Making basic universe, training, and tactic cards useful

[Nostalgic]

What's up guys. I see there is light traffic here, but its cool to see some are 'keeping it alive'.  When I started playing back in 95, I was in the 8th grade, and really only had one other friend who was into the game.  We decided to 'call' for all the characters we knew of at the time, like you call for your team in a pick-up basket ball game and gave each other the cards for our chosen characters as we bought packs individually.  So if I bought 5 boosters and had sabertooth and bishop cards I'd give them to him, and if he bought some packs he gave me which ever characters I had called for initially.   We mostly played throughout high school and some college, and after that very infrequently, but its always a blast when we do play.  We never went to tournaments, but had a ball bashing each other all the same. 

As I've gone online recently and learned about the tournament scene and the 'real' strategy behind the game (as it relates to not taking universe/tactic cards for card advantage) I must admit saddened me a little.  The whole concept of universe cards was one of the main appeals about the game to me.  Picking up a dumpster and hurling it, but then blocking it with a grenade was great fun for our imaginations back then.

It really bums me that the basic universe, training, and tactic cards are not used due to the discard factors and the concept of card advantage which basically makes any two cards combined to attack or defend less useful.  I understand it perfectly as far as strategy goes now, but I hate having all those cards wasted if you know what I mean.  I remember back in the day we were always trying to figure out how to make the biggest attack possible with universe and special bonuses and what not.  Anyway, my proposed solution to this is the location cards.
                                                       
Post Merge: July 22, 2011, 04:37:24 PM
   The "Rules"
The basic premise uses two game mechanics already we already know, how to play an event card and how to play an activator cards.  Here's how it would work.

A battle site may have basic universe cards placed under it and a homebase may have training and tactic cards placed under it.  For the battlesite, character cards that don't have corresponding specials under that battlesite can be used to retrieve basic universe cards.  In the case of the homebase, the character cards for the two heroes not used on your current team would be used to retrieve training and tactic cards. 

These 'activator' cards are played as follows:
If playing with event cards, after resolving the event, but before the discard phase the drawn character/activator card is traded for two (2) cards.   These 2 cards will be a basic universe card, from under the battlesite, and an additional card drawn from the draw pile.
This same mechanic would apply if one of the homebase characters/activator cards was drawn except it would be exchanged for a training or tactic card plus a card from the draw pile.  If using a 'generic homebase' use extra character cards of the reserve character as activators for training and tactic cards. 

After drawing the two cards, discard duplicates according to the normal rules and proceed with the regular order of battle.
No more than two characters can be assigned 'universe duty' in this way.  I'm not sure, but perhaps the universe, training, and tactic cards should be limited to no more than 1 or 2 of each specific type under the respective location cards. ('strength 7 to use +3' is still different from the fighting equivalent).

This idea is a little rough, but it takes care of the card advantage question and you're not getting any extra actions as your opponent will know the extra cards you have will have to be combined with a power card in your hand. (you could place them too)  It does mean you could have a starting hand of 10 cards, but once again you're still limited to 8 'real' actions.

So I'd really like some feedback.  What do you think?  Would that 'inspire you to use the basic universe, training, and tactic cards again?
Sorry about the long first post, but had alot to say!   

[Karmanal of Zert]

Interesting idea, I actually like this one better than the one proposed in your other thread. It even makes sense logically in the same way the battle sites allow you to use the characters' specials from that site as any-heroes (because you're fighting on their territory), it also makes sense to me that whatever super-heroes are wandering around the battle would also be able to help out by giving or directing their comrades to objects that can be used to their advantage. My brother and I haven't played with home bases or battle sites for our last few games but we were already planning on bringing them back for our next decks so I'll definitely be asking him if he wants to experiment with this concept. Thanks for sharing your cool OP ideas!

[Nostalgic]

There is a hybrid idea I came up with the other day that may work. I thought about posting my reply in the other thread, but since this involves the location cards I'll keep it here.  The battlesite would allow you to place universe cards to it just like you would a character.  The only difference is you could place up to 4  cards as long as they're not duplicates.  The Homebase would allow the placement of tactic and training cards, up to 4 total. Here's the key.  If you place a universe/ tactic card to a homebase or battlesite you get to draw a card to replace it, discarding duplicates of course.  Any character can use a card placed in that way as a part of an attack or defense.  Special cards that force you discard placed cards would affect the location cards the same way as a character.  In a way this is a combination of the two threads ideas and may be the 'solution' to making the cards more useful, but not making you want to load up on them for the automatic 'draw to replace' mechanic.  What do you think?

[Karmanal of Zert]

I told my brother about these ideas today so we may be trying them soon. This is probably your best idea yet, although I think whether one is using a home base or battle site shouldn't determine which kind of universe can be placed, in my opinion they should all be able to place BUs, trainings, and tactics. Also on the concept in the other thread of doing the drawing without the battle site or home base part of it, I think it would make for more exciting game play if you could only draw a card to replace the BU (for example) if it is used for defense, or if it is used for defense or a successful attack, or if it is used for defense or an unsuccessful attack. Otherwise it seems too easy to just know you're definitely going to be able to draw an extra card regardless, and I think doing it that way might spice it up a bit. And you could do it that way with or without the battle site/home base thing if you wanted to. I'll probably be trying some of these different variations and reporting on how the games go in these threads, hopefully others will do the same!

[Nostalgic]

On what you mentioned from the other thread, I think I would make more sense if the you only drew to replace on defensive acts and unsuccesssful universe/tactic attacks. 

My thinking with the difference of cards that could placed on a location card used as a homebase as opposed to a battlesite was simply to make a homebase seem more like the place a team would train or learn tactics, and the battlesite the place where the team find random stuff to bash with.  (When I was first typing it I was think of the X-Mansion, but I realize from the standpoint of 'any homebase' cards this makes less sense.) From a game mechanics point of view the rule would limit the number of cards in the 'universe pool' the team would have access to.  For example there couldn't be more than 4 BUs, and 4 Training, or Tactic cards placed to location cards at any time.  If all types of cards could be placed on both the homebase and the battlesite you could have up to 8 BU, training, or tactic (yea right  ) cards placed at once.  Perhaps not a real problem, but just didn't seem right.  Also since the location cards have different functions depending on how they are used I thought it also made sense for them to have different placement allowances.  To me it also seems kind of cool that a battlesite can be KO'd, taking away the advantage of drawing to replace placed BUs, (destruction of the general area of combat) but you would always be able to get that advantage for placing training and tactic cards on the homebase(can't take the 'knowledge' away).  [Not without a special card that is...  ] Anyway, due to the simplicity of this mechanic I definitely plan on trying it out in future games. Depending on how it goes, I may try allowing homebases to place up to 4 cards, 1 of which may be a BU.  Let me know how your experience goes. 

[Karmanal of Zert]

Yeah now that you've explained your reasoning as to why only certain types of Universe cards should be used depending on whether the location was used as a home base or battle site I actually think it makes perfect sense. It's very plausible that a home base would help out with tactics and training people and that a battle site would have the objects for attacking laying all around. I think that definitely could realistically replicate comic book situations, which is one of the greatest things about OverPower.