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I had another Top Ten idea I was preparing for this week, but it occurred to me that with America voting in the next leaders of the free world tomorrow, Heroclixin’ ought to list the Top Ten best Leadership pieces in the game.

What qualifies one to be a great leader?

  • The right point cost. It can’t be too low, because you want to be able to remove tokens from cheaper teammates upon successful rolls. But a leader too costly could crowd out the build total, leaving you with no other characters to use the extra actions granted by Leadership.
  • The ability to stay adjacent to allies with minimal effort. Your leader needs to always be in position to remove tokens from less-costly allies with the 5-6 roll. That means being a taxi or being taxiable.
  • Using that adjacency for something other than Leadership. It only works a third of the time, so the Leader really ought to have something else to benefit — or benefit from — adjacent allies.
  • Starting Leadership. Pushing to get to the power is useless. But…
  • No more attractive power on click #2. Nightwing (Crisis 029) is a prime negative example: though he begins with Leadership, unless a player is either using one of the feats associated with it (Inspiring Command, Contingency Plan) or married to leveraging his top-dial Incapacitate, Nightwing’s nearly always going to get pushed to click #2 for his Perplex. A better leader will not require feats and will get some actual mileage from the power.
  • Finally, the leader should have followers to benefit from the Leadership. Does she have any teammates that are a natural fit for her style (via team abilities, keywords or whatever)? This is taken into account.

 

 

 

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OK. Those are the ground rules. Starting tomorrow, see what Heroclixin’ voted as the 10th, 9th and maybe 8th best Leadership figures in the game!

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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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He’s called the Human Robot, but there are no fleshy bits in the #6 HeroClix figure of 2009.

Talk•to•the•hand•fleshy•ones

M-11
boot symbol
59 points
Team: none
Keywords: Agents of Atlas, Robot
Range: 6 x 1
DIAL: http://wizkidsgames.com/heroclix/gallery/
STRENGTHS: Unrelenting 3 damage for his WHOLE DIAL. 10 AV for his first SEVEN CLICKS. 18 DV and Super Strength for three clicks. Willpower for FIVE. And Regeneration the rest to potentially heal back up to his 2nd click. Psychic Blast through his mid-dial makes him deadly at range. For less than 60 points, he’s an awesome package.
WEAKNESSES: With zero damage reduction and no movement powers, M-11 is a soft, slow target.
CARDS TO CONSIDER: With so much Willpower, either OPPORTUNIST or PROTECTED are excellent fits. NANOARMOR helps mitigate big hits with enemy Super Strength. AUTOMATIC REGENERATION is choice in case he actually takes a hit.
IN SUM: Though he has his soft points, they’re easily worked around. M-11 is as good a mid-point fighter as you can ask for in HeroClix.
Next week, it’s on to the top five! This weekend, though, enjoy something from my “regular programming”… :)