Marvel Champions: Everything We Learned About The Rise of Red Skull Campaign Expansion

New Villains

The Red Skull is clearly the focal point in the new expansion, which makes sense since Captain America is already part of the game courtesy of his recent Hero Pack. That said there are plenty of other villains to take down in the new expansion, including some famliar Avengers level threats.

The new villain lineup is Crossbones, Absorbing Man, Taskmaster, Arnim Zola, and Red Skull. Each of the villains will have thei rown unqiue schemes and tactics, such as Crossbone's obsession with weapons, and because of that obsession he will come equped with the new piercing keyword if he has a Weapon attachment (like his machine gun). Crossbones can also get additional experimental weapons from Project P.E.G.A.S.U.S.

Meanwhile Absorbing Man will have a brand new type of Encounter card titled Environments. Eahch environment will give Absorbing Man new abilities, like for instance when you get additional threat added when battling on a Snowy Hillside. Absorbing Man takes on teh traits of these locations as do some of his Encounter cards, so each time you fight him things will change.

Red Skull, Zola, and Taskmaster will also come with their own unique traits and keywords, which will be revealed at a later time.

Campaign Mode

One of the most requested additions to the game is a Campaign mode, and now Fantasy Flight is delivering. While you can still tackle each villain as part of a singular scenario, Rise of Red Skull also allows you to take down all of the villains as part of a continuous campaign. You'll take down each villain one by one, and throughout the game, you'll need to make certain choices that will persist throughout the adventure, like upgrading your decks with new cards.

You can also play in expert mode, which will have players keeping the damage they take against previous villains, giving you an even greater challenge.

Hawkeye

The new set will also feature two new heroes, the first of which is Hawkeye. Hawkeye has access to explosive arrows, which can clear out all the minions engaged with a player. To fire these arrows you'll need to exhaust his bow, but an upgrade nets you an increase to your base attack and access to the Ranged keyword, so it might be more than worth it.

Hawkeye's deck is based in Leadership, and the set features several new Leadership cards to use. That includes an ally in Kate Bishop, who can deal big-time damage to your opponents if you don't mind discarding some cards to make it happen.

Spider-Woman

Next up is Jessica Drew, otherwise known as Spider-Woman! Spider-Woman is incredibly agile, and that comes into play when you first play an aspect card each round, which raises all of your base stats. You can do this more than once too since Spider-Woman has the ability to split her deck between two different aspects at the start of the game, and other cards and abilities can also take advantage of this.

In her pre-built deck, Spider-Woman has access to Aggression and Justice, and her allies include Spider-Girl and Spider-Man, who can help remove threat and attack on her behalf. Her unique combination of abilities allows you to really change up your playstyle, and that's even without taking into account her pheromones and venom blasts.

Hawkeye and Spider-Woman Game Mats

We also got a look at two new Game Mats for the game, one themed around each new hero. The Hawkeye and Spider-Woman Game Mats will retail for $19.95, and will ship out sometime later this year. That said, there is one more Game Mat that might interest you.

1-4 Player Game Mat

Marvel Champions already has a gorgeous 1-4 player Game Mat, but now it's getting a Rise of Red Skull themed 1-4 Game Mat, which will cover a 3 x 3 play area with spots for your heroes, villains, schemes, and discard piles.

Future Expansions

Last but not least is the tease for what's coming up next, and as you can see below, the future is bright for the hit game.

A new Scenario Pack is scheduled to hit stores in August, and the only tease is the silhouette, but we can't figure out who it is.

After that we will get three new Hero Packs in September, October, November, and December followed by another big expansion release.

As for who these mystery Hero Packs are, let us know who you are guessing in the comments or hit me up on Twitter @MattAguilarCB for all things Marvel Champions and Tabletop!