Occasionally Atomic Mass Games produce rules that give me a load more numbers to crunch. That’s exactly what happened when the reality gem was spoiled here. Now the numbers are well and truest crunched and here they are.

So what does it do?

A few things to note: this is an innate ability, not one you need to spend power on. It can cause one Fail dice results to not only count as a success, but to generate an additional die in the roll – not during interacts though.

There are currently only two characters that can take this gem: Corvus Glaive and Thanos, so the dice maths I have run is focussed on those characters.

Defense and dodging

There is a lot of 3 defense across Corvus and Thanos’ card, but with the reality gem, it looks a lot like 4 defense. That’s a huge step up, especially when you then add in their damage reduction powers. This gem is the only one that directly improves the survivability of its bearer – something that is very relevant given the threat investment. And it applies to dodge too!

Adding the reality gem on to Thanos bumps his mystical defense up seriously high: close to Ebony Maw’s 6.

Attack

The more dice you roll, the more likely you are to roll a fail. So bigger dice pools for attacks see bigger impacts of the reality gem:

Thanos has a 6 dice Strike, but with the Gem, it looks more like 8 dice. That’s going to really hurt, and generate a lot of power for him. It also increases his odds of a wild throw slightly from 60% to 63%.

His Cosmic Blast can vary, but instead of varying from 5-8 dice, with the reality gem it’s more like 6.5-10.5 dice. Against energy defense, which tends to be lower. Ouch.

Corvus Glaive is slightly more complex, as his Strike has Pierce. To illustrate, let’s put him against someone with 4 physical defense and compare with vanilla attacks.

Woah! That’s some big dice! Corvus is going to be dishing out some serious hurt. If he starts on one power, he has a 59% chance of getting enough to Death Blow with his second action. Which amounts to about another 9 dice attack, with a 68% chance of triggering the wild to get another 9ish dice equivalent strike.

It’s a really, really strong option on Corvus to pump up both his offence and defense/dodge.

Interacts

First let’s see the effect on Skrulls and Alien Ship Crash lands. In these crises, an interact involves rolling two dice and hoping for at least one critical result. The chance of that is 23%. By counting fails as critical, a reality gem bearer increase that to 44%. It’s not a sure thing, but you are stacking the odds in your favour and increasing your protection.

One Deadly Meteors, your character is nearly as good as a 4 energy defense character.

Corvus: a prediction

Looking at the numbers, Corvus with the gem looks an incredible bargain for 5 threat. He hits seriously hard and is incredibly tough, with effectively 4 defenses across the board and damage reduction.

His access to priority control when teamed with Proxima Midnight is a great bonus too, allowing him to wreak havoc early in the round, dazing or KOing opponent’s characters before they can act.

He lacks a move-and-attack power, but in Black Order, Mothership can get him where he needs to be, especially as his wife moves L and he can chain-activate with her. His other deficit is a lack of a throw. But he seems incredibly strong even without it.

I would be very surprised if Corvus with the Reality Gem didn’t become a regular feature and gracing top tables around the world. He will be a top tier character

This gem completely changes my feelings about him. I used to think he was okay, but probably only ever taken with Proxima Midnight. Now he’s a powerhouse in his own right and you should be worried when you see him across from you.

Oh, and if Thanos is nearby, he can get even more dice on these attacks. But that’s maths for another time.