ah the curse of superhero comics strikes again!
I have zero interest in Civil War II but heard good things about Stand off. That said I don't really want to buy a whole bunch of books to understand what the hell is going on, I would rather just not buy any then.
Although Stand off is also written by Spencer.... (reading his Ant-man atm and it's great)
Thanks for the replies tho, hope someone can comment on how self contained Secret Empire is.