X-Men Dice Throne Is a Board Game That Makes Good Use of its License

Marvel is everywhere these days, so it’s not surprising to see the deluge of heroes and villains represented throughout various media like the X-Men ‘97 show and Marvel Rivals video game. Even on the tabletop front, Marvel has seen its fair share of interesting crossovers with the likes of the team-based word game Codenames, and the long lasting trading card game Magic: The Gathering. Coming this Spring, there is yet another Marvel collab featuring the X-Men and the dice-rolling fighting game, Dice Throne. From what I’ve played so far, it’s very similar to past versions, but the new characters and unique abilities give this new X-Men run an interesting take for fans looking for a different kind of superhero tabletop experience.

The new X-Men iteration of Dice Throne was initially on Kickstarter. So the Kickstarter version and the Battle Chest version that can be ordered on their website will have different contents than the retail versions that I was able to play with. These differences are mainly in the quality of the tokens and game pieces, in addition to better organizational improvements like storage trays for each hero. For the retail versions, there are two boxes to choose from showcasing four different X-Men each. One includes Cyclops, Gambit, Rogue, and Jean Grey while the other has Iceman, Psylocke, Storm, and Wolverine. So when deciding on which box to get into, you get a good blend of some fan favorites no matter what. Each character has a difficulty rank from one to six, which can be seen on the back of the box as well. The box with Wolverine and Storm is best for new players, since neither of the heroes have a difficulty over four. The Gambit and Jean Grey box, on the other hand, has both of these heroes in particular at difficulty six, so it’s best to consider your playgroup before choosing one or the other.

Since this is ultimately Dice Throne, the gameplay is much the same, with each player rolling dice to determine what abilities their character will use on themself or their opponents or allies. Of the eight abilities on a character board, one of them is usually a defensive ability and another is a passive – alongside the other offensive abilities. On the center is the ultimate ability, which is of course very difficult to pull off being a game of chance. WIth each character board comes dice, a deck of cards specific to the character, dials for tracking resources, and associated character sheets with added information. It can take some time to understand a character’s abilities and the synergy between each one, but it all comes down to what you roll to decide what your turn will play out as. The deck of cards can assist you in manipulating your roll, but you can also alter your opponent’s roll if you decide to make an attack weaker or fizzle altogether. You’ll be taking turns rolling dice and bashing your opponents until they’re life hits zero. It’s pretty a straightforward goal, but how you get there is where the strategy comes in.

Since the basic gameplay is quite simple, the replayability really comes from the different characters you can pick from. Wolverine, for instance, has a fairly easy playstyle where he gains rage when taking damage. So the more Wolverine is attacked, the stronger his attacks will be. Then you have characters like Storm that can supercharge her abilities to have extra effects. She even has an ability to borrow dice from other players, so she has a better chance of rolling straights, like in poker, which are the cost of some offensive abilities.

Marvel X-Men Dice Throne