by Paul G
Except that that's what they did exactly. Only one resource, "buying" Locations and Villains... It's fairly clear that there is some level of abstraction.They implicitly have made this game a bit more abstract than the Marvel one. They offered us cake, and then gave us cake. Some people were expecting chocolate, and we got vanilla. I'm arguing that vanilla is a valid flavour as well. We even have Legendary if we want chocolate, so I'm happy about the whole two different flavour thing.
The word "Foes" is a bit weird, but it's a comic-y way to describe opponents. The Marvel DBG has attack cards as well.
Power buying Arkham Asylum and the Batarang makes perfect sense. It's an extremely general term, and it's used as such here. Batman's "power" has always been gadgets. Think of Power as the resource superheroes use to do everything. It could also have been called "Time" or "Effort", but that would have been weird and thematically inappropriate.
The Flash buying X-Ray Vision is impossible to avoid with a Deckbuilder with character selection at the start. The fun thing is, in the DC universe, it's extremely easy to imagine (yes, it requires imagination to justify this sort of game, but not just this game) the Flash getting X-Ray vision for an issue, or teaming up with someone that has it.
The Marvel deckbuilder has a lot of awesome theme in the villains, but the hero side makes very little sense. It has been said that Tony Stark would like to be the best hero, but... You're not playing as Tony Stark. All of the players are playing as... Something, something that can purchase 4 different cards representing each Hero.
It doesn't make any sense either. Yet with a tiny bit of imagination, you can imagine what role the player takes in the game world. It's a fairly common thing in board games (as I'm sure you're aware) that who you, the player, represents is a big hard to define.
In Mage Knight, you're a Mage Knight. In Dominion and Citadels, you're a ruler of some sort of some sort of place. In Ascension, you're... Uh. Something. That plays cards. A leader of... A thing?
In Agricola, you're a farming family. In Race for the Galaxy, you're a... Space country? Or corporation? Whatever. In Small World, I have absolutely no idea what you are.
Then you look at DC Comics and Marvel Comics. In DC comics, you're a story or storyteller. In Legendary... You're...? I don't have the faintest clue. A higher rank person in SHIELD who buys very specific contracts from the heroes that you get to play once per time you shuffle your deck?
"Who are you playing as?" is a weird question. It's commonly hard (or impossible) to define. It's easier in DC Comics DBG than in Legendary.
That's my point.