The Reserve Pool: Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man Post

We're getting close to the end of our starter set hero recaps, and soon we'll be into the heroes and villains that we'll only find in the wild. You can almost taste it - but we're not there yet.

Our penultimate starter set overview is Spider-Man. The lone unaffiliated hero contained within the starter set, Spider-Man's cards have some interesting effects. I'd assert that the potential of a couple of Spidey's iterations have not yet been fully realized - though it is also possible that we don't have all of the tools to let these abilities shine the way that they could.

Let's dig in a little deeper to the things that Peter Parker brings to the table.

The Die

Spidey is quite cheap to field - his TFC is a mere two. His dice provide fist energy and feature no bursts at any of the levels.

As with Human Torch, his stats are very straightforward. His attack and defense both range from 3 - 5 and it ticks upward one with each level.

Aesthetically speaking, my Spider-Man dice are among the best in the entire game. There are no blemishes whatsoever on them; my hat is off. Perhaps by coincidence, the only other black-on-red die in this game, Deadpool, is also in amazing shape. Whatever happened with this color scheme, it happened right.

The Card

Once again, we have three commons in the base set and one uncommon that is not. I don't think that comes as a galloping shock to anyone reading this.

From a thematic standpoint, everything that Spider-Man does has him manipulating fists and generally being clever. In all cases, this deals with him paying fists. "Webslinger", which allows you to pay a fist and force everyone to block him, may be the most thematic - he grabs his opponents with his web and pulls them right to him. Groovy.

"Tiger" - 4 cost - Pay fist to prevent Spider-Man from being affected by an ability or game effect - but not damage from an engaged character.
"Webhead" - 4 cost - When Spidey attacks, you may pay fist to give him +0/+4.
"Webslinger" - 5 cost - When he assigns to attack, pay a fist to force every opposing character to block him.
"Wall-Crawler" - 4 cost - If Spider Man attacks and is not blocked, you may pay two fists to change your opponents life to 10 before damage is dealt.

"Tiger" is interesting because it isn't necessarily clear what sorts of abilities and effects he can ignore. Could you, for example, pay a fist and have him be exempt from Canucklehead's game effect? I'm not sure; I doubt it, but we don't have anything definitive here yet. But he has utility and is a useful card to have in the meta even if he isn't particularly amazing at present.

"Webhead" is the card suggested for use in the base game. It's very straightforward and allows him to survive against a beefy blocker, if you have the fist to spend. I can't imagine saving a fist just for this.

"Webslinger" has some control potential and could combo well with some other things. For example, assign him and use distraction to pull him back - now everyone is assigned to block him and your other characters have a free board. Though they'll be on their way to the used pile if that's not enough to win.

"Wall-Crawler" intrigues me. I feel like there's some crazy combo with this that we haven't considered yet. Right now, though, it strikes me that two fists is really pricey.

My Favorite

I like "Webslinger" the best. It's a bit of a different take on the finishers like Hulk or Cyclops that take opponent's blockers out of the equation. Instead of wiping them, this will simply force them all on to Spider Man - and so they don't get KO'd and rerolled. If you pull him back with distraction, he stays alive, and your other characters have free reign to do what they will. Depending on the squad makeup of your opponent, Thor "God of Thunder" may be a good play with him, as he gets +4/+4 for each opposing fist character in the field. Colossus "Russian Bear" is another good play, because he'll return to the prep area when damaging your opponent instead of going to the used pile. He costs 7 and is therefore not cheap, but if you can get to him, that ought to do it.

I think that "Tiger" could be good, but we need more information about when it is that he does his thing.