In years past, I used to write post after post about various FAILs made during HeroClix games. These were those games where I:

• forgot to use a key power at a key moment…
• …even after making another key move for the express purpose of using said power.
• Or decided to protect a cheap tie-up character or meat shield, leaving a bigger attacker open to shots.
• Or completely neglected to field a piece I’d built onto the team.
• Or accidentally under built by 100 points.
• Or kinda all of the above.

So the good news is that it’s been some time since I can recall making colossal, game-killing mental pratfalls of those magnitudes. No, what I’m writing of today is something else much more innocent-looking, but have led to the same outcome: Losing. I’m talking about the Avalanche Effect. No, not the Marvel character made in 2002’s Clobberin’ Time or this year’s Days of Future Past sets, but rather how very minor decisions in many recent clix games have tended to snowball into crushing losses. These weren’t mistakes, either. But each may as well have been, given the result.  

 

Exhibit 1: The Hand vs. the Guardians

My Hydra Wolverine, WK Psylocke and a pair of Ninjas [both Hand and Snakeroot] faced Bill’s Guardians of the Galaxy: Groot, Star-Lord and Rocket Raccoon.

• Decided not to use Wolverine’s full-Speed Charge for fear of him being too isolated. He missed his attack anyway.
• But that left things up to Psylocke to tie up not 1 but 3 foes. It didn’t go well for her, despite 19 DV in close. 
• Wolverine alone couldn’t take out Groot, Rocket AND Star-Lord.

But what if I’d Charged Star-Lord instead? Chances look much better. A small decision costs me everything in this game. 

 

Exhibit 2: MODOK = “Mental Organism Designed Only for Killing?” More like “My Offense Dies, Object Kills”

It was an AIM theme team made of almost all generics led by MODOK on the Thunderbolts sub map, facing Tim’s team of Kree. Despite the general lack of Super Strength on the team, I always use objects. Never know when a little extra hindering terrain will come in handy.  This time, though, a light object would seal my doom.

• I had a shot on Captain Marvel [GotG 007b], who’s Defending and boosting DVs of his teammates. To have a shot in this game, he’s gotta be hit, and hard.
• There’s a light object between us. I consider using Running Shot to the object,
• but that A) puts me out of adjacency with AIM Renegades, whose Enhancement and Hydra TA are key for the attack. 
• I make the attack, but Super Senses saves Cap.
• That’s OK. I have a backup plan to use the Renegade’s Barrier to wall in MODOK to avoid retaliation.
• But that darn light object. It keeps me from being able to double up on Barrier tokens
• Thus it’s a simple matter for Tim to smash one Barrier, then lay enough attacks on MODOK to kill him in one turn.

All because of a light object I placed at the start of the game! Who expects that to make such a doggone difference?  

 

Exhibit 3: How an Invincible flying Mystic dies in one turn without Outwit, Pulse Wave or penetrating damage of any kind

So I made an unsuccessful Running Shot with Superboy on the Inhumans Fast Forces map and decided it’d be a good idea to move Black Witch adjacent, were she could use his Willpower trait to shoot next turn. I thought about pushing Sensor Girl, whose range I’d Perplexed in prep for this move, to build a Barrier to shield them. But why take the damage? Paul, my opponent, had no Outwit, no Pulse Wave, and no penetrating damage of any sort for two 18 DV Invincible Mystics to worry about. His highest damage that could reach me was 3. So I didn’t push to Barrier. I felt like my 18 DV Invincible flying Mystics would be OK. 

• Until Black Witch got pinged off Invincible.
• Then crit hit for 4 damage off the roof.
• Then took 3 in a Hypersonic attack — ANOTHER crit. 
• That knocked her into a wall for the KO!!!!

O. M. G. How does that even HAPPEN? Apparently, it happens when I don’t use Barrier in a paranoid fashion.  But then…

Exhibit 4: Too Much Barrier

During War Of Light, I faced a Red Lantern Spectre, who was protected by his ability to deny ranged attacks on his person. I’d set up a character on my force on non-elevated terrain and decided to encircle it with Barrier. But at the last second I changed my mind and built the Barrier as a wall to deny even more lines of fire. Perhaps I was recalling what happened in Exhibit 3. Unfortunately, on this indoor map, one of those block lines of fire was my own from Bedovian to Brother Warth. The crucial turn passed and my opponent wisely moved Warth out of range and where he could use Perplex and Prob to ensure the Parallax I TKed to battle Spectre could do nothing but almost die. Though Kyle-lallax survived to run, my chance of scoring any points, let alone winning, were done. All because of a last-second Barrier shift. Barrier is not my friend…

Exhibit 5: Barrier here instead of there.

I was going against The Bob and his Cobalt Blue and Captain America Sentinel. I’d picked the Central City map and had used Barrier from Doctor in a straight-ish line to guard friendlies from Jenny Quantum’s Pulse Wave.  But I should have put it diagonally. CapBot was able to thread a line of fire that one-shot Doctor, opening up much of my team to Cobalt Blue’s speed-nerfing powers and basically putting me on the defensive for almost the entire match.  All because of one little Barrier square.  

So there you have it: The Avalanche Effect. It’s how I lose all my games lately, it seems.

< shrug >

STILL GONNA PLAY