What’s better than Luke Cage? Luke Cage with a couple of 45’s! Equipment cards give any character a chance to beef up, gain new abilities, and try new tactics and tricks.

Equipment, unlike plot twists and locations, costs actual resource points. Look in the upper left-hand corner of the card, and you’ll see that equipment has a gold-colored cost, which means you have to spend resource points on it just like you do with characters.

Let’s take a look at Dual Sidearms. It has a cost of zero, so it’s free to play! It’s a quick way to boost up a character without having to spend any resource points. Dual Sidearms does two things. First, it gives the equipped character range. Range allows the character to make attacks even while it's in the support row. Normally, support row characters just hide behind their beefier front row protectors, but when you control a character with range, you can protect it and attack with it. It's a great tactic for when your opponent has the initiative, as a front row character can protect your ranged character. Later that turn, when it’s your chance to attack, your ranged character will hopefully still be up and ready for a fight!

Dual Sidearms also gives the equipped character a +2 ATK bonus. Especially in the early turns, that +2 ATK bonus can really do some damage. Lower cost characters often times have only a 1 or 2 ATK, so a bonus of +2 ATK can make a big difference. And since it has a cost of 0, Dual Sidearms is easy to play in the early turns, offering a great chance to get off to a fast start.

Equipment has one more advantage. The bonus it gives lasts as long as the character it’s equipped to stays in play. Plot twists are one-shot effects that don’t last, so the free play you can make with Dual Sidearms is a continuous +2 ATK and range bonus. While there’s no surprise value in whipping out a couple of big honkin’ pistols, the constant bonus it gives more than makes up for it.

Be sure you attach equipment to the character that you really want to give it to, because it’s there until the bitter end. It can’t be given to another character or brought back to your hand. And once you’ve equipped a character, you can’t equip it again. Fortunately, even when the equipped character is stunned, the equipment stays put. However, when the character is KO’d, the equipment goes to the KO’d pile, too.

If a piece of equipment like Dual Sidearms is so good and costs you nothing to play, imagine how good the equipment cards get when you actually spend some points on them!

Come back tomorrow for a first look at a pistol packin’ son of a gun who spells doom for all who oppose him.