Sentinels of the Multiverse

Sentinels of the Multiverse is a designer card game published by Greater Than Games and released at Gen Con 2011. It is a cooperative game in which players control a team of comic book-style heroes battling a villain. Each player controls a different hero, while a villain and environment deck each run themselves. A given game includes 3 to 5 heroes, 1 villain and 1 environment, which can be mixed and matched to create a number of different scenarios. The core game comes with 10 heroes, 4 villains, and 4 environments.

Gameplay

The game mechanics of Sentinels of the Multiverse include aspects that are somewhat similar to a variety of other card games, including Magic: The Gathering and Dominion. Each hero comes with a fixed deck of 40 cards, as well a "character card" that specifies initial hit points (HP) for that hero as well as an innate power. On their turns, the players may each play a card, use one of several "powers" provided by cards, and draw a card. On the villain and environment turns, the players reveal the top card of the villain and environment decks, respectively, and perform the specified actions. When a hero is reduced to 0 HP, they lose the ability to use cards or powers, but remain in the game as an "incapacitated hero" with a fixed set of abilities with which they may aid their allies. The game generally ends when either all heroes are incapacitated, or the villain is reduced to 0 or fewer HP, though some villains include alternate win conditions.

Reception

Sentinels of the Multiverse has been well received by players and critics since its launch, with Tom Vasel of The Dice Tower podcast giving it the #1 slot in his "top 30 games to look out for from Gen Con 2011",^[1] and the review blog Giant Fire Breathing Robot awarding it "Board Game of the Year: 2011".^[2] Reviewers generally praised the art and gameplay, while criticizing the small box, lack of HP trackers, and difficulty scaling among different numbers of players.^[3][4]

Expansions

Greater Than Games released an expansion, Sentinels of the Multiverse: Rook City in the spring of 2012. The expansion added 2 heroes, 4 villains and 2 environments to the base game. The villains in Rook City also include an H icon in some cards, which represents the number of heroes in the game, as a way to improve scaling. The cards used in Rook City are also of a better and thicker cardstock as compared to the original base game.

In the autumn of 2012 Greater Than Games released their second expansion, Sentinels of the Multiverse: Infernal Relics. Similar to Rook City, this expansion added an additional 2 heroes, 4 villains and 2 environments to the game. This expansion also introduced the concept of a super villain group, containing multiple villain characters in a single deck.

As of fall 2013, the Rook City and Infernal Relics expansions are now produced in a combined box.

At the same time as Infernal Relics, Greater Than Games also released a new edition of the base game, Sentinels of the Multiverse: Enhanced Edition. This edition of the game has minor change to some of the cards and added the H icon to the base game's villain to improve their scalability. A better box with built in storage inserts were also introduced with this edition along with dividers for all of the deck available to date. Other improvement includes better card stocks for all the cards and new artwork for the environment cards in line with what was introduced with Rook City and Infernal Relics. 162 tokens were also included in the new edition to help keep track of damage and the various different types of modifier in games.

In spring of 2013, Greater Than Games released the third Expansion, Sentinels of the Multiverse: Shattered Timelines. Similar to Rook City and Infernal Relics, this expansion added 2 heroes, 4 villains, and 2 environments to the game.^[5] The Shattered Timelines expansion featured the winning fan-created villain from the Create a Villain Contest run by Greater Than Games in September 2012.^[6] The expansion was supported by a Kickstarter campaign that ended successfully on November 29, 2012, having raised $185,200.^[5]

During the Shattered Timelines Kickstarter Campaign, Greater Than Games announced that they would use some of the funds raised during that campaign to help finance their fourth expansion Sentinels of the Multiverse: Vengeance.^[7] This expansion added 5 heroes, 5 villains, and 2 environments. The new villains have smaller decks than previous villains, as they're designed to be played in a new game mode as a party against the heroes. Vengeance is available as of February 2014.^[8] During this time Greater Than Games also released the box set Rook City & Infernal Relics, discontinuing the production of separate boxes for Rook City and Infernal Relics.

The Vengeance box included an advertisement for an upcoming expansion, Wrath of the Cosmos. As with earlier expansions, this will include 2 heroes, 4 villains, and 2 environments.

In January 2015, The "Wrath of the cosmos" expansion was released. This expansion included 2 heroes, 4 villains and 2 environments. The preorder campaign was largely successful and added 1 more hero, 1 villain, and 1 environment along with 6 hero promos.

The Villains of the Multiverse Expansion, release in December of 2015, reintroduces some old villains as well as some new ones, using the Vengeance combat mechanic of having one villain per hero character. This expansion includes ten new villain decks with over-sized villain character cards and four new environment decks. The preorder campaign also allowed the release of 1 promo villain and 1 promo environment, as well as 7 promo hero character cards.

On October 16, 2014, an iOS/Android version was released followed on December 22, 2014 with a Steam release for the PC.

On January 29, 2016, Greater Than Games announced the title of the next expansion, "Oblivaeon", which would be on Kickstarter beginning February 9, 2016 and will feature numerous perks. In this announcement, they also stated that this will be the final expansion for Sentinels of the Multiverse.^[9]

Sentinel Tactics

In March 2014, Greater Than Games announced a Kickstarter for a new game set in the Sentinels of the Multiverse universe, Sentinel Tactics: The Flame Of Freedom.^[10] This reached its funding goal in under 6 hours.^[11]

Heroes

The current heroes in the game include:

Base Game

• Legacy, an American hero and Superman analogue who focuses on damage and buffing other heroes.
• Absolute Zero, a hero who messes with fire and cold damage to heal himself and hurt the enemy.
• Wraith, a Batman-type heroine using many types of gadgets.
• Tachyon, a speedster whose powers are fueled by her discard pile.
• Bunker, an armored juggernaut who switches between different "modes", using a variety of weapons like Gatling guns and grenade launchers.
• Haka, a Maori tribal strongman who focuses on survival, milling his deck, and taking out low health opponents.
• Fanatic, an angel on earth, a versatile hero who benefits from boosts to damage.
• Visionary, a psychic who does many things to mess with her opponents.
• Ra, the Egyptian sun god who does all things fire.
• Tempest, an alien amphibian who controls storms, does a lot of damage and support.

Rook City

• Expatriette, a Punisher type gunslinger with a variety of guns and ammunition.
• Mr. Fixer, a martial artist and mechanic. Many extra benefits given to a single power.

Infernal Relics

• The Argent Adept, a complex master musician with 5 instruments and a variety of songs.
• Nightmist, an expert in the occult, uses spells and relics to both harm and heal herself to great effect.

Shattered Timelines

• Chrono Ranger, a time traveling gun-toter who posts bounties on his targets.
• Omnitron-X, a future version of the villain, Omnitron, who grew a conscience, all-around support hero with minor healing.

Vengeance

• K.N.Y.F.E., a melee and energy damage focused hero who isn't afraid to hurt herself for the greater good.
• The Naturalist, a sort of "beast boy" with three forms, a rhino for survival, a gazelle for support, and a crocodile for damage.
• Parse, an analytical mastermind, uses her bow and powers of observation to hinder the villains and support her team.
• The Sentinels, a team of four low-hp heroes who team together to make one multi-talented hero.
• Setback, fueled by bad luck, he uses his luck against his enemies, occasionally causing collateral damage.

Wrath of the Cosmos

• Captain Cosmic, a Green Lantern analogue, and an energy master who uses his constructs to buff his allies and do damage.
• Sky-Scraper, an Ant-Man-type heroine who uses her size manipulation and cards called "links" to damage the enemy and debuff them.

Mini-Expansions

• Unity, a technomancer who creates golems to support her and do damage.
• The Scholar, an elemental expert that focuses on self healing, survival, and team support.
• Guise^[12] a hero who consistently breaks the 4th wall, realizing he is in a game, similar to the Marvel character Deadpool.

Promotional Characters

• America's Newest Legacy (AKA "Young Legacy", analogue to Supergirl)
• Rook City Wraith
• Ra: Horus of Two Horizons
• Redeemer Fanatic
• Dark Visionary
• The Eternal Haka
• Freedom Six Team Leader Tachyon
• Freedom Six Wraith: Price of Freedom
• Freedom Six Unity
• Freedom Six Bunker: Engine of War
• Freedom Six Absolute Zero
• Freedom Six Tempest
• Dark Watch Expatriette
• Dark Watch Mr. Fixer
• Dark Watch Nightmist
• Dark Watch Setback
• America's Greatest Legacy
• G.I. Bunker
• The Super-Scientific Tachyon
• Prime Wardens Argent Adept^[12]
• Prime Wardens Haka^[12]
• Prime Wardens Fanatic^[12]
• Prime Wardens Captain Cosmic^[12]
• Prime Wardens Tempest^[12]
• Rogue Agent KNYFE^[12]
• The Argent Adept Kvothe Six-String
• The Scholar of the infinite
• Chrono-ranger The Best Of Times.
• The Hunted Naturalist
• The Adamant Sentinels
• Santa Guise
• Termination Bunker
• Termination Unity
• Termination Absolute Zero

Villains

The current list of villains in the game include:

Base Game

• Citizen Dawn, leader of the Citizens of the Sun, a sort of mutant army, she is a minion controller who is immune to damage for a few turns if too many of her Citizens are destroyed.
• Baron Blade, a mad scientist who causes you to lose if too many cards are destroyed.
• Grand Warlord Voss, an invading alien warlord bringing with him a vast armada.
• Omnitron, a robot factory gone bad. Uses drones to do his dirty work.

Rook City

• The Matriarch, a bird controller who attacks you if you destroy her birds.
• The Chairman, an organized crime kingpin of Rook City.
• Plague Rat, who infects heroes and deals a lot of irreducible and toxic damage.
• Spite, a Bane-like ex-death row inmate given powers through chemical experiments and drugs.

Infernal Relics

• Akash'bhuta, Mother Earth on a mission to destroy all life. High health, but damages herself when you destroy her body parts.
• Apostate, a fallen angel. Uses many relics and pet demons in his never ending attack.
• GloomWeaver, a demon fueled by gloom and despair being summoned to Earth by cultists and their zombie minions.
• The Ennead, 9 Egyptian gods/goddesses in 1 team.

Shattered Timelines

• The Dreamer, a younger version of The Visionary giving life to her nightmares while dreaming, the heroes must stop her from destroying herself.
• La Capitan, a time traveling pirate captain with a crew from across the ages.
• Kismet, uses her incredibly good luck and a talisman to manipulate the heroes into failure.
• Iron Legacy, an alternate dimension Legacy whose daughter has been killed (ensuring the end of the Legacy line) who seeks absolute control.

Vengeance

• Fright Train, a powerhouse with a cow-catcher helmet and a variety of train puns.
• Ermine, a Catwoman-like thief who turns her enemies against themselves.
• Vengeful Baron Blade, leader of the Vengeful Five, still using technology and mad science to destroy whatever he can.
• Friction, a speedster whose (stolen) prototype speedsuit gives her powers, with a chance of burning herself up if the suit fails.
• Proletariat, a communist themed villain who copies himself and uses his hammer to inflict punishment.

Wrath of the Cosmos

• Deadline, a last-of-his-species alien who is sworn to protect dying races and will destroy Earth to do so, if he must.
• Infinitor, Captain Cosmic's brother, also an energy manipulator whose manifestations do a lot of damage.
• Kaargra Warfang, a queen of the galactic gladiatorial ring who challenges you to sway her crowd in your favor.
• Progeny, a world destroyer and shapeshifter who takes on multiple natural traits to fight you.

Villains of the Multiverse

• Ambuscade, returning with a whole new line-up of sidekicks who want to take down the Sentinels.
• Biomancer, a flesh crafter and necromancer who uses his advanced homunculi and healing powers for a variety of effects.
• Bugbear, a former cartel man who stumbled across a hungry Bloodstone, and now seeks to feed its mad hunger.
• Citizens Hammer and Anvil, who fight together using their fire wielding and wing/shield creation powers to boost one another and change the heroes' tactics.
• Greazer, straight out of an episode of intergalactic Happy Days, this alien bounty hunter with an incredible pompadour is only after his target.
• La Capitan, who has not had enough of messing with the heroes' timelines, and whose pet monkey causes much mischief.
• Miss Information, her previous attempts have failed, so she has returned with new allies and a whole new plan to tamper with the sentinels' dimensional physics.
• The Operative, who has been resurrected in a Ra's al Ghul style tank by a man named Zhu Long, and has been trained in a new style of martial arts.
• Plague Rat, who has been captured RevoCorp scientists, and who gets more powerful, understandably, if his handlers are not around.
• Sergeant Steele, K.N.Y.F.E.'s old colleague, who has come to bring her and her "superhero friends" back to The Block.

Mini-Expansions

• Ambuscade, a bounty hunter after the ultimate prey: superheroes.
• Miss Information, the heroes' secretary, secretly plotting against them and booby-trapping their assignments and equipment.
• Wager Master^[12] an alien come to earth to "test" humanity in his odd game, constantly changes the rules and forces the heroes to play by them.
• Chokepoint, a reborn ferro-mancer and regular opponent of the Freedom Five and their allies. She uses the heroes' equipment against them, and rages when she cannot.

Promotional Characters

• Mad Bomber Blade
• Cosmic Omnitron
• Spite: Agent of Gloom
• Skinwalker Gloomweaver

Environments

Base Game

• Insula Primalis, Dinosaurs and lava running amok.
• Megalopolis, a metropolis featuring police shoot-outs, run away trains and bad traffic.
• Ruins of Atlantis, An equal environment with krakens aplenty.
• Wagner Mars Base, Bad for the heroes. Many things to screw you up.

Rook City

• Pike Industrial Complex, Vats and rats. The occasional chemical explosion.
• Rook City, another metropolis, featuring crime and enemies aplenty.

Infernal Relics

• Realm of Discord, Changes the rules of the game with distortions.
• Tomb of Anubis, Anubis shall come with mummy's and traps. But treasures await if you survive.

Shattered Timelines

• The Block, a space prison, with inmates and enforcers fighting each other.
• Time Cataclysym, time runs amok, and brings you many unique challenges.

Vengeance

• Freedom Tower, many rooms will help the heroes, and occasionally give the villains a small damage boost.
• Mobile Defense Platform, with workers and machinery to keep it afloat, but with an auto-lose condition.

Wrath of the Cosmos

• The Enclave of the Endlings, a sanctuary for many unique last-of-their-species aliens.
• Dok'Thorath Capital, an alien city where "Thorathians" and rebels are fighting for influence.

Villains of the Multiverse

• Court of Blood, an Transylvanian inspired town full of vampires and angry mobs.
• Madame Mittermeier’s Fantastical Festival of Conundrums & Curiosities, a carnival whose attractions all seem to be fatal traps.
• Magmaria, a region deep near the earth's core, whose magma creatures grow and value strange crystals.
• Temple of Zhu Long, a Himalayan refuge for the martial master hermit, Zhu Long, and his ninja academy.

Mini-Expansions

• Final Wasteland, an alternate dimension where monsters rule the world.
• Silver Gulch, a wild west theme area, complete with shoot outs.
• Omnitron-IV^[12] another incarnation of omnitron summoning drones and trying to rebuild itself.
• Celestial Tribunal, a sword-like space station which roams the universe, pronouncing judgment on anyone it comes across.

Number of cards

• The core game, either original or Enhanced Edition, has 578 cards. (41 for each of ten heroes; 27 for each of four villains; 15 for each of four environments)
• The Rook City expansion has 222 cards. (41 for each of two heroes; 27 for each of four villains; 15 for each of two environments; two extra for the Operative)
• The Infernal Relics expansion has 228 cards. (41 for each of two heroes; 27 for each of four villains; 15 for each of two environments; eight extra for the Ennead)
• The Shattered Timelines expansion has 220 cards. (41 for each of two heroes; 27 for each of four villains; 15 for each of two environments)
• The Vengeance expansion has 344 cards. (41 for each of four heroes; 45 for one hero team; 20 for each of the five villains; 5 oversized villain character cards; 15 for each of the two environments)
• The Wrath of the Cosmos expansion has 224 cards. (41 for one hero; 43 for the other hero; 27 for three of the villains; 19 for Kaargra Warfang; 10 for the title deck; and 15 for each of the two environments)
• The Villains of the Multiverse expansion has 271 cards. (20 for each of the 10 villains; 11 oversized villain character cards; 15 for each of the four environments)
• The nine mini-expansions collectively have 291 cards. (41 for each of three heroes; 27 for each of four villains; 15 for each of four environments)
• There are 37 promo hero character cards. (1 each for thirty-three promo heroes; 4 for the adamant sentinels)
• There are 8 promo villain character cards. (2 each for four promo villains)

• The total number of cards is 2,423.

(Note: This now includes over-sized Villain character cards.)

References

External links

• http://www.sentinelsofthemultiverse.com
• Sentinels of the Multiverse at BoardGameGeek
• Sentinels of the Multiverse: Rook City at BoardGameGeek