With Marvel’s popular and successful foray into films with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, I’ve finally decided to get back into comics. I grew up a big fan of X-Men and other superheroes but haven’t really kept up since the 90s. Thus begins my grand catching-up of the last ten years of Marvel comics, events and stories.

Thanks in large part to trade paperbacks and the digital convenience of Marvel Unlimited I can make relatively quick progress, and I’ll write down my Final Thoughts for each collection here on my blog. Like my gaming Final Thoughts, this will be full of spoilers. You’ve been warned!

Writers: Brian Michael Bendis

Artists: John Romita Jr.

Issues: Avengers (2010) #1-12, 12.1

Siege finally brought an end to Norman Osborn’s Dark Reign over the Marvelverse. Between the Civil War, the Secret Invasion and the Dark Reign, Marvel wanted to return to a simpler time of heroes versus villains, and so The Heroic Age was born.

The Heroic Age brought a reunion of many of our original Avengers like Thor, Captain America, and Iron Man, a team that hadn’t been together in over five years. Annoyingly, Wolverine also joined the team, despite also joining the concurrent New Avengers series and still being a member of the Uncanny X-Men and the new Uncanny X-Force. Spider-Man is also on both Avengers teams, what the crap.

The newly restarted Avengers series also gave us the old-school stylings of John Romita Jr, which I will readily admit to not liking. The heavy lines and flat faces just look odd, and the action never feels particularly dynamic.

The first volume thrusts our initial team of Thor, Iron Man, Bucky-as-Cap, Spider-Woman, Hawkeye, Spider-Man, and Wolverine into a time-distorting, dimensional-ripping, world-ending plot thanks to Kang the Conqueror and a future war with Ultron. There’s a funny moment where Kang appears and does the whole end of Back to the Future, “It’s your kids, something’s gotta be done about your kids” bit.

The plot goes in some confusing places, as most time-travel stuff does. The team recruits Noh-Varr, AKA Marvel Boy. I loved Bendis’ portrayal of the hot young stud that’s completely unfamiliar with Earth sayings and mannerisms, even though I’m pretty sure the Kree warrior has been around for years. Noh-Varr builds a time-machine and half the team goes into the future to investigate while the other half tries to deal with the insanity of time-ripping dimensions across New York City.

Normally this would be a fantastic backdrop for some grand scenes of destruction. But I don’t like Romita’s art style, so all that action fell flat for me. At one point the team fights Apocalypse and a crazy mutated version of his horsemen, and again the art just doesn’t do it justice, and Bendis writes Apocalypse all wrong (which is weird as he’s always great with Dr. Doom).

The future team meets up with old man Iron Man, old Hulk, and their kids (not THEIR kids, second generation Avenger kids in general). It delves into Kang’s history and backstory as a “time terrorist.” Finally they figure out this was all started because Kang kept pulling in heroes and villains from various timelines to try and defeat Ultron during his eventual rise to power in the future. Since Kang has power over time he can simply keep trying the same fight, and essentially destroys time itself. What a jerk.

After lots of hand-wringing the Avengers decide the only thing they can do is simply talk to Ultron and explain the situation. Since most superhero comics involve giant fights, I actually enjoyed this little twist at the end. They convince Ultron that if he resists and fights Kang, eventually everything is destroyed. So he has to lose on purpose. Ultron isn’t a dumb villain, and eventually agrees to fight again some day.

Bendis’ writing remains enjoyable. Nobody does inter-team banter as well as he does and I suspect the main reason he keeps dragging Spider-Man and Wolverine along is for their comic relief potential.

Volume 2 centers on a villain that Bendis desperately wants us to care about – The Hood. The former demon-possessing street-level villain rose to power during the Civil War and Dark Reign, and Bendis just can’t seem to let him go. He’s not a bad character but neither is he particularly compelling.

Here he manages to escape from prison and begin collecting the Infinity Gems, which were carefully guarded by each member of the Illuminati – Professor Xavier, Namor, Iron Man, Mr. Fantastic, Dr. Strange, and Blackbolt. The world has changed quite a bit since we first met the team years ago when they shipped Hulk off into space – mainly that Blackbolt is dead and the Inhumans aren’t even on Earth anymore. The Hood knows this, and their’s is the first gem he finds nestled where Attilan once stood.

The best thing Volume 2 does is add in Red Hulk, a character I’ve surprisingly enjoyed. For reasons that are never quite clear, the former General Ross takes a personal interest in stopping The Hood, and promptly gets his ass kicked after Hood acquires two gems. He swallows his pride and goes to the Avengers for help.

Stark gathers the Illuminati together to trace The Hood’s steps in gathering the gems. Commander Steve Rogers follows them, and we’re treated to the long-time-coming confrontation between the secretive Illuminati and the rest of the superhero community.

Rogers is understandably upset that a group of people (all men as Medusa points out) would take it upon themselves to make these big decisions – like hiding away the Infinity Gems. It’s a neat moment and Bendis is unafraid to have long, drawn out conversations for multiple pages. It helps that these pages are some of the best drawn of both Volumes.

The rest of the Volume is a race as our heroes split up to recover the last few gems before The Hood does. They acquire a few and have a big fight at the end against a powerful, but still vastly in over his head villain. The Hood is no Thanos, and wields the gems with reckless strikes rather than their full potential.

So in the end it simply comes down to a large fight, and our heroes eventually win thanks to Red Hulk swiping one of the gems. Iron Man whips out the Infinity Gauntlet, gathers the gems, and uses the power to reset everything back the way it was, honky dory. He then pretends to will them out of existence.

In secret he doles out the gems to his secret group once again. This time he includes Steve Rogers, to which Steve grudgingly acquiesces, which I found a bit odd. The whole arc felt rather pointless and surprisingly tame for involving the Infinity Gems. But Red Hulk does get to join the Avengers as an official member, and he seems like a good fit.

In terms of classic heroes versus villains, this Avengers series definitely checks all those boxes. I wasn’t a big fan of any of the villains that Bendis uses and I couldn’t get into the art. The actual dialogue remains enjoyable but overall it’s probably one of the weaker Avengers arcs I’ve read since I started reading comics again.

Watch our sessions live on my YouTube channel every Sunday night beginning at 9pm Central. Subscribe and catch up on previous episodes!

After the events of our previous campaign “The Lost Mine of Phandelver,” the party receives a job to escort a wagon East to Red Larch. On the way they encounter a retaliatory strike by some Cragmaw Hobgoblins, experience strange weather patterns, and suffer fitful nightmares of elemental forces destroying the world.

If you want to learn about our cast of heroes, see this post from before our first adventure, “The Lost Mine of Phandelver.”

The logical next step after “The Lost Mine of Phandelver” was to select another official published adventure for our new campaign. I really enjoy having everything already organized and planned out, and especially official maps of dungeons and the Since Phandelver only brought our heroes to level 4, I wanted to continue their journey. Out of all the official campaigns released thus far, “Princes of the Apocalypse” made the most sense to adapt it as a sequel to the events around Phandalin.

Because I’m adapting it as a sequel, I had to modify the beginning portions of the campaign. Our heroes begin in Phandalin and have to first make the long journey to Red Larch.

I gave them two of the adventure hooks suggested in the book – escort a wagon-load of ore from the mine, and accompany Sister Garaele. Both send them to Red Larch, but the journey should not be a simple quick montage.

There’s a huge list of random encounters presented in “Princes of the Apocalypse.” Instead of simply following the rules and rolling for a possible encounter every few steps, I chose to pre-determine when, where, and what an encounter would be. This allowed me to better tailor each situation and be far better prepared.

My players admitted they enjoyed the outside random encounters for the main reason that they could unleash everything, rather than having to mitigate their abilities like in the middle of a dungeon where resting is tough to come by. But I didn’t like whipping up purely random encounters and having to quickly shuffle over a generic map with tokens and rolling hit points. I found that having pre-determined encounters worked really well, and this session was praised for the interesting and more engaging encounters.

The first was a force of Hobgoblins mounted on Worgs, with a few wolves. They simply ran up behind the party and attacked, a retaliation strike force from the party’s previous invasion (and retreat) of their base in Cragmaw Castle. We hadn’t really done mounted combat before and for the purposes of this fight I simply treated them like separate entities. Thanks in part from a Level 2 Sleep spell the forces were easily dispatched.

Not every encounter need be a hostile enemy force, and I decided to present the ominous, unnatural weather as a literal destructive force. As the party continued East they were assailed by a ferocious windstorm, requiring STR saving throws followed by Acrobatics check. Some of the party were knocked down, while Talus actually failed so badly he was flung into a tree. Most of them lost most of their rations in the process. Kalinaar was hilariously shaken up about it. It’s hard to be Judge, Jury, and Executioner to the wind.

In Triboar the party resupplied and met up with Dara Shendrel. My players enjoy having some direction when it comes to being in town, and I pointed them towards the Home of the Boars lodge as the only notable location. Lord Protector Shendrel talked with them of the mysterious weather they’ve been having, as well as some missing persons they should look out for.

Traveling South along The Long Road the party soon had to cross the Haunted Bridge in the Black Maw Bog. Talus rolled a crit on his History check so I gave them some fun information on the history of the bridge and its magical properties.

I decided to incorporate the Red Larch side trek The Last Laugh here at the Haunted Bridge. Kethra found the skull and the arrow, then hilariously handed it off to Talus via Mage Hand. Talus received the laughing skull vision, and I had the party get attacked by ghouls that night to show off its effects. Unfortunately between Sister Garaele’s Turn Undead and the general strength of our heroes, I barely had a chance to show their fear of Talus before they were overrun and defeated.

We ended our session just as our party reached Westbridge. We covered a ton of ground in one session and everyone praised the variety of encounters and the ominous foreboding of the weather. Excited to reach Red Larch next week and dive into the main story of our new campaign.

Watch our sessions live on my YouTube channel every Sunday night beginning at 9pm Central. Subscribe and catch up on previous episodes!

Read the full list at Pixelkin.org

We’re at a point now where each month has a gaming, comic, or tabletop convention to be excited about. PAX South is now in its second year and has a much bigger focus on indie gaming. Few big publishers have much to show in January. Hopeful indie devs were there to fill the gap. Below is a list of some of the most notable games I saw at PAX South 2016.

Color Thief
Developer: Trouble Impact
Release: Early 2017
In a world of black and white, one chameleon discovers a hidden temple full of color. Our hero can absorb color from any object in the world and apply it anywhere else. Painting water creates a solid surface, while matching colors on a door opens it. Puzzles are forgiving and the non-violent world is kid-friendly.

Dead Star
Developer: Armature Studios
Release: Early 2016
Armature Studios had a neat booth capable of 5v5 matches in their top-down space shooter. The developers described Dead Star as a League of Legends-style MOBA in space. Players can choose between multiple classes and ship designs. Teams will need to work together to secure outposts on the map. The arcade-like gameplay was immediately fast and intuitive. The full game will allow 10v10 matches, leading to some deliciously chaotic space battles.

Read the full list at Pixelkin.org

With Marvel’s popular and successful foray into films with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, I’ve finally decided to get back into comics. I grew up a big fan of X-Men and other superheroes but haven’t really kept up since the 90s. Thus begins my grand catching-up of the last ten years of Marvel comics, events and stories.

Thanks in large part to trade paperbacks and the digital convenience of Marvel Unlimited I can make relatively quick progress, and I’ll write down my Final Thoughts for each collection here on my blog. Like my gaming Final Thoughts, this will be full of spoilers. You’ve been warned!

Writer: Brian Michael Bendis

Artists: Stuart Immonen, Daniel Acuna, Mike Deodato, Howard Chaykin

Issues: New Avengers (2010) #1-13

During the Civil War era the Avengers teams were split up, leading to two ongoing Avengers series. The official team and the unofficial rebels. I guess fans liked having two Avengers series, and Marvel kept them going even when it made a lot less sense. Even when multiple popular characters are on both Avengers teams!

With the main Avengers series starring the heavy hitters of Iron Man, Bucky-Cap, and Thor, the rest of the “Occasional Avengers” decide to move into the old Avengers mansion as an official second team. For some reason.

The team is lead by Luke Cage, whom writer Brian Michael Bendis has done a fantastic job with. The series is grounded by Luke Cage and Jessica Jones’ relationship as a superhero couple and new parents. Cage has grown into a wonderfully complex character and a great leader; he’s easily Bendis’ best legacy from his Avengers work (I would say the other is Spider-Woman, but she turned out to be the Skrull Queen sooo….).

Volume 1 introduces our team of Luke Cage, Jessica Jones, Mockingbird, Ms. Marvel, Wolverine, Spider-Man, Iron Fist, The Thing, and Victoria Hand – former right-hand woman of Norman Osborn. It’s an odd team, but the gender and diversity ratio is easily one of the better Avenger make-ups. Still, I can’t help but feel that part of the reason Bendis’ stuff is so satisfying and fun is that he gets his pick of the A-listers. Spider-man? The Thing? Wolverine? Sure, why not!

The initial plot brings Dr. Strange back to the team. In the previous iteration of New Avengers, Dr. Strange had lost the power of the Eye of Agomotto. It was bequeathed to a new Sorcerer Surpreme – Doctor Voodoo. I kinda dig Strange walking around all moody in a long coat still doing magic shit.

Somebody from another dimension seeks the Eye. Several members are possessed and enraged, and the sky cracks open as demons pour into our world. It boils down to an epic battle of survival while Strange and Voodoo concoct a magical way of dealing with everything.

Stuart Immonen’s art is an absolute treat. His style of clean lines and classic poses perfectly encapsulates the Marvel style, and works incredibly well for a main-line Avengers comic. Even the weird light-demons are all varied and cool. I particularity love all the double-page spreads we get, often several back-to-back.

In the end Doctor Voodoo sacrifices himself to defeat the Big Bad. His turnaround as Sorcerer Supreme was disappointingly short-lived (a year, maybe). The arc was really fun, showing off how the diverse team works together in a crisis, and also making all the magic mumbo-jumbo fun instead of eye-rollingly ridiculous.

That first Volume is a great start to a new Avengers series. It’s incredibly disappointing that Volume 2 then drops the ball so badly. An entire issue is devoted to finding a nanny for Luke and Jessica’s baby. An entire issue. It’s Squirrel Girl, by the way (good fit, but still).

The next issue mostly involves a date between Luke and Jessica, which I happened to enjoy. Bendis clearly loves Luke and their relationship. But again, an entire issue? They fight a doombot at the end, presumably because it’s a superhero comic and they have to fight something.

Issues #9-13 presents a weird A-B format. The present day story involves our team breaking up an ex-HAMMER ring of villains up to no good. There’s also a seemingly random past-tense story starring Nick Fury in the 50s as he creates a very weird Avengers team for a Nazi-hunting task.

The 50s story takes up way too much panel-time for how dumb it is. It also features some really terrible art that makes every character look oddly round and short. Nick Fury has never looked less menacing. It’s even more jarring as Mike Deodato, one of my favorite artists, handles the present day stuff. One artist per comic, please!

Example of the two different styles

At the very end it’s revealed that the McGuffin item the 50s team were after (which weirdly includes Kraven the Hunter and Sabretooth) is a super soldier serum. Our present-day team can then use that serum to save the life of Mockingbird, who was injured in the initial fight. Why we needed an entire B-story to explain Nick Fury knowing about the serum I have no idea. Mockingbird is saved from her multiple gunshot wounds but what powers or effects that manifest are yet to be seen.

Dividing the comic up into two stories (with two very different artists) was a poor choice, made even worse that neither story was the least bit interesting. It’s an awkward misstep for a promising Avengers series. I still actually prefer this team to the more famous team in the adjective-less Avengers (2010) series. Hopefully future stories will get back on track, and stick with a better artist.

Read the full Review at Pixelkin

Over a decade ago Final Fantasy fans were presented with an odd spinoff. Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles used a much more action-oriented, real-time combat system. The big hook was allowing friends to venture together in a static world, not unlike your typical online role-playing game.

Final Fantasy Explorers offers the same quest-driven gameplay with a threadbare story and piles of loot to collect and craft. Online multiplayer lets you play together with up to three other explorers using a variety of classic Final Fantasy classes such as Black Mage, Knight, and Ranger. Fans of Crystal Chronicles and online RPGs may find some enjoyment, though the action can quickly grow repetitive if playing alone.

Read the full Review at Pixelkin

Watch our sessions live on my YouTube channel every Sunday night beginning at 9pm Central. Subscribe and catch up on previous episodes!

Previously on “Princes of the Apocalypse” 

Our party finally makes it to Red Larch. The main adventure hook of the missing delegation begins, as well as hints and teases to troubles around the area, and within the town itself.

Dungeons are easy. Towns full of NPCs are hard. In terms of pure DM prepwork. Sure, I don’t have to align grids or create monster sheets or roll for hit points. Instead I have to perfectly layer in the story hooks, quests, and information available to the players. I can’t say too much so they have an opportunity to investigate on their own. But I have to say enough to get them invested and on the right track. It’s a tricky balance, and “Princes of the Apocalypse” is particularly open-ended when it comes to following leads and deciding where to go.

Red Larch is the Phandalin of this adventure. It’s a fleshed out town full of dozens of NPCs, business, and locations. For our previous adventure I highlighted which NPCs had information or a quest for our heroes – not unlike the floating yellow exclamation point that many RPGs use. I did a smiliar thing here, using a player map version of Red Larch and only annotating the important areas.

Since we’re starting at level 4, I’m omitting most of the newbie stuff, which also eliminates a good chunk of the NPCs. I know my players, and I know they are not interested in wandering around town striking up conversations with random people. That’s not to say they don’t enjoy role-playing, but they enjoy having a bit of guidance – me presenting them with a situation, rather than they exploring and seeking one out.

I also know that introducing a stream of NPCs with generic fantasy names and one sentence descriptions was not terribly memorable. I tried to incorporate the Game of Thrones style of consolidation – less characters (than the books), and make the ones you use more important. I think this served us well as I was able to concentrate on fewer characters to provide bigger swaths of information and dialogue. Namely – Lymmura at the shrine, Maegla at the clothiers, Endrith at the general store, and Kayelssa at the inn.

We actually had a bit of travel left before we reached Phandalin. As I mentioned in my previous recap, I created encounters rather than randomize them. Though I did base them on random encounters from the book. In this case, reaching the Sumber Hills triggered the Bandit Robber encounter.

I had a lot of fun role-playing the smarmy highwaymen posing as local militia and rangers. I also made sure not to show the grid map until combat finally triggered. To my players’ credit, they tried bribing the bandits twice to avoid a confrontation. But the bandits wanted the contents of the wagon so badly. I also showed off the rock armor guards of the Black Earth, teasing one of the elemental cults.

I knew the PCs had two locations they wanted to visit to complete their current quests – Bethendur’s Storage and the Allfaiths Shrine. With the storage business I had a bit of fun, trying to charge the players rather than rewarding them as was promised by Gundren in Phandalin. Instead of arguing much, they agreed to simply sell the ore to Bethendur directly for a tidy sum. No persuasion checks required as I enjoyed this surprising outcome.

At the Allfaiths Shrine the PCs were set to drop off Sister Garaele. I made this a more interesting area by having the town responding to an earthquake at the quarry (the same quake caused a landslide for the PCs as they exited the hills). The clerics were busy healing the injured, and Kalinaar jumped in with some Lay on Hands to help out. Lymmura was grateful and told them about the missing delegation, the weird weather, and some shifty town elders.

Lymmura pointed them to the Clotheir’s across the street. Maegla and her husband are members of the Lord’s Alliance. She’s also the only NPC to get her own pic in the book, so I used her as my main quest-giver. She detailed the Missing Delegation, giving all the clues she knows and explaining the missing diplomats. The PCs were intrigued, especially as one of them has certain familial ties to the party’s monk, Miri. She also spoke of shifty town elders, and pointed the PCs to Kalyessa at the Inn.

Having NPCs point to other NPCs helped guide the players to each area. Sister Garaele whispered to Talus that Endrith Vallivoe was a fellow Harper agent. He ran the general store on the South side of town, and the party briefly broke up as Talus went to speak with him. Endrith told Talus of the missing dwarven sage and his books from the delegation that need be recovered. Endrith had found what he thinks is one of the books (Talus, able to read Dwarvish, confirmed) and told Talus it had come from Womford.

At the inn the rest of the party talked to Kaylessa, asking about the weather and the missing delegation. A traveling priest overheard the conversation and admitted to being in Beliard about two weeks ago. He had definitely seen the large entourage of the delegation there, and was surprised they hadn’t arrived in Red Larch. I stressed and explained as much of the delegation’s purpose and size, and my players felt satisfied that this was an important, critical group of people they need to find.

We had gotten a bit of a late start and were approaching our cut off time, so nightfall at the inn made for a good stopping point. We ended up covering most of what Red Larch has to offer in terms of locations and NPCs – with one major exception that our heroes will discover next week!

Watch our sessions live on my YouTube channel every Sunday night beginning at 9pm Central. Subscribe and catch up on previous episodes!

Read the full review on Pixelkin

Available on: PC, Mac, Linux
Reviewed on: PC

XCOM 2 is the sequel to the surprisingly awesome 2012 reboot XCOM: Enemy Unknown. The sequel retains the same nail-biting tactical combat while adding new aliens, new soldiers, new maps, and a rejiggered strategy layer that paints XCOM as the resistance to our new alien overlords.

XCOM 2’s premise makes an incredibly bold choice – we lost the war. As a series XCOM has become famous for being brutally difficult. Developer Firaxis ran with this and declared that we lost the war in the first game. Thirty years later Earth is under control of the supposedly peace-bringing aliens. But like the old TV show “V” the aliens have sinister plans.

Read the full review on Pixelkin

With Marvel’s popular and successful foray into films with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, I’ve finally decided to get back into comics. I grew up a big fan of X-Men and other superheroes but haven’t really kept up since the 90s. Thus begins my grand catching-up of the last ten years of Marvel comics, events and stories.

Thanks in large part to trade paperbacks and the digital convenience of Marvel Unlimited I can make relatively quick progress, and I’ll write down my Final Thoughts for each collection here on my blog. Like my gaming Final Thoughts, this will be full of spoilers. You’ve been warned!

Writer: Matt Fraction

Artist: Greg Land

Issues: Uncanny X-Men (1963) #520-522, 526-534

The third and final collected book of Matt Fraction’s three year run on Uncanny X-Men is awkwardly sandwiched before and after X-Men: Second Coming. Issues #520-522 even carry the “Nation X” subheading, referring to a series of events that happens to the X-Men while living in Utopia. The rest take place after Second Coming, with the first story arc dealing with the direct aftermath of Hope Summers and the rise of several new mutants.

Why Marvel broke it up like that I have no idea. The Volume itself isn’t bad but it lacks strong cohesion. At this point in the X-Men’s career they appear to be spinning their wheels in between the giant events. Messiah Complex and Second Coming were both incredibly awesome. But the in-between stories barely get a chance to gestate and mostly come off half-baked.

The first three issues conclude the “Nation X” arc from the last volume. It wasn’t really a story arc so much as the state of affairs for the X-Men at the time. The mansion was destroyed during Messiah Complex, so they moved out west to San Francisco. Then they ran into typical X-Men problems of distrust and hate, tangled with Osborn’s Dark Avengers, and helped fish Magneto’s old Asteroid M out of the sea and created an island for mutants, dubbed Utopia.

Magneto had arrived in Utopia and bent the knee to Cyclops. Cyclops had created a sovereign state for mutants, and even Magento had to respect that. Magneto can be a great character with the right writer. Matt Fraction spends much of Magneto’s time acting needy and seeking approval from the X-Men. Sure he’s pompous and cold, but it still annoyed me.

Magneto stars in this final little arc to fully prove himself to the X-Men. He goes off to a mountain range and pulls all his power together to bring back the long-lost Kitty Pryde. Pryde had been MIA since the climactic events of Joss Whedon’s excellent story-telling on Astonishing X-Men way back in 2004-2008.

Unfortunately Pryde has been phased for so long her condition has become permanent, so she’s rescued but forced into a special containment area. We get her back but she’s completely absent throughout Second Coming thanks to her condition, which is super disappointing.

Issues #526-529 focuses on the aftermath of Second Coming. Hope Summers has finally returned to the present time, and she’s all grown up. The mutant messiah has been a fun character to watch evolve over the last few years, and her struggles and battles in Second Coming were fantastic.

Her relationship with Cyclops has always been strained (Cyke with all the X-Men now, really). Cyclops is finally validated when he sees several new mutant signature pop up on Cerebra – a new generation of mutants. The first since Scarlet Witch spoke those three little words and doomed their race.

The five new mutants are called “The Five Lights,” and it’s also the name of this story. Cyclops splits up the X-Men and sends them around the world to monitor the new mutants, all of whom change in violent ways. Hope can seemingly calm them down and help them unlock their powers, giving further credence to her role as the mutant messiah. Presumably this story continues in its own series titled Generation Hope, which I plan on reading through soon. The new teenage mutants all seem like neat additions, and appropriately international and diverse.

There’s also a long side story involving Emma Frost. Frost is increasingly worried about an event that happened earlier in the series. She had tricked Namor into thinking she killed Sebastian Shaw, her old mentor turned enemy from the Hellfire Club. Namor was so impressed he then joined the X-Men and helped create Utopia. Frost didn’t kill him though. Shaw has been in Utopia’s brig the whole time.

For some reason Frost decides she needs to essentially take him out back and get rid of him. She enlists Fantomex to help her, but Kitty Pryde finds out and comes along too. Hey at least they found something for her to do! And also gets a special suit that lets her interact with things, how convenient.

We get a lot more of Emma Frost’s background, which has already been done to death. At the end Shaw briefly escapes and they battle it out before she can lock him down. Super strength has its uses but it’s nothing compared to a world-class telepath that can completely blank your mind.

The final arc, “Quarantine” (#530-534) revisits the villainous Sublime company that Fraction had been working on earlier in the series. Lobe is a slimy businessman who wants to commercialize a drug that turns people into mutants. Synthesizing the X-gene seems like a rather shocking thing, but it’s mostly played off as just another bad guy with another evil plan. At least Lobe is more slimy businessman than megalomaniac.

The first part of the plan is to create a virus that only affects mutants. Cyclops issues a quarantine for the whole island, leaving only a few outside able to respond to threats. There’s a weird side story with a few D-list X-Men like Northstar and Dazzler fighting a Chinese dude called The Collective Man that mostly goes nowhere. I did enjoy X-Club scientist’s Kavita Rao’s efforts to examine the virus and the X-Men’s struggles with their PR image during the outbreak.

Eventually the virus is traced back to the sublime corporation and Cyke is forced to break quarantine to confront them. Lobe gives all his shareholders the mutant drug and there’s a big ridiculous battle that’s over rather quickly, since shareholders, even superpowered ones, don’t know what the hell they’re doing in a fight.

Greg Land’s art style continues to annoy me. Every character is a pin-up or supermodel. It’s incongruous to any action scene. Cyclops’ wavy hair drives me crazy. Everyone is super clean and pretty, and it completely weirds me out.

Fraction does a decent job with the writing side. There’s always a lot going on, and I liked that the Shaw-Frost storyline ended with a satisfying conclusion. Ultimately this era of Uncanny X-Men will be remembered for the awesome big events and crossovers; less so for individual story-telling.

Watch our sessions live on my YouTube channel every Sunday night beginning at 9pm Central. Subscribe and catch up on previous episodes!

Previously on “Princes of the Apocalypse” 

The town of Red Larch received a real kick in the teeth when a giant sinkhole appeared in the middle of town. The sinkhole opened a path into a hidden underground dungeon. The micro-dungeon teased some magic stones, and lead our heroes to their first real taste of Elemental Evil.

The Player Characters had nearly explored the entirety of Red Larch last week. At least the sections that were relevant to our adventure. I teased a bit more information in the form of a whistle-blowing employee at the wagon-repair shop. The PCs headed over to the tavern to seek him out.

When describing places in town, I specifically mention any important NPCs. I picture them as hotspots in an Adventure game or Exclamation Points in an RPG. My players like having the guidance and direction, and it helps cut down on time.

The local tavern – The Helm at Highsun – contained a half-orc fighter, an old shepherd, and our anxious halfling. The halfling spilled the beans on his boss Wulver, telling the party about a possible secret cellar entrance he’s seen the town elders use. The half-orc confirmed that the missing delegation had been in Beliard. I also had her aggressively come on to Talus, to the humorous delight of everyone.

The old shepherd told the party about some shallow graves he’d found while out grazing his sheep. The graves aren’t far from the tower to the East of town.

The party had all their clues and places to go, including one right here in town. They deliberated momentarily, ultimately deciding to head out and return to the cellar entrance at night. A good plan. However, the “Princes of the Apocalypse” book had a trick up its sleeve to force the players into the Tomb of Moving Stones dungeon where the PCs find it or not – the sinkhole.

I wanted the PCs to tackle this dungeon first before heading out. It’s a small, low-level dungeon with some nice little story bits and teases for the wider world and plot. The “Princes of the Apocalypse” book has a neat mechanic to force the PCs into it by opening up a sinkhole in the middle of town.

I enjoy dramatic moments and crises that don’t involve direct combat. Pits, traps, chaotic weather, etc. It’s surprising how engaging these moments can be. Our heroes sprang into action, and everyone combined their powers to help save the folks that fell in the hole, including several children. Talus levitated a flailing Kalinaar, Miri slow-fall’d down, and Kethra grabbed a rope.

The sinkhole isn’t actually deadly, despite dropping down to a 30 foot cavern. The soft earth breaks up anyone’s fall, and it’s a natural slope, not a sheer cliff. The whole town quickly gathered around. Most helped the PCs rescue their fallen neighbors. A few were anxious and shouted about disturbing “The Delvers.”

Our heroes took a pro-active approach and began exploring the cavern. Maegla promised to stall the authorities as long as she could, grateful for her rescued children. The party quickly realized one tunnel lead up to Wulver’s Wagonworks, while the East lead deep into a series of rock-hewn chambers.

The party then proceeded to take the optimal path through the dungeon purely on accident. They completed avoided the cage trap in T3. Instead they headed North and fought the Giant Rats in T5. I slightly upped their number due to the PCs much higher level, but they’re still ultimately rats (though Miri took a ton of hits).

T6 leads to the floating stone that Talus was utterly fascinated with. Through Investigation and Detect Magic he found the enchanted pillar and performed a number of experiments while the rest of the party patiently waited. I finally had to gave a gentle ‘move along’ suggestion!

T7 is full of loot, including a fancy dagger that I thought Kethra the rogue would be interested in. Instead she was far more fascinated with the gems and coins on the floor. The party decided to head West and stumbled into the half-orc guard. To their credit they tried to talk him down but Kalinaar failed the Persuasion check. A fight broke out, and swiftly ended. A single thug is no match for a party of four level 4 adventurers.

A captive child was kept in T4, mostly as a fountain of information on the Believers – the town elders that worship the Delvers down here. Heading East the PCs ran into Baragustas, a Believer who’s basically just chilling. He’s scared of the party and makes no effort to detain them, and is basically there in case the PCs don’t find Braelen, I suspect.

Finally we make it to the final room, the chamber of floating stones. A golden mask wearing priest is down here, and he’s not too friendly. He briefly admits to manipulating the town for his own ends thanks to their superstitious beliefs. When the heroes prepare to attack, a chanting group of cloaked figures appears behind them – the Bringers of Woe, and Larrakh the priests’ loyal disciples.

It was late in our session but I really wanted to get through this whole dungeon. The final battle wasn’t all that difficult. This is a level 2 dungeon that I adjusted by having the level 4 PCs fight both the six Bringers of Woe and spell-slinging Earth Priest together. Larrakah had heard the PCs coming thanks to their conversation with Baragustas, and cast Spider Climb. This let him stay out of melee range on the ceiling.

Unfortunately for him Kethra is still quite deadly with her crossbow, as well as sneaking around behind the stones. The party also did an annoyingly good job staying quite separated in the large room, preventing Larrakh from ever getting a decent AOE blast with his powerful Shatter spell. The one tense moment came when he cast it at Level 3 directly at Talus, recognizing a powerful mage when he sees one. Talus made the saving throw and survived, barely.

Talus cast Fog Cloud on the Bringers of Woe and Kalinaar charged inside, letting him tie up most of the fodder. Miri and Kethra cleaned up the rest.

Not wanting to die there in the chamber, Larrakh fled after a particularly brutal crossbow bolt. To my surprise most of the party Dashed right after him. Talus used one of his Divination Die, a 1, to cause Larrakh’s Earth Tremor spell to critically fail.

My plan was to use the spell to trigger the collapse of the hidden tunnel in the Southeast corner. Instead Larrakh casts it on himself, trapping himself beneath the rubble. Talus swiftly followed up with a Sleep spell, and now they have a captive!

The Bringers of Woe were easily dispatched – Kalinaar could one-hit kill them, and thanks to Cleave he could even kill two in one turn. They have the stat block of bandits and are not terribly impressive. Even so Talus nearly ate it with that spell, and Miri had to be healed after the rat fight.

Not every dungeon has to be a brutal slog. Even though the Tomb of Moving Stones is entirely optional in the grand scheme of the plot, I enjoyed its layout and structure, and how it ties into the events of Red Larch and Elemental Evil. With Larrakh as a captive, the PCs will be able to gain even more knowledge about the surrounding events. The Dessarin Valley now truly opens up, and the main campaign begins in earnest. Oh, and our PCs gained enough XP for Level 5. All this and more next week!

Watch our sessions live on my YouTube channel every Sunday night beginning at 9pm Central. Subscribe and catch up on previous episodes!

Read the full article and interview on Pixelkin

We’ve come a long way since the days of Mortal Kombat and Senate hearings on video games. In the last decade gaming has earned mainstream acceptance. Everyone games, whether it’s a teenager gunning down strangers online in Call of Duty, a child playing Minecraft with friends, or a grandparent playing Candy Crush on their phone.

For the most part gaming is still considered a purely leisure activity. That doesn’t mean that we can’t learn from video games and what makes them so successful. Gaming concepts like achievements and intrinsic motivation can help inspire students in the classroom to improve their grades and attitudes toward learning.

During PAX South 2016 I attended a panel by orchestra director and music teacher Ashley Brandin titled, “You Have Died of Dysentery: Meaningful Gaming in Education.”

Read the full article and interview on Pixelkin

Read the full Review at CG Magazine

When Tim Schafer put out his Kickstarter video for the 2012 Double Fine Adventure campaign, he jokingly mentioned that all the good Adventure games were being made in Germany—he was not wrong.

While many American studios are creating narrative-focused Adventure games (like Telltale), a number of European developers continue to release Point and Click Adventure games. These games revel in the nostalgic Golden Age of the 90s with hefty inventory puzzles, whimsical humor, and beautiful art work. Heaven’s Hope is a wonderful example of these qualities, and a particularly effective entry point thanks to its keen puzzle organization and variety.

Read the full Review at CG Magazine

Watch our sessions live on my YouTube channel every Sunday night beginning at 9pm Central. Subscribe and catch up on previous episodes!

Previously on “Princes of the Apocalypse” 

The aftermath of the scandalous town elder – secret cult revelation lead to some fun role-playing. Our heroes then leveled up to 5 and left Red Larch to follow one of their leads – some shallow graves near the mysterious white tower in the hills.

I’m never quite sure how a purely role-playing section is going to pan out. My players feel most comfortable rooting through dungeons and killing bad guys. Occasionally some big dialogue sessions can occur, and the enjoyment level seems to fluctuate depending on the mood of the table and the players’ interest levels in the NPCs and plot.

In this case my players got to be the triumphant heroes, having defeated Larrakh and exposed Red Larch’s town elders as a creepy, murderous cult.

Kalinaar immediately took an authoritative position and waved his Tyr flag around. Since the Knights of Samular are a major part of the Dessarin Valley, I had the town acquiesce to his leadership and rank (and the Constable was way over his head anyway).

I enjoyed how they handled Larrakh – a captive prisoner thanks to Talus. Talus secretively cast Charm Person, leading Larrkah to willingly give up information in a friendly manner. I did have to change and mostly dial back what he knew from the “Princes of the Apocalypse” book, as I wasn’t quite ready for my players to have that information, and I guess the book doesn’t account for the PCs taking him alive. I did give them one very important piece of information – the location of the Sacred Stone Monastery.

Kalinaar wanted to execute Larrakh there in front of the whole town but the rest of the party defended him, suggesting he go to Waterdeep to stand trial. Thanks to Larrakh’s cooperative mood, they won out, and Kalinaar stayed his hand. It was a very fun bit of role-playing. Moments where my players can RP without my direct involvement is definitely a treat for me.

At this point the main campaign begins in earnest. The party has several clues and leads with which to track down the missing delegation. They went with the closest one – the shallow graves South of the white Spire near Red Larch.

The journey was less than a day and uneventful. At the graves my players were more bewildered and confused by the bodies and the pitched battle that had taken place. Just as they were scratching their heads about what to do, I unleashed an attack.

“Princes of the Apocalypse” has detailed reprisals, counter attacks, and random events to help fill the gaps between major events. In this case I used the Skyriders reprisal. I had teased the giant birds and mounted knights throughout the last few sessions, always hanging around in the air scouting the heroes.

However because everyone leveled up to five this session, I had to scale everything up a bit. The attack consisted of two Feathergale Knights mounted on two Giant Vultures. Each also had a second rider, two Hurricanes. They all had wingwear, and the plan was for the monks to fly down and engage while the knights threw spears and the vultures swooped in and out.

It wasn’t meant to be a super difficult fight, and the party was fully rested. Even so I underestimated their ability to incapacitate their foes. Talus the wizard is especially keen on this tactic, picking up new 3rd level spells Counterspell and Hypnotic Pattern. Both would prove very useful.

I rolled pretty badly on initiative. The knights went early and ineffectively threw spears. Kalinaar used Abjure Enemy on one Vulure to reduce its speed to 0, and it crashed to the ground. Talus used Hypnotic Pattern on the other with the same effect. So much for aerial combat!

I had the knights roll Acrobatics checks to stay seated while the vultures crashed, and both rolled over 15. The Hurricanes went next and I had them unfurl the wingwear and glide in the middle of the fight, both of them unleashing Thunderwaves!

The first one I rolled near max damage, but Talus Counterspell’d it. Between Sleep and Hypnotic Pattern, the fight was over fairly quickly. Kethra was excited to loot the wingwear, and I had them find the map of Sighing Valley on one of the knights. Now the party had a way to get to the tower, and possibly some answers.

The fight wasn’t terribly damaging but it did drain Talus’ spells slots. I used the Sighing Valley map directly in Roll20, with each square representing about 250 feet. They couldn’t cross the river but they could either follow it North, or hug the canyon wall toward the spire. They opted to go toward the canyon to seek out shelter for a long rest.

I’d grabbed several battlemaps depending on where they went, and was prepared for the canyons. The party stumbled upon several Griffon nests, and the large creatures attacked! This was also not a particularly tough fight (Medium for four level 5’s) but the party was somewhat damaged and drained from the last one. In one strike thanks to a Crit and max damage, one griffon did 30 damage to Kalinaar, shocking everyone and nearly dropping him.

My players had an odd strategy where they purposefully damaged all three of them equally instead of ganging up on them. Kalinaar got his vengeance in the end, killing two of them in one turn thanks to Cleave.  I love that my players feel stronger, but area also battling strong foes that make them nervous. I especially enjoyed when Talus opened with a level 2 sleep spell (rolling quite well), only to fight that Griffons generally have more than 45 hit points (their AC is terrible, however).

The party found shelter and were able to get a Long Rest and examine the wingwear. They were excited, though the limited charges put a damper on Kethra’s dreams of testing it out. I like the way the Valley is set up and hopefully my system of using it as an overland map works well as we make our way to the Spire next week.

Watch our sessions live on my YouTube channel every Sunday night beginning at 9pm Central. Subscribe and catch up on previous episodes!

With Marvel’s popular and successful foray into films with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, I’ve finally decided to get back into comics. I grew up a big fan of X-Men and other superheroes but haven’t really kept up since the 90s. Thus begins my grand catching-up of the last ten years of Marvel comics, events and stories.

Thanks in large part to trade paperbacks and the digital convenience of Marvel Unlimited I can make relatively quick progress, and I’ll write down my Final Thoughts for each collection here on my blog. Like my gaming Final Thoughts, this will be full of spoilers. You’ve been warned!

Writer: Ed Brubaker

Artist: Mike Deodato

Issues: Secret Avengers (2010) #1-12

In 2009 Steve Rogers returned from the minor setback of death. To be fair he was dead quite awhile in comic-time (several years). It caused quite an upheaval for the Avengers, and lead to some of Ed Brubaker’s best work on the continuing Captain America series at the time starring Bucky Barnes (ex-Winter Soldier) as the new Cap.

So when Steve Rogers returns, he actually doesn’t want the shield back. The world is a far darker place, and he doesn’t want the political climate of fear to lead to another Civil War between superheroes. And Bucky’s done a pretty decent job as a new gun-toting Cap.

Instead, Steve starts his own Secret Avengers team where he takes on more of a Nick Fury role. It’s similar to when Cyclops created X-Force, only way less bloody. This is a team that sneaks in and gets shit done before it hits the fan.

It’s also a pretty wacky group that works surprisingly well: Steve and Agent 13 (Sharon Carter), Black Widow, Moon Knight, Ant-Man (the sassy Eric O’Grady version), Valkyrie, Beast, War Machine, and sort-of Nova. I say sort-of because he needs rescuing in the very first story, and afterward goes off to do more Cosmic-level stuff.

In both Bendis Avengers series that start around this time, the groups team up and immediately have to deal with some crazy situation, from time-travel to demons. Here Brubaker layers in a Hydra-esque plot that feels both natural and crazy.

In “Mission to Mars” (1-5) a hidden installation is discovered on the red planet. Nova goes in first, only to succumb to a powerful artifact that possesses him. The rest of the team hightails it up there and splits up to try and both rescue him and take him down.

Meanwhile we’re steadily teased with our new villains, including a Nick Fury clone called Max, a nearly-immortal cowboy-turned-businessman named Thorndrake, and undead mastermind Zheng Zu. Most stories are only as good as their villains, and here Secret Avengers really nails the intrigue. Max even gets his whole backstory explained, courtesy of the real Nick Fury in a fun one-off issue (#6).

The first story is an action-packed romp but ultimately pulls the cliché superhero finale of just working together to punch down the big bad. The plot improves immeasurably when our teased villains take center stage in the following story arc, “Eyes of the Dragon” (#7-10).

Secret Avengers basically does a mystical Kung Fu story featuring Marvel’s own thinly veiled Bruce Lee, Shang-Chi. His evil sorcerer father is returning and needs his son’s blood to fully resurrect. The Secret Avengers engage in a protection mission, then a rescue mission as plans go awry and secrets revealed.

Steve really shows off his battlefield tactics and leadership throughout each comic, setting up ambushes and keeping an ace up his sleeve – or in this case, an Ant-Man on the enemy ship.

Artist Mike Deodato is a perfect fit for these relatively low-powered heroes as most of the battles come down to melee attacks. Deodato is easily one of my favorite Marvel artists and his work here is just sublime. The fight scenes are an amazing ballet of punches and kicks and each page is a dynamic variety of box-in-box, slanted panels, and other awesome staging sequences.

The final two issues focus on yet another interesting villain that’s added to the mix: super-soldier John Steele. Steele used to fight alongside Captain America in WW2 (like every other superhero apparently), but clearly something went on between then and now.

Cap captures Steele and uses some mind-probing technology from Beast to try and suss out the problem in issues #11-12. It mostly just leads to more questions but it’s a fun ride. Brubaker loves jumping back into WW2 stories as much as he can.

Of the three post-Dark Reign Avengers series I’ve read, Secret Avengers is far and away the strongest opener. The team is fun and diverse, the villains intriguing, and the plot is a deft blend of reasonable and outlandish. Come for the fun team and plot, but stay for the phenomenal art work.

Read the full review at Pixelkin

Fire Emblem may not be as recognizable as Final Fantasy or Pokémon. But it is one of the most prolific franchises in gaming. Fire Emblem Fates combines the series’ trademark chess-like battles with building up relationships between your soldiers. The tale of family, love, and war remains captivating throughout each tactical battle.

The immediate biggest difference between Fire Emblem Fates and 2013’s Fire Emblem Awakening is the split story and dual release. Early on your avatar is forced to choose between two warring factions. It’s a critical decision that determines whom your allies and enemies will be for the rest of the game. It’s also decided for you depending on which version you buy.

Read the full review at Pixelkin

Watch our sessions live on my YouTube channel every Sunday night beginning at 9pm Central. Subscribe and catch up on previous episodes!

Previously on “Princes of the Apocalypse” 

A standard monster-filled dungeon can be fun, but I really enjoy when an area has some unique twist about it aside from room-to-room monster-bashing. The Feathergale Spire is a neat four-story tower filled with seemingly innocuous knights and aerial enthusiasts.

The encounter can transpire in numerous ways depending upon how the PCs react. Nothing is more fun to me as a DM than listening to my players hastily deliberate on a course of action, each crazier than the last.

First the party had to make it to the spire. When we left off they’d just killed a bunch of griffons in the Sighing Valley and found an alcove to rest in. When they awoke I had a group of aarokocra find them. The aarokocra were wary but curious. It was a fun opportunity for some unique role-playing, as neither party could understand each other.

Talus rolled really well on a History check and I gave him some information on these bird-like humanoids – mainly that they’re not evil and often fight forces of elemental evil. Numerous drawing, pointing, and miming ensued which was delightfully funny.

Talus would eventually cast Comprehend Languages (gotta love when seemingly mundane spells become very useful), and I would give them a bit more direct information – drawing a symbol over the tower, skull and crossbones nearby, question mark over the gully, and a hidden trail that lead up to the tower.

One of my players had a supremely clever moment. When the aarakocra demanded the return of the griffon eggs, Kethra stealthily grabbed two rocks, cast Disguise Self, and turned the rocks into the eggs. Then she carefully went back toward the nests and returned them to a safe spot, without letting the bird-men inspect them. It felt very sneaky and rogue-like, and earned her a point of inspiration.

I didn’t want my players scratching their heads over how to gain entrance to the tower. I also wanted them to approach the normal entrance as I had a surprise up my sleeve. For that reason I pointed out an easy trail they could take up the canyon wall that lead right to it – and they eagerly took it.

Journeying near the river did come with a combat encounter with a pack of gnolls. I let the PCs all have a surprise round since they were prepared for danger (the aarakocra had pointed out as much). I only slightly scaled this encounter up since it’s designed for level 3-ish and the PCs are all level 5.

Well, they absolutely slaughtered the gnolls. Talus unleashed a fireball right in their surprised faces, dropping half of them (I actually rolled crazy well for the saves) and critically wounding the rest. Out of six gnolls and a pack lord I think I got exactly two attacks off! We made fun of the fact that the party had just come across a peaceful gnoll family out having a river-side picnic, and had murdered them all.

At the entrance to the spire the party rang the bell before the drawbridge. Savra, a new Feathergale Knight, greeted them with a rehearsed introduction to the Feathergale Society of Aerial Enthusiasts. She stopped short when she saw her childhood friend Miri.

One thing I really want to improve over our last campaign is to incorporate my players’ backgrounds into the story. My players all did really great jobs crafting their characters and I really want to take advantage of their past relationships, deeds, and place in the world.

Miri is a runaway from Waterdeep Nobility and the Feathergale Knights are mostly made up of Waterdeep Nobles. Savra was delighted to see her old friend, and immediately invited them inside to show them around. Miri perked up and ran with it very well, while the others followed suit.

Getting a guided tour through a potential dungeon is a unique twist. When they made it to the pinnacle they met Lord Commander Thurl Merosska. Thurl invited them to the 10th anniversary feast that evening. The party were a whirlwind of conflicting emotions. I’m not sure if Miri hadn’t failed the Persuasion check for Savra to leave them alone at the top if they hadn’t just attempted to push Thurl off the edge and start a giant combat sequence right then and there.

Instead they were escorted down to a room, and I was treated to a fantastic sequence of player deliberation. I love it when my players are given an open-handed task or intriguing bit of information, and have to discuss it among themselves. I let it go on for quite awhile as I just loved every bit of it – even Kethra’s increasingly zany ideas to get around (climbing up the tower walls, Sleeping the guards in the Great Hall and taking their uniforms, etc).

They settled on trying to knock out the guards in the Great Hall, but they also Short Rested while in there. When they emerged the Great Hall was filled with knights ready for the feast, so for now the PCs went along with it.

They cut right to the chase when Thurl asked of their problems, showing them the wingwear they looted off the knights that attacked them. Thurl was troubled, but before they could discuss it further, a knight burst through the doors. They’d found a manticore, and the hunt was on!

I teased the beast a bit earlier in their first meeting with Thurl. The PCs jumped at the chance to dogfight a manticore in the air. I had them roll Animal Handling checks with a 10+ giving them control of their own hippogriff. Talus had to hang on to Kalinaar as they took off.

Meanwhile Kethra decided she had her own plan. In typical Kethra fashion, she neglected to inform the rest of the party, which definitely brought us back to her zany actions in our Shadowrun days.

Kethra pretended to be sick and didn’t go on the manticore hunt, which lead to a bit of multitasking on my part. While the others went with the knights to hunt the beast, Kethra lured Savra into a room and tried to cast Sleep on her. She shrugged it off. “I quickly punch her in the face,” was his reply, and we erupted in shocked laughter. Really wanting to see where this was going, I let him us his point of inspiration to deliver a knock-out sucker punch.

She then stripped her armor off and cast Disguise Self to look like Savra – replacement complete! She went outside and cleverly played dumb to get to Thurl’s room. There it was a simple task of picking the lock and to get inside. Kethra found a chest with some hefty coinage, and an incriminating letter to Thurl that clearly stated they were involved in a pitched battle and had a captive. Not just any captive – one of the diplomats from the missing delegation and Miri’s own mother!

I was still a bit unsure of how to run the manticore battle in a satisfactory way. The book abstracts it quite a bit and I think is there in case the PCs refuse to go. I only had the PCs and manticore roll initiative. The vultures and hippogriffs were on autopilot flying closer to the manticore, while the knights could occasionally hurl a spear. When the manticore attacked I had each PC there roll a d20, with the lowest receiving one of its three tail attacks.

Thankfully this odd battle was over nearly as soon as it started. Remember how the party is super good at knocking flying units out of the sky? Manticore, meet Hypnotic Pattern. It failed its save, dropping it out of the sky. They were hundreds of feet up in the air at this point so the beast took the full 20d6 falling damage. Manticore, meet ground.

Hilariously it still survived the fall (manticores are quite beefy). Miri did the fancy superhero fall using her innate monk featherfall ability, and ran up and crunched its face with Lightbringer. Dead manticore in nearly a single round! The knights cheered and everyone returned to the tower.

Kethra met them in the stables where she shooed the guards off while still disguised as Savra. We ended our session right before Kethra drops the bomb on the critical information she found. How the party (and Miri) reacts should be supremely interesting. I have a feeling we’ll spend most of our next session in Feathergale Spire – with completely different pretenses!

Watch our sessions live on my YouTube channel every Sunday night beginning at 9pm Central. Subscribe and catch up on previous episodes!

With Marvel’s popular and successful foray into films with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, I’ve finally decided to get back into comics. I grew up a big fan of X-Men and other superheroes but haven’t really kept up since the 90s. Thus begins my grand catching-up of the last ten years of Marvel comics, events and stories.

Thanks in large part to trade paperbacks and the digital convenience of Marvel Unlimited I can make relatively quick progress, and I’ll write down my Final Thoughts for each collection here on my blog. Like my gaming Final Thoughts, this will be full of spoilers. You’ve been warned!

Writer: Victor Gischler

Artist: Paco Medina

Issues: X-Men (2010) #1-6*

*Also included the following tie-ins: Death of Dracula One-Shot, X-Men Curse of the Mutants: Storm & Gambit One-Shot, X-Men Curse of the Mutants: Smoke & Blood One-Shot, X-Men Vs. Vampires #1-2, Namor: The First Mutant #1-4, Wolverine & Jubilee #1-4

The Heroic Age of 2010 gave us lots of clearly defined good vs evil storylines. What could be more evil than a conquering army of vampires? In “Curse of the Mutants,” yet another new X-Men series brought us a vampire story straight out of Underworld or Blade. By embracing its campy tone the story remains fun and action-packed, though the finale feels a bit too rushed and easy.

The problem with X-Men is that there’s always way too many X-Men comics. And most of them star the same damn popular team members. At the time this new 2010 X-Men volume began, we already had Uncanny X-Men, Astonishing X-Men, X-Men Legacy, New Mutants, X-Factor, and shortly – Uncanny X-Force and Generation Hope.

Now granted some of those are great off-shoots with unique teams (I can’t say enough good things about X-Factor). But we definitely didn’t need yet another book starring Cyclops and gang dealing with problems at Utopia. And yet, having the son of Dracula rise up, unite the vampire clans and set his sights on mutants as kindred spirits in need of a good ol’ fashioned subjugating makes for a damn fun little event.

The story kicks off in Death of Dracula, which really sets the Underworld or Jim Dreseden-esque tone of multiple vampire clans coming together to shake things up. I enjoyed that vamps came in all shapes and sizes, from monstrous gargoyle things to misty ninjas to classic sexy predators.

Xarus, one of Dracula’s sons, organizes a violent coup, cutting off dear old dad’s head. His argument is that vampires have been far too complacent, and through violence and coercion brings others around to his side.

His secret weapon is straight out of Blade: magical medallions that block the sun’s rays, allowing vampires to operate in the sunlight. As his first act in his newly acquired political office, Xarus decides to mount a full-scale vampire invasion of San Francisco.

It’s never quite clear why he decides to target mutants, other than a vague sense of “Hey you’re outcasts hated by humans too!” The X-Men have none of it of course and fight back when one of their own is taken out by an odd vampire suicide bomber.

My favorite part of the event is that it actually gives long-absent ex-X-Men Jubileee something to do. As one of the depowered mutants from the aftermath of House of M she hasn’t really been seen for years. Here she’s chilling in San Fran with friend Pixie when a vampire suicide bomber explodes next to her, infecting her with a bioengineered version of vampirism (okay technically just the desire to be fed on by a vampire). Xarus’ plan is to turn the X-Men one by one, and she’s the guinea pig.

Her arc has she goes through the fightening drug-addict-like withdrawl of her transformation is intriguing, and soon she’s joining the vampires as Wolverine goes after her. She actually ends up biting and turning Wolverine, though Xarus isn’t sure if Logan can even contract vampirism with his healing factor. Turns out, Cyclops has a plan all along.

The main plot isn’t all that complicated. The X-Men’s first goal is to resurrect Dracula in a classic Enemy of my Enemy ploy. This is where the Namor series ties in, as his head was sunk into the bottom of the sea. They’re not bad (though I’m not a fan of Ariel Olivetti’s water-color art) but pitting the already alien world and characters of Atlantis around a mer-folk vampire invasion is a bit much.

The X-Men recover Dracula’s body and reattach everything. His resurrection is quite anticlimactic, and he simply turns down Cyclops’ offer to help and walks away. Oh did I mention Blade shows up to help the X-Men? You can’t do a Marvel vampire story without him, though I could do without his incredibly goofy sideburn, wraparound mustache combo.

After Jubilee and Wolverine are turned, Xarus soon throws everything he’s got at Utopia, while the X-Men make a giant stand as they’ve done several times already.

The various “Curse of the Mutants” One-Shots and X-Men Vs. Vampires anthologies offer fun little stories occurring around this time. Storm & Gambit highlights a sneaky infiltration of Xarus headquarters by our two mutant thieves. It’s well-written but I hated the childish, anime-like art. The same can be said of Smoke & Blood, which is a straight up horror story starring the X-Club of scientists as they evade a monstrous predator in the bowels of Utopia. I do love the X-Club, and I will never tire of Dr. Nemesis’ pompous nark.

X-Men Vs. Vampires were two issues that included several stories, each focusing on a different X-Men during the event. These were fun little tie-ins starring minor characters we barely ever saw, like Husk and Dazzler.

Magneto discovers an old acquaintance-turned-vampire from WW2. Karma stumbles upon a darkly humorous Weight Watchers club infested with a regularly feeding vampire. Rockslide and Armor battle a giant fanged whale on a boat – which turns out to be Rockslide dreaming after reading Moby Dick and talking about vampires, heh. All of them effectively nailed that neo-vampire tone of stylized action and sexy dialogue (and some going full on B-movie camp), and really helped flesh out the event. Too bad the art ranges from decent to awful.

Xarus’ plan is sunk when Cyclops reveals his plan – they’d artificially stopped Logan’s healing factor and could restart it with the push of a button, freeing him from the curse. With a now very pissed off Wolverine the X-Men easily fought back. Plus there’s a number of X-Men with “tough skin” that could be used on the frontlines, like Colossus, Emma Frost, Husk, Armor, and Mercury.

With Wolverine’s help they can easily get to Xarus’ base of operations and take him down, but Dracula shows up and does it for them. There’s a supremely tense exchange between legendary leaders here, including Blade going after Drac and Cyke having to shoot him down. An unspoken agreement is made, Cyke makes some threats, Drac brushes them off but respects Cyke all the same. In the end Dracula is mollified and sends his people away.

The day is won, but not without cost. Jubilee is permanently a vampire, which actually makes her way more interesting than she has been in years. The X-Men can keep her urges and what not in check thanks to daily blood infusions from Wolverine, but she’s still miserable about it.

Their drama continues in the excellent four-part epilogue series Wolverine & Jubilee. My favorite portrayal of Wolverine is the surly mentor, and he dishes it out in spades to the suffering Jubilee. The two become embroiled in a crazy vampire plot in Siberia involving an inter-dimensional pocket bank and a dragon horde – seriously, it’s surprisingly awesome. If you’re only going to read one tie-in to the “Curse of Mutants” event, read this one.

Pitting X-Men against a vampire army is a fun, if simplistic idea. Seeing more minor characters in action is always satisfying and works really well in the anthologies. I loved what they did to Jubilee in making her a much more complex, interesting character and hope to read more of Vamp-Jubilee’s struggles and adventures. I started out complaining about the volume of X-Men comics but I’ll be damned if this wasn’t a really fun ride. Alright 2010 X-Men, you can stay.

I have finished another backlogged game via Rogue’s Adventures. You can read my latest Final Thoughts below and also on my gaming blog on Game Informer.

Developer: CreativeForge Games

Publisher: Gamibitious Digital Entertainment

Release Date: Nov 18, 2015

Hard West had all the right ingredients that got me excited about its Kickstarter campaign: tactical XCOM combat, Western setting, supernatural elements, choice-driven gameplay. The end result is something of a mixed bag, mostly due to its shoestring indie budget and odd campaign structure.

Hard West mostly tells a classic Western story of revenge. Warren loses his parents, then his girlfriend, then his life (life was rough back then, man).  He’s given a second chance with a not-so-subtle Deal with the Devil, and begins his quest for vengeance. Also an ill-conceived quest to bring back his dead girlfriend.

Now I said “mostly tells” because that story represents only a fraction of the total campaign. And here we come to the crux of my issues with Hard West.

The game is divided into eight individual scenarios: two campaigns, plus an additional prologue scenario. However, even these campaigns star different characters and stories. Warren’s story, for example is told in only half of his actual campaign. The other half focusing on his father, who becomes a badass cursed mercenary called the Undertaker.

A second campaign starts off only tangentially related to Warren’s story. A scientist researches the odd demonic activity happening in our corner of the Western world (and appears to be attributed to a meteorite, which I presume is a nod to Night of the Living Dead). Each subsequent scenario in that campaign spins off the previous one, with a new protagonist and posse. At one point you even kill the protagonist of the previous scenario, which is a neat twist.

The way these scenarios can intertwine the characters can be really cool. But I quickly realized it’s a way to maintain the balance of the game.

Each scenario has its own overland map filled with events and choices that grant you various advantages or injuries. Sometimes you might even gain or lose party members. Each one also has its own unique gameplay hook, with varying degrees of success. In one you have to feed and maintain your crew; in another you manage your character’s limited premonitions to grant you advantages.

No matter how you performed in each of the 3-4 hour scenarios, you’re stripped of everything and begin anew in the next one. There’s a real lack of progression in the game. There’s no leveling or experience.

Skills are tied to equippable poker cards, which is an appropriately thematic touch. You can mix and match them on any character, but this has the disadvantage of making nearly every character completely interchangeable and forgettable. And thanks to the Luck resource, I rarely had a chance to ever use any skills anyway.

So, the combat. The tactical combat is really fun. Each scenario has 3-5 combat encounters, sometimes even back to back. The level designs are big and filled with large two story houses and forts you can fortify or infiltrate.

The XCOM comparison is completely apt. Each character has two action points you can use with a combination of moving, shooting, and activating abilities.

Partial and full cover exists, and is even more important than XCOM as cover actually reduces the amount of damage you take. Flanking becomes absolutely critical, though is sadly one of the few tactical options you ever have.

The Ricohet skill is by far the most useful – able to paint a deadly path of bullets around corners to hit foes deep in cover. It’s so fun I wish it was just a standard ability on everyone, rather than a single equippable skill.

Guns come in the familiar Western sizes of rifles, pistols, and shotguns. However due to the supernatural, “Weird West” setting you see increasingly outlandish and crazy weapon designs, like shotguns with a dozen barrels or a single-shot Bonehand Rifle that pretty much kills anything in one hit.

Performing certain tasks or milestones in a scenario unlocks these unique weapons for future scenarios, though you still have to purchase them. It’s a neat idea, but it also means you end up using the same really good weapons over and over in the later scenarios.

The combat shines when you have enough allies to pull of some Clever Girl Velociraptor in Jurassic Park flanking maneuvers. Get in a standoff shootout with someone on a balcony, and sneak in another character into the house to blow them away from behind with a shotgun. It’s a fun tactic that the AI will absolutely use against you as well. No XCOM-style overwatch system exists, but annoyingly the AI gets a free shot if you get too close to them from the front.

It does feature the Concealment mechanic recently seen in XCOM 2. In most scenarios the enemy starts off non-hostile, but with a cone of sight like a stealth game. You can maneuver your forces around to grab map objectives or get in the best possible spot before starting combat. It’s very time-consuming but satisfying when you can murder several enemies right at the beginning.

Successfully dodging a shot drains your Luck (I think by the percentage chance of the shot). Characters often have 100-150 luck, while a decent shot could drain 60 luck in a single blast. Most skills cost luck to activate. Really good ones, like damaging everyone in range or firing a guaranteed shot, cost a lot of luck to activate. If you’re getting shot at all your luck is pretty much nil.

In reverse, getting hit restores your luck. Hopefully you’re in cover and not taking much damage, because health is always very low, around 10 for each person. It’s bad to get hit, therefore you rarely have enough luck to work with. The Luck balance feels a bit out of whack, but I still never had much of a problem on Medium difficulty, even when vastly overwhelmed.

Despite its limitations I enjoyed the combat. Each map is a lot of fun to traverse. There’s no fog of war but enemies will be hidden unless you can sense them nearby. Many battles have varied objectives, such as holding out in a fort for a certain amount of turns, freeing imprisoned potential allies and quickly escaping, or activating machines around a laboratory while an army bears down on you.

The overland map portion of each scenario feels heavily randomized with each choice you make. Without a proper save system (think Shadowrun Returns‘ autosave only) you have to live with whatever comes. None of them are devastating and overall I found it well-balanced on Medium difficulty, but many of the scenarios’ unique hooks felt underdeveloped and mostly inconsequential.

The main focus definitely lies in the combat, and it works well. The Western themes are fun and well-realized in both the gameplay and the writing – especially the sardonic narrator Death. The “Weird West” setting combines many familiar Horror tropes with Western ones, and the ending is appropriately dark and messed up. Worth playing if you enjoy XCOM-style tactical combat, but be prepared to forgive its quirky flaws.

Pros

• Effective XCOM-style cover-based tactical combat
• Large, well-designed maps with a fun variety of objectives and tasks
• Unique “Weird West” setting combines Horror and Western themes
• Supernatural Western setting also allows for lots of goofy, cool guns, as well as more diverse combatants (like, uh, women)
• Ricochet is fun as hell

Cons

• No manual saving, but you can restart each combat level
• Individual scenarios break up any sense of progression and advancement
• Most scenarios’ unique gameplay mechanic are largely inconsequential
• Most skills cost way too much Luck to ever use
• Characters mostly feel interchangeable

Final Say: A fun XCOM-lite in a dark Western setting hampered by its tight indie budget and odd campaign structure.

Read the full list at Playboy

The rise of geek culture has lead to wider exposure and acceptance of one of geekdom’s fondest hobbies: tabletop role-playing. Now you’ve got Vin Diesel playing Dungeons & Dragons to promote a film and prolific voice actors rolling dice online every week.

Even if you don’t know your beholders from your mind flayers, D&D’s latest Monster Manual is a treasure trove of mythological beasts and horrific nightmares. But some are just plain silly.

Read the full list at Playboy

Watch our sessions live on my YouTube channel every Sunday night beginning at 9pm Central. Subscribe and catch up on previous episodes!

Previously on “Princes of the Apocalypse” 

Here’s an interesting solution to making a lower-level dungeon a bit more difficult: have the PCs fight multiple rooms together, and without a proper rest! In this week’s session our heroes act on their new information gained from Aerisi’s note to Thurl, and end up in a giant battle royale with the Knights of the Feathergale Spire.

The Spire is an interesting set up. A small, multi-leveled dungeon offers some interesting perspectives for going room-to-room. The most important factor is that the knights are not initially hostile, and I further played with that by having the guard at the door, Savra, be an old childhood friend of Miri, the party’s runaway-from-home monk.

However, at the end of last week’s session Kethra did some snooping and found an incriminating letter in Thurl’s room. It spoke of a battle with a Black Earth Cult, and a captured prisoner – one that matches the description of one of the diplomats that went missing.

Armed with this information our heroes marched straight to the Pinnacle and accosted Thurl himself. The party’s emotional interrogation was awkward at best, including Thurl successfully resisting a Zone of Truth spell from Kalinaar. Coupled with Kalinaar drawing his sword and Miri kicking him toward the ledge, Thurl called the alarm and the fight was on!

I thought my players would attempt to use an element of surprise or subterfuge but instead went straight for the throat. Currently at the pinnacle were a pair of knights mounted on giant vultures, and I soon had two more knights arrive up the stairs. Thurl had sent one of them down during the interrogation with a “knowing glance” – which was prepping the knights to be vigilant in case of the PC’s shenanigans.

The pinnacle fight was a close one, as our heroes were still somewhat drained from the gnoll battle and manticore aerial hunt last week. I tried to play with the tower setting and have the knights cast Gust multiple times on a PC near the edge, but those pesky heroes kept making their saving throws.

Thurl is a beefy combatant and basically a low-level fighter-mage. Even with Misty Step helping him reposition, the party focused most of their attention on him, especially an enraged Miri. You see, I made that particular missing diplomat her mother, as she was from a noble family in Waterdeep.

Despite her rage she continued to role-play quite nicely, yelling at Thurl to give up the information upon raining blow after blow. Finally when he was at about 10% health I had him relent somewhat, teasing the spyglass and ordering them to stand down and leave the spire.

Kalinaar, of course, would have none of it and wanted to kill them all and burn the place to the ground. The rest were a bit more mollified, mostly as they were quite injured and drained – Talus had actually come close to death after some particularly vicious vulture strikes. Half the party needed to down some healing potions, and Kalinaar used the brief respite (I actually ended combat/initiative temporarily) to use Lay on Hands on himself.

Kalinaar tried to role-playing walking up and swiftly murdering Thurl, but I wasn’t quite prepared to let him just do that. Instead that act brought up an adjacent knight’s sword, and Thurl spit at them for being lying dogs. The fight was back on (“Damn it Kalinaar,” yelled the other beleaguered players, heh). Talus won the best initiative, and promptly killed Thurl in a volley of Magic Missiles.

Kalinaar remembered to blow his whistle the aarakocra gave him, summoning them to the pinnacle. I pictured them swooping in to save the day just when things got dire, but the timing ended up being awkward and a bit anticlimactic. During the RP-break, Kalinaar actively wondered where they were (I had to remind them that a single combat round is like 6 seconds), and then when they arrived next round, half the enemies had been slain.

One of the knights had retreated down the stairs to warn the others, and the PCs briefly deliberated on what to do next – including possible flying down via the aarakocra and working their way up the tower. But since it’s all a central staircase, they correctly surmised that it wouldn’t make much difference.

There was some debate on whether they even needed to kill everyone, seeing as how they had already killed Thurl and gained some information. Miri tired to get Kalinaar to agree to leave them along if they didn’t attack them, creating a tense stalemate situation.

Savra greeted them with a contingent of knights, initiates, and an air monk (Hurricane) at the 2nd level – at least half a dozen foes. Miri tried to talk things out with Savra and ended up being partially successful, disarming her while she wrestled with the cult’s mental influence over her. I later had her flee down stairs and keep more reinforcements from coming up to flank the PCs.

The rest of the Feathergale residents were furious at the attack and death of their lord commander, and attacked. Both Kalinaar and Miri sustained heavy blows. That Guiding Wind ability from the Initiates proved quite useful, letting each of their dagger attacks hit their mark.

I got exactly one round out of my Hurricane – Gust of Wind, which was embarrassingly cut short after Miri used Water Whip for a One Hit Knock Out. Even Talus managed to crit with his Fire Bolt, which he misses with so often it’s become a running joke. We were laughing so hard after he effectively role-played his own surprise that he gained a point of Inspiration.

Note our expressions after that Crit Fire Bolt!

At this point our heroes were bleeding and drained quite badly. With no more forces coming up the stairs, they quickly piled up the bodies on the stairwell and settled in for a Short Rest to lick their wounds. An entire session of just two combat encounters. But they were big, tense, and fun action sequences filled with some nifty role-playing and dialogue.

Where the party goes from here is anyone’s guess, and I spent a good chunk of time off-stream explaining how “Princes of the Apocalypse” is quite open-ended in where the party can go. I use Roll20 Handouts to keep track of quests and missing people, including a note of all the clues the PCs have learned. I also warned them that it’s quite possible to stumble on dungeons or areas that are higher level than our party. While there’s a few things I can do to adjust the difficulty, it does get quite tricky. Thanks to this being our second campaign, our heroes are already 5th level, so that does give me some breathing room for tackling the rest of the initial adventure hooks.

Watch our sessions live on my YouTube channel every Sunday night beginning at 9pm Central. Subscribe and catch up on previous episodes!

With Marvel’s popular and successful foray into films with the Marvel Cinematic Universe, I’ve finally decided to get back into comics. I grew up a big fan of X-Men and other superheroes but haven’t really kept up since the 90s. Thus begins my grand catching-up of the last ten years of Marvel comics, events and stories.

Thanks in large part to trade paperbacks and the digital convenience of Marvel Unlimited I can make relatively quick progress, and I’ll write down my Final Thoughts for each collection here on my blog. Like my gaming Final Thoughts, this will be full of spoilers. You’ve been warned!

Writers: Jonathan Hickman

Artists: Alessandro Vitti, Mirko Colak

Issues: Secret Warriors (2008) #17-28, Siege: Secret Warriors

Secret Warriors had a really fun start as one of the best new comics to come out of Marvel’s Dark Reign period. Nick Fury’s clandestine team of second generation sleeper agent superheroes battling Hydra forces felt very GI Joe-ish in all the right ways.

The second half of the series is nicely compiled into another collected volume. Unfortunately it almost completely drops the titular team in favor of focusing on Nick Fury.

Jonathan Hickman dives head first into Fury’s convoluted past and present. It’s filled with silly twists, gotchas, and “oh he was a just a Life Model Decoy” – all gimmicks that I’ve grown to resent. I much prefer reading about the team’s inner-drama and action set-pieces rather than the Nick Fury Files, but apparently Hickman and Marvel saw otherwise.

For example, the first story arc, “The Last Ride of the Howling Commandos” (#17-19) is just one big backstory on Fury’s World War 2 team. The actual pacing and editing is neat, weaving together three different scenes: Dugan at a UN meeting spilling the beans on a recent Hydra attack, Fury and Steve Rogers at a reunion of Commandos, and the WW2 flashbacks.

There’s a complete lack of the actual Secret Warriors team for an entire three issues, despite the previous collected volume leaving us at a startling cliffhanger involving the betrayal of one of the team. While the actual dialogue is compelling, I’m just not a fan of the direction this series has ended up. There is a pretty great conversation between Steve Rogers and Nick Fury, which comes around again to close the series out later.

“Night” (#20-24) is a return to form, with Fury and his team infiltrating a Hydra base. Things go terribly wrong thanks to J.T.’s betrayal, and they’re immediately under fire, losing their teleporter and forcing a high stakes, action-packed retreat.

Mirko Colak takes over an issue and a half of art, and pales compared to Alessandro Vitti’s work, which in turn is a small step down from Stefano Casselli’s.  While the overall art has steadily declined, it still remains consistently good, and I enjoy the vibrant colors and excessive lines on every haggard face.

Phobos, son of Ares, dies in a brutal one-on-one sword fight with Gorgon, while the rest of the team helplessly looks on. It’s definitely an Obi-Wan – Darth Vader moment. This time however Phobos doesn’t become more powerful, he simply dies and goes to Elysium, where he’s reunited with his father Ares. It’s an abrupt ending for the character that doesn’t feel very satisfying.

As the team makes their dramatic bomb-is-ticking escape, Fury finally gets J.T. in a vulnerable position. He reveals he knows of his betrayal (Fury knows everything, it’s incredibly annoying) and lets J.T. die for it. Daisy is understandably upset, and Fury later explains everything to her, which I was admittedly impressed by.

The specific scene where Fury drops J.T. is also absolutely fantastic. Hickman seems to excel at these individual dramatic moments, and they’re definitely the highlights of the series.

In “Wheels Within Wheels” (#25-28) we come to the ultimate “Nick Fury can do anything and is always on top of everything” plot device that annoys me to no end. It’s a long, drawn out con wherein we learn that the Kraken, one of the major Hydra villains we’ve been battling, is really Nick Fury’s not-so-dead younger brother Jake. Yep.

Baron Strucker has the tables turned as it was really Nick in control of Hydra, not the other way around as he suspected in Dark Reign, Which doesn’t really make any sense, but whatever, it’s Nick Fury I guess.

The pacing feels really off in this final arc, like they were just kind of spinning their wheels to get a few more issues out before closing the series. It’s also mostly told in flashbacks, including an incredibly convoluted backstory involving Fury, Strucker and other big players all involved in yet another clandestine group.

There’s a whole issue devoted to exploring what happened to The Druid after he was kicked out way back in Secret Warriors #13. Apparently he goes through a rigorous training montage with Howling Commando John Garrett, and returns to seal the team’s escape at the end of “Night.” Ultimately it doesn’t really matter because their team and story is pretty much over, making his whole issue rather pointless.

Despite some oddities, the series does wrap up nicely, with another great conversation between Steve Rogers and Nick Fury. My primary issues with the series are more exemplified in this second collection, as the actual young team is present in less than half the issues. I found Fury’s complex backstory and silly machinations annoying and trite, even by comic standards. Hickman, however, is an excellent writer that does some great stuff with what he’s given. Secret Warriors wasn’t quite the new-team series I wanted it to be, but it’s still an enjoyable ride.