I’m trying something new today; rather than host a team build, talk about a specific piece, or look at someone’s winning team, I want to talk about my recent LGS event that attracted a decent turnout with a large prize.

My LGS is Villainous Lair Comics & Gaming on Adams Avenue here in San Diego, California. It’s a really great place; the people there are exceptionally nice, the play space is large, and the regular playgroup is a good selection of people. It absolutely helps that our judge is a real stand-up guy and echoes a lot of the same sentiments that players do and always wants to know what we want to run for events. I started playing at my LGS in Fall of 2015 as my first clix venue ever and I’ve never looked back. I got pretty lucky.

Before diving into the event, I want to go over how our venue works and the typical turnout/piece selection/etc. We typically have between 6-8 players and there’s a lower focus on winning or abusing pieces. Most of us try and just build teams that we want to play and have fun. Resources are a rarity as they kind of gate new players from joining in on the fun, and we play a decent amount of Golden Age, though we’ve been playing a lot more Modern lately which makes me pretty happy (as you can tell, I have my ear to the floor of the main competitive scene). We also limit the use of Colossals, Vehicles, and Possession; that’s not to say that you have a limit to what or how much you can use. It just means that with each event, there’s a list that tells us whether they’re legal that day or not, with each having it’s own answer. So one event might allow colossals but no vehicles or possession, while another might allow everything. The main point is that we’re a pretty low-competitive scene, although the players are good.

Every once in a while, we’ll do a competitive day, and those are when I can pull out all the stops and throw whatever I want at the other players, as do they. The great thing about these events is that usually they’re “everyone wins” days where we all get an LE for playing, so no one leaves with a sour taste in their mouths because someone played a winning ROC team while they only brought a 6 man X-Men team. It’s a good system.

Last Sunday, December 11th 2016, we had a really neat event; Colossal Charity. For this event, the buy-in was one unwrapped toy to go to Toys for Tots. On top of buy-in, you could purchase tickets for $1 each that could be redeemed at any point during any game to give a character a use of Probability Control with all proceeds benefiting charity. The prize was the coveted Galactic Guardians Galactus, with Second and Fellowship earning either SMWW Solaris or SMWW War Wheel. Here’s the rules we had for the event:

Age: Oreo (New base style as opposed to the original base style)

Point Total: 400 Points

Relics: Yes

Resources: No

Vehicles: Yes

Colossals: Yes

Team Bases: No

Possession: Yes

Feats: No

BFC’s: No

Special Rules: When a character with the Cosmic keyword is targeted by an opposing character with Outwit or Perplex, roll a d6. On a result of 4-6, ignore that effect.

We ended up with 8 players.

I knew with the large prize on the line that I don’t have (I only have the OG, Critical Mass Galactus), I wanted to build a really great team to try and take the win. Here’s what I ended up playing:

400 Point Battle For Galactus Team

NFAoS 056 Nick Fury Possessed by Black Hand | 120 Points + 25 Points

WKD-027 Felix Faust | 80 Points

FL 026 Rainbow Raider | 68 points



FL 031 Turtle | 50 Points

DOFP 008 Senator Robert Kelly | 42 Points

Thor, Dr. Strange, Wonder Woman ID Cards | 5 Points Each = 15 Points

Sideline: AOU 018r Thor, CWSOP 112 Doctor Strange, BVS 003 Wonder Woman (GF)

Build Total: 400 points

I knew that I wanted Fury for my Cosmic piece; I never play him because I feel he’s not fair at my LGS, but this was a big event pulling in people from outside our typical group. The Outwit/Perplex protection is huge and really helps him stick around a bit better. This build was actually recommended by a user on Reddit that I talk to pretty regularly and it’s stupid fun. It’s all about negating what the enemy can do while Faust does his magic and Fury kills anyone who gets close. Rainbow Raider gives a -1 to combat values to virtually anyone he wants, while the combination of Kelly and Turtle make it painful to make any board progression. For ID cards, I went with my medic producer Thor since I don’t own Nightwing or his ID card. Wonder Woman is a pretty good pick for her possible 12 damage in a single turn. Strange was picked both for his Inspiration and his special power of turning to his ‘isolation’ click and buffing whatever I need for my entire force.

I had my team ready, so off to the races I went! I purchased $10 in Prob tickets and got ready for my match-ups.

Round 1 – S.H.I.E.L.D. Theme Team

NFAoS 051 Steve Rogers | 150 Points

M16-005 She-Hulk | 115 Points

NFAoS 036 Agent Coulson | 75 Points

NFAoS 007b Peggy Carter | 60 Points

Build Total: 400 Points

The initial match-up was against a friend of mine who I had taught how to play and he’s gotten quite good. Unfortunately, he didn’t have time to think about a good team build and came up with this SHIELD team in what he said was 5 minutes. Looking at the two team comps, I’m sure you can guess how things went.

I lost map roll (every game) and we played on the Joker’s Wild Chemical Plant map. He moved his characters up 4 squares to not take extra tokens from Turtle and passed. I tokened Rainbow Raider selecting Orange to nerf Steve, Peggy, and Coulson, positioned Turtle at a stairway in cover, moved Fury up 4 squares and passed the turn. We both cleared (Faust was rolling kinda poorly) on the following turn. Third turn, he crept up more and passed. Faust rolled brown (no combat modifiers), and I picked up Running Shot with Nick and a +1 to damage via Black Hand, and Perplexed his damage with Faust, shooting his Steve for 6 clicks penetrating. He did what he could to try and get in my face on my elevation but still couldn’t attack. The following turn, I put Steve out of his misery, setting my sights for She-Hulk. After some Outwits and him moving up into my area, I took my second shot at She-Hulk and KO’d her. Now Coulson and and Peggy were on my elevation. He had to clear tokens, and I only had one on Nick. I took a shot at Coulson, rolling double 5’s to knock him off the elevation. He theme-team Prob’d with Coulson, and I rolled a crit hit. Peggy followed in the next two turns.

I felt bad because this guy is a good friend and he really wasn’t prepared for what I brought. Still, he’s an incredibly good sport and wasn’t upset at all and thought my team was really kick-ass.

Score: 1 | 0, 400 Points

Round 2 – Cosmic X-23 Team

DP 104 Cosmic X-23 | 275 Points

NFAoS 059b Nighthawk Prime | 65 Points

CWSOP 105 Night Nurse | 20 Points

FI 301 Splitlip | 20 Points

SFoSM 005 Thug | 10 Points

FI S107 Angrir’s Hammer | 8 Points

SOG S101 Bat Signal | 2 Points

Build Total: 400 Points

This game was against the judge’s wife, who I play quite a bit as she tends to go pretty far in regular events. She loves Cosmic X-23, so I had a feeling I would be seeing her.

I lost map roll again, and she picked the same map; the Chemical Plant, so I set up the same way I did before with slight variations to item placement. Looking over her team, I knew there were two things that needed to happen; The Bat Signal needed to go away as it could pull my pieces to her (EDIT: I misread what the Bat Signal did and thought it pulled MY pieces. Still good to take out to keep her medic in the back field), and Nighthawk Prime had to go first so I could burst down X-23. She moved X and Nighthawk up 4 squares, 1 away from both her items and passes the turn. I picked Yellow on Rainbow Raider to nerf Night Nurse and X, and picked Cosmic for Robert Kelly, totally neutering X into a standard, 275 point paperweight. I picked up Running Shot for Nick and had just enough range to snipe the Bat Signal, and afterward picked Running Shot on my Watcher’s Eyes to further torment X. She slowly moved Nighthawk Prime up while X took two turns to pick up Angrir’s Hammer. I took a shot with Nick on NHP and after a dumb amount of prob’ing, I hit for 3 damage. My next turn, Faust rolled Orange giving all her pieces Energy Dampener tokens, and Nick took NHP down, all the while taking off Running Shot from X. She finally gets X onto the chemical vat where I’ve been positioned all game and gets stopped by Turtle. Now with full number pumping, I pick +1 to damage for Nick from Black Hand, Perplex his damage with Faust, and shoot her for 6 penetrating. Turtle rolls for breakaway and gets a 2, which thanks to Plasticity, let’s him move the one square to let Faust have line of fire. I push Robert Kelly to pick up a second Perplex, pump his damage by 1, and take a shot KO’ing X with no loss. From there, she marched her other pieces up for the firing squad to take shots as the end was inevitable.

Score: 2 | 0, 800 Points

Round 3 – Final Round – Past Theme Team

AVAS 058 Immortus | 160 Points

NFAoS 056 Nick Fury + Black Hand | 120 Points + 25 Points = 145 Points

TMNT2 029 Renet Tilley | 55 Points

SMWW 007 Newsboy Legion | 15 Points

SMWW G006P War Wheel | 15 Points

Level 7 ID, Captain America ID, Jocasta ID | 15 Points

Sideline: NFAoS 056 Nick Fury, NFAoS 051 Steve Rogers, AOU 039 Jocasta

Build Total: 400 Points

I had played this gentleman before in the final round of our last big tournament for a brick and the Punisher Van and came out on top. He and two others aren’t part of our regular group of players and this was the second event they showed up to.

He won map roll and took us to Ryut, which I was okay with, except for the fact that the elevation from the starting area is pretty bad if you don’t have any fliers (which I didn’t). He moves up 4 squares with Renet, carrying his team, and Sidestepped with War Wheel. I crept up as best I could to stay out of firing range of his Fury and played cautiously, picking Orange on Rainbow Raider and Past for Robert Kelly. He pushed Renet and moved another four squares which put him in range for me to take a shot. This meant that if I didn’t deal enough damage, Fury was out in the open for him to pick off. I took about 5 minutes really debating my actions. If I moved back, I was okay, but almost everyone on my team would be double tokened, meaning he could pick Running Shot and I would have no chance to making any plays. With that in mind, I decided I had to take the risk and try to disable him first. I Perplexed/Possessioned Fury’s damage all the way to 6 to try and nuke his and after an insane amount of probs, I ended up hitting. What sucked was that he wasn’t calling his possession choices out during the beginning of his turn and he would wait until something happened and call them then. I should have said something, but I didn’t and I do regret that as it ended up providing Invul for his Fury. Although I got doubles and knocked him off elevation, the Invul saved him from most of my damage. He Sidestepped up War Wheel and called in his Nick Fury, and tokened basically everyone he could to get +1 to damage and nuked my Nick. I knew I was done for, unless Faust blessed me with rolls. He passed turn, I rolled Faust, and got ‘any’. I was stoked! I picked Yellow and Perplexed my attack by two. Once again, through a series of Probs, I managed to score an 18 attack, hitting everyone but his Renet. It only managed to take out the Newsboy Legion and War Wheel, and put Renet on her last click while Nick went to his 4th click. He moved up for the kill shot and passed. I rolled a blank on Faust, Perplexed defense up, and passed. He called in Steve, shut off my Perplex and took the shot on Faust. I didn’t feel like going on based on the disaster with the possession mechanic and just conceded at that point giving him full points. I was graceful about it and said good game.

Score: 2 | 1, 840 Points

I ended up taking 2nd place, which was okay with me as Galactus isn’t modern legal, and I really wanted to get War Wheel since I didn’t own him. I left with my Toy Soldier (participation prize for everyone) and War Wheel and reflected on the day and the games.

The event was pretty fun, but the last round left a bit of a sour taste in my mouth. It wasn’t due to a loss as this is a game and you can’t win ’em all. The reasoning behind this was two-fold; the possession situation was something I should have brought up rather than staying quiet and trying to be friendly. It would have given me more information and a better idea of what I was looking to do. The second reason was because of something that went down during the game. After the player had KO’d my Nick, he asked the judge “How much time is left in the round? I feel like being a dick”. If you haven’t played in events before, asking how much time is left with the intention of stalling or restricting what the other player does is a big no-no and pretty frowned upon. Our judge was pretty stern telling him that this was a disqualify-able question, yet he persisted and ended up twisting the judges arm and getting the time out of him. It really took everything I had to stay seated and keep playing.

The reason why I bring this up is not to shame the other player (in case they or someone they know reads this). That’s why I haven’t provided names. They are protected by anonymity and therefore no one knows who they are and this is just discussed as a situation. No, the reason I bring this up is to provide information for new players or those who haven’t gone to an event before but are thinking of doing so. As a player of this or any game, it’s up to you to be friendly and come into this with the basic premise that this is a game and you’re there to have fun. When a participant does something like this, it leaves a very poor taste in the other players’ mouth and really kind of damages your reputation at that venue as a player since it’s something that you can’t take back. I hope that after reading this, you as a player understand this and take it as a lesson on what not to do. Again, remember that this is a game and you’re there to have fun.

That wraps up my first event report. I apologize that there was a little bit of drama in this one; unfortunately you can’t control what happens with other players, and my job here is to report what happened, not sugar-coat things. All in all, it was a fun day and aside from that final match-up, I was pretty satisfied. My team was uber-fun to play and although it’s something I will rarely break out (it’s quite mean), it was really neat playing something that had so much control.

I hope you enjoyed reading about this event! Do you want more of these types of things? We don’t do many large-scale events, but I’m more than happy to do this when we do these if you like them. I’m also planning on playing in the upcoming Wizkids Open in February, so I can try and report on that if you’d like. Let me know!