Some (Quick) Avengers Catch-up
With just hours more than a week until the set releases, Wizkids did an afternoon update of their Avengers Gallery.
Now we're officially up to 20 entries, 19 of which are going to emerge from boosters, and 11 of those are clix. The clix detail additions are for Moon Knight and an Ultimates version of the Falcon.
For 38 points, the Moon Knight appears to be an economical piece with some options.
The Avengers TA, three opening clicks of Super Strength, an opening and two closing clicks of Stealth, and three Pounceable clicks of Leap/Climb. An opening click of Energy Shield/Deflection (I'm expecting an errata on that, to whatever they really want to call it with respect to him being a moving target) to help keep him from being tagged from range if he's out in the open, then one of Combat Reflexes to let him evade damage from a target he's moved adjacent to.
His special power, noted by the red dots I've placed on his final three clicks of Damage, allows him to boost his Damage by 2 for either Ranged or Close Combat, or to Perplex one of his own stats. Once he's resolved that action he'll take a click of damage... so, the power's a suicide move on his final click. Hmmm. Still, for a guy who has been known to push himself dangerously beyond his limits it's a reasonably appropriate power.
Not a game-breaker, but a reasonably good expenditure of 38 points.
As noted on the card, he's a veteran version and is a common figure, so he should be relatively easy to find.
The Falcon is the Ultimates version, which means nuts to me. If I have a Falcon he's going to be an honorary 616 universe version.
Having just gotten an REV of Falcon, along with a mail-away and - if one happens to have him , an LE - in Sinister, the first impulse is to see this as a superfluous version. However this is a very active version with a potentially playable dial over its full range.
Running Shot on the first, fourth and fifth clicks, and a range of 6, along with reasonable Defense numbers modified by Energy Shield/Deflection (once more, intended to be a reflection of an evasive target) help give him a chance to get out onto the map and avoid attempted attacks.
Clicks three and four of Perplex could allow him to boost his low-to-middlin' Attack Values or assist an ally. His final click, albeit with an Attack Value of 7, includes Blades/Claws/Fangs, which could be used along with his special ability.
His special power - on his second, third and final clicks - allows him to possibly continue to move after making a Charge attack, though since it's just to a total of half his Speed... how often is he going to be close enough to a target to make use of it? Even on the second click, when his Speed is 10, he would have to be within 5 spaces of his target in order to Charge, hit and then be able to finish his move at least one space away from his target. It can be done, but on a piece that's 75 points Falcon's likely to be seen as a good target. He's going to have to depend on a combination of his allies' distractions and his ES/D to evade hits.
His SHIELD TA potentially allows him to amplify the damage made by and adjacent ally taking a shot at range by 1. However, it'll require an action by Falcon to do it, and since he's lacking Willpower, well, he's either going to be pushing to do it or he's going to have to be doing a lot of hanging around, doing nothing.
Falcon's more likely to come in handy on teams larger than 300 points, where he won't be one quarter of the team's points.
As seen on the card, Falcon's an experienced version of the character and a rare piece in the set, which is probably a good thing.
A week from the set's release and I still can't separate how much I'm looking forward to it for its own sake and how much simply as a distraction. With only twelve of the sixty pieces in the set (Darkhawk's been wholly revealed, even if they haven't yet added it to the gallery) laid out for us, most of the set's still a mystery to us.
They can still give us the dial and card details for Molecule Man, Wasp, Captain America, Ultimates Hulk and Giant-Man without expanding the list of sculpts we've already seen.
We've seen Feats one through three, and I'm wondering how many more there will be. Since the ratio of those card elements to clix will be lower as of this set (one per booster, as before, but now it's 5 clix per booster) collecting the usual complement of cards would be more problematic, especially those one would likely want multiples of.
Oh, while I'm here -- those who are interested have almost certainly seen it already, but here's Molecule Man:
Here are the heralds:
The bystanders:
...a couple special objects:
...and, while this is for the after the end of the summer, the Slaves of Starro (complete with old school uniforms):
With just hours more than a week until the set releases, Wizkids did an afternoon update of their Avengers Gallery.
Now we're officially up to 20 entries, 19 of which are going to emerge from boosters, and 11 of those are clix. The clix detail additions are for Moon Knight and an Ultimates version of the Falcon.
For 38 points, the Moon Knight appears to be an economical piece with some options.
The Avengers TA, three opening clicks of Super Strength, an opening and two closing clicks of Stealth, and three Pounceable clicks of Leap/Climb. An opening click of Energy Shield/Deflection (I'm expecting an errata on that, to whatever they really want to call it with respect to him being a moving target) to help keep him from being tagged from range if he's out in the open, then one of Combat Reflexes to let him evade damage from a target he's moved adjacent to.His special power, noted by the red dots I've placed on his final three clicks of Damage, allows him to boost his Damage by 2 for either Ranged or Close Combat, or to Perplex one of his own stats. Once he's resolved that action he'll take a click of damage... so, the power's a suicide move on his final click. Hmmm. Still, for a guy who has been known to push himself dangerously beyond his limits it's a reasonably appropriate power.
Not a game-breaker, but a reasonably good expenditure of 38 points.
As noted on the card, he's a veteran version and is a common figure, so he should be relatively easy to find.The Falcon is the Ultimates version, which means nuts to me. If I have a Falcon he's going to be an honorary 616 universe version.
Having just gotten an REV of Falcon, along with a mail-away and - if one happens to have him , an LE - in Sinister, the first impulse is to see this as a superfluous version. However this is a very active version with a potentially playable dial over its full range.
Running Shot on the first, fourth and fifth clicks, and a range of 6, along with reasonable Defense numbers modified by Energy Shield/Deflection (once more, intended to be a reflection of an evasive target) help give him a chance to get out onto the map and avoid attempted attacks.Clicks three and four of Perplex could allow him to boost his low-to-middlin' Attack Values or assist an ally. His final click, albeit with an Attack Value of 7, includes Blades/Claws/Fangs, which could be used along with his special ability.
His special power - on his second, third and final clicks - allows him to possibly continue to move after making a Charge attack, though since it's just to a total of half his Speed... how often is he going to be close enough to a target to make use of it? Even on the second click, when his Speed is 10, he would have to be within 5 spaces of his target in order to Charge, hit and then be able to finish his move at least one space away from his target. It can be done, but on a piece that's 75 points Falcon's likely to be seen as a good target. He's going to have to depend on a combination of his allies' distractions and his ES/D to evade hits.
His SHIELD TA potentially allows him to amplify the damage made by and adjacent ally taking a shot at range by 1. However, it'll require an action by Falcon to do it, and since he's lacking Willpower, well, he's either going to be pushing to do it or he's going to have to be doing a lot of hanging around, doing nothing.
Falcon's more likely to come in handy on teams larger than 300 points, where he won't be one quarter of the team's points.As seen on the card, Falcon's an experienced version of the character and a rare piece in the set, which is probably a good thing.
A week from the set's release and I still can't separate how much I'm looking forward to it for its own sake and how much simply as a distraction. With only twelve of the sixty pieces in the set (Darkhawk's been wholly revealed, even if they haven't yet added it to the gallery) laid out for us, most of the set's still a mystery to us.
They can still give us the dial and card details for Molecule Man, Wasp, Captain America, Ultimates Hulk and Giant-Man without expanding the list of sculpts we've already seen.
We've seen Feats one through three, and I'm wondering how many more there will be. Since the ratio of those card elements to clix will be lower as of this set (one per booster, as before, but now it's 5 clix per booster) collecting the usual complement of cards would be more problematic, especially those one would likely want multiples of.
Oh, while I'm here -- those who are interested have almost certainly seen it already, but here's Molecule Man:
Here are the heralds:
The bystanders:
...a couple special objects:
...and, while this is for the after the end of the summer, the Slaves of Starro (complete with old school uniforms):
Comments
I frankly like that Falcon piece. I'm not at all wild about the TA -- I don't know if Falcon has ever worked for SHIELD in the real Marvel Universe, and I'm not sure I think much of the SHIELD TA anyway on anything but a pure support piece -- but under my House Rules, that special power is going to rock out loud. Similarly, Falc will only be able to carry someone on his first click, and maybe the two Perplex slots if he uses it to get his Damage Value up to 3 -- but that's fine, Falcon shouldn't carry anyone very often.
The new Moon Knight is workable, now that I see his dial, and very inexpensive. I'd expect him to be long gone by the time a game entered the fifth turn, unless maybe he was Thunderbolted to a very defensive TA... but, still, he could clear a few low cost enemies, or do some damage to an opponent's tent pole, before he goes down.
The new Heralds look good. Odd to get yet another Surfer right after Supernova, but hopefully he'll have a decent dial. A 200+ point Terrax is kind of intimdating to contemplate -- I hope the new Firelord is in the same point range.
It makes me sad that all those classic Silver Age JLA sculpts have great big alien mollusks fastened to their faces, but that's the life, I guess.
I'm with you in not specifically remembering the Falcon working with SHIELD, though since Cap did and Sam knows Sharon it's not much of a stretch. (The more I'm thinking about it, though, he and Cap did pull an assignment or two over the years, and when Mark Waid was writing the title it might have gotten a touch more formal.) Unfortunately, I'm also with you in not thinking much of the SHIELD TA, at least on a piece that doesn't have Willpower... and since Seth did that combo on the Sam Wilson LE in Sinister I suppose he didn't want to devalue that piece by doing it again here.
Effective cover and giving an opponent more to worry about are what I expect will most likely keep Moon Knight alive. Certainly, if he's given Pounce to pick him up on clicks 2-4 he'll both be more likely to burn through clicks and with an added 15 points will be 53 pt target. Maybe Swingline would be the better choice -- it certainly fits the type of character. (Granted, I know that the under your house rules the piece is much more dynamic than what those of us in the official game must use.)
This MK's not going to be much of a primary attacker - more a clean-up piece or part of a swarm. As I'd hoped, it appears that the built-in damage of his special power absorbed most of its cost. He is going to be at something of a loss on those final clicks when it comes to deciding to amp his AV and make a hit somewhat more likely despite dealing only 1 click of damage, or go for the 3 clicks of damage. A Perplexing and/or PCing ally will come in very handy for him.
I'm trying to recall the point values for the other heralds, and am fairly sure that the new Firelord comes in just a little higher than the 171 points Stardust has.
Unfortunately most of our info about the range of powers each has comes from the Inquest piece earlier this month, which, like most Inquest pieces, is written by someone with only a passing familiarity with the game. Taking what we can from that, though, and looking at them in order of release - noting only that all four have the Power Cosmic TA and that I've taken the liberty of putting in the correct power names for what the writer sometimes fished for:
The Surfer: 231 pts. 10 range, two targets. Energy explosion, psychic blast, phasing, invulnerability, toughness, running shot, energy shield/deflection, hypersonic speed and regeneration. He's also supposed to have a "Cosmic Speed" power, too, the workings of which we haven't been let in on.
Terrax the Tamer: 218 pts, 8 range, single target. Blades/Claws/Fangs, toughness, charge, exploit weakness, impervious, invulnerability, barrier, battle fury and (possibly only one click of) running shot.
Firelord: 176 pts, 8 range, single target. Poison, flurry, phasing, energy explosion, invulnerability, toughness, energy shield/deflection, ranged combat expert, pulse wave, and a single click of running shot.
Stardust: 171 pts, 8 range, single target. Phasing, super senses, hypersonic speed, psychic blast, pulse wave, regeneration and combat reflexes.
Huge tracts of unknown dynamics in there. I'm guessing they put them in descending point value to make the decision to swap one into the following week's event more difficult. Or maybe it's loosely meant to cover a succession of heralds?
He's the Ultimates version and as such, worked with SHIELD from time to time. I just finished reading the Ultimate Galactus books and SHIELD employed his services in that storyline.
Is anybody else less than impressed with the new Wasp sculpt? I know its representative of her original look, but still...kinda lame.
As I have probably irreconcilable problems with the Ultimate universe that connection's going to remain theoretical for me. I'm still at the stage where Marvel could contract Alan Moore to write and Alex Ross to illustrate and I still wouldn't buy an Ultimate title. I'm just stubborn that way. Maybe one day I'll accept it the way the apologists pitch it -- 616 and Ultimates like Earth II and Earth I -- but I don't even like it on that basis.
As for the Wasp, while the face seems unfortunately doomed to be somewhat masklike due to relying on a single color, another shot taken by one of the people who got hold of a booster early makes her look much better. She and Giant Man are two of the pieces I'm most looking forward to both in the senses of the characters and their history.