Unless you’ve been living under a log you’ll be very aware that FFG have announced the next six heroes making their way to Marvel Champions and goodness gracious they seem exciting. Three other content creators and myself have teamed-up to tell you a little bit about four of them, and to try and increase your hype even more. This guy definitely lucked out compared to the other tree (not a typo), cause, if you haven’t twigged yet, I get the honour of talking about the mean green fighting machine, Groot.
Links to the other three characters:
Quicksilver: http://1-2-punchboard.com/2020/08/03/marvel-champs-monday-fastest-man-alive/
Scarlet Witch: https://tcgcoop.design.blog/2020/08/05/scarlet-witch-preview-speculation/
Rocket Racoon: https://irebeldestiny.com/2020/08/05/marvel-champions-team-up-im-going-to-rocket/
Up until now the vast majority of expansions have been Avengers related, so it came as a great surprise to many when FFG announced that they were branching out into the cosmic side of the marvel universe with their next box, Galaxy’s Most Wanted. The announcement generated a massive positive reaction, specifically regarding the fact Rocket and Groot were the two heroes being included.
Since James Gunn’s 2015 smash hit, Rocket and Groot have been catapulted into the mainstream. Even my mum, who is not a superhero fan in the slightest, loved Guardians of the Galaxy and recently sent me a picture of a small log with the caption “Groot!” (I’ll include the picture at the bottom of the post so you can judge for yourself, but personally I think it just looks like a log and she’s going slightly mad). I want to take things back to way before all of that though, before the MCU made him a merchandise machine, and briefly talk about his comic book roots.
The original Groot first appeared all the way back in November 1960 in Tales to Astonish #13, as a tree monster intent on capturing humans in order to study them, a far cry from the jovial Groot we all know and love today. He also had run ins with the Hulk, the Collector, Mole Man, and even haunted the nightmares of a young Peter Parker.
It wasn’t until 2007 that a version of Groot far more recognisable to most was introduced in Annihilation: Conquest. It was during this run that he met the likes of Star-Lord, Drax, Gamora, and most importantly, developed his close bond with Rocket Racoon. This bond lead to Rocket recruiting him to the Guardians of the Galaxy. This run obviously inspired James Gunn when deciding on which version of the characters to include in his film and since then Groot has become a massive name, starring in his own solo comic run and, most importantly, becoming a hero in Marvel Champions.
The first thing you notice about Groot is his massive 3 defence and immediately your mind races to protection. The next thing you notice is his 10 hit points which is Oak-A but not anything special, certainly not for a monster like Groot. His two abilities, however, are gloriously thematic and mechanically really interesting. Whilst in alter-ego Groot can place 2 growth counters to a maximum of 10. This doesn’t exhaust him so any time you flip down you are guaranteed 4 growth counters. Couple that with his solid 4 recovery and you’ve got a very strong alter ego side.
His hero side is also closely linked to growth counters, stating that when he would take damage to instead remove that many growth counters from him. There’s some interesting wording with his hero ability. Firstly, it’s a forced interrupt, meaning that if you have any growth counters you have to discard them, and can’t choose to take damage instead. Secondly, it’s instead of taking damage meaning any card which has an effect if you don’t take damage is triggered even if you lose a few growth counters.
Unflappable Groot is going to be an absolute monster. An armoured vest will take his defence to 4, so provided he’s got at least a few growth counters down, Unflappable is practically guaranteed to trigger every turn. Add in a desperate defence and you’re looking at a defence of 6, bearing in mind you’re practically guaranteed to be able to ready if you’ve got even 1 growth counter as there aren’t many villains doing an attack greater than 7. Whilst those two protection cards are excellent with Groot, cards like Energy Barrier and Defensive Stance will be less useful as they only come into effect when you would take damage, and therefore can’t protect your growth counters.
Unfortunately we only got to look at one of his 15 hero cards. Fortunately the one we did get to look at is absolutely excellent. The brilliantly titled “I. AM. GROOT!” could potentially be the most efficient card in the game, dealing 1 damage for every growth counter on Groot. That’s a 2 cost event card that can deal up to 10 damage. Take note that you don’t spend the counters either, so you don’t have to sacrifice your armour to do damage. A Groot with 10 growth counters is going to be unstoppable.
This is only scratching the surface of Groot possibilities. Who knows what other growth counter related events he will have, and whether there will be a way to place growth counters whilst on his hero side. We also don’t know what kind of synergy he’ll have with his best friend Rocket, or how their team up-card, Flora and Fauna, will work. What we do know is that his pre-constructed deck is protection, so there will be even more protection cards added to the card pool, putting even more options at our fingertips.
Now comes the hard part, the long arduous wait until February. Until then all we can do is speculate, theorise, and hope, that his bark isn’t greater than his bite.
This is the picture my mum sent me by the way:
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