Clix Conundrum

Mutations and Monsters: The List?

This appears credible, so I'm running with it. Based on the info -- which could certainly go wrong in the details -- I'm glad I ordered strongly into this set.

The Commons (1-16) Two to three per booster:

1. Marvel Girl - 40 pts
2. Cyclops - 50 pts
3. Beast - 50 pts
4. Iceman - 60 pts

Hmmm... those are all from their first appearance. No Angel from that period in the mix, though. Those four make a 200 pt team... and the Danger Room Angel is 50 pts.

5. Strong Guy - 124 pts (Oh, it'll be nice to see Guido.)
6. Pete Wisdom - 33 pts (Odd little choice.)
7. Brood - 49 pts (Terrific! Another generic common!)
8. Box - 125 pts
9. Cuckoo - 40 pts Already known and still awaited.
10. Maverick - 63 pts (I'll be interested to see how his kinetic energy-absorbing powers will be handled.)
11. Dazzler - 48 pts
12. Colossus - 158 pts (Interested in seeing how the rumored, built-in Fastball Special will work.)
13. Agent Brand - 44 pts (Eh.)
14. Bishop - 100 pts (A new version? Well, it makes some sense since the other was from Mutant Mayhem)
15. The Hood - 28 pts (At the smallest point value in the set I'm maybe expecting something along the lines of what we had in Armor Wars with Ghost.)
16. Miek - 60 pts (Potentially another alien generic, and still among the commons.)

The Uncommons (16-32) One to two per booster:

17. Hulk - 143 pts (Gray with tattered shirt. We might have a First Apperance Hulk -- hopefully one with an Avengers keyword.)
18. Korg - 82 pts (An uncommon, and a little pricey for the role, but another potentially used as an alien generic.)
19. Absorbing Man - 184 pts (Ah! Oh, let's hope they've gotten the special powers worked out well. Also I'm hoping for a cool sculpt.)
20. Morph - 90 pts
21. Mimic - 148 pts
22. Gorgon - 110 points (At last! That leaves Triton and a proper remake of Medusa.)
23. Cyclops - 75 pts (Age of Apocalypse)
24. Shatterstar - 57 pts
25. Zaxx - 126 pts
26. Chamber - 45 pts
27. Beast - 73 pts
28. Giant Man - 97 pts (a zombie, reportedly eating the Black Panther. Eh.)
29. Iceman - 100 pts (Ah! A newer - modern? - version?)
30. X-23 - 35 pts (Look! Teen Wolverine with a sex change!)
31. Professor X - 131 pts
32. Gambit - 90 pts (This'll likely make some people happy.)

Rares (33-48) One to two per booster:

33. Green Scar - 230 pts
34. Archangel - 95 pts
35. Ahab - 88 pts
36. Fabian Cortez - 61 pts (Hmm... a mutant who could amp up the abilities of other mutants, sometimes to levels dangerous even to themselves. This could be the basis for an intriguing Special Power.)
37. Jean Grey - 90 pts (Age of Apocalypse)
38. Omega Red - 124 pts
39. Danger - 124 pts (Ah. The Danger Room made robotic.)
40. Devil Dinosaur and Moon Boy - 151 pts (And the world asks "Why?")
41. Spiderman - 41 pts (Zombie)
42. Unus the Untouchable - 90 pts (At last!)
43. Black Tom Cassidy - 55 pts
44. The Leader - 116 pts (Oh, hopefully a vast improvement over the earlier version.)
45. High Evolutionary - 143 pts (Interesting.)
46. Arcade - 86 pts
47. Super Adaptoid - 143 pts (Classic Look)
48. The Wrecker - 230 pts (Ah! I'll reserve judgment, though, since this game doesn't tend to do grounded bricks well.)

Super Rares (49-60) Roughly one in three boosters:

49. Cassandra Nova - 142 pts (Brrrrrapp! Well, Seth seems to have a thing for Grant Morrison jags, so I suppose this was inevitable.)
50. Hulkbuster - 165 pts
51. Silver Savage - 96 pts
52. Mastermind - 117 pts (As with Unus -- At last!)
53. Emma Frost - 107 pts (Reportedly in her diamond form. I'll be interested in seeing the interpretation in the dial.)
54. Living Monolith - 104 (Ha! Well, there's an interesting choice.)
55. Iron Man - 70 pts (Zombie)
56. Wolverine - 148 pts (Zombie)
57. Storm - 100 pts (Mohawk and black leather version)
58. Warskrull - 110 pts (I'm a little confused, since this appears to be a special class of Skrull... which would make it a lousy choice for a Super Rare.)
59. Apocalypse - 250 pts
60. Maestro - 195 pts (Hmmm. Under 200 pts? I'm curious!)
61. Dark Beast - 69 pts
62. Rampaging Hulk - 128 pts

Only 4 zombies in the mix - 5 if you count the Wasp bystander - which was welcome news.

Apparently three functional generics in within the commons - Brood, Cuckoo and Miek. Wonderful!

Plenty of pieces I've been waiting for. It remains to be seen how well executed many of them are, but I'm encouraged.


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rarer than Rare?

One thing I'd noticed in collecting the first two sets of Heroclix under the new set construction - Avengers and Justice League - is that it can be a pain in the ass to collect the cardboard items that are the 6th element in a booster. With Mutations and Monsters that's about to go up a notch.

This isn't at all a doomsaying post, but just something I think it's important for people to anticipate as they look towards collecting the new set starting in less than three weeks.

We all know that under the new set structure the Super Rares have become chase pieces. Certainly not at the rarified level of the at least questionable (I'm trying to be charitable here and not turn the thread down a side-path) move they did with Supernova and Origin, but most people who weren't either very lucky or had LEs to trade have found it difficult to collect a complete set of SRs. No news there. At that level we're still watching for the list to be filled in so we can see which ones are likely to be hot and which are less likely to be seen as solid trade material.

Also, I'm sure I'm not the only one who's noticed that collecting a complete set of cardboard elements from Avengers and Justice League didn't tend to prove easy, all the less so if one wanted to gather multiples of any of them. The new booster design dropped their occurrence noticeably now that there's only 1 per every 5 clix instead of 1 per 4.

In both Justice League and Avengers we had 18 of what I'll refer to as 6th element items (something beyond the 5 clix in a booster, which for those first two sets were only cardboard), and as noted above I'd never had as much difficulty getting a complete set of cardboard, including some multiples of interesting Feats, in any set before the structure change. Once I heard about the Events Dials being in the same slot I'd hoped they would trim other card elements so that we at least would only be dealing with the same level of difficulty.

Not so, it appears.

With Mutations and Monsters, it seems, the mathematics of the set are going to make accumulating multiples, especially more than two, of any of the 6th element bits (not that one would have much use for more than one of the Event Dials or even BFCs, but objects, Feats and perhaps a few of the bystanders may become sought after as multiples) more difficult than any earlier set.

I'm estimating roughly 23-25 of these elements in M&M, so even if meticulously distributed through a case (and we know they've done this before when they set their minds to it) that still wouldn't be a complete set of 6th element pieces in a case. Chances are, it won't be that even-handed. As with the Super Rares these elements won't have a parity of value, so the poor shmuck whose luck brings him a plethora of bystanders and maybe BFCs and a deficit of the other items is likely to find it difficult to trade those extras directly for Feats, Objects and perhaps even Event Dials.

I'm figuring 7 bystanders, 3 BFCs, 2 Special Objects, 6 Event Dials and 6 Feats, the last based on partially pulled information found on a Spanish Heroclix site - so that's 24 pieces occurring in that extra spot beyond the 5 clix in a booster. Since there are only 16 Rares and they, too, are 1 per booster, the individual 6th element pieces are now solidly, technically rarer than Rare. (We won't discuss the three LE Feats that will be out there, because whether they're there to be won or handed out as participation pieces they're not going to be in boosters, so they're not part of this discussion.)

So, for now, I'm just mentioning that collectors/players should keep in mind that what's of value in the set may be changing in a way that may seem odd. Most of the Commons, Uncommons and Rares under the new set structure have dropped in trade value. I'm expecting Cuckoos and perhaps Korg, who could be viewed as a generic in some circles despite the specific name, will hold more trade value, but most of the rest will be fairly easily found and soon will be lightly esteemed by the average clix buyer. The 6th element bits, though, I'm suspecting more of those will be sought after. During the summer and early fall events I increasingly saw people causally giving away commons, uncommons and even rares, considering them so worthless and not useful in the least for trading for the pieces they really wanted (the SRs) that they didn't even try lining up a trade. Some where that way with the cardboard, too. I'm... just advising that you may want to revise your estimate of what trading value these extra bits beyond the clix may end up having before you go tossing things away because you have an outdated illusion that they will be very easy to come by.


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A leak via a Spanish Heroclix site gave us the seven bystanders from the upcoming set. I'll have something to say connected to the slot they fill in the set, but I'll do that as part of another post when I get around to it. These are really all simply for my amusement anyway.

For now, it's onto Seth's sometimes curious choices for beings with not long to live in most games unless they stay out of the way.

First, we have Val Cooper, a government operative whose specialty has been mutant relations of one stripe or another since Claremont and John Romita jr. created her almost 25 years ago. Seven points for a Stealthed character with a 6 range and 9 Attack Value -- albeit with a 1 Damage, so who really cares about that? -- could be useful. I expect her to mostly be carried around as a stealth shield. As a normal human she's reasonable game for being a bystander.

Next, at 6 points, is Lila Cheney, she's a musician, thief and mutant, using her teleportation powers for personal gain. So, it's another bystander with a power, Phasing/Teleport, and a Speed of 10, so she can get places if you need her to.

Another Claremont creation, she's been around almost as long as Val has. Not likely to be any good as an attacker, unable to take a punch and likely to be hit if one's thrown, her main utility appears to be as a highly mobile blocking or tie-up piece or simply as bait. Either way, she's going to be a sacrifice piece on a team. Still, if she can do any of those things with the right pieces, she'll have been worth more than her 6 pts. I have no doubt that fans will be irritated that she received such shoddy treatment, especially when another mutant musician she sometimes played with - Dazzler - will be getting a sculpt and more than one click of life.

One last note: While bragging about one's own ignorance is generally not a good trait, I must confess that I'm feeling good about not even recognizing that despite the name and powers being Lila Cheney that the image is, in fact, Jubilee from her Age of Apocalypse incarnation.
The third bystander's a strange choice. Swarm is a composite being, a human intelligence that was essentially consumed by mutated bees and whose intelligence now controls them. Hardly a major villain, but to be fair he gave both the Champions and Spider-man some grief, so this is a sad state to find him in. Leap/Climb allows him mobility and Super Senses potentially helps him avoid being hit, so he's potentially a tie-up piece, but for 11 points his 8 AV, 6 range and 1 Damage he's hardly a shoo-in. Still, I suppose one could play multiple Swarms as a composite being... if you happen to pull more than one. (There's that element I'll be doing a separate post on sometime soon.)
In the fourth spot we have Jarella, once-beloved of the Hulk when he was shifted to that microverse and magic imbued him with Banner's intelligence. She's long dead, and looking at her bystander token there doesn't seem to be a great deal of life either. Need 5 points for Mastermind fodder or as a meat shield, well, here it is. I can't even get myself to bother working up a Hulk scenario for using her.
Recent comics star (at least over in the Hulk line) Amadeus Cho, teenage supergenius. Well, that way everyone can hate him. A recently-created addition to the Marvel universe, Reed Richards tagged Cho as the "seventh smartest person in the world." Basically, revive all your loathing for Wesley Crusher, plug that in and multiply it by some random whole number and you'll have the right attitude for him.

What makes Cho stand out a little is that he's the first bystander with a special power. Well. See? Now you can die in peace and fulfillment. It grants him Outwit as a Power Action, so he has to get into place and then Outwit on a separate turn. Certainly, one can potentially make it work, but he's ultimately going to be an easy 11 points for one's opponent in most teams.

Next we have a Native Warrior, and by this we mean an insect-like native of the planet Sakaar. Again, we're looking at an 11 pt pog. Leap/Climb and Toughness, I suppose these could be useful, but that 1 Damage... Really, would it have been terrible to make them 20-25 pt, full-sculpt commons in the set? Finally, remembering that the Marvel Zombie plague is also part of this set, we have what remains of that world's Janet Pym: A zombie head in a protective bubble atop a robotic body. Apparently a fairly crappy robot body. Only six points and at least she can't infect anyone. To paraphrase another dead guy, "She's dead already."

Anything especially inspiring? No, not really. Some bits of potential here and there, but I'd be in favor of not making any more bystanders.


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Another preview today, it's the Battlefield Conditions and one special object.

Including the Battlefield Condition to be given out at the pre-release (fourth one down in this list) we have three BFCs to be found in boosters.

The first is the reprint of an old favorite for many players: Deep Shadows. For line of fire purposes all squares of clear terrain are considered hindering, so by itself it can be a stealthed team's dream. All ranges, including those for powers such as Outwit, Perplex and Probability Control are dropped to 6. This will be a terrific card to play with a theme team and then ignore it. A non-theme opponent will have his range chopped while you'll still be able to see clearly through the clear terrain.

Next, we have the first of the new BFCs with one old (well, middlin' at least) X-Men fans will recognize: Krakoa the Living Island.

With Krakoa in play each player can, at the end of his turn, choose to use an adjacent, unoccupied square of outdoor hindering, blocking or elevated terrain and make an attack roll with an Attack Value of 9 and a Damage of 2 against the target. The target cannot be knocked back by the attack. If the attack succeeds but the target takes no damage (if it has Invulnerability or Impervious) and has zero or one token on it, give the target an action token.

Wow! The only question I have here is if "target" offers any defense for Stealthed pieces. It's as if the terrain's come alive and made a close combat attack, so I'm thinking it won't, but we'll need an official word on that.

Next, it's Sue Richards in her bondage gear thanks to some serious tinkering by the Psychoman -- it's Malice (The Battlefield Condition.) Try to hurt your opponent or else you'll hurt yourself!

Those going to the pre-release events will receive the Planet Hulk-themed The Great Arena. Any successful attack where one rolls doubles is a critical hit. A little spice that isn't biased toward either player, but which can help provide some upsets. Cool.

An object in the set is the second (so we know there's at least one more) and it's the Shield Disruptor. Anyone within 4 spaces of this object has no damage-reducing powers. Simple and potentially deadly; place it near where one expects one's opponent's forces will try to gather as they move out onto the map. This will be an interesting one for Arcade to give marching orders to with his Murderbots power, too, come to think of it.


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Step Right Up...

Ah, after the disappointment that was the zombie Iron Man on Halloween, we have the wonderful Arcade.



Ahhh! When I learned that Arcade was going to be in the set I was afraid he would turn out to be one of the more lackluster clix in the set. Outwit and Probability Control -- that sort of thing; useful but unoriginal. Instead, we have an 86-point piece with some fun powers.

Able to animate up to two objects within 10 range of him to move at speeds up to his own, and then to cause one of them to detonate next to an opposing piece. Having terrain walk out from under an opposing character (which I believe they'd be able to do under this, though they're going to need to roll for breakaway) alone would be worth it, but turning one of them into a weapon, too? Actually, he doesn't even need to have the object move, he can just use Deathtrap to have it vanish in an explosion. .. as a Free Action! Separately he can summon one or both objects to block line of fire. Outwit down the dial, and a special defensive power providing him both Barrier and Mastermind... he'll be great fun to field.

I'm likely not the only one to think that this is an evolution of what Seth tried out with Mr. Mxyzptlk... and Arcade appears to have gotten the better deal.

Arcade's riding high on my list of welcome pieces, and as he's a Rare I should see a few. I rated him a 9 and may not have done him justice with that.

Here's a link to Seth's designer notes.


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