Description
A mad scientist holds the world hostage with his terrifying inventions. An alien warlord from a far away galaxy brings his limitless army of bizarre minions to conquer the planet. A giant rampaging robot cuts a swath of destruction across the coast, destroying major population centers. And who will stand in their way? A team of heroes, all with impressive powers and abilities stand between the world and the forces of evil. Will you help them? Answer the call to protect the multiverse!
Sentinels of the Multiverse is a cooperative, fixed-deck card game with a comic book flavor. Each player plays as one of ten heroes, against one of four villains, and the battle takes place in one of four different dynamic environments.
Each player, after selecting one of the heroes, plays a deck of 40 cards against the villain and environment decks, which "play themselves", requiring the players to put the top card of the appropriate deck into play on the villain and environment turns. On each player's turn, they may play a card from their hand, use a power printed on one of their cards in play, and draw a card from their deck. Each round starts with the villain turn, continues clockwise around the table, then concludes with the environment turn. Each villain has various advantages, such as starting with certain cards in play, as specified by the villain character card. Play continues until the heroes reduce the villain to 0 or fewer HP, or until the villain defeats the heroes, either via a win condition or by reducing all the heroes to 0 or fewer HP.
In another of our regular board game spotlights, Zatu reclines on the sofabed, ready meal resting on its ever-growing gut, daytime TV carving away at its mushy frontal lobe. Nestled between the cushions, Sentinels of the Multiverse: Enhanced Edition, the 2011 release from publisher Greater Than Games and designers Christopher Badell, Paul Bender and Adam Rebottaro.
The Game
Sentinels of the Multiverse is a game about good and evil, right and wrong, justice and injustice, sweet and sour, benson and hedges. The world is under threat from any number of villains: mad scientists, aliens, robots, barons, and 1-5 players must band together (if they exceed 1, obviously; if not they just band) to defeat whatever evil that game may bring.
It’s a card game with a comic book hero theme, in which a selection of hero decks can by pitted against the various villain decks.
This core set includes ten heroes, four villains and four environments for endless combinations of scenarios. The ‘villains’ essentially play themselves. Each has their own deck and a set of instructions outlining how they act on their turn. Same goes for the chosen environment. Players use their hero decks to respond to whatever the surroundings or chosen megalomaniac throws at them.
If their health is reduced to zero, they die and lose like in life. If they manage to thwart the villain, they win.
Gameplay itself is simple. Each turn, players play a card from their hand, use a power on a card in play, and draw another. The game doesn’t reach its bitter end until the heroes or the villain are all the way dead.
The Publisher
Greater Than Games were founded in 2011 by designers Christopher Badell, Paul Bender and Adam Rebottaro. In 2015 they merged with Dice Hate Me Games, and now publish under three different brands.
Popular titles include the above, the Sentinel Tactics series and Galactic Strike Force.
The Designers
Badell, Bender and Rebottaro are the aforementioned founders of Greater Than Games. Badell is a writer and the design director at GTG; Bender worked on a web start up before becoming GTG’s operations manager; and Adam Rebottaro is an artist, responsible for all the artwork of Sentinels of the Multiverse.
Join the Sentinels Multiverse today
If the multiverse strikes you as something worth protecting, buy the game from our online store!