Out of the Shadows…is a series of articles highlighting fun, helpful cards that aren’t getting a lot of attention. They may or may not be meta-worthy, but are definitely worth looking at for casual play.
Hope Summers: All of Us
As we wait for news of new releases, I’ve been delving back into what’s avaialble in current Modern and looking for gems to highlight, which is how I came across this card to share with you today.
I know what you might be thinking as you see the words Hope Summers. But this is not THAT Hope Summers – to be specific, it is not Pluripotent Echopraxia. That card is well known and very strong. This is one of the other two Hope Summers cards available in the X-Men Forever (XMF) Campaign box, and is easily overlooked because of her overpowered counterpart, but, in my opinion, Hope Summers: All of Us is also a great card and very playable.
Hope Summers: All of Us is a 2 cost shield with the X-Men affiliation. Hope’s ability reads:
When Hope Summers is fielded, draw a die for each of your different, active X-Men affiliated characters. Place any X-Men affiliated character dice you drew in your Prep Area. Place all other dice drawn in your Used Pile.
Why is this special?
The first thing we need to have if we are choosing to run this Hope Summers is at least a couple of X-Men affiliated characters that are part of your strategy. Ideally, you would want to have one or two that are sitting in the field zone so you can draw as many dice as possible when you field Hope Summers. However, if you don’t have any other X-Men affiliated characters active when you field Hope, you will still draw one die – because Hope herself is an active X-Men affiliated character die.
Let’s look at the order of events when you field Hope Summers.
- Field Hope Summers (paying her cost, if relevant)
- Look for the total # of unique, active X-Men affiliated characters
- Draw that number of dice
- Prep any that are X-Men affiliated
- Place the rest of your dice in your Used Pile*
*These dice WOULD go directly to your Used Pile, and not to the Out of Play area, because they are not rolled or placed in your Reserve Pool.
The more I write about this card, the more I realize the brilliance of it. You’re guaranteed to draw at least 1 die – because Hope herself is an active X-Men character. If you draw an X-Men character, you can prep it for next turn. If you don’t, you can place a die in your used pile, at which point, you can interact with that die if you have character abilities, action dice, or global abilities that permit you to do so.
If your bag is empty, this effect will trigger a bag reset, as you are drawing a specific number of dice (based on your number of unique, active X-Men characters).
This effect can also help you churn through your bag, if it’s late game and your bag is full of stuff you need to clear out, or if you’ve had one of those games where you over-purchased (I mean, who over-purchases? *shrug*).
What else can she do?
I like prepping dice. What I like even more than prepping dice, is prepping the exact die I want. And even better than prepping the exact die I want, is possibly prepping that die for free…because it’s part of a when fielded effect on a character with a level 1 face that has a 0 fielding cost.
What do you think of this Hope Summers? Have you played her on a team before? Will you try her out now? Is she as brilliant as I think I’ve discovered while writing this article? Let us know in the comments below.
Until next time…
-jbouwme