Hulk may have been played by approximately seventeen different actors in the last decade, but in Marvel Dice Masters, there are just four cards that feature our green gamma-ray-bombarded friend.

Continuing with our trend started by Captain America, the Hulk is one of the starter set characters, and there is one additional uncommon hidden amongst the booster packs at your friendly local gaming store or wherever you choose to buy them.

As you might expect, the Hulk is a heavy hitter and features high-damage attacking and knocks out opposing characters with ease. Let's have a look.

The Die

The Hulk falls on the most expensive end of the spectrum with a TFC of 6 - you'll certainly be paying a premium to field this guy. He provides fist energy, as is pretty appropriate given that he is, you know, the Hulk.

The die features a burst at levels one and two and the stats certainly make him one of the heaviest hitters in the game - attacks ranging from six through eight and defense from five through eight.

The quality of the Hulk dice that I have is about average for the overall set of dice in this game. There are slight differences in the color of the fill on the numbers and symbols, but all are quite clear.

The Cards

All but one Hulk variant cost six to purchase; "Anger Issues," at seven, is the lone exception. Hulk is an Avenger, so he benefits from Nick Fury "Mr. Anger"'s ability to field avengers for free - something to keep in mind given his high TFC.

The thematic draw behind the Hulk is that he gets more powerful when he takes damage. This fits the character perfectly: Your opponent won't like him when he's angry. Given the cost to purchase and field, we'd expect Hulk to be a closer. Does he stack up? Let's look at each variant:

• "Annihilator" - When Hulk is active and either he or you take damage, you move Hulk dice from your used pile to your prep area.
• "Jade Giant" - When active, and he or you take damage, knock out a level 1 character from your opponent. Burst: Knock out one of any level instead.
• "Anger Issues" - Hulk gets +2/+2 when either he or you take damage. Burst: +3/+3 instead. This happens every time he takes damage and lasts until the end of the turn, so multiple pings from Human Torch or Power Bolt will continuously pump him up that turn.
• "Green Goliath" Hulk deals 2 damage to each opposing character when either he or you take damage. Burst: He deals 3 damage instead.

"Annihilator" suffers from the same "win more" problem that I described with Captain America's "Sentinel of Liberty" variant. Pull it off and it's a potential huge play, but it's either going to pile on if you're winning or not do enough if you're losing. For this to work you have to have purchased at least two Hulk dice and one must be in your used area when the other takes damage. Too situational for me. I think that this is a good ability, but I also think that by the time you have it up and running, the game is close to over. It might close out the victory for you, but I would wager that if you make this happen, you were probably going to win anyway. Getting your opponent to zero works just as well as -7.

"Jade Giant" is nice for dealing with an annoying character later in the game, especially if it's one that's pumping up your opponents blockers like the common Green Goblin. This has some utility for certain, but requires other characters to take full advantage. More on that later.

"Anger Issues," the lone seven-cost Hulk can get pretty powerful, but unless he's comboed with something like "Thrown Car," that's all for naught. He's big, but in most cases it just takes one to keep him from doing anything. If you can get him through he's pretty solid, perhaps if he is comboed with a character that can force blockers. This is also a character that you might want to damage intentionally with Power Bolt or a global. The potential of a behemoth with 10 power is intimidating.

"Green Goliath" is the uncommon card that is not included in the base set. It is certainly at its best when it has a face with the burst showing. This has the potential to clear out a lot of your opponents characters and also forces the opponent to consider the consequences when attacking you. It's possible to rush to a six-cost die, so this guy is attainable.

My Favorite

I'm cheating here. I like three of them a lot.

If I'm looking at the card alone and not considering what else might compliment it, I think that "Green Goliath" is the cut-and-dry favorite here for me. He impacts everyone instead of just himself or one other character. This is a potential clean-up card a la Cyclops "If Looks Could Kill" that would fit in multiple places.

"Jade Giant" is close though because it interacts well with other characters like Black Widow "Tsarina," the super-rare that encourages your opponent to spin characters down levels. This Hulk could easily get rid of the more annoying opposing characters that are in the field because a lot of them will be down to level one quite quickly and he can KO them without a thought. His high defense means that this can happen multiple times if you use abilities to intentionally damage him. This could be an effective part of a Patch Avengers deck because of the extra damage or a Mr. Anger Avengers due to the free field.

"Anger Issues" has plenty of potential if you can make it work with something like Thrown Car or force your opponent to control blockers. There are combos there - the Spidey that you can force everyone to block comes to mind - but they could be a bit too fiddly to work well.