Last year, we said on the podcast that WizKids needed to knock Uncanny X-Men out of the park or they could be in dangerous waters, despite the demand that had been there. The power cards in AvX were known, used, re-used, and the meta was the meta for the better part of four months. Things felt a little stale and the news was slow to come.

And now?

Now?
In my opinion, they did exactly what they needed to do, and as a result, the game is in a great spot today.

Uncanny X-Men stirred the pot in all the right ways. Old power cards saw new counters to their abilities.

Dice churn became a juggling act rather than a blocking-fest with Beast. New strategies centered around the prep area came into play. Useful, cheap characters with no abilities came to the forefront, and new globals like that on Transfer Power or Relentless became staples. Blocker Control became a big thing, Sidekicks are prominent thanks to cards like Falcon: Recon, and in general all is well.

It's like Avengers vs. X-Men was a strong dress rehearsal for what was to come.

Uncanny X-Men took the problems that were there with the first set and for the most part, rectified them. Nearly all of the lessons learned and points that we wanted to see included in the game when we pondered our wish lists in prior podcasts began to appear.

We now have characters that are cheap and powerful, but have a drawback (they can only attack, not block). We now have a cost/ability curve that provides for a true early/mid/late game progression. We now have dice churn that both players have access to if just one gets a card. We have super rares that are solid and special, but not essential.

Hence the buzz. Hence the strong conversations and excitement when we find new information about D&D (I mean, it helps that the D&D cards are stunningly gorgeous, but still), Age of Ultron, and DC Dice Masters. It's why there's a lot of conversation around Yu-Gi-Oh, the IP that I had written off entirely until I saw the new modes of gameplay that it brought to the table.

WizKids and the designers did see where the game needed to improve and they acted on it.

I, for one, am thrilled.