What is the strongest hero card?

Barring that, however, I have to say that I get very excited to see either Impromtu Invention or Wrathful Retribution in my hand.

I think many cards are situationally great. Wrathful Retribution, to use Rabk's example, isn't as useful if you're up against The Dreamer.

Having said that, we just had a discussion during a game last night that Impromptu Invention is just always amazing (although the word used was "overpowered" ).

While it doesn't allow as many options as Impromtu Invention, Unique Cabilities is an exciting card for me, and always useful: it can turn Irreducible damage against it's dealer, turn Plague Rat's infections into some kind of innoculation, and provide powerful options regardless of board position. 

Impromptu Invention is totally OP.  Fellet of Foot is close up there as an "auto play".

Anything with a 'draw a crad, play a card' clause is pretty great; Impromptu is often called out as the best, but Unique Capabilities serves a similar porpoise, and Fleet of Foot and Team Communication are both fantastic for card draw.

In terms of cards that can break villains and turn games into easy mode, Savage Mana is a whale of a card.

Situationally best? Synactic Analysis is quite good for really getting a hero rolling during a turn by peeking at the top two cards.

Overall best: Savage Mana and Wrathful Retribution come to mind.

Savage Mana is definitely huge in most cases.  I tend to like Extrasensory Awareness for (often) being able to cripple a villain.  I'd think that Turn of Events, allowing everyone else to use a power, would be up there as well.

In which deck is Unique Capabilities?

I came in here ready to support the Impromptu Invention train, and I was not dissappointed. You can summon 2 Equipment cards, plus draw a card on top of it. Oft times, you can follow up with double powers, too, thanks to Utility Belt. Maybe it's just Wrait being Wraith, though. As mentioned before, any Draw a card, Play a card things are always great.

Savage Mana is only as good as the matchup you are playing. It can't be compared to Impromptu in the same breath if we are talking about best overall cards.

Savage Mana is a dead card in any match up against Iron Legacy, Kismet, Miss Info, Plauge Rat, Progeny, ect. 

Impromptu is most likely the best play against any villain in any situation. 

As far as which card is situationally the best? That is totally dependant on the situation. 98% of cards in this game are situational. Impromptu and the few other "Draw/play" machanic cards are the rare exception.

Best. Card. Ever.  Seriously, it lives up to its title.  But then what do we know about that?

As for currently released cards, here is Phantaskippy's top ten, kind of in order.

1.  Impromptu Invention.  Fully replaces itself and adds any equip from your deck, the sheer number and variety of equips gives this card the edge over Unique Capabilities.

2.  Infrared Eyepiece.  It destroys so many villains, and is really good against most others.  Just an incredible power, and it gives you a card draw.

3.  Inspiring Presence.  No upkeep cost, a heal to start and +1 to all hero damage, it is awesome.

4.  Wrest The Mind.  So many targets to use this on, most of which you can clear with no damage to Visionary.  Also provides opportunity to destroy several decks used well.  Visionary's ability to decoy or cocoon her backlash damage and get WtM back from the trash helps it get a spot on this list.

5.  Grease Gun.  Cost is arguably higher than Ground Pound for less scope of protection, but the ability to get it into play in tough situations when you might not be able to pay for Ground Pound is great.

6.  Mistbound.  Beats out Take Down because it can target the environment or villain, or even whatever deck Ronway is playing, because sometimes you want your hero to live.

7.  Bestial Shift.  The best card in a really strong deck.  It is versatile and powerful, and sets off a really nice combo that requires minimal setup.  Can grant multiple effects and power uses, all of which are strong in this deck.

8.  Battlefield Experience.  A hard card to quantify, it refunds itself and the play you used on it, then it gives you a 2 and 2 power that she boosts internally.  It also provides you with the opportunity to set up a bigger turn by playing it and saving that extra card play for another turn.  It is a combo-nut's dream and a great overall card.  It also gives some insurance against destruction, which is nice, esp. when you can set up a combo for the Villain turn.

9.  Fueled Freeze.  The best ongoing destruction card in the game.  I don't care about your arguments to the contrary, because they are wrong. 

10.  Stealth Bot.  Best Tank Ever.  No upkeep, can come out and back in multiple times, laughs at single points of damage, and can take damage from any source at the player's whim.  It's a fantastic card.  Only weakness is it's power scales inversely with (H).

Parse's Buffer Overflow. Being able to say no to something that could devastate the team is pretty good.

Legacy's Take Down is similar, but more in line with stalling the villain in the early game or preparing for a coordinated assault to end it.

Infared Eyepiece is only good when you have a "bad" choice to bury and a tame one to send to the top. I'd say it's nowhere near the most powerful, just a lot of luck involved.

Fueled Freeze is good, but Ball Lightning is also guaranteed damage. Given that tempest can do AoE anyway, swinging for a guaranteed 4 damage plus 2 ongoings isn't bad.

Cedistic Dissonant:  For nuking that one card that you can't deal with, and for drawing cards as well.

He has a point. Being able to destroy anything is pretty impressive.

Team Communication is amazing. 4 card draw, plus an extra play? Awesome.

Sedative Flechettes.  Destroys two ongoings and deals all the baddies 2 damage.

That'd be Disruptive Flechettes - Sedative is villain-Omnitron's version ;).

Anyway, agreeing on Impromptu Invention being most uber :). Anything with "draw a card, play a card" is super-useful too. Someone asked, a few posts back, where Unique Capabilities is from - it belongs to the Sentinels. It's something like "search your deck for a Signature card and put it into play, draw a card, play a card". I've been in at least one game where two or three Team Communications (draw four cards, play a card) have chained into two or three Unique Capabilities :D.

I think Arcane Cadence is pretty good, especially early game (not so much in the later stages of a longer game when you've managed to get set up and don't really need anything in particular to come out any more) and even more so if you can chain it into other copies of itself - it means you can basically search a decent portion of your deck and have a much greater chance of getting hold of the stuff you think you're really gonna need for that game :).

Buffer Overflow is another nice one - "Oh, a Devastating Aurora? Umm, nope >:)". Very useful if you're against anyone who can turn the tables in a single card play.

Cards like Wrathful Retribution, Savage Mana, and Omnicannon are good for use as finishing moves if you can get the latter two powered up enough, which of course is very hard/impossible to do with Savage Mana if you're against someone like Spite or Iron Legacy who have no targets in their deck besides themselves.

What else is good? By Any Means, that's another one - stick it on the main villain and hit them for more damage. Have someone redirect the villain's own damage to themselves so they hit themselves more. In Akash'Bhuta's case, you even get to take advantage of the natural course of play as she hits herself for buffed damage when you break her limbs (fantastic fun if she has many of them out and an End of Days gets played, during which you conveninently have the bounty destroyed after all the limbs are gone >:)).

There's probably a whole bunch of other cards that are "zomg love this one!" but I think I've covered several of my main ones, at least :).

When you have 1 HP and Interpolation Beam is in play.

Who needs HP?

Not Ronway, that's for damn sure

I thonk people are underestimating Inspiring Presence. This game is tuned towards damage and rhis card does it best. There are a couple situations that it may not be perfect, but the main cases, plague rat and iron legacy are still damage races. Hero hp is overrated, burn them down before they do the same to you

"By Any Means " from Chrono-Ranger is comparable to Inspiring Presence.   It doesn't have drawbacks of when you damage yourself and if cards from the villain or environment cause damage they are dealt extra in those cases too.  

It also only applies to one target, while IP applies to everyone you hit. In most cases, there will be multiple targets to hit, so IP is better than By Any Means.

Like I said it is comparable and with how CR's deck works is more likely to see play.  

I play Inspiring Presence anytime i draw it

That being said, sometimes you don't WANT to hit every target, or you want to buff damage dealt to that target by non-hero sources. In these cases, By Any Means is superior.

It really just comes down to circumstance. Obviously the only correct answer is BOTH of them, together.

By any means has its moments, and it's main denefit of increasing damage dealt to that target by environment and villain targets is great.  In most cases Inspiring presence is better.

By any means can be tutored and has two cards that can contribute to destruction recovery meaning it is much easier to play compared to inspiring présence. It may not be card texte but it factors in a cards efficiency.

Team Lader Tachyon is in my opinion best card (character cards are still cards!) Everyone draws a card for your turns power? Please sir may I have another?

The number of villains where you would want By Any Means over Inspiring Presence is so small.  

Iron Legacy and Plague Rat in games with low environment target threat and Tachyon but not Absolute Zero?

Are there other matchups where the threat of hero self damage is greater than the extra damage to all but one target?

KNYFE maybe but i still think she would prefer IP. And i even think most times CR would prefer IP to BAM

I guess Setback too... but honestly who tries to play Setback safely

*Raises hand*

It can be done. Although I aim for self-preservation early game and switch to damage output mode late game when we're pushing for damage more. Unless I get Silver Lining early.

For situational strength, I will suggest what we just did last night (we have had the basic game only, for two days so far): as the Visionary in a five-player game, facing Omnitron, who had just drawn Electro-Pulse Explosive, I played Wrest the Mind and did 70 points damage to Omnitron at the start of his next turn.

Unless we misread the rules or failed to find an errata, that is. (Other than the very short thread on official errata here, is there a good place to ask clarification questions? I had a couple other questions that came up in the two games we've so far played, and I probably will have more.)

First, Welcome to the forums!

Second, Spiff has an amazing FAQ.

Third, while Wrest the Mind is fantastic with the Electro-Pulse Explosive, the overall damage will be slightly lower. After each redirection, the EPE will take 3 damage from Visionary, which will lower its next damage. So, if there were five hero targets out, the EPE would deal: 15+12+9+6+3=45 damage without other modifications.

Fourth: If you need to ask any questions, you can try searching for the answer by typing in the cards (although this doesn't always work great. Or just start a thread over here.

Fifth: Welcome to the forums!

I find I actually prefer Super-Scientific to Team Leader.

It's hard to argue against Impromptu Invention or Team Leader Tachyon, but I think that Jim's Hat is also a contender. Particularly if used early in the game, it can lead to many more extra cards in play than Impromptu Invention.

The same could be said of HUD Goggles, but Tachyon has plenty of other ways to get extra card plays, so the effect of HUD Goggles isn't as strong as Jim's Hat. 

I don't recall any other cards that allow a hero to play two cards every turn. As for the cards that allow a hero to use two powers (Utility Belt, Legacy Ring, Turret Mode, etc.) I think they provide less flexibility as one generally has fewer powers to choose from then cards.

Snap Decision. It has the discard cost, but when you get 3 critical multipliers, that's hardly a downside.

 To me the strongest card is Reclaim from the Deep. It gives you access to using AGAIN and AGAIN all the best cards of your team. Reclaim from the Deep can reclaim itself, and allow all your teammates to use their best card once every two turn at worse. As you pointed out very little point in not playing Impromptu Invention, or Fleet of Foot and with that you could over and over the only backside is it stalls Tempest but it does so for the greater good of the team. If you've got a way to play extra cards like AA as a teammate or PW Tempest you're not even stalled.

Reclaim is good, but you would need two copies of it to have them Reclaim each other. The first copy wouldn't be in the trash when it takes effect and lets you pull one out. Otherwise, yeah, great card.

Personally, I'm currently in love with BEST CARD EVER, and Impromptu Invention is an eternal favorite.

Impromptu Invention is always best when you can chain them.

I'd argue that Impromptu and the cards it has a high likelihood of putting in play (including gaining an extra power) in Wraith's deck is worth more than an extra card play in Chrono-Ranger's deck.  Wraith's equipment is really powerful.

Reclaim from the Deep + Vernal Sonata = <3

Yes, but the topic is "what is the strongest hero card", not "what makes an awesome combo".

I set up all of the cards under the force-displacement tester at work. It turns out that Enduring Intercession is the strongest card. Who knew?

I know...but we were on the topic of "reclaim from the deep" and pointed out that a card allows great recycling, that's all.

I've had both copies of Don't Dismiss Anything and spent most of a game chaining them, which was fun (play DDA, it goes to trash, next turn play other DDA to put first DDA to top of deck then second copy goes to trash, end of turn draw first DDA again, next turn play first DDA to put second one back on top of deck, and so on) :).

As for cards that let you play other cards, I think Swift Bot does, doesn't she? I think she gives you an extra play and draw per turn.