The foes of the Golden Realm assault Asgard!

against my friend Lenny’s

Odin 295 + Protected 8 + In Contact With Oracle (ICWO) 10
Thor 226 + Fortitude 25 + ICWO 10
Heimdall 149 + ICWO 10
Balder 130 + ICWO 10
Sif 93 + ICWO 10
Beta Ray Bill 159 + ICWO 10
Volstagg 103 + ICWO 10
Fandral 101 + ICWO 10
Hogun 96 + ICWO 10
Karnilla 64 + ICWO 10
Asgardian Warrior 37
Valkyrie 38

I played, on my iPod, some appropriate tunes from the Lord of the Rings films (Minas Morgul, A Knife In The Dark, and especially The Fields of the Pelennor).

We played on a Realmsworx map, which may not have been the best idea. The quarters were very close, preventing Lenny from leveraging his range advantage and giving my Telekinesis-enhanced reach a lot of cover for its approach.

Thus, I got an easy first attack off on Odin; first a solid hit by Ulik that burned Protected and then a Meteorite strike with Raganarok Surtur that sent the All-Father fleeing for his life. But the first KO was Fenris Wolf, blasted into oblivion by Thor, who was subsequently (and appropriately) felled by his half-brother Loki.

It went on to a resounding victory for the foes of Asgard, losing Lorelei (whose Mind Control was a key boon to this team), Raganrok Surtur, Fenris Wolf, Ulik, and all 3 Rock Trolls but wiping the Asgardians. Lenny’s rolls were pretty poor despite high AVs, In Contact With Oracle, and theme PCs. The cramped map (his choice) cut off most lines of fire for the bonus.

So, in truth, for this game it was indeed Ragnarok, the twilight of the gods.

Then, more recently, I traveled to a new venue to play this comic-accurate team:

Thor #353

+ Sidestep 10

+ Damage Shield 10

+ Protected 8

+ Thunderbolts (Batman Ally) 5

+ Outsmart 10

+ Extended Range 10

+ Protected 8

+ Inside Information 4

It was a battle royale on the Arena map, with my opponents also playing pretty theme-ish teams:

Host Thomas (csi on HCRealms) Surtur, Ragnarok Surtur, Son of Surtur, and about 10 Fire Demons.

Andy (ghosta on HCRealms) played Ragnarok Surtur, Seth, Ultron (Hammer of Thor) , Ulik (Hammer of Thor), Rock Troll, Fire Demon, Phalanx Soldier and Valkyrie (Hammer of Thor).

A.B., the newest player on the field, ran Thor (Hammer of Thor), Heimdall, Malekith, Hela and 3 Asgardian Warriors.

Andy and Tom played Cosmic Radiation Interference and Poor Teamwork but both BFCs were theme-teamed away. I used the Mjolnir special object and the Dynamostat to give my team a little bit of cover on this wide-open map.

Thomas’s RagSurtur, holding Meteorite, was the big threat to me on the board. But it would take him some time to get to me, so I concentrated on stopping A.B.’s Thor. Didn’t take long, with both Thor & Loki and Odin laying down fire. Meanwhile, Andy mixed it up with the rest of A.B.’s force, keeping him good and occupied.

Thomas elected to leave me alone for the moment and slowly flew his Fire Demons and Surtur across the board to engage Andy’s Seth and company, burning theme team-granted Probability Controls to help mostly A.B.’s attacks on Andy’s force.

As they decimated one another, I eventually decided to bring the fight to Thomas’s RagSurtur with a Running Shot from 11 range (thanks to Perplex). Crit-missed, though. Realizing that I was still in a perfect spot to duo-attack-snipe at him indefinitely, Thomas brought RagS in Charging range, tying me up with a Fire Demon. I forced him to burn Protected with Odin and, a turn or so later, got rid of both the Fire Demon and the Charge+Meteorite threat with Thor & Loki’s duo attack. RagS was pretty much toast at this point (although we ruled incorrectly on a failed Sidestep breakaway roll that would have ended up dealing more damage to my team — but almost certainly not nearly enough to affect the final outcome).

This highly-tentpoled team did better than expected. Keys to the game:

–Not being effectively swarmed helped me a great deal, allowing me to cherry-pick my targets.

–The Valkyrie’s Carry ability kept Odin from wasting actions on movement.

–Using duo attack whenever possible.

–Extended Range on Odin is points well-spent.

–Inside Information should have been on Thor & Loki.