The Iron Campaign (part 4). BATTLE!

Got three games in last Saturday to continue the Iron Campaign. I went wayyyy too in-depth with my last battle report (though some told me they enjoyed it — THANKS!) so I’m going to try to shorten things up and make it a little more readable.
First game
200 points
Anthony Stark 100 + Alpha Flight 0
U Iron Man (Mutations & Monsters) 100
vs Lenny’s
Winter Soldier 70
Gamora 73
Scarlet Witch (Avengers Super Rare) 35
I got to pick the wide-open Arena with a Tombstone, Eleha’al Vine and Dynamostat to help me out. Lenny used only a Meteorite.
Opening moves.
I had Anthony Stark grab the Tombstone and park behind the Dynamostat, leaving Iron Man in the starting area. I expected Lenny to move Winter Soldier immediately to the map’s existing hindering terrain, giving him a great sniper’s coverage of nearly the whole Arena. But he instead picked up his Meteorite and parked on a light object while moving Scarlet Witch to a building. A turn later, he moves Gamora to the existing hindering.
First shots.
Winter Soldier blew away the Dynamostat, exposing Stark. This was fine with me; Iron Man then blew away Winter Soldier’s hiding place so Stark could Outwit his Ranged Combat Expert. Lenny tied up Stark with Scarlet Witch, but it didn’t seem to help him much; Iron Man Running Shot Winter Soldier off his top click and Scarlet Witch fell to a OHKO by Stark’s Tombstone. Stark then Outwitted Gamora’s Charge.
Turning point.
Lenny forgot about Charging and simply based Stark with Gamora. In the meantime, Winter Soldier was able to pop him off Outwit. That opened him up for Gamora to peel his suit apart with hit after Weakness-Exploiting hit.
Iron Man started to break for the Vine, having taken a crithit from WS and further damage from Gamora, but I realized Gamora would catch up and probably KO him before any real healing occurred. Managed to break WAY away from her to chase Winter Soldier, but the gun-toting spy managed to immediately roll the 9+ needed to win the game.
Iron Campaign record slips to 5-10.
Lessons learned:
Stark should be kept just close enough to use Outwit until it’s time to close in. I got too close in, trusting too much to the Dynomastat for cover KNOWING it would get blown up, and then pressing the attack instead of retreating beyond any possibility of being swarmed.
Beware enemy tie-up.
Get Gamora while the getting’s good. I treated WS as the main threat too long and Stark paid. Without Stark, I couldn’t win.
Now that Paul, our last player of the day, was here, we played a 700-point 3- way Battle Royale.
Iron Man (Secret Invasion) 188 + Brilliant Tactician 20 + Inside Info 4 + Thunderbolts 5 + Alias 3
Hulkbuster 165 + Unstoppable 5
Iron Man (Supernova) 160 + Stunning Blow 10 + Thunderbolts 5
U Iron Man (Mutations & Monsters) 100 + Vendetta 6
R Mandroid Armor 28
As usual, Lenny loaded for bear:
Superman (Justice League) 226 + Fortitude 25
Green Lantern (Crisis) 157 + Shellhead 10
Green Arrow (Crisis) 104
Batman (Justice League) 75
Gamora 73
Soooooo close to a thematic team. :)
Paul, on the other hand, went for mostly wackiness:
Bizarro #1 (Arkham Asylum) 199
Ch’p 82
Plasmus 80
Impossible Man 72
Batzarro 69
Mr. Mind 68
Plastic Man (Justice League) 55
Ambush Bug 50
Val-Or 23
Franklin Richard 2
Yeah, a lot like one of my first posted teams. :)
Paul won the map roll and picked the old office, an indoor map with an open space between compartmentalized rooms. He also played Damage Control, while Lenny cancelled my Bright Lights with Ordinary Day. I made my T-Bolts Ultimates.
Opening gambits.
I played very conservatively to not get double-teamed. I’d picked the most open part of the map to give my ranged fighters maximum lines of fire.
Lenny, though, underestimated Paul’s reach with Ch’p’s TK and got Green Arrow immediately crithit by Bizarro onto his last click. (That’s all Bizarro could do, eventually becoming the first KO.
I get involved.
Me, I kept my tin men well down the open hallway in a snipers’ formation to prevent any easy forays against me. But Paul decided not to leave me alone, sending Plastic Man (who I’d deliberately let alone despite having easy attack access to him via my TBolts) to tie up my 100-point Free Comic Book Day Iron Man and somewhat spoiling my options.
An opening!
After Lenny used Superman to finish off Bizarro #1, he put him in a safe place around a corner…or so he thought.
Using the Unstoppable feat, Hulkbuster smashed the wall Superman was hiding behind and SN Iron Man landed a Stunning Blow that caused 3 clicks all told to Supes, effectively ending his Hypersonic Speed threat. Then, thanks to the Damage Control BFC, the wall closed up, preventing any possibility of retaliation. Meanwhile, SI Iron Man Running Shot Plastic Man to near-uselessness (though it took a couple of tries.
Lenny and Paul continued to fight it out, with Paul definitely on the losing end of matters. Though Green Arrow finally dropped, Paul lost Impossible Man, Plasmus and Mr. Mind in the process.
Too little, too late.
I wouldn’t be able to use my Unstoppable wall-break trick again, so I inched closer to the skirmish. Made the slight error, though, of using my Mandroid as a meat shield for his taxi, Hulkbuster. Ch’p came out and Running Shot the ‘droid into near-uselessness. Meanwhile, I was way short on points and nearly out of time in “regulation play,” so I threw my efforts into nailing Ch’p and Batzarro for points. Got the squirrel, but couldn’t quite finish Batzarro…not without pushing, and it wouldn’t NEARLY make up the deficit. So as time expired, I found myself in a distant  2nd place.
The REST of the story (with apologizes to the late great Paul Harvey).
We played on. As Paul retreated to attempt an end-around of my team with his remnants, Lenny came after me, big time. Green Lantern TK’d Gamora into Perplex-aided Charge range of Hulkbuster, hitting him for 4 straight (Exploit Weakness. Ugh, I hate that chick). The rest of the Iron Men lit her like a Christmas tree in the fireplace. Similarly, Superman was hit hard onto his 20 DV click and eventually off the board.
Now there was only Green Lantern and Batman to deal with (besides Paul’s Val-Or, Franklin pog and Ambush Bug sneaking in behind me), but they weren’t going quietly. Batman’s Outwit made sure Hulkbuster felt all 3 clicks of GL’s Running Shot, sending the suddenly Stealthy big guy to the bushes. Batman was the next to fall (at the replusor-wielding palms of SN Iron Man — thank you Thunderbolted Ultimates TA), but not before SI Iron Man got blasted for 4 clicks off his Extremis powers and onto Charge.
By now, Paul had gotten his scragglers in place to tie up most of my team, leaving them sitting ducks for Green Lantern to take potshots at once he;d finished off Hulkbuster. SN Iron Man was particularly stuck with Val-Or, failing breakaway after breakaway. Fortunately, SI Iron Man made most of his and eventually cleared out the annoying fodder until SN Iron Man finally got clear to finish the game.
Lesson learned:
SI Iron Man wins games for this team. So much so, I almost decided not to use the piece in the next game.
Hulkbuster + Unstoppable pays off. It seems unthinkable to me that there was a time I was determined to never play him on this theme again. (I’ll tell THAT story in a future installment.) Unstoppable on him is ALL about giving this ranged team a way to compete on cramped, indoor maps, and it worked big time.
Got to be careful of those time limits without overextending myself. Haven’t quite found the balance, here.
Paul had a date, so completely-uncoupled-up Lenny and I played one more match.
700 points
Iron Man (Secret Invasion) 188 + Brilliant Tactician 20 + Inside Info 4 + Thunderbolts 5 + Improvise 7
Hulkbuster 165 + Unstoppable 5 + Lunge 5
E Iron Man (Armor Wars) 135
U Iron Man (Mutations & Monsters) 100 + Vendetta 6
Guardsman 32
R Mandroid Armor 28
vs
Thanos (Supernova) 267 + Shellhead 10 + Protected 8
Dr. Doom (Fantastic 4) 200 + Alias 3
Susan Richards 120
Gamora 73 + Alias 3
I won the map roll and picked a map I usually hate: the Rooftops of Galactus. Limiting Thanos and Gamora’s range of movement was key, I figured, and it would also lessen Skrull Sue’s opportunities to shoot through walls and stuff.
The fight starts QUICK!
I huddled much of my team on and around my Kinetic Accelerator and Eleha’al Vine behind a tiny bit of blocking terrain. Nearly paid dearly for it when Sue TK’s Thanos who barely missed his Psychic Blast on Hulkbuster. I pushed E AW Iron Man to try to ping Thanos but missed. The mad Titan hit him back.
The 2nd wave.
Now Sue tossed Doom out to Running Shoot someone. Fortunately, Doom missed, giving E AW a chance to get off the Accelerator and to the Vine right next door. Unfortunately, I rolled too high on the Accelerator and blew it up, negating my plans for Hulkbuster to Charge Thanos 10 squares away. I went to the backup plan and TK’d (with my Mandroid) Hulkbuster to hit Doom with the Meteorite for big damage.
Uh-oh.
That was the good news. The bad was that Doom had regained his free-breakaway Special Power, had Willpower and would certainly leave Hulkbuster wide open for Thanos to easily destroy. That is, unless I sacrificed Guardsman to block Line of Fire. Which I did. It also had the side benefit of preventing a TK’d Gamora from getting to Hulkbuster as well.
As I expected, Doom ran behind Thanos’ skirts (well, okay, it’s a tunic, technically) and Thanos hit Guardsman…even with a roll of 3…even though I’d Brilliant Tactician’d up his defense. And because I’d had to push Guardsman to make the move, he was thus one-shot by the mad Titan.
So here came Gamora, TK’d over and Charging Hulkbuster. I said, out loud: “I’m REALLY getting tired of this chick.” :)
Fortunately, she missed her initial attack. But the advantage was all Lenny’s thanks to the free-push abilities of Gamora and Thanos.
Turning Point.
E AW Iron Man had healed a single click via the Vine but still had Perplex, so I boosted SI Iron Man’s range with him while using Extremis to boost his damage. FCBD Iron Man then Running Shot, using Mandroid’s free SHIELD range  boost to ping Thanos off his first click. Then I did a Running Shot with SI Iron Man him next to both Mandroid and FCBD Iron Man to gain a double SHIELD boost to range to hit Thanos from 11 out, keeping all from Thanos’ retaliation.
Now unable to shoot anyone at the moment, Thano chased and based E AW. That gave me a SHIELD-boosted Running Shot with FCBD Iron Man to knock Thanos off his Probability Control clicks. E AW was done for as soon as Thanos could act again, but I was OK with this, as it had allowed SI Iron Man to chase down Doom for the KO. Meanwhile, Hulkbuster had survived several low Gamora rolls and scored a couple on her to take her out.
Now I could swarm Thanos, with Hulkbuster basing and all missing (I continually Extremis’d down Thanos’ AV). Between misses against Thanos, SIron Man got Sue and eventually Hulkbuster cracked through for the KO.
Iron Campaign improves to 7-10. Getting there.
Lessons learned:
SHIELD TA is worth its weight. Make sure I always have one or two cheap sources of the ability on a team OTHER than Free Comic Book Day Iron Man.
Put Hulkbuster on the Kinetic Accelerator, not some other “placeholder” character. E AW Iron Man’s premature overloading of the special object could have been a crippling occurrence.

And again: Hulkbuster comes through. Next installment, I’ll take a look back at an event that contributed some of the loss-column numbers of the Iron Campaign back in early 2008.

Ready to RUMBLE.

Ready to RUMBLE.

Got three games in last Saturday to continue the Iron Campaign. I went wayyyy too in-depth with my last battle report (though some told me they enjoyed it — THANKS!) so I’m going to try to shorten things up and make it a little more readable.

First game: 200 points

Anthony Stark 100 + Alpha Flight 0
U Iron Man (Mutations & Monsters) 100

vs Lenny’s

Winter Soldier 70
Gamora 73
Scarlet Witch (Avengers Super Rare) 35

I got to pick the wide-open Arena with a Tombstone, Eleha’al Vine and Dynamostat to help me out. Lenny used only a Meteorite.

Opening moves.
I had Anthony Stark grab the Tombstone and park behind the Dynamostat, leaving Iron Man in the starting area. I expected Lenny to move Winter Soldier immediately to the map’s existing hindering terrain, giving him a great sniper’s coverage of nearly the whole Arena. But he instead picked up his Meteorite and parked on a light object while moving Scarlet Witch to a building. A turn later, he moves Gamora to the existing hindering.

First shots.
Winter Soldier blew away the Dynamostat, exposing Stark. This was fine with me; Iron Man then blew away Winter Soldier’s hiding place so Stark could Outwit his Ranged Combat Expert. Lenny tied up Stark with Scarlet Witch, but it didn’t seem to help him much; Iron Man Running Shot Winter Soldier off his top click and Scarlet Witch fell to a OHKO by Stark’s Tombstone. Stark then Outwitted Gamora’s Charge.

Turning point.
Lenny forgot about Charging and simply based Stark with Gamora. In the meantime, Winter Soldier was able to pop him off Outwit. That opened him up for Gamora to peel his suit apart with hit after Weakness-Exploiting hit.

Iron Man started to break for the Vine, having taken a crithit from WS and further damage from Gamora, but I realized Gamora would catch up and probably KO him before any real healing occurred. Managed to break WAY away from her to chase Winter Soldier, but the gun-toting spy managed to immediately roll the 9+ needed to win the game.

Iron Campaign record slips to 5-10.

Lessons learned:

Anthony Stark should be kept just close enough to use Outwit until it’s time to close in. I got too close in, trusting too much to the Dynomastat for cover KNOWING it would get blown up, and then pressing the attack instead of retreating beyond any possibility of being swarmed.

Beware enemy tie-up. Especially if a swarm or snipers are involved.

Get Gamora while the getting’s good. I treated WS as the main threat too long and Stark paid. Without Stark, I couldn’t win.

Second game: 700-point 3- way Battle Royale.

Now that Paul, our last player of the day, was here, we played the real tournament.

Iron Man (Secret Invasion) 188 + Brilliant Tactician 20 + Inside Info 4 + Thunderbolts 5 + Alias 3

Hulkbuster 165 + Unstoppable 5
Iron Man (Supernova) 160 + Stunning Blow 10 + Thunderbolts 5
U Iron Man (Mutations & Monsters) 100 + Vendetta 6
R Mandroid Armor 28

As usual, Lenny loaded for bear:

Superman (Justice League) 226 + Fortitude 25
Green Lantern (Crisis) 157 + Shellhead 10
Green Arrow (Crisis) 104
Batman (Justice League) 75
Gamora 73

Soooooo close to a thematic team. :)

Paul, on the other hand, went for mostly wackiness:

Bizarro #1 (Arkham Asylum) 199
Ch’p 82
Plasmus 80
Impossible Man 72
Batzarro 69
Mr. Mind 68
Plastic Man (Justice League) 55
Ambush Bug 50
Val-Or 23
Franklin Richard 2

Yeah, a lot like one of my first posted teams. :)

Paul won the map roll and picked the old office, an indoor map with an open space between compartmentalized rooms. He also played Damage Control, while Lenny cancelled my Bright Lights with Ordinary Day. I made my T-Bolts Ultimates.

Opening gambits.
I played very conservatively to not get double-teamed. I’d picked the most open part of the map to give my ranged fighters maximum lines of fire.

Lenny, though, underestimated Paul’s reach with Ch’p’s TK and got Green Arrow immediately crithit by Bizarro onto his last click. (That’s all Bizarro could do, eventually becoming the first KO.

I get involved.
Me, I kept my tin men well down the open hallway in a snipers’ formation to prevent any easy forays against me. But Paul decided not to leave me alone, sending Plastic Man (who I’d deliberately let alone despite having easy attack access to him via my TBolts) to tie up my 100-point Free Comic Book Day Iron Man and somewhat spoiling my options.

An opening!
After Lenny used Superman to finish off Bizarro #1, he put him in a safe place around a corner…or so he thought.

Using the Unstoppable feat, Hulkbuster smashed the wall Superman was hiding behind and SN Iron Man landed a Stunning Blow that caused 3 clicks all told to Supes, effectively ending his Hypersonic Speed threat. Then, thanks to the Damage Control BFC, the wall closed up, preventing any possibility of retaliation. Meanwhile, SI Iron Man Running Shot Plastic Man to near-uselessness (though it took a couple of tries.

Lenny and Paul continued to fight it out, with Paul definitely on the losing end of matters. Though Green Arrow finally dropped, Paul lost Impossible Man, Plasmus and Mr. Mind in the process.

Too little, too late.
I wouldn’t be able to use my Unstoppable wall-break trick again, so I inched closer to the skirmish. Made the slight error, though, of using my Mandroid as a meat shield for his taxi, Hulkbuster. Ch’p came out and Running Shot the ‘droid into near-uselessness. Meanwhile, I was way short on points and nearly out of time in “regulation play,” so I threw my efforts into nailing Ch’p and Batzarro for points. Got the squirrel, but couldn’t quite finish Batzarro…not without pushing, and it wouldn’t NEARLY make up the deficit. So as time expired, I found myself in a distant  2nd place.

The REST of the story (with apologizes to the late great Paul Harvey).
We played on. As Paul retreated to attempt an end-around of my team with his remnants, Lenny came after me, big time. Green Lantern TK’d Gamora into Perplex-aided Charge range of Hulkbuster, hitting him for 4 straight (Exploit Weakness. Ugh, I hate that chick). The rest of the Iron Men lit her like a Christmas tree in the fireplace. Similarly, Superman was hit hard onto his 20 DV click and eventually off the board.

Now there was only Green Lantern and Batman to deal with (besides Paul’s Val-Or, Franklin pog and Ambush Bug sneaking in behind me), but they weren’t going quietly. Batman’s Outwit made sure Hulkbuster felt all 3 clicks of GL’s Running Shot, sending the suddenly Stealthy big guy to the bushes. Batman was the next to fall (at the replusor-wielding palms of SN Iron Man — thank you Thunderbolted Ultimates TA), but not before SI Iron Man got blasted for 4 clicks off his Extremis powers and onto Charge.

By now, Paul had gotten his scragglers in place to tie up most of my team, leaving them sitting ducks for Green Lantern to take potshots at once he;d finished off Hulkbuster. SN Iron Man was particularly stuck with Val-Or, failing breakaway after breakaway. Fortunately, SI Iron Man made most of his and eventually cleared out the annoying fodder until SN Iron Man finally got clear to finish the game.

Lessons learned:

SI Iron Man wins games for this team. So much so, I almost decided not to use the piece in the next game.

Hulkbuster + Unstoppable pays off. It seems unthinkable to me that there was a time I was determined to never play him on this theme again. (I’ll tell THAT story in a future installment.) Unstoppable on him is ALL about giving this ranged team a way to compete on cramped, indoor maps, and it worked big time.

Got to be careful of those time limits without overextending myself. Haven’t quite found the balance, here.

Paul had a date, so completely-uncoupled-up Lenny and I played one more game.

Third game: 700 point match.

Iron Man (Secret Invasion) 188 + Brilliant Tactician 20 + Inside Info 4 + Thunderbolts 5 + Improvise 7
Hulkbuster 165 + Unstoppable 5 + Lunge 5
E Iron Man (Armor Wars) 135
U Iron Man (Mutations & Monsters) 100 + Vendetta 6
Guardsman 32
R Mandroid Armor 28

vs

Thanos (Supernova) 267 + Shellhead 10 + Protected 8
Dr. Doom (Fantastic 4) 200 + Alias 3
Susan Richards 120
Gamora 73
+ Alias 3

I won the map roll and picked a map I usually hate: the Rooftops of Galactus. Limiting Thanos and Gamora’s range of movement was key, I figured, and it would also lessen Skrull Sue’s opportunities to shoot through walls and stuff.

The fight starts QUICK!
I huddled much of my team on and around my Kinetic Accelerator and Eleha’al Vine behind a tiny bit of blocking terrain. Nearly paid dearly for it when Sue TK’s Thanos who barely missed his Psychic Blast on Hulkbuster. I pushed E AW Iron Man to try to ping Thanos but missed. The mad Titan hit him back.

The 2nd wave.
Now Sue tossed Doom out to Running Shoot someone. Fortunately, Doom missed, giving E AW a chance to get off the Accelerator and to the Vine right next door. Unfortunately, I rolled too high on the Accelerator and blew it up, negating my plans for Hulkbuster to Charge Thanos 10 squares away. I went to the backup plan and TK’d (with my Mandroid) Hulkbuster to hit Doom with the Meteorite for big damage.

Uh-oh.
That was the good news. The bad was that Doom had regained his free-breakaway Special Power, had Willpower and would certainly leave Hulkbuster wide open for Thanos to easily destroy. That is, unless I sacrificed Guardsman to block Line of Fire. Which I did. It also had the side benefit of preventing a TK’d Gamora from getting to Hulkbuster as well.

As I expected, Doom ran behind Thanos’ skirts (well, okay, it’s a tunic, technically) and Thanos hit Guardsman…even with a roll of 3…even though I’d Brilliant Tactician’d up his defense. And because I’d had to push Guardsman to make the move, he was thus one-shot by the mad Titan.

So here came Gamora, TK’d over and Charging Hulkbuster. I said, out loud: “I’m REALLY getting tired of this chick.” :)

Fortunately, she missed her initial attack. But the advantage was all Lenny’s thanks to the free-push abilities of Gamora and Thanos.

Turning Point.
E AW Iron Man had healed a single click via the Vine but still had Perplex, so I boosted SI Iron Man’s range with him while using Extremis to boost his damage. FCBD Iron Man then Running Shot, using Mandroid’s free SHIELD range  boost to ping Thanos off his first click. Then I did a Running Shot with SI Iron Man him next to both Mandroid and FCBD Iron Man to gain a double SHIELD boost to range to hit Thanos from 11 out, keeping all from Thanos’ retaliation.

Now unable to shoot anyone at the moment, Thano chased and based E AW. That gave me a SHIELD-boosted Running Shot with FCBD Iron Man to knock Thanos off his Probability Control clicks. E AW was done for as soon as Thanos could act again, but I was OK with this, as it had allowed SI Iron Man to chase down Doom for the KO. Meanwhile, Hulkbuster had survived several low Gamora rolls and scored a couple on her to take her out.

Now I could swarm Thanos, with Hulkbuster basing and all missing (I continually Extremis’d down Thanos’ AV). Between misses against Thanos, SIron Man got Sue and eventually Hulkbuster cracked through for the KO.

Made of WIN.

Made of WIN.

Iron Campaign improves to 7-10. Getting there.

Lessons learned:

SHIELD TA is worth its weight. Make sure I always have one or two cheap sources of the ability on a team OTHER than Free Comic Book Day Iron Man.

Put Hulkbuster on the Kinetic Accelerator, not some other “placeholder” character. E AW Iron Man’s premature overloading of the special object could have been a crippling occurrence.

And again: Hulkbuster comes through. Next installment, I’ll take a look back at an event that contributed some of the loss-column numbers of the Iron Campaign back in early 2008.

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