Back In The Saddle Again

It's been two months since I played any Heroclix, since every Saturday since then I've either been out of town, or I'm real stressed because I just spent five hours driving back to town, or oh, you know all this.

So it was a good thing I showed up, 'cause otherwise Jack wouldn't have had anyone to play against. We're in the middle of WizKids big series of events for their Crisis set, and well, most of the regulars aren't DC fans, I suppose. Plus, they've got kids and wives and jobs and stuff like that. You know how it goes. But I was there, so Jack actually had some competition, to the extent that I qualify. He wanted to try a Hal Jordan, Kyle Rayner, Power Ring and Sinestro team, with Mercury thrown in for assistance purposes, but he forgot the character cards, and all those ring-bearers have special powers where you need the card to remember what they are, so he had to shift gears. Ultimately he went with Kyle, Lobo, Ambush Bug, and the incomparable team of Blue and Gold! Clearly, I was doomed.

But why not humor myself? So I threw out a Rogues squad: The Trickster/Pied Piper Duo figure, Abra Kadabra, Mirror Master, Captain Cold, Dr. Alchemy, Heat Wave, and Captain Boomerang (Boomer Jr., with the super-speed). We rolled to see who goes first, I won, then we set out the map, and because this is a "Crisis" thing, time and space are a mess, so we placed smaller pieces of other maps over the larger map, to make this weird mishmash of medieval castles, Legion headquarters, wrecked Metropolis streets, and some other place with sandbags.

There's a rule that says you can't make any attacks until your opponent has had a chance to move, which is fair, but kind of bad for me in this case. It stifled my taking the initiative. Still, things started well. Alchemy TK'ed Boomer up the field, Kadabra boosted his attack by +1, Piper/Trickster upped it by another +1, and Boomer charged in a took his shot at Kyle. And missed. Figures. But it's a "Theme Team", so I had two reroll chances a game (one for every three guys on my team). There goes the first one. Actually paid off. I hit Rayner, knocked him off his nasty first click, and went from there.

Things went back and forth for awhile. Captain Cold hurt Booster, Booster responded in kind. Beetle Pounced and finished Cold. I did some more damage to Kyle, knocked him onto the 2nd half of his dial, but the Ambush Bug played meat shield and it seemed to take forever to kill that bastard. It wasn't even his Super Senses saving him, I just couldn't roll high enough (which is pretty sad since we're talking about needing 7s and 8s). Boomer and Heat Wave finally took him out, but by then Lobo was after Trickster/Piper and wreaking havoc.

There was a moment where I might have slowed Lobe down. The Duo have Psychic Blast as a power, which ignores powers that reduce the damage taken. I had them boost their attack by +1, and took a shot. It wouldn't have been much, 2 damage against a character 10 clicks deep, but it might have helped. So naturally, I missed, and I had already burned the other reroll while trying to kill Ambush Bug. So Lobo wiped those two out, but Alchemy actually managed to hurt him. A futile gesture, but it was something. Then Lobo smacked him, and Alchemy tried to run towards an enemy his Poison would actually effect, and I think Booster finished him.

Mirror Master had hit Booster pretty good earlier during a Flurry, though the sequence pretty much summed up how things go for me. I needed to roll a 7 to hit Booster, rolled a 10. Great, fine, it works, except it was double 5s, so it knocks him out of range, so now I have to attack Beetle, who was standing next to us at the time. For him, I need a 10, but I roll a 7. At which point I exclaimed 'Curse you two, you've gotten me all mixed up!' Jack's response was 'Then we've done our job!' About that time, Kyle Rayner finally got useful and hit Boomer for 5 damage, eliminating him, then took out Heat Wave the next turn. Kadabra did take out Booster before being beaten to a pulp by Lobo and Kyle, and at that point, it was just a matter of how long Mirror Master could use Shape Change to stop people from attacking. It kept him alive against Beetle for quite awhile, but once Kyle and Lobo joined in, it was pretty much over.

So yeah, I lost, but it was pretty close for awhile. I probably would have been best served by getting Piper/Trickster over by Blue and Gold. They had Poison early on, and Booster and Beetle lack the damage reducers to neutralize that, so I could have worn them down a little, whereas Poison was ineffective against Lobo. The problem was, I liked having their Perplex there in the middle of the field where they could help more of my guys, and Booster and Beetle were off in their own section of the field for most of the fight. Plus, Lobo can move more in one turn than Piper/Trickster can, so I couldn't have outrun him. Well, it was still a fun match, as opposed to one of those where it's over quickly because I can't make any good rolls, or my plan blows up immediately (plan? what plan?). And I was able to trade a figure I didn't want for an extra Arcade Jack had, so bonus!