SG Protocol

  Right in the excitement of the biggest Update in the history of MCP (See my last four posts for details if you've somehow missed it), AMG has treated us to the Panel to Play for their second (on card) ever 8 Threat: Onslaught.  Let's start right at the top. Strike is a very boring name for an 8 threats attack. You're going to be using it barely ever if you can manage Onslaughts power well enough. The Throw Trigger is also hard to get so no guarantees there either. But at least it's sizeless and any direction.  Let's quickly move on to by far the best and most important line of text on this card. Mind Spike is what you want and need to be doing twice every Activation of Onslaught. Range 3 on the 65mm Base is good and 8 dice Mystic is strong but the most important part is the guaranteed S advance of the defender. It's two guaranteed displacements every round and Onslaught should be activated as late as possible anyway.  Atomic Singularity feels like an emergency...

  After we went through the 173 characters in the three PDFs for the last three days in today's final reaction post to the August Update we will look at the changed TTCs, Core Rules, FAQ, Apocalypse and the Affiliation list.  TTCs :  Are You Sure You Want to Remember? : Leadership updated to generate 2 memory tokens per Daze/KO. Tokens put on the card instead of the character.   While still not in the running to be my favorite leadership It Was YOU!!! Now at least mechanically works and is not dependent on your leader not being dazed. Gaining two memory tokens back per daze/KO is also helpful. Sad that it is still only useable by affiliated models (but I do get the thematic reason for it) C+  Asteroid M : Changed timing to Power Phase and if a character has an objective they can drop it now instead of not being able to be placed. This maybe feels like a straight nerf and it is intended to stop turn 1 shenanigans but I think it will end up being mostly a side gra...

  Here are my takes on part 3 of the character updates:  Red Skull, Master of Hydra:  Red Skull 2 was hit with a couple of nerfs. The first one being his Empowered Gauntlets now no longer counting Blanks but instead counting Skulls as crits. The spike potential is now even higher than it used to be but the floor is much lower. It's still going to be a strong attack when he does it but he is going to be a bit less reliable. Something that had to happen because of space on the card is that the Push and Advance Trigger are now combined into one. He also got Peerless which for him really limits his use cases as he can now only play under Sin in Cabal. He'll be basically only be a Hydra leader from now on and sometimes a splash if you don't need an affiliated Peerless model. And lastly while we're here we can mention that the Hydra Troopers lost a Stamina (down to 2) and the range of their attack was reduced to 3 from 4.  B-  Rescue :  I can't detect any changes...

  Here are my takes on part 2 of the character updates:  Gorgon :  injured side art update only  Green Goblin :  8/6 for Norman now. He's now much harder to flip but sometimes that is exactly what you want for him. Likely still mostly only interessting as a leader but maybe decent under Shadowland Daredevil as well.  Groot : Art update only.  Gwenom :  Hard to put down at 7/8. She's always been good but struggles to find a home. That likely won't change with the update but you don't have to feel bad at all for putting her in your squad if you're so inclined.  B+ Gwenpool :  Miss Pool has gained injured side Stamina and can now drop an objecitive to use her teleport. A small but helpful buff.  B Hawkeye :  Art Update only  Heimdall, the All-Seeing :  Art Update only Hela, Queen of Hel : Hela goes to 7/5. it means she doesn't die as easy on her injured side anymore.  C+ Honey Badger :  The spender gained a die...