So there we were, me and Paul (the longtime clix player who taught me), there for a 300-point sealed tournament with no one else showing. Most of the regulars had dropped everything to play a D&D campaign (since one of their key players is frequently out of town) or had pressing personal concerns, and the two newbie players we did get couldn’t afford the buy-in at all (and we certainly couldn’t float them).

But they could stay to play a battle royale, so we built 300-point teams. And as you can tell from the title and the art, I chose the Runaways.

Nico Minoru 84 + Contingency Plan 12
Karolina Dean 55
Gertrude Yorkes & Old Lace 54
Chase Stein 45 + Lunge 5
Molly Hayes 43
= 298 points. Basic intended strategy was to use Chase to get the team into attack range, then use Nico to TK pieces into battle.

I’m a bit of a purist concerning the new “print and play” policy on feats and battlefield conditions. If there’s a genuine copy available, I’ll play it…otherwise I just won’t (unless I really, REALLY need that 7th Submerged card for a massive Atlantis keyword force or something like that). For that reason, I didn’t play my printed copy of the Runaways alternate team ability feat card.

To my left, Paul fielded Thor (Hammer of Thor) and Bi-Beast. To his left was Donovan, a Yu-Gi-Oh player beginning to dabble in HeroClix; he used Taskmaster (Avengers), Stature, Guardsman, E Scarecrow (Icons) and Bucky. To my right was Linda, a returning player excited to try out this Asgard-heavy set: Heimdall, Malekith and Pip the Troll were her force. As the only themed team on the board, I easily won the map roll and chose the blocking-terrain-heavy Anti-Matter Fortress. It’d nerf Paul’s huge range advantage somewhat and had the least confusing terrain rules for the new players to worry about.

Despite what I thought was a careful map choice and character placement, Karolina was nearly an immediate victim of Thor’s first-turn Running Shot. Only her theme-team-granted Probability Control saved her. I was forced to use Nico to TK her out of harm’s way rather than set up a potential attack on Bi-Beast next turn.

Meanwhile, super-green Donovan moved his pieces up with little rhyme or reason, giving the slightly more seasoned Linda an easier time of positioning.

From here, there was a bit too much going on to do a proper play-by-play, so I’ll restrict it to individual characters’ performance and other highlights:

Donovan, dazzled by the potential of Taskmaster’s “Photographic Reflexes” Special Power, risked it and landed a solid shot on Heimdall. But he tried it one time too many and was the first KO of the game.

Linda’s Heimdall made an obscene amount of Super Senses rolls. But E Scarecrow, of all people, finally took him out.

On my end: Gert & Old Lace took the first damage of the game, getting blasted hard by Thor’s Running Shot and forcing Chase to pull them out of range so Nico could heal. That worked out well, as the duo got to Charge (and then free-attack via “Lend A Dino”) Pip the Troll and wear him down considerably. Later scored a crit-hit Charge on Bi-Beast that was a game-changer.

Chase’s “Leapfrog” was a key to the game, but I made one of my three awful mistakes of the game with him. I based Bi-Beast with him, trusting his Combat Reflexes to keep him safe…fool! Bi-Beast has no range! Once I’d Outwitted BB’s Super Strength with Nico — which I had planned to and did — Chase was utterly safe! Chase took a big attack and was forced to push and run the very next turn.

Molly Hayes totally underperformed against Pip the Troll, utterly wasting an object on the Super Sensing little brute. But she made up for it with a KO blow to Thor!

Karolina mostly missed her attacks but also forced a lot of misses thanks to her highest-of-the-Runaways defense at range. To the degree that she kept Thor occupied made her worth her cost.

Nico was, of course, the team linchpin and cornerstone. In addition to the early clutch TK to save Karolina from near-certain 2nd turn doom after the 1st turn near-miss, she used:

Support to get Gert & Old Lace back in to semi-fighting form;
Outwit to help low damage stick or Perplex to improve a stat here or there;
Energy Shield/Deflection to clutch-dodge  Thor’s attack;
Exploit Weakness to successfully soften Thor up;
Phasing/Teleport to escape Bi-Beast’s impending heavy-object+Willpower attack;
Willpower to run further out of BB’s reach for a while;
Regeneration in the late game to  get back to full;
Pulse Wave to painlessly blast the Mystics-teamed Malekith;
Poison to make the Willpowered Bi-Beast pay for basing her.

And, of course, Contingency Plan freed her and the rest from needing Perplex all the time to do anything. Though way expensive compared to the rest, Nico is worth every point. And, incidentally, was the last piece standing.

Final tally

Donovan KO’d Heimdall and Pip for 191 victory points.
Linda KO’d Taskmaster, Stature, Scarecrow, Guardsman and Bucky for 297 victory points.
Paul KO’d Karolina, Gert, Chase and Molly for 202 victory points.
I KO’d Thor, Malekith and Bi-Beast for 390 victory points.

Runaways: better than expected.