Sentinels of the Multiverse is a cooperative fixed deck superhero card game.
Title: Sentinels of the Multiverse
Year Published: 2011
Designer: Christopher Badell, Paul Bender, Adam, Rebottaro
Publisher: Greater Than Games
Players: 2-5
Game Time: 60 Mins
Set-up Time: >5 Mins
Ages: 10+
Theme: Superhero Comic
Mechanic: Cooperative
How to win: Defeat the Super Villain
Game Description
A mad scientist holds the world hostage with his terrifying inventions. An alien warlord from a far away galaxy brings his limitless army of bizarre minions to conquer the planet. A giant rampaging robot cuts a swath of destruction across the coast, destroying major population centres. And who will stand in their way? A team of heroes, all with impressive powers and abilities stand between the world and the forces of evil. Will you help them? Answer the call to protect the multiverse!
Set-Up
Players take a Superhero deck, puts the Character card in front of them and shuffles their deck then draws 4 cards.
The Villain deck is chosen, the Villain card is set aside and you follow the actions on the ‘Set up’ portion of that card. This differs from Villain to Villain.
The Environment deck is chosen and shuffled and placed face down.
Sentinels of the Multiverse Game Play
The Villain goes first and is controlled by the game. As each Villain is different this changes quite a bit. But generally…
- Follow all ‘Start of Turn’ instructions on the Villain and then the other Villain cards
- Play the top card of the Villain deck
- Follow all ‘End of Turn’ instructions on the Villain and then the other Villain cards
Then in clockwise order, the Hero players take their turn. Again, depending on the Hero you have different options but you usually perform these actions in this order
- Follow all ‘Start of Turn’ instructions
- May play a card from their hand
- May play a Power
- Draws a card
- Follow all ‘End of Turn’ instructions
If a player neither plays a card or plays a Power, they may draw two cards instead.
After all Hero players have gone, it’s the turn of the Environment. Predictably it goes as follows…
- Follow all ‘Start of Turn’ instructions
- Play the top card of the Environment deck
- Follow all ‘End of Turn’ instructions
Then the Super Villain acts again. This continues until one side is victorious.
End Game
Either the Super-Villain is defeated and you win, or all Heroes are Incapacitated and you lose.
Sentinels of the Multiverse Round-Up
So this game is made by variety.
Each hero feels very different. You have to change mindset to play a particular hero so you can get the best out of them. Some are team orientated, some are quite selfish but do massive damage.
The Villains are the same. You have to play each one differently as they all have different pros and cons. Some you can just attack and attack whereas others require a little more subtlety.
The Environment, again, makes things different. They hinder you but in different ways.
The variety isn’t all positive though. There are many non-bo’s available. For example, some Heroes require a certain damage type to give them something extra and other Heroes change the damage types.
If you choose The Wraith who thrives on Equipment cards you will be disappointed by the Dinosaur themed Environment that destroys Equipment most turns so your game can feel… useless?
Some Villains hinder certain Heroes too but you can’t really complain about that.
One thematic element added is that some Heroes and Villains are each other’s Nemesis. They deal extra damage to each other.
Player Elimination
Another thing I’m not a fan of is player elimination. You can get incapacitated but you’re not out of the game. You flip over you have the choice of 3 actions to take on your turn.
This is nice. Is represents your downfall inspiring the rest of the Superhero team.
This is a very nice game. It’s simple enough to play with 5 players that the token flying around the table is not a problem. It also scales well as the cards deal damage in the form of (H), where H is the number of Heroes.
Sentinels of the Multiverse Rating
It is a very good game but as with a lot of Co-op games it can be partially spoiled by an Alpha Gamer, but they can’t see your hand so lie to them 😉
I give it 5/10
Fave 5 Sentinels of the Multiverse Heroes
Sentinels of the Multiverse is a great cooperative Superhero Game.
Several players fight against a boss and their environment to save the day, but it isn’t easy…
The bosses are tough. The environments are tough. Including more players (Heroes) in the game makes it easier but as the enemies damage will scale to the number of players they just get more powerful!
Update: This Fave 5 is ONLY from the base set.
5 – Haka
Being the tough guy, shaking off damage, healing yourself and dishing out a lot of pain is not my usual way to play.
But this isn’t a usual game. Playing as Haka I feel that I am helping the group even if it is a bit of a solitaire game.
4 – Legacy
Legacy is an all-round team player. He deals damage himself and also prevents damage to himself… BUT he also increases damage by EVERY OTHER PLAYER!
Very good to have on your team.
3 – The Wraith
Building up a nice collection of Equipment making every turn an epic adventure is great.
You end up playing loads of different powers and cards each turn as you build up more and more equipment. Starts slow, gets very good.
2 – Bunker
Switching modes with Bunker is quite tactical.
Switching to “Turret mode” so you can’t play cards but can play 2 powers a turn allowing you to build up cards in your hand. Then knowing when to switch to “Upgrade mode” so you can’t play Powers but you can burn the cards out your hand 2 per turn. Then knowing when to go into “Recharge mode” to build back up…
If you can get it working it’s a lot of fun.
1 – Tachyon
Tachyon is more my SPEED 😀
You really feel like you’re building her up from a walk to “The Quickest Woman on Earth” speed dealing massive amounts of damage.
It takes time. Getting enough burst cards into your graveyard does take a while but with all the card drawing and discarding you soon build up then BOOM.
Jesta ThaRogue