Welcome to Goonhammer’s Marvel Crisis Protocol: Learning From Legends series. In these pieces, we interview top-tier MCP players to find out what they’re playing and how to get the most out of their affiliation of choice. You can read our other articles in the series by clicking the links below:
Midnight Sons with Jeremy
Convocation with Zach Cohen
This time, I was lucky enough to chat with Brady “Yourmammu” Schroeder to talk about the ruler of the Dark Dimension, Dormammu! Brady has been repping the big man for quite some time and is currently the third-highest-rated Dark Dimension player in the world on the Longshanks leaderboard. He isn’t just a Dark Dimension man, though, and Brady also boasts the number two global ranking for Legion of the Lost and Hydra.
Building a list for any affiliation can be challenging, but there are even more decisions to make with open affiliations like Dark Dimension, so read on to look under the hood at what makes Brady’s Dormammu list particularly scary.
Image Credit: Troy Alanis
Let’s start broadly. What’s the elevator pitch for playing Dark Dimension? Why should people consider trying the affiliation out, and what’s earned Dormammu so much of your time?
Do you enjoy playing the literally biggest model in the game AND bringing literally anyone you want? Have I got the guy for you. [The Dark Dimension leadership] gives extra power to all the models you bring, so a lot of turn one powers are online, and it really lets you get the ball rolling early.
If you just wanna jam games with your favorite models and not actually worry about staying “in affiliation,” then all you need to worry about is bringing the right threat amount to the game. Dormammu has earned so much of my time because when I first started competitively playing in this game, I wanted one of those sweet, sweet fake internet Longshanks badges for affiliation leader, and Dormammu - at the time - was the easiest point of entry. At this point, Dormammu has earned so much of my time because it’s just genuinely fun to have to play a rather niche model/affiliation and try to be the best at it.
As you’ve mentioned, the world is your oyster when playing Dark Dimension with its open affiliation list. What does your roster look like right now?
Dormammu (8)
Hulk (6)
Red Skull, Master of Hydra (5)
Namor, the Sub-Mariner (5)
Beta Ray Bill (4)
Carnage (4)
Weapon X (3)
Baron Zemo (3)
Nick Fury & the Howling Commandos (3)
Okoye (2)
Patch Up (R)
Brace for Impact (R)
Dark Restoration
I Am A Baron, After All
Gamma Launch
Cosmic Obliteration
Carnage Rules
Recalibration Matrix
Survival
Warpath
Intrusions Open Across City As Seals Collapse
Wedding Party Targeted By Terrible Attack!
Deadline to Destruction
Deadly Legacy Virus Cured?
The Montesi Formula Found
Skrulls Infiltrate World Leadership
There’s a lot to talk about here, but let’s start broadly. What’s the overall goal with this list?
The initial goal is that I’m just trying to bring my pet models into the game and have fun with them, like Dormammu himself, Hulk, Carnage, and Weapon X. With them, the goal is high attrition and aggression.
Do you have a specific win condition you’re shooting for every game, or is it designed to be flexible depending on the opponent and crisis combination?
The ideal win condition is keeping scoring down to let my attrition catch up. If the game goes five rounds or more, then I’ve done my job.
Image Credit: Troy Alanis
Getting more specific, Dormammu is obviously the only model you have to play every game, but he’s a huge investment at 8 points. What’s some general advice you have for players trying to get the most out of the big man? Any general play patterns, things to look for or avoid, etcetera?
You want to bring at most one support model with Dormammu, and every other model needs to generally be self-sufficient or able to apply high pressure to make sure you don’t go down on points. Try to stay away from low-threat Crises. I know 17 threat is a vast majority of the game currently, so you’re definitely going to need a plan for it, but you’ll want to hope for a good game of 18 threat and up.
For play patterns of Dormammu himself, you ideally never want to take move actions with him in a game, which helps ensure you’re getting maximum output from arguably your hardest-hitting piece on the table. So, bringing a model that can give Dormammu early movement greatly helps him [before he gets the power to use his range 2 place]. Commandos, Medusa, Heimdall, Loki 2, or any Space Stone user can do this.
Hulk is a 6 threat, which is a lot when your leader is an 8. Is he there for a certain matchup, crisis, or threat value? Do any other 6 threats have play in Dark Dimension?
Hulk comes out for a very specific Crisis cards: when the Extract is Montesi being played at 18 or more threat, or if the Secure is either Wedding Party Targeted by Terrible Attack! Or Intrusions.
Hulk brings an extremely niche card called Gamma Launch, which lets Hulk pay three power to place an adjacent allied model range 5. With Dormammu being a large base, placing him range 5 is a massive distance. If you deploy Dormammu directly across from any model in the game, except for stealth models, you’ll be able to attack them twice on their deployment on your next activation. This places a lot of pressure on your opponent to immediately move a model they might have wanted to save for later activation, and if they don’t move the model, you can very likely daze that model before they activate and still keep priority.
Your other high-threat models are Red Skull, Master of Hydra and Namor at 5. What makes them stand out for your list over other potential models at that threat value?
Red Skull, Master of Hydra brings an additional grunt body that you can have sit on the midline and not be very worried if they get attacked or not. If they are ignored, it’s an extra scoring body, yay! If attacked, then that’s free power for Dormammu. Red Skull is a good attrition piece. While not the most mobile fella, he can still hit a model or two rather hard. He comes in when it might be a particularly narrow crisis that really needs bodies on points like Fisk or Deadline.
Namor helps with chasing models and can help with double bubble [two sources of rerolls in a range 2 area] plays to help Dormammu and friends with much more consistent dice. Namor is great for a late activation round 1 and early activation round 2 so that he can charge any X-Men or Web Warrior model and put the pressure on. He’s particularly good against X-Men and Asgard since they are unable to play their damage-reducing TTCs against him.
Your suite of threes seems pretty self-explanatory. The Howling Commandos can move Dormammu (or anyone else) around every turn by default with Dark Dimension leadership power. Weapon X and Zemo are best-in-class mobile killers, with the latter having some support as well. Is there anything more to their inclusion worth discussing?
Weapon X - I just love the guy. He’s got a silly little VR headset, and he’s just an angry missile you charge at the enemy and see who dazes first. Often it’ll be Weapon X, but that’s not truly an issue, and if he doesn’t go down, then he has healing factor 3 and just gets fixed up!
Your crises are expectedly slow-scoring, which makes sense for a relatively tall team that fights well. Are there any other crises that almost make the cut and could be worth considering?
Deadline to Destruction is a bit iffy, but it also plays rather closely, so there’s a lot of fighting that occurs. That one could be changed to Deadly Meteors, but pay-to-flip secures requires a lot of mobility. Mayor Fisk could definitely take the spot as long as you bring stun-immune models or don’t actually try to score it.
Image Credit: Troy Alanis
On paper, open affiliations seem evergreen, as they always have access to whatever models they want to take. However, they are at the mercy of the Crises. How does Dark Dimension feel on the current Crisis set versus the previous one?
The new Crisis set is definitely a rough spot for Dormammu since 17 is by far the most common threat value, and that’s such a low value to bring an 8 threat leader into and have only 9 points to work with.
The loss of Demons Downtown is massive for Dormammu, and the Smash TTC got rotated out, so with the current crisis set, a lot more strategic play is needed. The peak Dormmamu Secures feel like Intrusions and Wedding Party, both benign midline, high threat, and relatively low-scoring.
Dormammu has seen a bit of a resurgence lately as a “10th model” that gives lists a Dark Dimension pivot for specific Crises or matchups. Have you experimented with duals here? Whether you have or haven’t, what’s the appeal of mono-affiliated DD over a dual?
I’ve dabbled with duals, but I’m so far down the Dark Dimension rabbit hole that I very often play lists “pure” these days. It’s rather tough to make a good dual list, and I personally fixate on a single affiliation at a time. Part of the appeal of mono DD is that your opponent can truly never guess what list you’re going to bring since every option is on the table.
If you build the roster to be flexible enough, they have to plan for the possibilities of a 3-tall attrition list or a 5-wide, more scenario-focused list. The appeal of mono-Dorm is the near-guaranteed threat projection and silly plays you can execute. As mentioned earlier, one of my favorite plays is to bring Hulk and Dormammu and Gamma Launch Dormammu into the middle of the board, but still let Hulk have a power from the leadership to interact with a Crisis if need be.
The “meta” feels pretty open right now, with several affiliations seeing competitive success. Which matchups feel particularly good for you, and which can make you a bit nervous?
Web Warriors and Invaders give me the greatest heartburn since both factions have a leadership that gives defensive rerolls and unlocks skulls, which is very often a significant part of Dormammu’s output [who counts both his own and opposing Skulls as successes when he attacks]. I feel I’ve had my best games into X-Men lately if I can put on the aggression fast enough to make them use big resources like Xavier's Dream or other tactics cards.
If people want to talk with you more about Dark Dimension, can they do that? Do you have a Discord handle and any MCP servers you commonly hang out in?
I’m very active in the Discord server Alfredo’s Size 3 Taco Truck, and in the Unofficial Fan Server I frequent the Dark Dimension channel to help make sure followers of the great one can have the most fun with the game!
And that's the Dark Dimension! Check back soon for another entry and to learn more from the best of the best in MCP.
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