Marvel: Crisis Protocol – November 2025 Rules Update

Welcome back to another Atomic Mass Games Transmission!

We’ve got a group of new and exciting updates to Marvel: Crisis Protocol available to download now! You can find the updated documents on the Rules page for Marvel: Crisis Protocol on our website. The Marvel: Crisis Protocol Core Rulebook includes a set of rules updates. Two new Crisis Cards are available for Print-and-Play in the November 2025 Crisis Cards document. The Challenger document was updated to include those new Crisis Cards in the Standard Timeline. There are updated Team Tactic Cards and character Stat Cards in the November 2025 Updated Cards Print-and-Play document. Finally, the FAQ and Errata document has changed to list the updated rules and cards.

Marvel: Crisis Protocol Rulebook

We’ve been watching the game grow and evolve and absorbing feedback from as many of the communities around the game that we can. In addition to that, our designers, developers, and playtest team have steadily worked to test potential changes to the game to make the game the best it can be. From that work, we’ve made a set of updates to the core rules of the game.

The most important update to be aware of is to Roster building and the process for Building the Mission and selecting Crisis Cards for a game. We’ve increased the amount of Crisis Cards in Rosters from 3 Secure and 3 Extract to 5 Secure and 5 Extract. This change massively increases the variety of combinations that a player will play from game to game. In addition to the Crisis Cards found in products such as CA13 War of Kings Crisis Card Pack and CP271 X-Men Starter Set, players can find Crisis Cards available to print out and play with on the Organized Play page for Marvel: Crisis Protocol under Challenger Crisis Card Set 2025.

Perhaps even more significantly, we’ve changed the process for Building the Mission so that the players randomly draw 2 of their Crisis Cards for a type instead of 1, and their opponent picks 1 of those cards to use in that Game. This change makes it much more likely that the players find a pair of Crisis Cards that both of them enjoy since both players have some control over each card being used. This process also guarantees players can avoid the Crisis Card they like the least (or the one they played last if a player wants to make sure their games are different from one another).

The last update made to ensure variety in the early parts of the Game is to Deployment. After all characters are deployed, the players roll to see who gets the Priority token for the first Round of the Game. This second priority roll forces players to deal with uncertainty in Deployment. When a player deploys knowing they will have the Priority token in Round 1, they can build their Squad and deploy their characters with a very clear gameplan. For example, on Skrulls Infiltrate World Leadership where there are 4 tokens in the middle of the table, they could deploy the best character they have in their Roster to safely pick up the Skrull Agent on the left side of the table as their first Activation and deploy the most deadly character they have in their Roster to attack the character that tries to pick up the Skrull Agent on the right. If they save those 2 characters to be their last 2 characters deployed, they can reliably put their opponent in a tough position. With the update to make another priority roll, each player has to choose their Squad and deploy without knowing which player will take the first Turn. That incentivizes the players to build backup plans into their Squad, possibly include more well-rounded characters that can respond to what happens, and deploy without as clear of a spot to set up an ambush.

Outside of the start of the Game, the largest update is to Throws. Damage from Throws is now set at 3 instead of being based off the Size of the object being Thrown. Outside of Brace for Impact, most characters dodging a Throw can expect to just roll their Physical Defense without any help. Even 4 Defense characters are lucky to dodge 2 of the incoming damage from a Throw. Taking that into account, a Throw that deals 3 Damage before the dodge is still very impactful. Throws that deal 4-6 Damage before the dodge can Daze a character with no Damage on them with only one player rolling a few dice, making those plays too reliable. Throws should be an important part of the game, but we want the largest swings in Damage to come from attacks where both players are rolling dice and the outcome isn’t as certain. With this change, players can include much more Size 3 and 4 terrain in their games without worrying that it will warp the gameplay. Our playtest games with terrain-packed tables have been incredibly fun, and I’m excited to see the tables players set up.

The rest of the changes, except for the new appendix with rules for new objective types, are smaller. Damaging allies with beam and area attacks has been removed. While it did not come up often, causing damage to allied characters without them gaining power could be quite punishing when it did. Passing has been updated to not count Grunts since they activate on the same Turn as their parent character. To clear up some rules interactions, rules priority was updated to give precedence to rules from Crisis Cards and character damage was updated so that Dazed characters can be used by the opposing player to score VPs.

Finally, Appendix I was added to the rulebook. It contains the rules for new objective token types that will be part of the upcoming Crisis Card pack releasing next year.

Source tokens are the new type of Extract objective token. Source tokens represent objects that create or store other items. When a character Interacts with a Source token, they flip the Source token to its exhausted side and pick up a set-aside Asset or Civilian objective token that behaves like the Extract objective tokens you’re used to. At the end of the Round, those non-Source objective tokens are removed from the game, so characters need to return to the Source token that doesn’t change locations to pick up another token. Source tokens allow characters to run in and take the objective out from under the feet of their opponents, but those characters have to come back and do it again the next Round if they want to keep scoring points from that Source objective token.

The upcoming Secure objective tokens change the way characters position around them. The new type of Secure objective token, Zone tokens, do this by having a 90 degree Arc marked on them. Characters within Range 3 and within the area defined by the Arc are affected by the Zone token’s special rules.

November 2025 Crisis Cards

Lockdown! Security Systems Stymie Breakout and Jailbreak Leads to Mass Mutant Escape! are the new Secure and Extract Crisis Cards you can play with now! These Crisis Cards were designed to be played together, tested to work well together, and set a scene.

In Lockdown! Security Systems Stymie Breakout characters can contest the objective tokens, Prison Blocks, from Range 2. There is a massive area of the battlefield characters can stand and still contribute to scoring. At the end of each Round, one of the Prison Blocks locks down. That forces the characters to scramble. Standing near the center of the table makes it easier for characters to move between objectives but puts them in the most danger.

Jailbreak Leads to Mass Mutant Escape! uses Source tokens, Cells, that characters need to approach to pick up Prisoners and score VPs. The way out of the jail is in the center of the table, and Prisoners slip away from any character leading them away from it. This Crisis Card forces a fight near the 4 corners of the battlefield where the Cells are located and spreads throughout the middle of it when characters pick up Prisoners and move nearer to the middle to avoid those brawls.

November 2025 Updated Cards

Our significant repacking and reissuing project discussed here continues! As before, we’ve taken the time to review all of the characters and cards in these products and playtest adjustments that would align those characters closer to our vision of how they should play in the game. The November 2025 Updated Cards Print-and-Play document contains all of the updated cards that have been prepared for release, and those cards are available to play with now.

When we were working on the Sentinel Affiliation Pack, we knew we needed to make more aggressive changes to bring them up to the balance curve. The Sentinel MK4 in particular was identified as needing more durability and particularly a more useful Injured side of the card. When we were testing the affiliation as a whole in playtesting, we had to acknowledge just how big of a problem terrain could be for these characters. To that end, we added the Acceptable Collateral Damage innate superpower so that small terrain no longer got in the way of Sentinel MK4s moving where they wanted to go since they could just stomp right on top of it. Cassandra Nova began playing well as soon as she got an additional power in the Power Phase. Sentinel Prime MK4’s biggest change was in his leadership to have it work when KO’ing enemy characters in addition to Dazing them. These reworks makes the affiliation feel like the deadly mutant hunters we envision.

Dormammu’s updates were a bit of a rollercoaster. We tested very aggressive improvements including removing the once per Turn restriction from Not of This Dimension, and he was blowing games out of the water. Ultimately, we were convinced he wasn’t incredibly far from the mark, and we brought more modest updates. Updating Master of the Realm of Darkness so that Dormammu adds Failure results to his roll and changing his dice triggers to all use Failures really did the trick to make him feel truly villainous and simultaneously increased his reliability as a damage dealer. Updating his Leadership, Flames of the Faltine, to check for too much power in the Cleanup Phase instead of the Power Phase removed the terrible situation where it made an allied character lose their Activation to it that Round by Dazing or KOing.

The S.H.I.E.L.D. updates went smoothly. We just increased the Stamina of the characters, and that allowed the characters to play the objectives in the way we envisioned. In the remaining updates, Stamina increases also worked to make Professor X, Psylocke, Star-Lord, and Yondu have the presence we wanted.

The last updated character also got quite a bit of playtest and discussion. We wanted Emma Frost to transform between Normal and Diamond forms more often. To that end, we moved her ability to absorb collision damage to her Diamond form by allowing her to transform when she would make a dodge roll. Her Physical and Energy Defenses increased in Diamond form to make transforming defensively more worthwhile. Activating in Diamond form is more appealing since she can now Throw characters, and it’s also easier to leave Diamond form with a cheaper Shatter attack and changes to the Far From My Best Look Innate superpower. Additionally, we reworked her Normal form to feel more telepathic. We replaced Telekinetic Deflection with the Telepathic Lash Active superpower on her Normal form to really hammer home her ability to control the battlefield.

The following is a comprehensive change log:

Team Tactic Cards

Under Your Skin, The Professionals, and The Initiative were all updated for clarity.

Characters

Cassandra Nova – Injured side Stamina up to 7 from 6. Mind Possession changed to Advance Short instead of the character’s Speed. Flesh Manipulation down to 3 Power cost from 4. Telepathic Cloak updated so that Cassandra gains an additional Power in the Power Phase

MK4 – Physical Defense up to 4 from 3 and Mystic Defense down to 3 from 4. Healthy side Stamina up to 8 from 7. Plasma Blast up to 5 Strength from 4, but only 2 more dice can be added by spending Power. Acceptable Collateral Damage innate superpower added. Sentinel Programming updated so that allied superpowers can Advance and Push this character. Plasma Leak Injured side attack strength up to 5, gains 1 power, and the System Overload trigger reworked to cause damage to every character within Range 2 of the Sentinel.

Sentinel Prime MK4 – Physical Defense up to 4 from 3 and Mystic Defense down to 3 from 4. Healthy side Stamina down to 9 from 10 and Injured side down to 7 from 8. Plasma Blast MK2 up to 6 Strength from 5, but only 2 more dice can be added by spending Power. Suppression Protocols MK2 up to Range 4 from 3, Strength down to 8 from 9, and Power Cost down to 3 from 4. Mutant Hunters updated to work on KO in addition to Daze. Pattern Analysis updated so that each character can reroll dice with it only once per Turn. Sentinel Programming updated so that allied superpowers can Advance and Push this character.

Dormammu – Shadow Bolt attack triggers updated to require Failures instead of Wilds. Incantation of Obliteration’s Dark Miasma trigger updated. Flames of the Faltine updated to check to see if allied characters suffer Damage from having too much Power in the Cleanup Phase instead of the Power Phase. Master of the Realm of Darkness updated to add Failure results to Dormammu’s attack roll instead of just counting enemy Failures as successes.

Black Widow, Agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. – Healthy side Stamina up to 6 from 5 and Injured side up to 6 from 5.

Hawkeye – Healthy side Stamina up to 5 from 4 and Injured side up to 6 from 5

Nick Fury – Healthy side Stamina up to 7 from 6 and Injured side up to 6 from 5.

S.H.I.E.L.D. Agents – S.H.I.E.L.D. Operatives Innate superpower updated to specify Extract objective tokens instead of Civilian or Asset tokens.

Emma Frost (Normal) – Hands Off Defenestrate trigger replaced with Terrify trigger. Telepathic Lash Active superpower added. Diamond Form Reactive superpower updated to be usable when this character would make a dodge roll. Telekinetic Deflection superpower removed.

Emma Frost (Diamond) – Shatter Power cost reduced from 6 to 5. Sometimes One Must Get Their Hands Dirty Active superpower updated to be able to Throw characters. Far From My Best Look updated to allow a transformation at the beginning of this character’s Activation. Psychic Immunity updated so that allied superpowers can Advance and Push this character.

Professor X – Injured side Stamina up to 6 from 5.

Psylocke – Injured side Stamina up to 6 from 5.

Star-Lord – Injured side Stamina up to 6 from 5.

Yondu – Healthy side Stamina up to 7 from 6 and Injured side up to 6 from 5.

Until next time, Atomic Mass Games, signing off!