by johnclark
On which superheroes are best, you will find as many opinions as there are players. Here is how the discussion goes:
A: "[this hero] is SO overpowered! How can it be fixed?"
B: "no way! [this hero] is junk! They never win in my games! [another hero] is basically unbeatable].
A: "Well, you are wrong. [this hero] is clearly best. [insert reasons why the ability must be much better]. PLUS I win with [this hero] EVERY time."
B: "No, those reasons are bad. [another hero] is clearly better [insert more reasons]. PLUS I win with [another hero] EVERY time."
A: "Well, you must be playing it wrong or your opponents stink".
Last year my group played over 100 games (base game only), recording all the results. We made sure everyone played each hero the same number of times. The results are in this thread:
http://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/1059584/yet-another-char...
After each game the characters get a score, such that first = 1 and last = 0, with the other placings a fraction depending on the number of players. The overall average will therefore be 0.5. They were mostly 4 player games, with some 5 player and a few 3 player.
Here are the average scores for each character:
0.59 Cyborg
0.55 Aquaman
0.52 Wonder Woman
0.47 Green Lantern
0.46 Superman
0.45 Flash
0.44 Batman
None of the characters are that bad - they all do ok - but Cyborg came out as a bit better than the rest. There is no material difference between the bottom four. GL is hit-and-miss, with a high rate of winning AND coming last. Aquaman is opposite - does not come last much but only has a mid-range winning rate.
Obviously you can disagree with the results, and my group may not be as skilled as yours, but I would be very interested if there were any others out there who have recorded results for a LOT (100+) of games. The data is more powerful than anecdotal evidence.