Greetings Heroclix fans! X-Men: Xavier’s School has released and for the first article involving this glorious set, I’m building around the top brass, the guy who puts master in headmaster, the man who started it all! Today I’m building around the Rare Professor X.

WizKids has a pretty good track record with X-Men sets. While I wasn’t playing during Wolverine and the X-Men, I know a lot of people have a lot of love for that set. Uncanny X-Men was brilliant and did a soft reboot of the dial system and power creep (which seems to be right back where it was). Deadpool and X-Force was simply brilliant in my eyes, and Xavier’s School has followed that tradition with a really solid set. I could keep going back in time, but I’ll keep it bookmarked there.

Professor X has been a running theme in these sets as you really can’t have an X-men set and not include him. What I love about Charles is that he almost always has a really great dial for his cost, and he’s sort of the end-all, be-all Mind Control piece every time a new one comes out. Who in comes do you think of when we’re talking about telepathy? I’m guessing 9/10 of you said Xavier. From Patrick Stewart’s awesome rendition to the old school sharp eyebrows from Uncanny X-Men the series, Xavier is front and center of all things mutants.

This new set continues that tradition with a very strong example of what Charles can be. Let’s take a look at what this version of our good ‘ol professor brings to the table before we move on to teams. Yes, I said teams. And we aren’t talking two!

Professor X is 75 (or 50) points with only 5 clicks (or 3) with a typical large range, this time 8 with two targets. He has the X-Men team ability, Indomitable, and just the X-Men Keyword. Like just about every Xavier should, this guy can fire anywhere, anytime with his improved targeting that thanks to the new rules, lets him fire through characters and regardless if he’s based or not. Charles has a single trait, which is shared by a lot of big names in this set; he’s a Headmaster. We’ll get to that.

Dial-wise, there isn’t a lot to talk about. Charles always has a very shallow dial, and rightfully so. He might be the strongest mind in Marvel, but his body is frail. His movement is low, again as normal, with 6 and his Special movement, moving to 5 on click three, and two final clicks of 4 with Mind Control. His attack is fantastic starting with 12 Incapacitate, which drops to an 11 on click two, sheds Incap on three, drops to 10 on four, and ends his dial on a 9. Defense has a single power of Defend on his first four clicks, and starts off with 18, which shifts to 17 on his last three clicks. For damage, he’s a goose egg across the board with 0, but his first three clicks do have Outwit.

If you want the discounted 50-point line, you do lose the 12 attack, 18 defense, and Incap, but you’re still getting a very disgusting top click. Personally, I would rather play the 75 point line, but that’s just me.

The Headmaster trait gives Charles a nice boost, and frankly, I think it’s one of the best shared traits we’ve ever seen:

HEADMASTER: X-MEN: Leadership. Perplex, but only to target another friendly character with the X-Men keyword. During force construction, you may include one STUDENT ID card on your force without adding its cost.

You get Leadership which is significantly better than it used to be, Perplex (even though it’s only for other X-Men), and you get a free ID card on your sideline. Oh, it’s just a Student ID with no inspiration? So what, you’re paying 0 points for an ID card! That’s huge. This little trio of abilities really drives home the overall value of this dial, even without his Special movement power.

When we look at that Special movement however, this Chuck goes from good to amazing:

I WILL NOT HARM ANOTHER IF I CAN HELP IT: Mind Control. When Professor X uses it as a RANGE action, he targets all opposing characters within range, regardless of line of fire, and hit targets can’t make attacks during this action.

Holy. Crap. Remember how many times I’ve said that positioning is perhaps the most important part of this game? This guy single-handedly commands a 17 square diameter where no one is safe from his Mind Control. You can’t get anywhere near him for fear of being drawn out where he wants you. What’s that? I can’t make attacks with those characters? So what! Xavier is only 75 points, which means you have 225 points worth of hurt to add to your team that can take advantage of the board manipulation that he brings. The best part of this power is that it ignores line of fire, meaning everyone within his radius is getting targeted, and with a 12 attack, there’s a pretty damn good chance he’ll land his attack on everyone.

Charles brings a very good control dial to the board and if your opponent doesn’t have any Battle Fury or Hypersonic Speed to get in and get out, they’re going to have a really tough time engaging you on their terms.

I’m going to stop doing the Positive Vs. Negative analysis as I think it repeats a lot of information and makes my articles tend to go longer than they need to. Instead, I’m shifting to a new section.

Tools for Success

No doubt, the worst part of Xavier’s dial is the length and fragility it presents. However, if you can keep him safe, you get board manipulation, Outwit, double Incap, and Defend for your team (not to mention the goodies from his Headmaster trait). Obviously Xavier excels with an X-Men team so that you can take full advantage of his trait, but he doesn’t have to be on one. I would recommend it though since map choice can be a key ingredient for keeping him safe.

More than anything, Xavier needs deadly allies that can capitalize on his board manipulation. Figures that can target multiple characters or make several attacks are all very good choices. A taxi is also a great asset to have to keep Xavier mobile, get him into the middle of the map quickly, and bail him out if he needs it. He doesn’t really need Probability Control with his monstrous 12 attack, and he brings Perplex and Outwit to the table, so we’re good there.

During this time of year, I would normally run Modern Limited teams, however, Professor X awards you with a free ID card. That means we’re dropping Limited in favor of simply 300 Modern No Resources.

300 Modern Professor X Team – No Resources – Budget-Friendly X-Men

Yep, it’s a team chock-full of characters from the new set! To be fair, this happens quite a lot as older characters have been used time and time again, so it’s fun to build with just the newer characters. Also, outside of the X-Men sets, there really aren’t a ton of X-Men characters.

Most of the damage from this team comes from the Fast Forces Cyclops, and that really isn’t a bad thing. This guy’s dial is incredibly efficient with fantastic values of 11 attack and 3 damage with Ranged Combat Expert, no attack values lower than 10, consistent damage, potential for more damage on attack rolls, Indomitable, and his own form of Probability Control… I feel like I could keep going on how efficient this dial is. While he does only have Sidestep instead of Running Shot, the repositioning from Xavier will work very nicely to line up the shots for slim.

Jubilee is a piece that I was intrigued with during the set review, and then I got to play her in sealed. Frankly, she’s incredible. The ability to not only slam two groups of enemies for 2 damage each, but then reducing their attack and defense values for a complete round of play is icing on the cake. She’s very push-friendly as well since she picks up Perplex on the second click. This is another great example of how we can punish enemy teams for coming near us; Xavier sets them up in a group and Jubilee throws off her fireworks into the crowd for big impact.

Next up is Dust, a figure that I’m not too fond of, but actually works quite well for this team. She’s a good secondary attacker with 11 attack and 3 damage with Precision Strike like Cyclops, but the real reason Dust makes the cut is because of his Scouring Sands ability. While on the approach, Dust can throw up a wall of smoke to protect the team, and once you’ve closed the gap, she can smoke the enemies and potentially hit them for 1 damage at the end of your opponent’s turn. She’s a finesse piece, but she can bring some nice extra damage.

Last up is the uncommon Iceman, and he’s in here more for the control side. While his values are average, he has a nice Incap that either gives him +1 to attack or locks the target down to where they can’t be moved or placed. So Xavier brings them in, Iceman locks them down, and rest of the team fires away. Iceman can also trigger Dust’s ability for free damage thanks to his lockdown effect, so you get some nice synergy there.

Regarding the Student ID, Leech is pretty much the best option. Since Xavier will do a great job of bringing the enemy to you, Leech can be dropped to Outwit something on every member of the enemy team allowing you to potentially score some KO’s from one turn, or at least heavily wound the enemy. What’s even better is that anyone on the team can call him in.

This is a fairly safe team and probably won’t wipe opposing teams and score full points. It’s a pretty cheap team to track down monetary-wise, and is pretty easy to play. If you’re looking for an efficient build with this Xavier for an LGS event, this could do nicely, but will probably be pretty tough to run against big pieces with meaty dials.

300 Modern Professor X Team – No Resources – I Like to Live on the Edge

If you want to live a little dangerously, this is a much bigger shift for Xavier to run with.

Old Man Logan is an incredibly efficient piece for 75 points. There’s tons of pain on this dial with HUGE attack values and he has a great damage power that helps others that stick with him. Because his defenses are pretty low, he’s a great piece to take advantage of the Mind Control power that Chuck brings as he’ll be able to stay relatively safe while doing tons of damage. He also serves as tie-up piece and more importantly a ruse.

The Super Rare Cyclops and Wolverine are both very good in their own right, but their 50 point lines are extremely strong even though they’re incredibly frail. Cyke can sit back and wait for the proper time to strike and thanks to Xavier’s Defend, he’ll be sitting pretty with a 20 defense from range. Meanwhile, Wolverine will probably sit behind the two of them to stay hidden until he can dash in and hit along with his older self. The real key here is that both Cyclops and Wolverine will want to wait until literally anyone else on the team is damage by an attack. If they do, they get to pop their “Stay Away From My Students” traits and get a free attack off. With these two, we’re getting a ton more damage for 100 points than we did with the Fast Forces Cyclops for 75. Oh yeah, and they both have the Headmaster X-Men trait, so you get three Perplexes, three chances to pull action tokens, and three Student ID cards on this team.

Up next is Mercury, an insanely efficient dial for 35 points. Honestly, I don’t know who approved this dial, but they need to re-examine what they think she should cost. Cessily represents the other form of our bait as she strides into battle along with Old Man Logan and serves as a tie-up to everyone Charles brings together, and in incredibly difficult piece to deal with once she’s there. She’ll pick up Combat Reflexes thanks to the old timer, so she’ll be hanging out with Plasticity, Shape Change, Super Senses, and a 19 defense. If you can manage to push her to her third click, you’ll get Blades and she’ll really start to dish some great damage.

For the final 15 points, I went with an X-Student rather than a X-Trainee. Both are very good, but the Student has more powers that really help our team. I don’t mind letting the opponent pick which dial they start on because frankly all of them are very good for us. Sidestep and Support can be very good with Old Man Logan to keep him very healthy with his deep dial. TK is always a great option and extends our engage range. Mind Control with an 11 attack (for 15 points!) can serve as further pull and hurt on the enemy team since you can use an attack here. Finally, Plasticity and Poison are great together, especially when Xavier can Outwit through characters and nerf a reducer. If they get damaged, then you turn on the aggression and go full-ham.

For ID cards, I went with Leech for the same reason as the last team, Chamber for another source of decent ranged damage, and Synch for some nice tech. Synch has some great potential as he can potentially steal Flurry from our Wolverine, Blades from either Logan, Mind Control from Xavier, literally anything annoying on Mercury’s dial, Running Shot from Cyclops… I can keep going. Tech is the key here.

This team obviously costs a lot more money than the last team, and can be countered pretty hard, but if it manages to find a groove, it’s going to be very hard to beat. The damage potential here is scary and with a +6 to map roll, you have pretty good odds that you can pick somewhere that protects your very short dials.

Bonus Team Time!

300 Modern Professor X Team – No Resources – Theme Teams are for Suckers!

For this bonus team, I decided to scrap the theme team and went straight for the most hurt without incredibly fragile dials like the last team, and this doesn’t disappoint.

Old Man Logan returns as he is simply put one of the best aggro pieces for his point cost right now. Logan will be our piece that fully commits once Xavier brings people in while also really benefiting the rest of the team.

Flurry is ultimately the power we want to abuse with Xavier and frankly I don’t think anyone does it better than the first set of Turtles. These guys are so incredibly efficient at just 50 points with both Charge and Flurry, along with 11 attack up front. Mikey locks people down while Raph goes straight through reducers making them very brutal pieces. Even better, Old Man Logan will grant them both Combat Reflexes to up them to 19, and with his Empower and Mikey’s, they’re hitting for some serious damage. But wait, we’re not done yet.

Overdrive is the taxi that I didn’t include in both the builds above (or any taxi for that matter), and he’s a welcome addition. Now we have another source of Empower so that Logan can hit for 5 damage so he doesn’t need to risk on Blades, Raph can hit for 10, and Mikey can hit for 8, as long as everyone sticks together. Overdrive also does a great job of getting the team into the opponent’s starting area which we actually want so that if Logan is on his way out, we can transport him over and take a second turn, basically giving us the game.

I want to talk Boxing Ring before the Crowbar because it’s incredible how strong it is on this team. While it’s true that Xavier doesn’t want to sit in the ring thanks to the -2 penalty he’ll take to his Mind Control, he can easily sit behind it and pull people into the ring. If he does so, he gives everyone on the team a +1 to attack value thanks to the boost to melee while in the Ring, and it gives him a place to run into if he needs to escape from snipers. If we position the Boxing Ring close to the opponent’s starting area rather than our own, we’re pushing the fight to them and making Xavier more of a threat than he already is, which is totally fine since all of our damage comes from melee attacks. Mind Control them in, and then have all three of our attackers jump to that piece and KO everyone one by one.

The Crowbar is here for Old Man Logan so that there are no reducers that can stand in our way, making the team even more deadly. Simply place this inside the Ring and have Overdrive drop him off inside on top of it and wait.

Again, Leech is the optimal choice here for a student ID since you get that insane Outwit.

Even though we’re sacrificing theme, I think this is the strongest team of the three, and if you don’t count the Boxing Ring, it’s actually cheaper than the last team to run. It’s also a little more safe since we have some solid defenses and dial lengths, along with a great taxi to help in mobility. I personally can’t wait to try this one out.

That wraps up another week here at Clix Fix. What are your thoughts about these teams? Is there a combo I didn’t think of, or did you like some of the recommendations I made? What composition would you run?

Thanks for reading everyone. I hope you’re enjoying this new set as much as I am. See you next week on Two Clicks!