I have been tinkering around with a "campaign" mode that would run every scenario in order. No real story or anything like that, just goofing around with a way to link them all together. So far the key theme has been persistence...

Example

IE, scenario 1, Expert Rhino with Hydra Patrol and Hydra Assault added (in an attempt to keep the "Hydra"theme intact, Leadership Black Panther and Justice Hawkeye

An ill-timed "villain Attacks you" with double Charges and a flip of 3 pips single-shotted Black Panther on a turn he started with full health and an ally that ran into surges, minions and the attack...he started against Klaw 2 as one would do if they were playing it standalone.

There were 3 threat on the scheme which for "persistence" were added to Klaw's Scheme, as did the accelerator token (I flipped 32 cards looking for side scheme)

Hawkeye had 7 HP, those stayed, but in the theme of persistence I also let him keep all the stuff he had built up. However, for each item he kept, I added a threat to Klaws scheme which meant I actually started against stage 2.

So Klaw started with some danger in play but with Hawkeye having everything...even with flipping to stage two,having a couple side schemes out from the beginning, it was too easy. I had cleared out all the threat, both guys at full HP, BP had all his cards in...

Ultron now with 2 accelerator tokens, this time I just let the heroes keep Superstar Specific, same deal, for each one add 1 threat to the main scheme. That was closer to fair. It may require some balancing per scenario. Also toying with the idea of an accelerator/item or per two items.

Green Goblin Risky Business is always an easy scenario and it almost felt like a respite. The only reason

So thoughts that are germinating. The idea of what happens in one game having an effect on the other seems to be the key. With that said, I am pretty much locked into the following things will stay from end of last round to start of next round:

- accelerator tokens

-threat

-side schemes with same amount of threat

-damage

- anyone who has had Shadows of the Past hit, their dedicated minion suite stays in the encounter deck for each scenario. Going forward, any time Shadows pops, if the player it pops on already has their set in, then it goes around the horn in player order. IE, if Hawkeye already has Crossfire in, Black Panther gets a visit from Killmonger. If all players have met their minion already, I adjust it to put the side scheme and minion in play.

-some of what the heroes were able to build; tending towards super hero specific, with a noticeable cost for each item that stays in play. May need to make this hero by hero as starting with Mockingbird in play for Hawkeye may be too strong for example. But if Hulk happens to have his full suite (less the card that he loses when he flips to Bruce Banner) does he break anything? Iron Man with all Armor, Ms Marvel with all her Personas, Embiggen...that could be too much. Should it be 1 or 2 things per person? only resource generators? no resource generators? only allies? no allies? etc.

It is the last that is the sticking point. It can lead to the snowball effect. One on scenario I started on scheme 2 and something like 14 of 15 or 15 of 16 threat, don't recall exactly, but 1 threat from flipping and losing, and a couple side schemes if I recall correctly and being fully built, cleared it all up. I think that was when I was leaving everything out, that was clearly too strong. But there should be some benefit for having advanced, at this point it is figuring out the cost/benefit ratio.

The trick is threat sometimes matters and sometimes doesn't. Ultron is deadly if he reaches the third scheme, but Green Goblin Risky Business...meh. Flip to Hero form, keep Criminal Enterprise under control, threat is never an issue. But Crossbones...roll in with 4 accelerators and some leftover threat and he could start with 3 weapons and his machine gun...having to deal with indirect threat, a base attack of 3,4,5 and maybe threat without anything in play yourself could be impossible. The bad flip I mentioned above that cost me Black Panther there were things I could have done to mitigate...this, you have nothing you can do as it is first turn.

I do think mixing the Hydra sets tends to be a bit much. I think it dilutes the decks too much. So theme is still an issue. To some extent it is there already...Rhino has some Hydra troopers already, obviously all 5 Rise of Red Skull scenarios have them...Ultron, Klaw, Goblin and Wrecking Crew are outside of that. I considered a Bane-type scenario...start with Wrecking Crew B side (or running through A&B), then both Green Goblin scenarios as if the criminals were all escaping and I was trying to round them up, it is a possibility I am considering. I am also considering having a separate "villain pile" where

I don't have the balance down but I do have the rough outlines. It is just mixing and matching what stays, at what cost, and it will be complete. Feedback welcome and if someone is looking for something admittedly very basic but at least a sketch outline...these are the first musings of my first play through that I am tweaking as I go. If people are interested, as I go I will report more. Also, if others want to take the framework, tweak it and come up with something actually good (as it stands it is too easy) I would love feedback. I am building towards this for me group to have an ongoing campaign that will hit new scenarios as they come on until the next big box.

If you keep acceleration tokens, I’d forget about the cost of keeping the hero cards in play, it’ll become inevitable that you can’t win later missions...or even early ones if a single game goes wrong (eg a ill timed Search Card forces you to cycle the encounter deck)

12 hours ago, Derrault said:

If you keep acceleration tokens, I’d forget about the cost of keeping the hero cards in play, it’ll become inevitable that you can’t win later missions...or even early ones if a single game goes wrong (eg a ill timed Search Card forces you to cycle the encounter deck)

yeah last night I went through Wrecking Crew and it added 2 accelarators...so going into Crossbones, it would auto-flip one, be within 1 threat of going to the third and final phase so Crossbones starts with 2 weapons (making tough irrelevant), Hawkeye on 7 HP, and I am trying to figure out how it would be defeatable. His final phase (2 handed) is only 10 to beat me. With 5 accelerator tokens and 2 threat...that is 7 threat without him ever being allowed to scheme if it gets there...which it will. So there may need to be further tweaking. (and by may...there needs to be a lot of tweaking)

On the one hand, it is great that the campaign would get harder the further it goes, but I definitely want to create something tough but beatable, not unbeatable.

If you wanted acceleration tokens to have an effect without overwhelming the next scenario you could add one starting threat for each acceleration token in play at the end of the previous game.

I think for a challenge I'd stick with the Expert Campaign Rules from Red Skull. Keep your health, if you choose to heal add 1 (random) card from your set of 4. You can only heal a maximum of 4 times during a campaign - choose wisely.

I ran through all 11 currently 11 scenarios on Expert. Zola, which typically I find to be among the easier scenarios, ended up being overwhelming in this case and ended up being the only loss, I went with a couple modifications:

1) Option to Deduct 1 Acceleration Token for each Hero Specific card you had in play you elect to discard at the beginning of the next game (having it in discard pile instead of being ready to draw felt like an appropriate penalty)

2) Option from the very beginning to fully heal individual by taking one of the Obligation cards from Red Kull. Having it for more than 4 games (most you would ever attain it in Rise) made it seem more of a choice; some are no big deal, others crippling

I am planning to run through it again with these modifications, with a...less strong hero shall we say, Black Panther Leadership is incredible and Hawkeye Justice can thwart and still eliminate a ton of threat. Thinking something like Ms Marvel/Thor and see how that works, see if it is fun, too tough, too easy...it shows promise but definitely has kinks to work out