking video. I actually liked the little gimmick you did with placing them all randomly facedown and then selecting the card whose spot you chose. I’ll admit with many other ranking vids on other channels I’ll just skip ahead to the end and then go back and listen to those I’m interested, but with this one I felt the need to watch the entire thing. Well done!
My first game against Crossbones was an absolute nightmare due to some bad RNG I was playing the precon Starloard leadership deck and all my allies were stuck at the bottom of my deck. I kept dealing thwart cards when there was no threat, his starting weapon gave him retaliate which was whittling my health, and then I drew a hydra goon. By the time I lost, he was stacked with so many weapons I was forced to hide in alter ego mode. fun times.
Ugh lol. Crossbones was kinda tough to rank just because of the Legions of Hydra. If you see that side scheme early it’s almost impossible to win. But if it never shows up then he’s usually not too bad. Unless all the things don’t go your way like in your case 😅😖
Great video. I don't play much Standard, to the point I've only played Mutant Genesis and Mojomania on Expert, so my opinion on a Standard ranking is sketchy at best. With that said, my general feelings after watching are that I love your insight, I agree with almost all the individual points you make, but there's a few I'd rank quite differently! (It's worth noting that 80% of my games are done at 2-player too, which may skew some of my personal rankings.) Risky Business, Rhino and Absorbing Man are definitely the easiest to me, in that order. On the other end of the spectrum, Ronan is definitely the hardest, followed by Venom Goblin. Next come Magneto, Loki, and Nebula. (Nebula is often a lot easier, but she can also just surge you into oblivion as you mention.) And I'd actually put The Hood next - it varies with the modular, but using the ones he comes with is pain and probably what the majority of people have played him with. Mojo might be up there, but he's only been available here in the UK for about a month and I've only recently come back from a hiatus from the game. Even for Expert, I need more experience to truly comment on him. Thanos and Red Skull come in next as the gatekeepers of the Very Hard villains, in my opinion. Both can exploit certain weaknesses and seem very difficult, but to the average all-rounder deck/team I think they're fine. Without the Gauntlet, Thanos is actually very similar to Rhino - just slightly more difficult across the board. And Red Skull is pretty weak himself, it's again his own special mechanic - the side-scheme deck - that really elevates his difficulty. Zola is a weird one to rank. In solo, I put him above Red Skull. In 2-4 player, below. It turns out that 4-players can handle an extra minion every 3 turns much easier than 1 player! But it also depends on your aspect; Zola tests your minion-slaying and Red Skull tests your threat removal. Aggression usually struggles massively with Red Skull while Justice can cruise, and on the other hand Protection's low output tends to lead to Zola just inevitably overwhelming you while Leadership tends to be able to slay minions and deal with all his side schemes too. So, while largely in agreement, those are a few thoughts! Between those, there are a few outliers I place very differently. Namely, I put Mansion Attack just above the very middle - though varies depending how often Mystique visits you. Kang I consider easy overall, with Mutagen Formula just above him. I actually think Drang is harder than Mutagen Formula, though they both hit similar notes - both green, and both swarm you with minions. I've heard a few people say Venom is difficult but, even on Expert, I consider him to be pretty easy. Other than his starting side scheme, the scenario gives you the perfect counter to him in the form of the Bell Tower. And other than scary attacks, he is pretty simple with very weak minions. This is because Symbiotic Strength is overall a very easy modular aside from the one card that means he can attack in alter-ego. So, outside of getting that one card when you're low hp and in alter-ego (which is very rare), it's generally an uneventful modular. Thanks for reading!
Thank you for the very kind worlds! And I always greatly appreciate your insights and am so thankful you take the time to leave these amazing comments because they greatly help the community! When I have more time I want to address your points more specifically but for now I just wanted to say thank you! 😊
Thanks so much for putting this together, I've got about half the MC content so it really helps with deciding what to get next. I agree a lot of the villains play very differently depending on player count. We play mostly with 3 people and just did Mutant Genesis, found Master Mold pretty tough (not the hardest, but definitely not easy) while Sabretooth wasn't too bad at all. Magneto was soooo tough though - with our player count we were getting at least 3 magnetic counters (and often more) each round which meant a nasty effect (or two) every single time. On a separate note I'm really torn about Galaxy's Most Wanted - I'd love to get Rocket Racoon and love the Guardians theme but the majority of the villains sound fairly unfun to play, in which case it's a lot to pay for a single character. Such a shame, would be great if they released some sort of 'second edition' that fixed the balancing issues. I'd buy it in an instant!
Thanks for watching! Oof yeah Magneto is so brutal in high player counts 😖 I wish I could be more encouraging about GMW but you’ve pretty much got it right lol. I really like Drang, and Collector 2 is pretty good. Collector 1 is pretty not fun, Nebula can be fun but also can be ridiculous, and I’m sure you know all about Ronan. But the heroes are good and there’s a ton of good deck building cards in there so it’s kind of a tough pill to swallow but it’s probably worth getting eventually. But I wouldn’t rush it 😆
I watched this a while back but didn’t comment. Fun video! I think the way you did it, moving them around, was way better and more engaging than if you had arranged them ahead of time and just flipped them! 👍👏
Thanks! Yeah that was a really fun way to go about it and it seemed to be a hit! Now I’m getting ready to do my hero rankings and the pressure is on to do something more creative than just a tier list 😅
Thanks! Yeah seriously lol, he’s so tough to start the box! With a little more experience he’s not quite as scary, but he’s still always a challenge in my mind 🫣
Really cool video, I feel you did cross bones and tower defence slightly dirty and wrecking crew is way too high, but I can’t complain too much with the order.
Haha yeah it’s tough, I haven’t played Wrecking Crew in forever so in my memory of it it was decently challenging but you’re probably right lol. And Crossbones can definitely give you a rough time if he’s feeling up to it. Tower Defense is one I’ve just never come close to losing so that was where it just seemed to fit 😊
That was a great video! You're very engaging to listen to, and I thought the whole gimmick where you flipped over each villain as you put the previous villain in their spot was fun.
I like to add goblin gear to the towers, it likely gives both villains gliders and adds a heal, which can make their health mechanic more problematic. For absorbing man, if you want a challenging and fun experience, I recommend the master's of mayhem and self experimentation modulars. One thing absorbing man has is a lot of treacheries, and self experimentation gives a mean side scheme.
Those are fantastic suggestions! I’m especially excited to try Goblin Gear with Corvus and Proxima. I really like the scenario but it’s way too easy. That’s a great way to modify it. Thanks! 😀
Wow I was just talking with a friend about how I dont like to change my deck for a specific villain and you talked about it when you mentioned ebony maw, funny coincidence.
Haha yep! I feel like for this game until you get to the Hard category most deck types should be able to handle most villains. Once you end up in the higher end though you’ve gotta at least consider a few things when deck building
Great idea for a video. Most of your choices I agree with, some of the Villains I still have not played against and this video is a year old. Any chance of an Expert version or a 2024 edition?
Thanks! I would probably adjust a few things here and there but I’m still pretty happy with it ☺️ Unfortunately I can’t say anything for sure as I’ve got a couple videos that are super high priority for me right now and I can’t even seem to get those made 😅. But I do like the idea of revisiting it for expert since some villains definitely change more than others when you move up to expert 👍
i know there are 2 challenges on each villain ( I assume, as i only played the core so far ). but we actually use all villains phases for the even more hardcore version of the game haha
Interesting take. I would agree broadly with most of this. There's a whole load I don't really have much opinion on as I have not played them much. A few comments. Zola is far harder in solo than multiplayer. I think this applies to the game in general - 2 player is probably easiest but the (lack of) scaling in Zola makes him super tough solo. Kang I never found very hard, just long so he's more mid tier. Sandman I think is like an easy Rhino. He doesn't hit as hard, so you are under less pressure and his scheme goes 2 higher so you rarely lose to an unlucky Advance. Managing sand is a thing but it's not hard. Mysterio seems very easy as half the time he does nothing. The other half of the time you spend more time shuffling than playing, which is miserable so I have not played him enough to confirm the difficulty. Mostly I play expert but I played Nebula on Standard a fair bit. I think she is MUCH easier there & never really struggled with her. Some like the Sinister 6 are almost as difficult in standard as expert. Any how I agree it's a good idea to have some daylight between standard & expert. I was amazed how much easier Magog was on standard!
I always really appreciate your insights! And I usually end up agreeing and questioning all of my opinions 😆 I’ll say for Kang I don’t have a ton of experience with him but the times I played him when he was new I remembered it being pretty tough. When I played him recently I had the game in hand til I forgot a crucial piece of information so he wasn’t too bad, but a newer card pool helps with that. That’s another thing that makes it really difficult to rank these actually And you’re so right about Mysterio! I do really enjoy him but the shuffling gets really really old 😅
Thanks for the video. I just have a few issues with your choices. Haha. I will say, my biggest complaint is your placement of Crossbones and Taskmaster. I think they should almost swap. To me Crossbones is a perfect medium difficulty villain, while Taskmaster is somewhat easy. Overall, it's a pretty good list, imo, and thanks for making the video. I'm gonna post my list which is in 2 handed solo and campaign mode and the individual ratings are in chronological order so I didn't decide who is harder in each rating. (Ronan is the hardest though.) Two handed solo standard difficulty tier list (campaign) 10: Ronan, Venom Goblin (Advanced Glider) 9: Ultron 8: Nebula, Thanos, Loki, Venom Goblin (no Advanced Glider), Magneto 7: Red Skull, Collector I, Sabertooth, Mansion Attack 6: Zola, Collector II, Tower Defense, Hela, Venom 5: Crossbones, Draang, Ebony Maw, 4: Klaw, Taskmaster, Sandman, Mysterio, Project Wideawake, Master Mold 3: Rhino, Sinister Six 2: Absorbing Man, Wrecking Crew
P.S. It's interesting that Tower Defense is very easy in non-campaign mode. I'll have to try it out one day. Because yeah, in campaign mode you really don't want it to damage the tower which does make the scenario annoying. Also, I've never understood how people struggle with Zola. I never have. But it's interesting to hear people rank him as difficult.
Very nice list! Thank you for sharing that, as well as your thoughts! 😀 If I could change any one, it would be Crossbones. But only because so many people said that one was wrong. That’s where he feels right to me. But similar to what you say about Zola, I’ve never thought he was very hard at all. Though that’s somewhat contingent on whether or not you see Legions of Hydra lol. That definitely ticks him up a fair few spots, which I mentioned in the video but I probably should’ve given him an official spot for Legions. Maybe I’ve just gotten lucky though and most of my games with him I was able to dodge the scary side scheme lol
Hi, Would you make a video about how to set up every campaign, enemy etc? Explaining tricky parts, how many thrats to put how it increases how it effects... I have adequate English and even with it sometimes game is too confusing with every icons, every new set of rules etc. It turns into a mess very fast.
Hello! I’m not sure how soon I can get to something like that but I’ll see what I can do! I’m always happy to help so I’ll try to come up with something ☺️ In the meantime I highly recommend PlayDGame’s series called Villains Beyond. He talks through all of a villain’s main mechanisms and things to look out for. It’s not exactly what you’re asking but I think it’ll still be helpful!
Also, feel free to join the Discord server I hang out in, the Living Card Games Discord. It’s full of very friendly and helpful people that are always happy to answer questions! discord.gg/jq3m2ngM
Haha yeah I’d love to hear your take on it! I’ve definitely learned (in kind and fun ways) I’ve got some, uh questionable, takes in there, it just depends on who you talk to as to which ones they are lol. So I’d be curious to hear where we differ!
I played solo, and I thought Mutagen was much harder than Zola. I know Goblin gets a lot of love, but I struggled so much - I’ll be playing again soon, hope to be able to handle him better then.
@@prufrock1977 I can see that. I kind of struggled to rate the difficulty of Mutagen cause I’ve played it so so much that I probably think it’s easier than it is. Plus that encounter deck is so darn big it can give a pretty variable experience lol
I was kinda disappointed with the Risky Business scenario because when it was revealed, I loved the concept, but like you said, it’s just too easy. I would love to see them revisit the concept with someone else; with what they’ve learned in 5 years of designing villains in this game, I think the idea would come out much better. Just look at what they’ve done with multi-villain scenarios since the Wrecking Crew. I don’t know enough about the lore to know who would fit that bill (I definitely don’t play this game because of the theme.)
@@GetUpandGame I have! I own and have played everything. It hadn’t really occurred to me that’s what Spiral was, but now that you mention it, she kinda is that.
Shocked by the Loki choice. IMO the difficulty with him is he starts hard, but once you’ve had some time to build up, it’s just annoying and drawn out. I think he belongs around the Red Skull-ish area.
Oh yeah? Haha dang I feel like he always wrecks me, or at least it’s really hard to get going thanks to the Infinity Gauntlet. But I’ll admit I also haven’t played him all that many times because I didn’t really enjoy him as much as other villains so I probably don’t have a great strategy for him
I think during mojo you mentioned that you only get two runs through the encounter deck on solo. Is this a mojo thing, or a general rule that i missed 😢
Something that I wish the game did was offer an easy mode. Not because I would play the easy mode, but so that I could call normal mode "intermediate" and feel better about my win. Because every time I beat a normal deck, I'm like, "Well, c'mon, who are you kidding, you're not playing the reeeeal version of this deck."
Tower defence to me is the easiest scenario in the game because you can completely ignore scheme. I'm not actually even sure how you lose in that scenario. It also has the highest win rate on the bgg forum with 87 percent win rate followed by risky business then wrecking crew
Oh is it the lowest one on that list? I never checked it cause I didn’t want to be influenced, but I didn’t realize Tower Defense was the lowest one. For as much as I said you can largely let the Tower take damage, I’ve always felt like you do need to at least keep Proxima from hitting it with her scheme since she does such a large chunk of damage to it. That gives you something to do with your thwart cards at least lol
and here i am not even beaten rhino yet... he's relatively easy to deal with but eventually he gets a big hit on the scheme with like 5 and its game over for me so annoying otherwise he would be pretty damn easy
Yeah you’re right he can be really annoying. I’ve said a few times that I don’t like him for the “tutorial” if you’re playing solo. You definitely need to prioritize the main scheme. Keep it at 0 as much as you can. Try not to go to alter ego any more than necessary against him, and always be aware of how many Advances are still in the encounter deck Try to spend the early game thwarting and getting some upgrades, ally’s and supports on the table. Don’t worry about damaging Rhino until you’re a little more setup You’ll get him!
Hmmm, that’s a really good question! Everyone gets a lot harder for sure, but are there some Villains that benefit more? On expert, yes. There are some villains that are significantly harder on expert, like the Hood, Ultron, both Goblins, and Nebula. They would move up the list from where they are. As for the Gauntlet, Crossbones comes to mind since he benefits from having a Weapon attachment. taskmaster gets some use out of that as well. Not sure who else but I’m sure there are some other cool interactions out there!
I agree with Get Up and Game. It's hard. Starts you with facedown encounter cards, so turn 2 is gonna be rough. The villains have annoying effects every time they attack. Only 7pp threat on each main scheme and only 2 need to be completed to lose. And that The Brotherhood side scheme is annoying because it comes with an awkward number of threat. (I play 2 handed solo so it comes in with 7 threat, which is an awkward number when most side schemes are a simple 6.) Oh and when you defeat a villain you get another facedown encounter card. I'm not saying it's unbeatable, I've beaten it in all 3 of my plays, but it's always on a knife's edge. It's always a struggle. I just feel like it puts so much pressure on you and rarely relents.
Here’s the list for easy reference in the future!
In Easy I have: Risky Business, Absorbing Man, Rhino, Tower Defense, Crossbones, Master Mold, and Drang
In Normal I have: Magog, Ebony Maw, Taskmaster, Sandman, Wrecking Crew, Mysterio, Hela, Spiral, Collector 2, Sinister Six, Mutagen Formula, Sentinel, The Hood, and Klaw
In Hard I have: Ultron, Mojo, Collector 1, Kang, Red Skull, Venom, Sabretooth, Mansion Attack, and Zola
In Very Hard I have Thanos, Nebula, Magneto, Loki, Venom Goblin and Ronan
All from generally a solo perspective on Standard with recommended mods 🙂
Back to this great resource again, thank you for making these! I'm curious where would the Next Evolution villains rank in here for you? Ive heard everyone saying they're easy, but Stryfe gave me a good smashing the first 2 games against him and Sinister gave me a great fight too.
@@Mr.Bassman that’s a great question! Unfortunately I’ve only had time to play through them all about twice. Once with a super charged Scarlet Witch deck that ran through non-campaign mode pretty easily. And once with Drax in campaign mode who’s finding standard a good challenge but not overly difficult. So I can’t really say for sure but my impression is on Standard Morlock Siege would end up toward the bottom of easy, On the Run a decent ways up from there but not quite middle difficulty , Mister Sinister and Stryfe somewhere in the Red Skull/Zola range, and Juggernaut a bit harder than that.
But super unofficial lol
Pretty fun ranking video. I actually liked the little gimmick you did with placing them all randomly facedown and then selecting the card whose spot you chose. I’ll admit with many other ranking vids on other channels I’ll just skip ahead to the end and then go back and listen to those I’m interested, but with this one I felt the need to watch the entire thing. Well done!
Thanks! Yeah the idea just hit me the other day and I thought it seemed like a fun way to do it. Glad that seems to be the case!
For someone who hasn't played that much, your run-down very very fun and informative. All your work paid off!
Oh thank you so much! I really appreciate the kind words! 🙏😄
My first game against Crossbones was an absolute nightmare due to some bad RNG
I was playing the precon Starloard leadership deck and all my allies were stuck at the bottom of my deck.
I kept dealing thwart cards when there was no threat, his starting weapon gave him retaliate which was whittling my health, and then I drew a hydra goon.
By the time I lost, he was stacked with so many weapons I was forced to hide in alter ego mode. fun times.
Ugh lol. Crossbones was kinda tough to rank just because of the Legions of Hydra. If you see that side scheme early it’s almost impossible to win. But if it never shows up then he’s usually not too bad. Unless all the things don’t go your way like in your case 😅😖
Great video. I don't play much Standard, to the point I've only played Mutant Genesis and Mojomania on Expert, so my opinion on a Standard ranking is sketchy at best. With that said, my general feelings after watching are that I love your insight, I agree with almost all the individual points you make, but there's a few I'd rank quite differently!
(It's worth noting that 80% of my games are done at 2-player too, which may skew some of my personal rankings.)
Risky Business, Rhino and Absorbing Man are definitely the easiest to me, in that order.
On the other end of the spectrum, Ronan is definitely the hardest, followed by Venom Goblin. Next come Magneto, Loki, and Nebula. (Nebula is often a lot easier, but she can also just surge you into oblivion as you mention.) And I'd actually put The Hood next - it varies with the modular, but using the ones he comes with is pain and probably what the majority of people have played him with.
Mojo might be up there, but he's only been available here in the UK for about a month and I've only recently come back from a hiatus from the game. Even for Expert, I need more experience to truly comment on him.
Thanos and Red Skull come in next as the gatekeepers of the Very Hard villains, in my opinion. Both can exploit certain weaknesses and seem very difficult, but to the average all-rounder deck/team I think they're fine. Without the Gauntlet, Thanos is actually very similar to Rhino - just slightly more difficult across the board. And Red Skull is pretty weak himself, it's again his own special mechanic - the side-scheme deck - that really elevates his difficulty.
Zola is a weird one to rank. In solo, I put him above Red Skull. In 2-4 player, below. It turns out that 4-players can handle an extra minion every 3 turns much easier than 1 player! But it also depends on your aspect; Zola tests your minion-slaying and Red Skull tests your threat removal. Aggression usually struggles massively with Red Skull while Justice can cruise, and on the other hand Protection's low output tends to lead to Zola just inevitably overwhelming you while Leadership tends to be able to slay minions and deal with all his side schemes too.
So, while largely in agreement, those are a few thoughts!
Between those, there are a few outliers I place very differently. Namely, I put Mansion Attack just above the very middle - though varies depending how often Mystique visits you. Kang I consider easy overall, with Mutagen Formula just above him. I actually think Drang is harder than Mutagen Formula, though they both hit similar notes - both green, and both swarm you with minions.
I've heard a few people say Venom is difficult but, even on Expert, I consider him to be pretty easy. Other than his starting side scheme, the scenario gives you the perfect counter to him in the form of the Bell Tower. And other than scary attacks, he is pretty simple with very weak minions. This is because Symbiotic Strength is overall a very easy modular aside from the one card that means he can attack in alter-ego. So, outside of getting that one card when you're low hp and in alter-ego (which is very rare), it's generally an uneventful modular.
Thanks for reading!
Thank you for the very kind worlds! And I always greatly appreciate your insights and am so thankful you take the time to leave these amazing comments because they greatly help the community!
When I have more time I want to address your points more specifically but for now I just wanted to say thank you! 😊
These are som very helpful pointers 😊 Thanks.
Thanks so much for putting this together, I've got about half the MC content so it really helps with deciding what to get next. I agree a lot of the villains play very differently depending on player count. We play mostly with 3 people and just did Mutant Genesis, found Master Mold pretty tough (not the hardest, but definitely not easy) while Sabretooth wasn't too bad at all. Magneto was soooo tough though - with our player count we were getting at least 3 magnetic counters (and often more) each round which meant a nasty effect (or two) every single time.
On a separate note I'm really torn about Galaxy's Most Wanted - I'd love to get Rocket Racoon and love the Guardians theme but the majority of the villains sound fairly unfun to play, in which case it's a lot to pay for a single character. Such a shame, would be great if they released some sort of 'second edition' that fixed the balancing issues. I'd buy it in an instant!
Thanks for watching! Oof yeah Magneto is so brutal in high player counts 😖
I wish I could be more encouraging about GMW but you’ve pretty much got it right lol. I really like Drang, and Collector 2 is pretty good. Collector 1 is pretty not fun, Nebula can be fun but also can be ridiculous, and I’m sure you know all about Ronan. But the heroes are good and there’s a ton of good deck building cards in there so it’s kind of a tough pill to swallow but it’s probably worth getting eventually. But I wouldn’t rush it 😆
I watched this a while back but didn’t comment. Fun video! I think the way you did it, moving them around, was way better and more engaging than if you had arranged them ahead of time and just flipped them! 👍👏
Thanks! Yeah that was a really fun way to go about it and it seemed to be a hit! Now I’m getting ready to do my hero rankings and the pressure is on to do something more creative than just a tier list 😅
Great video and rundown, thank you! Glad you felt the same about Sabretooth, he gave me a rude awakening as the opener in Mutant Genesis! Holy smokes
Thanks! Yeah seriously lol, he’s so tough to start the box! With a little more experience he’s not quite as scary, but he’s still always a challenge in my mind 🫣
Thx for this ranking. Great job!
Thanks! And thank YOU for watching! 😀
Really cool video, I feel you did cross bones and tower defence slightly dirty and wrecking crew is way too high, but I can’t complain too much with the order.
Haha yeah it’s tough, I haven’t played Wrecking Crew in forever so in my memory of it it was decently challenging but you’re probably right lol. And Crossbones can definitely give you a rough time if he’s feeling up to it. Tower Defense is one I’ve just never come close to losing so that was where it just seemed to fit 😊
That was a great video! You're very engaging to listen to, and I thought the whole gimmick where you flipped over each villain as you put the previous villain in their spot was fun.
Oh thank you! I’m so glad you enjoyed it, and I really appreciate the kind words! 😊
I like to add goblin gear to the towers, it likely gives both villains gliders and adds a heal, which can make their health mechanic more problematic.
For absorbing man, if you want a challenging and fun experience, I recommend the master's of mayhem and self experimentation modulars.
One thing absorbing man has is a lot of treacheries, and self experimentation gives a mean side scheme.
Those are fantastic suggestions! I’m especially excited to try Goblin Gear with Corvus and Proxima. I really like the scenario but it’s way too easy. That’s a great way to modify it. Thanks! 😀
Wow I was just talking with a friend about how I dont like to change my deck for a specific villain and you talked about it when you mentioned ebony maw, funny coincidence.
Haha yep! I feel like for this game until you get to the Hard category most deck types should be able to handle most villains. Once you end up in the higher end though you’ve gotta at least consider a few things when deck building
Great idea for a video. Most of your choices I agree with, some of the Villains I still have not played against and this video is a year old. Any chance of an Expert version or a 2024 edition?
Thanks! I would probably adjust a few things here and there but I’m still pretty happy with it ☺️
Unfortunately I can’t say anything for sure as I’ve got a couple videos that are super high priority for me right now and I can’t even seem to get those made 😅. But I do like the idea of revisiting it for expert since some villains definitely change more than others when you move up to expert 👍
thanks for the awesome content as always!
Well thank you for the kind words! 😃
I’ve been waiting for a video like this for ages 😊🎉
Haha it was your suggestion that got me to finally do it so thank you!!
@@GetUpandGame aw that’s great thanks and you’re welcome too 😅
i know there are 2 challenges on each villain ( I assume, as i only played the core so far ). but we actually use all villains phases for the even more hardcore version of the game haha
Haha nice! I’ve often been tempted to do that but I’ve never tried it. I like a longer game so I’m sure I’d enjoy it!
Interesting take. I would agree broadly with most of this. There's a whole load I don't really have much opinion on as I have not played them much. A few comments. Zola is far harder in solo than multiplayer. I think this applies to the game in general - 2 player is probably easiest but the (lack of) scaling in Zola makes him super tough solo.
Kang I never found very hard, just long so he's more mid tier. Sandman I think is like an easy Rhino. He doesn't hit as hard, so you are under less pressure and his scheme goes 2 higher so you rarely lose to an unlucky Advance. Managing sand is a thing but it's not hard. Mysterio seems very easy as half the time he does nothing. The other half of the time you spend more time shuffling than playing, which is miserable so I have not played him enough to confirm the difficulty.
Mostly I play expert but I played Nebula on Standard a fair bit. I think she is MUCH easier there & never really struggled with her. Some like the Sinister 6 are almost as difficult in standard as expert. Any how I agree it's a good idea to have some daylight between standard & expert. I was amazed how much easier Magog was on standard!
I always really appreciate your insights! And I usually end up agreeing and questioning all of my opinions 😆
I’ll say for Kang I don’t have a ton of experience with him but the times I played him when he was new I remembered it being pretty tough. When I played him recently I had the game in hand til I forgot a crucial piece of information so he wasn’t too bad, but a newer card pool helps with that. That’s another thing that makes it really difficult to rank these actually
And you’re so right about Mysterio! I do really enjoy him but the shuffling gets really really old 😅
Thanks for the video. I just have a few issues with your choices. Haha. I will say, my biggest complaint is your placement of Crossbones and Taskmaster. I think they should almost swap. To me Crossbones is a perfect medium difficulty villain, while Taskmaster is somewhat easy. Overall, it's a pretty good list, imo, and thanks for making the video. I'm gonna post my list which is in 2 handed solo and campaign mode and the individual ratings are in chronological order so I didn't decide who is harder in each rating. (Ronan is the hardest though.)
Two handed solo standard difficulty tier list (campaign)
10: Ronan, Venom Goblin (Advanced Glider)
9: Ultron
8: Nebula, Thanos, Loki, Venom Goblin (no Advanced Glider), Magneto
7: Red Skull, Collector I, Sabertooth, Mansion Attack
6: Zola, Collector II, Tower Defense, Hela, Venom
5: Crossbones, Draang, Ebony Maw,
4: Klaw, Taskmaster, Sandman, Mysterio, Project Wideawake, Master Mold
3: Rhino, Sinister Six
2: Absorbing Man, Wrecking Crew
P.S.
It's interesting that Tower Defense is very easy in non-campaign mode. I'll have to try it out one day. Because yeah, in campaign mode you really don't want it to damage the tower which does make the scenario annoying.
Also, I've never understood how people struggle with Zola. I never have. But it's interesting to hear people rank him as difficult.
Very nice list! Thank you for sharing that, as well as your thoughts! 😀
If I could change any one, it would be Crossbones. But only because so many people said that one was wrong. That’s where he feels right to me. But similar to what you say about Zola, I’ve never thought he was very hard at all. Though that’s somewhat contingent on whether or not you see Legions of Hydra lol. That definitely ticks him up a fair few spots, which I mentioned in the video but I probably should’ve given him an official spot for Legions. Maybe I’ve just gotten lucky though and most of my games with him I was able to dodge the scary side scheme lol
Where would you place the Green Goblin scenarios?
@@prufrock1977 I hadn't played them at the time, and I've still only played them once so I'm not sure. Sorry.
Hi,
Would you make a video about how to set up every campaign, enemy etc?
Explaining tricky parts, how many thrats to put how it increases how it effects...
I have adequate English and even with it sometimes game is too confusing with every icons, every new set of rules etc.
It turns into a mess very fast.
Hello! I’m not sure how soon I can get to something like that but I’ll see what I can do! I’m always happy to help so I’ll try to come up with something ☺️
In the meantime I highly recommend PlayDGame’s series called Villains Beyond. He talks through all of a villain’s main mechanisms and things to look out for. It’s not exactly what you’re asking but I think it’ll still be helpful!
ruclips.net/p/PLggRViGeFsuPnS0_rgDmR-byQPMNYd7lr
Also, feel free to join the Discord server I hang out in, the Living Card Games Discord. It’s full of very friendly and helpful people that are always happy to answer questions! discord.gg/jq3m2ngM
Imma come back to this video after work to rank them in my opinion, you lit a fire in me to wanna do it😂 love when you do these kinda videos
Haha yeah I’d love to hear your take on it! I’ve definitely learned (in kind and fun ways) I’ve got some, uh questionable, takes in there, it just depends on who you talk to as to which ones they are lol. So I’d be curious to hear where we differ!
I played solo, and I thought Mutagen was much harder than Zola. I know Goblin gets a lot of love, but I struggled so much - I’ll be playing again soon, hope to be able to handle him better then.
@@prufrock1977 I can see that. I kind of struggled to rate the difficulty of Mutagen cause I’ve played it so so much that I probably think it’s easier than it is. Plus that encounter deck is so darn big it can give a pretty variable experience lol
Great video helps with villian match ups
Thanks! Yeah I was hoping it might be useful in some ways 😊
I was kinda disappointed with the Risky Business scenario because when it was revealed, I loved the concept, but like you said, it’s just too easy. I would love to see them revisit the concept with someone else; with what they’ve learned in 5 years of designing villains in this game, I think the idea would come out much better. Just look at what they’ve done with multi-villain scenarios since the Wrecking Crew. I don’t know enough about the lore to know who would fit that bill (I definitely don’t play this game because of the theme.)
Have you played the Mojo mania pack? Spiral is a much better take on Risky Business. Really fun villain!
@@GetUpandGame
I have! I own and have played everything. It hadn’t really occurred to me that’s what Spiral was, but now that you mention it, she kinda is that.
Shocked by the Loki choice. IMO the difficulty with him is he starts hard, but once you’ve had some time to build up, it’s just annoying and drawn out. I think he belongs around the Red Skull-ish area.
Oh yeah? Haha dang I feel like he always wrecks me, or at least it’s really hard to get going thanks to the Infinity Gauntlet. But I’ll admit I also haven’t played him all that many times because I didn’t really enjoy him as much as other villains so I probably don’t have a great strategy for him
Really cool video!
Why thank you sir!
Master mold was a nightmare with 3 players...We just could not beat it.
Venon in the other hand is always easy
I think during mojo you mentioned that you only get two runs through the encounter deck on solo. Is this a mojo thing, or a general rule that i missed 😢
Just a Mojo thing 👍
What sleeves are you using?
I use the KMC Perfect Fit sleeves. Not as nice as Dragon shields but way cheaper and still good enough lol
Something that I wish the game did was offer an easy mode. Not because I would play the easy mode, but so that I could call normal mode "intermediate" and feel better about my win. Because every time I beat a normal deck, I'm like, "Well, c'mon, who are you kidding, you're not playing the reeeeal version of this deck."
Hahaha I know exactly what you mean! I don’t think that’s how we’re meant to feel but I’m in the same boat 😆
Tower defence to me is the easiest scenario in the game because you can completely ignore scheme. I'm not actually even sure how you lose in that scenario. It also has the highest win rate on the bgg forum with 87 percent win rate followed by risky business then wrecking crew
Oh is it the lowest one on that list? I never checked it cause I didn’t want to be influenced, but I didn’t realize Tower Defense was the lowest one.
For as much as I said you can largely let the Tower take damage, I’ve always felt like you do need to at least keep Proxima from hitting it with her scheme since she does such a large chunk of damage to it. That gives you something to do with your thwart cards at least lol
and here i am not even beaten rhino yet... he's relatively easy to deal with but eventually he gets a big hit on the scheme with like 5 and its game over for me
so annoying otherwise he would be pretty damn easy
Yeah you’re right he can be really annoying. I’ve said a few times that I don’t like him for the “tutorial” if you’re playing solo. You definitely need to prioritize the main scheme. Keep it at 0 as much as you can. Try not to go to alter ego any more than necessary against him, and always be aware of how many Advances are still in the encounter deck
Try to spend the early game thwarting and getting some upgrades, ally’s and supports on the table. Don’t worry about damaging Rhino until you’re a little more setup
You’ll get him!
I'm curious how this entire list looks if you give every villain the Infinity Gauntlet on Expert.
Hmmm, that’s a really good question! Everyone gets a lot harder for sure, but are there some
Villains that benefit more? On expert, yes. There are some villains that are significantly harder on expert, like the Hood, Ultron, both Goblins, and Nebula. They would move up the list from where they are.
As for the Gauntlet, Crossbones comes to mind since he benefits from having a Weapon attachment. taskmaster gets some use out of that as well. Not sure who else but I’m sure there are some other cool interactions out there!
why galactus isn't in the game :c
He will be! Whenever they get around to the Fantastic Four 😀
Mansion attack hard?! Lol
Well I thought it was…. 😅😆😆
But one thing I’ve learned from this list more than any others is people have wildly different experiences with the villains lol
I agree with Get Up and Game. It's hard. Starts you with facedown encounter cards, so turn 2 is gonna be rough. The villains have annoying effects every time they attack. Only 7pp threat on each main scheme and only 2 need to be completed to lose. And that The Brotherhood side scheme is annoying because it comes with an awkward number of threat. (I play 2 handed solo so it comes in with 7 threat, which is an awkward number when most side schemes are a simple 6.) Oh and when you defeat a villain you get another facedown encounter card.
I'm not saying it's unbeatable, I've beaten it in all 3 of my plays, but it's always on a knife's edge. It's always a struggle. I just feel like it puts so much pressure on you and rarely relents.