Rook City provides over 200 cards in decks for two heroes, two environments, and four villains. Everything reflects a gritty, street-level theme darker than the original fare, while still being true to the roots of heroes like Batman. The production values of this expansion are better than the original: the cards are sturdier (yet not too dissimilar from the original set, since the cards don't get mixed this wouldn't be an issue regardless), and individual environment cards get custom artwork (which the original decks lack). The box is larger and tougher, so you will probably end up storing some of the original cards in it.
As with the original, a lot of care went into the design of the cards. Each deck has a unique back with artwork germane to its content. All cards contain snippets of dialogue from the heretofore mythical Sentinel Comics line, really fleshing out the backstory of the Sentinels Multiverse.
Best of all, the designers have addressed the original game's largest flaw – the failure to scale the challenge to the number of heroes. Now cards use a special symbol to stand in for the number of heroes, modifying their effects accordingly. For example, a card that once inflicted 4 points of damage may now do H-1. It is certainly gratifying to see improvements to the rules along with additional content.
Meanwhile...
For those new to the game, Sentinels resembles a collectible card game in which each player has a custom deck of cards to play. Each hero uses their own set of cards with unique powers and effects. Some rely more on equipment, while others have an impressive array of innate abilities or mechanics common to CCGs. This concept also applies to villains and environments, whose cards include instructions on how they are played. The result is a game that does feel like a superhero combat, where team members set their allies up for greater effectiveness and absorb devastating attacks for the good of the team. The environments are a mix of good and bad effects, always changing
Each hero has an active and incapacitated side, which changes the powers they can use (and keeping KO'd heroes in play, albeit less effective). A related mechanic works with the villains, who have two possible states depending on which side of their card is in play – although both sides are deadly. Certain in-game conditions make the villains flip into new menaces.
Rogues' Gallery
The six new characters all have unique wrinkles to their play styles, although similarities arise as the number of supers increases. Here is a short description of the new heroes and villains.
Expatriette is the daughter of the super-supremacist Citizen Dawn from the original set. While her lack of powers confounds her mother, her enthusiastic adoption of firearms is the bane of anyone she calls an enemy. She is a pretty straightforward hero to play, with a combination of weapons and ammunition to inflict a variety of damage.
Mr. Fixer is an auto mechanic by day and a fearsome vigilante by night. He adopts one of many martial-arts styles while wielding a Snap-on chest of automotive equipment in his onslaught against crime. The art is an original mix of oriental prints and the tool calendars you see in repair shops. If Expatriette is the Punisher, than Mr. Fixer reminds me more of Mike Baron's Badger.
Spite is a serial killer addicted to several combat-enhancing drugs. His deck contains a number of innocent victims who need rescuing, along with the chemicals that boost his power. The former provide a nice game-within-a-game change of pace from straightforward combat, although when he finishes his drug regimen Spite deals prodigious amounts of damage.
Plague Rat is another tough solo villain whose mind-altering venom causes the heroes to turn against each other. They end up battling themselves as much as the infections that are consuming them in a gruesome slugfest.
The Matriarch possesses a magical crown that allows her to summon and control crows. A horde of avian minions prevents a superteam from getting close enough to defeat her.
The Chairman is a Kingpin-like figure running the underworld behind a screen of crooked cops and snitches, tougher underbosses and his sinister Operative. Although this minion-heavy deck demands a lot of bookkeeping, it really feels like the heroes are cleaning up the streets one crook at a time.
Along with the darker theme of the cards, the two environments are just as grim – an abandoned chemical complex and the mean streets of (c)Rook City herself.
Overall, the game play is excellent – the game gives me a better superhero experience than any of the combats in superhero RPGs which I've played. The only issue that crops up is the tedium of keeping track of hit points and damage modifiers (there is an app for iDevice users available, but I have not used it). Also, even with the scaling of players, you still need a minimum of three heroes as some of the cards end up doing H-2, or zero, damage.
Added to the already impressive base game, Rook City is a fantastic addition, almost doubling the potential variations of the original. Even when you try to stack a game in your favor (by gauging the villain's play style and choosing the heroes to match it), things tend to turn out differently.
Sentinels of the Multiverse appears next in Infernal Relics!
