Special Terrain seems to be a huge aspect in today’s game, and for good reason. Rivaling ID cards at just 5 points, they’re a great way to carve the board up some. How do they stack up to each other though?

Last year, we saw the very first Special Terrain in Heroclix with the Convention release of the Boxing Ring (along with Superman and Muhammad Ali, two fantastic pieces). It was weird and new, and folks weren’t really sure what to make of it. There were a lot of questions about how exactly the boxing ring worked and some erratas were made as WizKids worked through mass market playtesting. Now that the rules have been nailed down, we’re seeing a bit more terrain being released, and we had our first few in an actual retail set with Avengers: Infinity.

So let’s take a stroll through these various terrains and see how they compare and which one’s I believe are truly worth keeping.

The Boxing Ring

Still the largest terrain that you can play at 25 squares, the Boxing Ring is the undisputed champion of the bunch. You get the most bang for your buck here because of how large it is. It’s also the only terrain that you can actively inhabit making it a bit more useful in its ability to eliminate printed terrain. There’s a mobility issue as well that you can build around in that the ring has ‘hindering terrain’ squares where the ropes are, but only for movement, so characters that can’t ignore hindering terrain for movement purposes, they have to stop when they first enter. That gives you a lot of counterplay options since you can fill your force with characters that get around these squares while your opponent might not plan for that.

The ring also provides a fantastic safety net as it gives a huge penalty for attacks that are made from outside of it to those inside and vice-versa. A -2 to attack value is a lot better than giving the target a +2 to defense, much like hindering terrain grants a +1, because again you can build around this. Characters with Combat Reflexes (Mjolnir) or Energy Shield/Deflection that sit in the ring are incredibly difficult to deal with as they essentially get a +4 to their defense value. With the proper team, you can position Plasticity pieces around the edges to prevent them from ever being assaulted. You can also get around this with pieces like the Kingdom Come figures where their values can’t be modified, so they suffer no penalty for firing from within our outside the ring.

Finally, the ring provides a +1 to attack for close attacks to characters that are inside the ring, making it a total haven for melee-oriented characters. With two fantastic new multi-TK pieces like Hellion and Jakar, you can easily setup a Flurry character to chew through targets.

For 5 points, there’s so much value this thing provides and while it might be unruly for storage purposes and a little difficult to get ahold of, it’s still easily the best terrain you can get.

The Invisible Plane

Unlike the ring, Wonder Woman’s plane acts as hindering terrain for lines of fire and blocking terrain for movement and occupancy, making it a fantastic 8 square wall that is very difficult to destroy. Unlike the ring, that means you can use the plane in a number of different ways from picking a map with two choke points to effectively reduce it to one, to giving yourself some cover on a wide-open map if you happen to lose roll.

While you can’t attack the plane directly, it can be destroyed and that leads to it’s one effect; giving characters that are hiding behind it an additional +1 to defense. This gives a sniper team a fantastic 8 square piece of cover that melee pieces can’t get through and giving them a lot of cover from opposing snipers. This isn’t entirely good though; since you’re always going to be firing from a hindered line for your protection, you’re automatically giving your target a +1 to their defenses or making them untargetable if they can use Stealth. However, just like the ring, you can easily build around this and pick snipers that ignore hindering for lines of fire and you’re solid.

Now the 8 squares of blocking terrain for movement purposes is very good, but keep in mind that since there’s no way around this on indoor maps, placement is very important, and incorrectly dropping this thing can completely screw you by cutting off an exit or giving your opponent an easy path to come at you.

The Plane’s KO effect, which takes place if 3-5 attacks go through it and miss their target that’s hiding behind it, makes it explode and heal each adjacent character 2 clicks. This portion isn’t all that controllable as the only way to click through the dial is for your opponent to actually take the gamble of shooting your characters through it and missing multiple times. However, if this does happen and they have a bruiser that took some damage on his approach, you’re probably going to have a bad day as you’ll be healing them as well as your own characters. Still, the odds are greater that you’ll get more of a benefit here than your opponent.

The Invisible Plane might not be quite as good as the Boxing Ring, but it’s still incredible in its own right. There’s more counterplay options here thanks to the limiting terrain and is a fantastic secondary option if your team doesn’t want the open area of the ring, or you can’t track one down.

Deadpool’s Merc Jet

The Merc Jet is exactly like the Invisible Plane in mechanics; same base size, same rules, etc., until you reach it’s dial and KO effect, so this one will be short and sweet.

Deadpool is more about booby trapping his plane rather than providing healing like Diana. The first difference is that the Merc Jet is much more susceptible to actually blowing up since it’s KO effect shows up as soon as one shot misses through it rather than the 3rd on the Invisible Plane. This makes the Jet a little easier to play around and have it’s effect resolve, so you can count on it a little more often and take that into account for your strategy, but still not that much because it requires continuous action from your opponent.

The big difference is the KO effect itself. This thing blows up and hits each adjacent character for 3 damage (or 1 damage to characters with the Deadpool Corps or Heroes for Hire Keywords). Free damage that doesn’t require a roll is always good, but again, a lot of things have to go right for this to have any effect on the opponent. Chances are they’ll read the card of the jet, see that it explodes and hits everyone next to it, and either avoid it or never set their pieces adjacent.

The counterplay option here is that you can mitigate the damage yourself by building a Deadpool Corp or Heroes for Hire theme team (or just including a few on your force), and then goad your opponent into coming to you. Again though, you need them to actually try and shoot your characters to have a chance at this going off.

Frankly, Deadpool’s Merc Jet isn’t as good as the Invisible Plane, but barely. They work the same way, so it’s your choice which you like better, but the Invisible Plane has a more reliable KO effect that will most likely help you more than hurt your opponent.

S.H.I.E.L.D. Flying Car

Our first mass-market release for terrain comes in the form of the S.H.I.E.L.D. Flying Car from Avengers: Infinity. The effects of the car are again the exact same as the Invisible Plane and Deadpool’s Merc Jet, so I’ll save us some time by just covering the differences.

Right off the bat, you’ll notice that the car only has a 2X2 base, meaning you’re only getting 4 squares of blocking for movement/hindering for lines of fire, making it a lot harder to block areas with or actually get the cover since diagonals are easier to get to. That alone makes the S.H.I.E.L.D. Flying Car suffer a few points. However, in a small indoor map, the car can still shut down a corridor while providing a nice sniper nest from behind it (but then again, why would anyone come down that corridor then?).

Like the Invisible Plane, the S.H.I.E.L.D. Flying Car takes between 3-5 misses through it for it’s KO effect to trigger, so it’s quite hard to chew through the dial, but it’s actual KO effect is much like the Merc Jet in that it explodes and deals 3 damage to all characters within 2 squares and line of fire. Honestly, this makes it better than Deadpool’s jet because it’s a bit harder to stay out of its’ blast radius. Still avoidable, but it’s slightly more difficult and posses a bigger threat. Of course, you don’t get the safety of reducing that damage with Keywords, but it also doesn’t force you into a certain team or certain pieces.

I would rate the S.H.I.E.L.D. Flying Car at about even with Deadpool’s Merc Jet. It’s a little more stable for cover and has a better KO effect, but only having 4 squares of cover hurts since it’s fairly easy to fire around it.

Dune Buggy

Further watering down explanations, the Buggy is the same as the S.H.I.E.L.D. car in design in size, bonus, and mechanics. However, the Buggy gives us our second “always on” effect like the Boxing Ring rather than a KO effect.

Rather than blowing up and causing something to happen when it does, the Buggy has a constant -1 to attack values within 4 squares power, giving off a 10 square area of -1 attack values for just 5 points. That means that unlike the other pieces of terrain, the buggy can be used more has a hindrance for your opponent. On a map with two distinct areas of elevation, you can force them to pick one side or suffer the effect of the terrain. This also gives you options with team building as you can use more mobile snipers that don’t need to hide behind your terrain, or melee attackers that can stand at entrances/elevation changes that aren’t near the car.

The downside here is that unless you need to turtle up, or have someone with a HUGE attack value, you’ll never want to use the Buggy for actual cover. Again though, this can be neutralized with highly mobile pieces, say Hypersonic Speed, where they can hide for a turn behind the terrain and then strike out far enough away to not reduce their own attack values.

Unlike the last two options, I would say the Dune Buggy is absolutely worth obtaining. There’s a huge benefit in this piece and no matter which map you’re on, it will give you value.

Tony Stark’s Car

Taking things a step further with yet another identical mechanic system is Tony Stark’s Car (which should have been blue and the S.H.I.E.L.D. Flying Car red). This piece is even more unique than the rest with it’s special effect in the defense slot.

Tony’s Car might not provide an aura like the Dune Buggy, but it does something very special; it moves when you need it to, but with a heavy cost. Much like Iron Heart, this dial moves whenever you decide to move it, which means you have a chance at either destroying it from just one move, or can squeeze 6 different moves out of it before it goes down. This is huge and even though you only get 4 squares of cover, it allows you to adapt the board to your opponent while the game is actually playing out. And since this doesn’t consume any actions (like a character pushing it to the next square), there’s no cost to utilize this effect.

Additionally, Stark’s Car grants Energy Shield/Deflection to adjacent friendly characters, meaning you can use it’s benefits regardless of which side you’re on, and your opponent’s can’t hide behind the car and gain the same effect (although the additional +1 mechanic is still present). The important thing here though is that you can keep your characters in front of the car and use it as a mobile wall to block areas off while still getting a huge benefit, or getting behind it and using it as pretty much the best defense ever since you’ll get a +4 (rule of three’s, so +3 in reality) to your dial thanks to a hindered line of fire, terrain giving you an additional +1, AND ES/D.

Tony Stark’s Car is by far and away the best ‘vehicle’ terrain dial, and in my opinion it even beets out the Invisible Plane because of it’s overwhelming utility. Giving out ES/D is nothing to sneeze at and the fact that it can only help you is huge.

Spider-Mobile

Much like Spider-Man, the Spider-Mobile throws things in reverse as it’s dial is pretty much identical to the S.H.I.E.L.D. Flying Car since it has the same base size and the same setup on it’s dial. The only difference is again it’s KO effect.

The Spider-Mobile is perhaps the most gentle destroyable terrain as it doesn’t heal or cause damage upon destruction. Instead, it spews out web markers on everyone within 4 squares and line of fire. These are exactly like the web markers from Superior Foes of Spider-Man in that they lock characters down and require breakaway before they can move again, committing them to an action before they can carry on with their business.

Again, there’s the same issues with requiring a lot of things to happen for this to actually go off, and it’s effect is honestly quite bad. Chances are you’re going to have your characters within 4 squares of this terrain for it to actually take a hit and explode meaning that your trading ranged cover for the possibility that your entire team gets locked down and forces your next turn to be a breakaway fest. I don’t know abut you, but I don’t really want to run something that has the chance of completely gimping one of my turns, and that’s what the Spider-Mobile is all about. The silver lining is that you can instead place this closer to your opponent’s area and purposely take shots that will miss to try and web them up, but they can simply not use the terrain for cover.

The Spider-Mobile is perhaps the worst Special Terrain we’ve gotten and has virtually no redeeming qualities. While the dial for the vehicle is fantastic, you should almost never run this as terrain.

What are your thoughts on these different pieces of terrain? Do you still feel that the Boxing Ring is king, or do you think one of these other players gives it a run for it’s show money? Let me know in the comments section below!

My goal is to have the Batman: The Animated Series set review for you all next week, but that requires all of the dials to be revealed and we aren’t quite there yet. Also, since the Turtles set review was posted on Two Clicks From KO, I want to post the Batman review here, so there might be a little swapping of articles between our sites this month. Lastly, there may be a drop in articles for the last two weeks for this month; Comic-Con is next week (holy crap) and my wife and I are moving the week after, so it’s going to be busy. I’ll keep you posted!