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It’s the holiday season, when many are out trying to obtain stuff. So it’s a good time to look at a HeroClix mechanic revolving around trying to obtain stuff: RELICS.

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Relics. They’re a weird thing in HeroClix. They cost extra points on the force but seem riddled with drawbacks:

  • Limited to just one per force.
  • No guarantee of use.
  • Mean one less object for the Super Strong and the Telekinetics.

But on the other hand, it’s not all bad news where relics are concerned:

  • Indestructible hindering terrain for the Stealthy.
  • Some neat game effects.

Is it worth losing one of the three objects? Naturally, this matters more for Super Strength teams than others. But it’s also an issue for other teams because running a relic means they MUST run one light and one heavy object. So is the relic worth the risk of a SStrong foe getting more weapons?

 Whether a Relic works with a Resource will NOT be considered. Many of them change drastically in how they are acquired and how they function and, in any case, are simply a subset of their Resources instead. [In fact, Heroclixin’ goes on record as decrying Resources for essentially making Relics completely pointless. Don’t know why WizKids even continues making Relics, really.]

This week, Heroclixin’ looks at the top ten relics in the game — the ones giving the best bang for the most figures for the best price and ease of use…and five of the very worst.

Here’s an HONORABLE MENTION to start it off:

Batman Cowl [No Man’s Land]
A 5-point, 50% shot at getting Batman Ally TA and extra-sneakfulness for existing Batman teamsters is best saved for Bat-teams, which can use it even on failed rolls as an extra patch of hindering terrain. Other figures, while they’d surely welcome the Stealth, won’t get as much bonus mileage from it, pass or fail.

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Tune in tomorrow for the beginning of the list in earnest!

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#2

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Black Panther [Avengers]
The original Black Panther in HeroClix was trash only suitable as a cheap Stealthy Outwitter. This one, OTOH, is one of the few pieces from 2007’s Avengers set to remain playable to this day, even outshining a much newer version in 2011’s Captain America set. The A vs. X LE has a high bar to meet to top this lord of the Wakandas.

#1

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Ultra Boy [Legion of Super-Heroes]
I’m a diehard Legion of Super-Heroes fan, and Ultra Boy kinda embodies the spirit of the group more than any other for me with A) his rambunctious nature and B) limited powers.
At first, I thought his dial should have reflected his one-power-at-a-time ability better by not giving him Impervious on the same clicks as Super Strength, but the character’s good at switching from power to power instantly. So the dial’s simple but accurate. I’m a little afraid they’ll screw him up in upcoming Superman + the Legion of Super-Heroes set. In any case, as much as I love running the Legion, I won’t if I can’t fit U-Boy on the squad.

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#4

 

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Zauriel [Justice League]
I like angels, so this character was an immediate favorite from Grant Morrison’s JLA run that I was glad to see in the game. He consistently underperforms for me — somehow that 18 DV never has seemed to pan out for me, even when it was more exceptional that it is today — but he’s still a fave.

#3

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Veteran Steel [Origin]
With 10 range and solid stats/powers, this is still the best version of John Henry Irons ever made. And look at that sculpt!

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Next: Heroclixin’s two favorite figures of ’07.

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7
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Bronze Tiger [Justice League]
Although the set he came in has aged terribly, Bronze Tiger remains a good piece with solid skills (Charge with Willpower and Close Combat Expert, then Flurry and Reflexes later) even now. Not even the bad memory of two identical losses with him is enough to keep this Tiger off the list.

6
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Experienced Wildcat [Origin]
The 66-point boxer in the cat suit is the best of the REV, with Charge and 3 damage and double Regen. Ted Grant was a favorite during the height of my JSA completist era of collecting.

#5
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Unique Jakeem Thunder [Origin]
Similarly, Jakeem was a must-play for JSA, thanks to his first-for-the-team 18+ DV to share with team members and wildcards — or any ally, because it was matched with the Defend power. He also went a ways toward making my All-Black Everything team competitive.

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The retrospective continues tomorrow with numbers 4 and 3!

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OK. Hiatus is over. We’ll kick off the first week of the new month with the customary Top Ten list!

For this month’s Top Ten, Heroclixin’ takes another look back at its Favorite Clix of the year from a pre-blog age: the year 2007.

 

#10
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Veteran Cat-Man [Origin]
The REV represented the best of the rookie/Experienced/Vet progression, and the Vet was my favorite: A 64-point Willpowered Charging BCF fig with a long-click dial that can be longer still thanks to the Suicide Squad TA. Simply can’t run a Secret Six theme without him.

#9
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Devil Dinosaur and Moon Boy [Mutations + Monsters]
They were Giants. They were a Duo. They were even a double base. And the tail was POSEABLE. Really, how could this NOT be a favorite? If only the starting Attack Vaue weren’t such an anemic 9…that’s inexcusable for a 151-point figure.

#8

This sculpt, different dial.

Rookie Mister Miracle [Origin]
The first versions of Scott Free in ‘clix were all great. But this one rose to the top for me because the others were too expensive in their roles as tie-up and support. At 64, he’s great with Perplex, Super Senses, and Phasing to start, with Flurry just a push away. He’s actually better than he was thanks to the boosts to his full dial of Smoke Cloud and he still rocks a back half full of Leap/Climb, Willpower and Prob Control. Plus he fits on my Seven Soldiers team as a stand-in for the yet-unmade Shilo Norman, Scott’s protege.

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Next time: Numbers 7 through 5

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It’s tough reviewing these. Heroclixin’ is all about F.U.N. But BFCs were all too frequently the OPPOSITE of fun. Especially these:

Earthquake: Bad for soft non-fliers. At least it only occurred once per game, so it’s the least unfun of the lot.

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Armor Wars: It didn’t make damage reducers completely useless, but close. It also got real complicated if more than one was on the field.

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Isolation: Defend, Blades/Claws/Fangs and a host of team abilities that shared AV or DV were all rendered null and void by this card. Worse, teams that need these effects tend to be utterly ineffective without them. Unfun.

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Poor Teamwork: Whoops; your taxis and TKers are mostly dead weight now. Terrible unfun for any team that needed the mobility.

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Power Dampening Field: On its surface, it looks like the card that helps the little guys and screws the big guys. But when one considers that those little guys are going to have some real trouble digging through the biggies’ tough armor with only 3 damage at a time — barring aid from Outwit or penetrating damage — one sees how everyone loses when this unfun BFC is in play.

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Exhaustion: As if pushing weren’t bad enough, this one doubled the damage for doing so. Worse, it swung the action advantage even FURTHER in Willpower’s direction.

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Disbanded: Nothing’s worse than seeing all those points paid for those team abilities on your team go up in smoke upon this card’s reveal. The one BFC even Galactus fears.

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Bright Lights: Woe to any team that actually used Stealth as a defense. It’s worthless with this BFC on the field. Used almost exclusively to punish players who abused the black Speed power, it also gave a really strong advantage to range-heavy teams.

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 Deep Shadows: This card is mean because Stealth can be mean. But Stealth has a built-in dependence upon hindering terrain that usually limits the degree of its meanness. This card gives all the advantages of being hidden and none of the drawbacks. UnF.U.N. Why the hell was it reprinted over and over and not its more F.U.N. cousin, Darkness?

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Malice: The meanest card out there, bar none. It forces teams to take damage any round it doesn’t attack. Supposedly an anti-turtle tactic, it actually rewards turtle teams more than any other so long as it has a healer available to absorb the self-damage. Meanwhile, it can set up the killbox for teams that CAN’T bide their time, anymore, because of this #$^$% card.

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Usually, Heroclixin’ devotes the first full week of the month to a Top Ten countdown of something. But battling the happy fatigue that follows the great Labor Day weekend nerd prom called DragonCon makes this one short and sweet as yours truly takes a short, sweet break from Heroclixin’. Readers new and old can use the time to catch up on older articles.

Next week, look for the usual rotation to start again:

Monday: Card Art, where I explain my choice of art for DC feats, BFCs and ATAs after WizKids stopped licensing art from DC comics;

Wednesday: F.U.N. Fights, a semi-regular feature of battle reports

Friday: an occasional F.U.N. Friday article starring a team or a figure I’d like to run, or other commentary on the game;

and Token Totin’ Tuesday/Thursday, the photographic record of how characters with Super Strength can visibly and practically hold the game’s object tokens.

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Usually, Heroclixin’ devotes the first full week of the month to a Top Ten countdown of something. But we’re battling the happy fatigue that follows the great Labor Day weekend nerd prom called DragonCon. So this one’s going to be short and sweet as yours truly takes a short, sweet break from Heroclixin’. Readers new and old can use the time to catch up on older articles.

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It’s tough reviewing these. Heroclixin’ is all about F.U.N. But BFCs were all too frequently the OPPOSITE of fun.

  • They were often used as a “screw you” to the other side…
  • …or were fielded in self-defense against unbalanced powergaming tech.
  • Or both.
  • USUALLY both.
  • Or they were so even-handed in how they crippled/enhanced each team that you’d almost rather never play them at all.

When themed teams became a thing, BFCs lost much of their steam as the one you needed to use could all too frequently be canceled away. And so now Heroclixin’ simply shares, in mostly no particular order, its take on the best/worst of the purple-headed cardboard:

F.U.N. ones

Atlantis Rising: Characters with the Dolphin Speed symbols usually work at a disadvantage. This BFC evens matters up for them a bit. And because Swim figures are usually F.U.N. figures, Atlantis Rising’s ability to flood Level 1 of any map isn’t terribly broken.

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White Noise:  Outwit and Perplex could be annoying sometimes. But it’s also a pain not to have them at all. The partial solution was this BFC that made the free action powers riskier to use. It’s a help to a team that doesn’t have those powers yet won’t completely hose those with them.

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Bizarro World: There are several BFCs that mess with the world of crit hits and misses (Extraordinary Day, Madness, Critical Strike, Great Arena) but none that equal F.U.N. for everyone like this one, which takes the sting out of getting hit with either the 12 or the 2 roll.

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Infiltration: This neat BFC allows select characters — Stealthers, Teleporters, Swimmers — to start a little closer to the action in their terrain of choice. It’s a risk/reward move, as it puts some closer to being alpha-struck. But it doesn’t screw any player over for building a team, so it’s nice and F.U.N.

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Darkness: Long range can be really hard for some teams to deal with. This little BFC just cuts it all to a manageable 6. It does hurt snipers a bit, but ranged combat has enough advantages already. This card alone won’t beat ’em. A quintessentially F.U.N card that levels the field.

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Ordinary Day: It just cancels the other guy’s BFC; the ultimate defense against deleterious BFC effects. Or it used to be, before themed teams, which now just as often kill off THIS card.

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Resistance: A very F.U.N. card that rewarded old-school “theme” play of characters with the same team symbol, it was balanced by requiring adjacency to gain immunity to Outwit.

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Assembled: Another “theme” card that encouraged old-school “theme” play. (Although I tend to forget to use its effect — +1 AV when a same-team-symbol friend is adjacent — whenever I use the card.)

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Pacification: Back in the old days, many clix couldn’t take a hit, so nerfing high damage was a must to survive an alpha strike. (The more things change, right?) This BFC helped a little without taking ALL the teeth out of natural heavy hitters and B/C/F figs the way Power Dampening Field did.

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Debris: Heroclixin’ has noted the problem associated with a lack of objects in the game. This F.U.N. BFC reverses that by adding six EXTRA objects to a game. A boon to the Super Strong and the Stealthy, to be sure, but not one that breaks the game into an unwinnable slog for teams lacking same.

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TOMORROW: The Top Ten most unF.U.N. BFCs ever made. 

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There were SO many other feats that were great but couldn’t quite make it to the top 10. Here are some of Heroclixin’s other favorites:

10. Camouflage (Sinister and Secret Invasion):  This 8-pointer was nicely balanced by preventing range attacks but not all line of fire while next to blocking terrain, giving Outwitters a shot at nixing the Shape Change prerequisite. It’s at the bottom of my list because it often restricted mobility on many maps.

9. Loner [Secret Invasion]: 5 points to boost DV on a non-themed character? Sure! The prevalence of themed teams and keywords made this a tough play most of the time, though.

[tie] Rip It Up [Fantastic Forces]: 20 points is a LOT to pay not to ever be able to use heavy objects. But it also ensures a Super Strength team never runs OUT of objects, so it sort of balances out in the end.

8. Opportunist [Crisis]: This might be Heroclixin’s favorite feat for just filling out points. But for the sacrifice of a few early-game actions, this 10-point card can really pay off later by turning near-misses into solid hits. I like that it modifies the die roll, not the attack value, circumventing the Rule of Three.

7. Alias [Secret Invasion]: 3 little points, small enough to fit on any force, that can get your big guy out of an attack of opportunity. It’s a bit too one-size-fits-all for Heroclixin’s taste, but it’s just right for its disposable nature.

 

6. Inside Information [Mutations + Monsters]: Spend 4 points, get a +2 AV boost against your own keywords. Great little feat that’s almost always worth running.

5. Unstoppable [Fantastic Forces and Justice League]: A nice inexpensive feat that helps ground-pounding bricks a lot — but not TOO much, like the similar but overpowered Swingline did. Ignoring  hindering terrain is fine, and it’s finely balanced by the wall-busting ability only working during move actions.

4. Outsmart [Mutations + Monsters]: It’s not as Outwit-proof as Fortitude, but Heroclixin’ prefers less point-and-click strategies anyway. This 10-point feat has the dual benefit of being way cheaper and helping allies not get countered, too. Don’t get to use this as often as I’d like.

 

3. Not So Special [Brave and the Bold]: The last great feat in Heroclixin’s opinion, this 3-point card is a no-brainer for standard-powered pieces. It’s lost a few steps because there practically ARE no standard-powered pieces any more.

2. Submerged [Icons]: Swimmers have needed all the help they can get. This 5 points to stay unseen in water is among the best help the marine set could pay.

1. Takedown [Mutations + Monsters]: This fan-made feat might be the best feat card ever made, working perfectly in flavor with its prerequisite powers Incapacitate and Plasticity. Priced perfectly at 6 points. It’s perfect!

 

 

 

 

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The two very best feats.

#2

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20 points. Expensive, but such a simple way to make our whole team better as needed every round. There’s probably no better use of 20 points on a team with, of course, the prerequisite Perlexer and allied beneficiaries.

 

 

# 1

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5 points. The inexpensive price is what vaults this one to the top of the feat heap. It suddenly makes a HOST of Leap/Climbers and Close Combat Experts highly viable move-and-attack pieces, opening up tons more positioning options than before. But it’s also quite balanced since its two-square reach really isn’t that overwhelming. It’s the perfect example of a great feat card and it’s a real pity that more weren’t this fun and awesome.

 

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 The very worst feats.

 

#2

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9 points. Even when Soaring was a thing, this feat was useless. +2 movement for move actions really was not a big deal without the ability to carry. Breaking away from other soaring characters came into play about the same number of times more than one character occupied soaring status: almost never. And the cost? At least seven points too many.

 

 #1

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12 points. Couldn’t have been much worse if they’d just written “only this one Colossus character and that one Wolverine figure can use this feat, once, EVER.” I mean, have you ever seen so many arbitrary conditions to use a power?

  1. Same team symbol required. This kind of makes sense, but cuts out so many combinations.
  2. First must have Super Strength. OK, that’s fine.
  3. Second must have Toughness. Sure, that’s fair. Need to be able to survive the impact. But…
  4. …not Invulnerability. Not Impervious. ONLY Toughness. Here’s where it gets stupid. And we’re not done.
  5. Can’t have more than 3 damage, either. Which is ridiculous, because…
  6. …It costs both a power action. Ugh. So you’re burning up two actions for one light attack! Really?!
  7. Hit or miss, it’s a one-time-use feat…
  8. THAT COSTS 12 POINTS.

Feats are supposed to increase a character’s flexibility. This one is the definition of INflexible. That’s why it’s the worst feat WizKids ever attempted.

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Tomorrow, a bonus: Heroclixin’s favorite F.U.N. feats!

 

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Feats were even more game-warping than Resources, as will become clear as we look back at the top five of the Top Ten feats ever:

#5

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8 points for the other feat that broke the game. It’s perfectly costed and perfectly balanced but probably should have been one of the game’s few “unique” feats like Loner or Saboteur: one per force. As it was, entire teams would be outfitted with this ultimate “get out of jailhouse damage free” tactic, necessitating the rule change of no more than 10% of a force build being feats.

4

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10 points. A simple way to make weenies a legit threat on the board. This feat used to be required to make Energy Explosion any damn good, and Poison still gets a lot of mileage from it. A bit annoying because of the total lack of prereqs.

 #3

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10 points per character. Point for point, for a long time this was possibly the best 20 (or more) points one could spend in HC. If you had the Oracle (Legacy) figure, so much the better.

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WizKids used to just throw away money on these stinkers that no one wanted to even pull, let alone play, like the #5 worst feat:

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5 points. I don’t like disposable feats in general; paying points for a one-time effect seems unwise. But if the effect is more or less guaranteed, then it’s not so bad.

This one is so bad.

It requires getting hit to work. It requires taking DAMAGE from that hit to work. It requires the hit being close combat to work. And all of this has to happen to a character of 60 points or more, so no putting it on a fig one might not mind risking the points to use this feat.

We’re not done with the drawbacks. It requires a high die roll of 9 or higher to work. All to deal just 1 damage (or maybe 2 if it’s a crit). Better hope the target doesn’t have Toughness.

Succeed or fail, it’s costing you 5 points. There’s just no reason to ever field this weak attempt at payback. Can you believe this was a TOURNAMENT PRIZE?

#4

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2 points per character. Gets on the list partly for teasing me every time I thought I’d found a cheap feat to fill out those last few leftover points on a team. Then I’d be cruelly reminded that it’s 2 points per character. So on the average force, you’re paying 6 to 10 points for a feat that only works once.

  • …When you’ve already lost your bigger pieces.
  • …Then you give up the feat’s 6-10 points to the opponent, too, after its single use..

“Revenge” is what you’ll seek against the dude who MADE this feat and put it in a collector set, of all things. But it wouldn’t be the last:

#3

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10 points. So it’s like using Support, except you remove action tokens — and clicks of life! No thanks. No thanks at ALL.

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Tomorrow: The very best of the feats…and the worst of all.