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Next round, goes to characters who’ve gotten some useful versions, but have evolved well past their  do-one-thing-well origins. Again, one from each of the Big Two:

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Captain Atom

The Legacy versions did one thing well: Running Shot while being Impervious. Just like, y’know, several other dials in the game. But that’s not what makes Captain Atom unique. In addition to being a flying, blasting machine, he has the ability to absorb the energy of, say, a detonating nuclear bomb, then later release it in a self-detonation of his own that tends to fling him through time. (There was a sort-of version of him as a villain, Monarch (Crisis 043), but the less said of that, the better.)

So give him a Trait that reflects that, something like this:

When Captain Atom is hit with Pulse Wave, or takes 3 or greater damage from a ranged attack, roll a d6 and subtract the damage he’d take from the result and put that many Detonation tokens on his card. At the beginning of each turn, remove a Detonation token; when the last is removed, he must immediately use Pulse Wave as a free action and is removed from the battlefield. Replace each of the Detonation tokens and place him on his card and remove a token at the end of each round. When the last token is removed, place him in his starting area. If the game ends before he returns, victory points are scored by the opponent.

Short version: When he takes a big blast, he explodes with the excess energy and is transported to the future.

Needed keywords: Justice League International, Soldier, Super Buddies. Because he’s a mainstay of those named keywords in particular and has never quite gotten a dial that really nails him, he’s Heroclixin’s #8 Most Needed Remake.

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Scarlet Witch

I had a nice long treatise written on how Scarlet Witch deserves to be more than a cheapo boot speed Probability Control specialist that might be able to toss up a Barrier sometimes. I also wrote about how powerful a flying, reality-warping Switchie would be… too powerful, probably, for the game even in today’s power creep leap atmosphere. I mean, how do you balance a character who can say a sentence and permanently counter a whole keyword?

Anyway, it was a great entry, until WordPress “No more mutants’d” it and it was lost forever. 🙁

Hence, this short version.

The Scarlet Witch we need is still a Prob specialist, but with a bit more offensive focus. Her version of PC should only work on enemies’ rolls, and when she forces a miss, she can counter a power or ability the attacker used during the action, including team abilities (and regardless of team abilities).

That accurately reflects her “hex-bolts” or “chaos magic” more than basic PC. Meanwhile, solid range and offensive numbers (at least 10 AV and 3 damage at range) should suffice for her skills on the battlefield.

Because this longtime Avenger needs a definitive version, she’s Heroclixin’s #7 Most Needed Remake. Maybe the soon-to-release Chaos War version(s?) will do justice to Marvel’s biggest sometime-chaos magician?

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Tomorrow and Thursday, the countdown moves to characters that sorta proxy for their whole crew but happen to be the one most in need of remake for one reason or another.

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These are characters that have at least one full dial (not counting bystanders) in the game but are somehow inadequate and need to be redone, STAT. We’re starting with a pair from both mainstream universes that have some dials that are playable, but are woefully outdated both power-wise and character/keyword/teamwise.

Moon Knight

The white-clad nocturnal crimefighter has gotten a pair of lightweight renditions (REV in Critical Mass and an Uncommon in 2007’s Avengers) that don’t properly represent his “Marvel’s Batman if he had Super Strength and was insane, sometimes” level of ability.  The 2007 Avengers version made a go at it, but severely failed due to a poorly written, three-fold Special Power that can only be 2/3 used. (He can use Close and Ranged Combat Expert or self-Perplex but takes a click of damage right after. The trouble is that Perplex’s effects go away after taking damage, so he could never — EVER! — use his Perplex.)

Moon Knight’s profile has also risen a little bit in the Marvel U. since his last clix incarnation, having helmed a pair of solo series and won a place in the Secret Avengers. So since his erroneous SP was never given an errata and he needs the Avengers keyword proper, Moon Knight is Heroclixin’s #10 Most Needed Remake.

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Power Girl

“Peegee” had a decent-for-the-time trio of versions made in 2005’s Legacy set, with the Vet starting with Charge, Quake and Impervious for  just 120 points. But like most every figure of the time as well, she dropped fast, sinking to sad lows by mid-dial. What good is Super Strength’s appearance with Attack Values of just 8 and 7 and no Charge or anything and utter dependence on the Justice Society team ability to prop up defenses of 15, 14 and 13?

2010’s Brave and the Bold set brought us a much beefier Power Girl at 199 points, sporting the same JSA team ability as the older REV (but with better DVs), the appearance of Hypersonic Speed, nonstop, uncounterable Super Strength and a nifty Special Power granting Exploit Weakness against non-Robot, non-Willpowered foes.

But in the end, this Power Girl is still not right.

  • Her Attack Values are almost exactly as bad as her Legacy incarnation. How does that happen in this stage of the game? She’s the most expensive Modern figure in the game to have a click of 7 AV on her dial — one of just nine costing 150 or more points — and one of the only three that have 2 clicks of it. The other two are human Ms. Marvel and Psycho-Man, both of Secret Invasion and costing 31 and 48 points less, respectively.
  • Her Super Strength trait had to be added via errata. Though I don’t doubt it’s built into her cost — how else to explain it? — one wonders if some of those points are again wasted on her inability to hit many targets literally half her weight class for literally half her dial.
  • Where’s the range? She’s a Kryptonian, with the heat-ray optics to match. I know she likes to tangle in close, but it’d be nice to have the option.

Add to it all her poor sculpt, which totally fails to capture the spirit of the cover art that inspired it, and you have a character who deserves much better. Let’s hope there’s a shot at the classic, pre-New-52 version of Power Girl, Heroclixin’s #9 Most Needed Remake.

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Next round, goes to characters who’ve gotten some useful versions, but have evolved well past their  do-one-thing-well origins.

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“We can rebuild him…we have the technology.”

Been a little while since I did a Top Ten. Really needed the break after spending the first four months of the year slowly completing a bunch of them.

But now we’re into the first full week of a new month, which is when I usually do these. I’m not ready to do a very in-depth Top Ten in the vein of the top Barrier pieces, or the 10 needed changes.

Rather, I’m looking to the future for Heroclixin’s Top Ten Needed Remakes. These are characters  that have at least one full dial (not counting bystanders) in the game but are somehow inadequate and need to be redone, STAT.

As an example (and to keep them from burning up four of the 10 slots by themselves), I present Power Pack (with text cut-and-pasted from way back in Sept. ’09):

Gee: Originally, the oldest Power kid (age 12.5, not 15 like his card says) could only affect the gravity of people and objects he touched, making some version of Super Strength and the Carry ability a shoo-in. But the current revamp recasts him as more of a standard telekinetic, and that’s the clix we got. It’s OK, but not accurate.

Lightspeed: Also mis-aged on her character card, Julie only flew real fast at first. Much, MUCH later she learned to teleport, but that was never her main power. The current Lightspeed (in the kids’ books, not the teenaged runaway seen in recent years) has been treated as much as a speedster as anything, and even the original broke the sound barrier early in her career. Would it have been too much to give her at least ONE click of Hypersonic Speed, even with super-low attack and damage values?

Mass Master: the greatest disappointment of the four, thanks to his way-too-low defense numbers. Think of it; he’s an intangible cloud most of the time (and a 5-inch-high, 60-pound “Jack Hammer” the rest). He should have 17 DV at minimum with Defend or something, not to mention Phasing/Teleport for his ability to slip through any crack in his cloud form. Drop his damage to 0 with Close Combat Expert.

Energizer: the original Katie was considerably more destructive than the new incarnation that the ‘clix version seems based on. Always relied upon to either disintegrate or smash walls and such, the youngest deserves some 3 damage clicks.

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The actual top ten will have a little less griping than this example. But you get the idea.

Be here all next week to see Heroclixin’s choices and see how they line up with yours!

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Welcome again to the photographic record of how all the sculpts of characters with the Super Strength power can hold object tokens.

Back when the Incredible Hulk set was fairly new, I managed to get shots of two of the six Hulked Out Heroes chase figures, IceHulk and Mighty Thorr. Now, thanks to fellow player David Leverette, I’ve photographed the other four below:

Wolverage effortlessly holds his heavy under his right claw. Winter Hulk, on the other hand, already has his hands full with his puny shield and can only lamely lean the token on his chest. Hulkmariner must’ve been occupying water terrain, ’cause he’s balancing a light object on his head and under his right arm. (And he really is just balancing it; it’s not a great hold at all.) Finally, Hulklops’ is wedged in his stat slot and some eyebeams.

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Token Totin’s takin’ a break next week; it’s time for another monthly Top Ten countdown. Be here tomorrow for the intro!

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With some embarrassment, I recently noted that nearly a year has passed since a reader posted a comment requesting some terms be added to Heroclixin’s glossary.

A.

Year.

So yeah, sorry man. Better late than never, but really it shouldn’t get to that point. Check it out for previously missing terms like “meta” and killbox” and “IG.” I also brought the list of set abbreviations up to date (the latest being “GG” for “Galactic Guardians”).  Click here or the link in the menu up top.

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Would ya believe this weekly (haw!) feature hasn’t been updated since OCTOBER? It’s been so long, I don’t even remember what I last presented. (Here’s a link back to the original concept.)

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After doing some webcrawling, it looks like I’d started on the Icons feats. So let’s pick up with a pair of them to sorta kinda make up for lost time.

Still doing sloppy work at this stage. The artwork is Scott McDaniel from the then-current Green Arrow title. At the time, I don’t believe there was an actual Green Arrow figure that could use the feat — and boy, is it ever overcosted for its limited usefulness — but this was the perfect art for it.

Scott McDaniel is a fantastic cartoonist, so this wasn’t the last time I’d refer to his work for this little fanwork:

A card named “Sidekick” just begs for a Robin, and fortunately I had in my collection an issue of Nightwing that featured the perfect image of the Boy Wonder side-by-side with his mentor. (It was a flashback of Dick Grayson’s career or somesuch.) It very much, to me, illustrates the card concept of a much cheaper character being able to wade into battle just as fearlessly as its higher-cost partner — you don’t get the impression from this art that Robin would back down from any foe that Batman was facing alongside him.

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OK. Maybe I’ve gotten this little feature a bit back on track.

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Welcome again to the photographic record of how all the sculpts of characters with the Super Strength power can hold object tokens. Finally sort of getting back into a regular groove here.

I’m pleased to present a pic of a character who, at first glance, doesn’t even seem to rate Super Strength, the Queen of Attilan, Medusa:

She holds it tenuously under her arm and on the base.

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Next Token Totin’ edition will be SMASHING!

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Ever since the Avengers movie, my longtime love for the Black Widow character has been freshly revived (even though Scarlet Johansson’s casting is my least favorite thing about the film. I’m so over it). So at first opportunity, I played a 400-point team composed soley of every single version of Black Widow in my collection:

Black Widow (Captain America 006) 85 + Thunderbolts ATA 8 + Inside Info 4

The Covert Avenger (Avengers Movie Starter 004) 75 + Lunge 5

Black Widow (Captain America 206) 60 + Nanoarmor 6

Black Widow  (Classics 2-08) 59 + Not So Special 3

Black Widow  (Avengers Movie 007) 50 + Vault 3 + Infiltrate 2

Black Widow (Avengers Movie 036) 35 + Lunge 5

And here’s how they wound up playing:

Black Widow (Captain America 006): The big gal of the crew, her Running Shot and 3 damage made her invaluable. I wasn’t scared to push her to get to Penetrating Psychic Blast, either. Being able to pick Mystics with Thunderbolts ATA — never run her without T-Bolts — served as a good deterrent against Hypersonic attackers like Supergirl. (Too bad I didn’t pick Mystics in the first round against Ms. Marvel.)

The Covert Avenger (Avengers Movie Starter 004): Really tried to make her defense-countering SP work, but the must-hit attacks failed. She did OK, but I feel like she should contribute more.

Black Widow (Captain America 206): This was a true linchpin of the team with her 2nd-click Perplex. This Widow also served well as a secondary sniper even with her paltry 4 range. Willpower helped.

Black Widow  (Classics 2-08): Mostly outclassed by more modern dials, the old Ultimates Widow still packs a mean punch with 3 damage and Willpower. Since she doesn’t have to front a team (in the sense of bringing anti-Stealth to the game), she can make some surprise shots.

Black Widow  (Avengers Movie 007) : Another who ignores enemy Stealth, though the 4 range makes that a fairly empty threat. I never got to use her Takedown power, either (chiefly due to her getting OHKO’d by a Blood Brother and thoroughly forgetting my Themed Team Probability Control to turn that improbable hit to a miss).

Black Widow (Avengers Movie 036): The littlest Widow sometimes made a big impact. From Lunging about (thanks, feats!) to using her SHIELD TA (with the 60-point Widow’s, too) to lengthen the swings of big Widow and Ult. Widow to just tying up enemies or blocking line of fire, she’s useful in a multitude of ways. And only 35 points!

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Welcome again to the photographic record of how all the sculpts of characters with the Super Strength power can hold object tokens.

I was hoping to post a final update with of photos of  the rest of the Avengers Movie ‘clix with objects in hand (or otherwise). But I’ve yet to even see either a Frost Giant Champion or Laufey — or even the regular Frost Giant! — to test it out.

Still, I’m pleased to present this Avengers Movie clix that can tote his tokens: The mighty Thor (020 & 200)!

Thor’s token fits easily under his cape, though it’s not quite as secure a fit as it looks like it should be.

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And oh, look! I got ahold of two of the the other Super Strong characters in the set to photograph: Volstagg (the Voluminous) and Iron Man 019!

Both tuck their tokens underneath their respective elbows.

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Activity on the site’s been a little scant, lately. Too often, time I planned to use on Heroclixin’ has gotten eaten up by surprise freelance work (that doesn’t pay well enough) or just plain fatigue.

Sorry about that.

To make up, here’s a little bit of Heroclixin’ fun for ya: a team I want to play once I’ve accomplished my goal of playing my two Fast Forces cases full of unplayed pieces.


The Nazgul.

Witch-King of Angmar
Servant of Sauron x2
Black Rider x2
One of the Nine
Nazgul
Ringwraith x2
All Nine at once equals 930 points. Since LOTR figures are Golden Age, maybe I ought to add 70 points of feats, objects and resources to fill in the gap, such as:
Fortitiude: 25 points. Defense against Outwit and, perhaps more importantly, Exploit Weakness for the King.
Vampirism: 6 points. Though all qualify, it’s best on Servant of Sauron.
With the ‘Wraiths and the King and Nazgul and One all sporting Exploit Weakness, the 5-point Yellow Lantern is a no-brainer, objects-wise.
The One Ring: I mean, why NOT? 10 points.