It's too quiet in here. So I figured we can start speculating on what the next "cycle" is going to look like.

On the Hulk reveal stream, Boggs mentioned that the story box is going to mark an end to the current "cycle" and an intro to the next one. We know from GAMA the box is Rise of Red Skull. Is there any other hero besides Captain America who dealt with Red Skull in the comics? Might point in the direction it will go.

Personally, I don't think X-Men will be coming up soon, though I'd love to see them brought in. Unless both Boggs and Caleb were lying at different times when they said nobody has been working on the Fantastic Four, I don't think it'll be them, either. Could it be the Eternals? They do have a movie coming out this year.

I really thought a Thanos box was likely, because of the prevalence of himself and the Guardians of the Galaxy on the core box art. Now I'm feeling like we're getting more and more Defenders art (or at least Daredevil and Luke Cage), and I can't tell if that means they're more or less likely to come soon, and if they're just putting them in more art to include them in the mean time.

If the next "cycle" is Hydra-focused at all, SHIELD is the only particular group that makes sense to me, for them to shift focus to. But I don't feel like we're gonna get too many SHIELD Heroes, rather than allies/supports.

I could see the X-Men starting with their own core set when they do get released. Since they are not doing traditional cycles maybe something in the MCU like Guardians of the Galaxy.

@SpiderMana Yeah, I'm not sure how Red Skull is supposed to be an intro to anything since Cap is the one hero associated with him. I'm not worried, just intrigued. I do hope they don't put off the reveal article for the box if they haven't figured out the FFG Live videos before the reveal day.

@codytx2 I'd be all over a Guardians cycle. Granted, I'm all over all the releases, but I'd really love to see if they have any synergy going between Rocket and Groot, kind of like has been done with some of the LOTR LCG heroes.

6 hours ago, maniakmedic said:

@SpiderMana Yeah, I'm not sure how Red Skull is supposed to be an intro to anything since Cap is the one hero associated with him. I'm not worried, just intrigued. I do hope they don't put off the reveal article for the box if they haven't figured out the FFG Live videos before the reveal day.

I’m starting to think that the box itself might not actually work directly into the next “cycle”? Wrapping up the Avengers focus and moving into a big bad like Thanos that would face the GotG as well just makes so much sense...

Maybe they'll use GOTG as a way to work up to Thanos, just like the MCU did.

21 minutes ago, CaptainJaguarShark said:

Maybe they'll use GOTG as a way to work up to Thanos, just like the MCU did.

Yeah, that’s what I was trying to get at 😅

Well, we could try and look at what heroes/villains are getting put on art, but have yet to appear otherwise.

Counter Attack (Black Widow pack, Aggression aspect) has Gamora and Drax

Silver Sable is on Heroic Intuition (Core set)

Gamora is on Inspired (Core Set)

Rocket Racoon is on Relentless Assault (Core Set)

Venom is on Assault (Core set)

Ghost Rider is on Avenger’s Assemble (Captain America pack, Leadership aspect)

Shang-Chi is on Melee (Ms. Marvel pack, Aggression aspect)

Target Acquired (Black Widow pack, Basic card) has The Lizard (Spider-Man villain).

and Rocket and StarLord are both on the cover of the core set.

Seems like there is no plans for the Fantastic Four or X-Men for at least another year.

Wouldn't be surprised to see Scarlet Witch or Shangi Chi in the next cycle since they will have shows soonish.

There has also been a push for Miles and Spider-Gwen.

Not sure how many heroes will come in the bigger sets but I wouldn't be surprised if the next one is based around Gaurdians of the Galaxy with one or two of the more popular characters being their own pack.

I REALLY hope Scarlet Witch is coming soon.

There is a connection between the X-Men (Professor X) and Red Skull in the comics

for more on the topic just check out https://marvel.fandom.com/wiki/Johann_Shmidt_(Clone)_(Earth-616)

We might find out more on The Rise of The Red Skull reveal on FFG Live, this Thursday: https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2020/3/31/ffg-live-in-april-1/

The preview text includes the words “both heroes”, so as many people speculated there will be two heroes in the box.

I think Evan hinted that there might be another line up of hero silhouettes coming, but if everything is delayed by a month we probably won’t see these yet.

Ooooo! I hadn't checked the site yet so thanks for posting @Assussanni ! I know they have mentioned more silhouettes coming in at least one FFG Live stream before, but yeah, I guess we'll have to wait and see if they make an appearance on Thursday. I kind of hope they do and kind of hope they don't at the same time. I'm already petulantly pouting that I know what Dr. Strange's deck has and it's been pushed back at least a month.

55 minutes ago, Assussanni said:

We might find out more on The Rise of The Red Skull reveal on FFG Live, this Thursday: https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2020/3/31/ffg-live-in-april-1/

The preview text includes the words “both heroes”, so as many people speculated there will be two heroes in the box.

I think Evan hinted that there might be another line up of hero silhouettes coming, but if everything is delayed by a month we probably won’t see these yet.

We already know the two heroes though... from FFG's announcement at GAMA or whatever. It's Hawkeye and Spider-Woman.

But yeah, Evan did mention we'd be getting more silhouettes after Rise, and I agree it may be a month or so.

Just now, KBlumhardt said:

We already know the two heroes though... from FFG's announcement at GAMA or whatever. It's Hawkeye and Spider-Woman.

That's just supposition based on the heroes that were on the box. It was never actually announced.

3 minutes ago, maniakmedic said:

That's just supposition based on the heroes that were on the box. It was never actually announced.

Huh.... I thought for sure it was officially announced somewhere that there was exactly two new heroes in the box.

I think Boggs mentioned in the FFG Live Hulk reveal that there are two heroes, but before that as far as I know it was speculation there would be 2-3. As far as which heroes exactly, people have extrapolated from the box art revealed at GAMA for Rise of Red Skull that Hawkeye and Spider-Woman would be the two heroes, but nobody at FFG has confirmed that as far as we know.

9 minutes ago, maniakmedic said:

I think Boggs mentioned in the FFG Live Hulk reveal that there are two heroes, but before that as far as I know it was speculation there would be 2-3. As far as which heroes exactly, people have extrapolated from the box art revealed at GAMA for Rise of Red Skull that Hawkeye and Spider-Woman would be the two heroes, but nobody at FFG has confirmed that as far as we know.

I suppose... but what are the odds that Jessica and Clint are featured so prominently on the cover (with NO other heroes pictured) and they're not the heroes in the box? Basically zero. Like, as close to zero as possible without actually being zero.

I mean... it's hard to even call it 'extrapolated' because that implies it's an educated guess based of data given. This didn't take any deduction, the cover art just basically screams it.

Regardless, I guess we'll know in 2 days! 🙂

However, I'm not sure, has anyone actually seen this box? There's a whole lot of talk about it on many, many threads, and yet none of them actually include an image.

I'm just inclined to disbelieve given how monumentally crazy they'd have to be to make a spider-woman hero since she has a unique ally, over bigger Avengers like Scarlet Witch.

It's also been posted in other threads in these very forums. 🙂

My take is that the box art doesn't entirely reflect the product this is going to be, Red Skull notwithstanding. It's highly likely this was drawn before they even started working on the content itself.

1 minute ago, Ascarel said:

My take is that the box art doesn't entirely reflect the product this is going to be, Red Skull notwithstanding. It's highly likely this was drawn before they even started working on the content itself.

To me it sure looks like a bunch of different pieces of character art all put together—not one coherent picture like the core box art. Not a complaint on the art, just saying that I’m pretty sure they superimposed Hawkeye and Spider-Woman in front of Red Skull and that’s not an accident.

@Ascarel No it isn’t. They would start working on the set and then commission art to reflect that. The artist is being employed by FFG, not the other way around.

10 minutes ago, Hyperjayman said:

@Ascarel No it isn’t. They would start working on the set and then commission art to reflect that. The artist is being employed by FFG, not the other way around.

Also this, though I could see some of the art being a bit less directed than other pieces.

Here's a clearer shot of it:

...and, again, regarding the doubters: We'll know for sure in just a bit over 24 hours!