It’s tough reviewing these. Heroclixin’ is all about F.U.N. But BFCs were all too frequently the OPPOSITE of fun. Especially these:
Earthquake: Bad for soft non-fliers. At least it only occurred once per game, so it’s the least unfun of the lot.
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Isolation: Defend, Blades/Claws/Fangs and a host of team abilities that shared AV or DV were all rendered null and void by this card. Worse, teams that need these effects tend to be utterly ineffective without them. Unfun.
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Poor Teamwork: Whoops; your taxis and TKers are mostly dead weight now. Terrible unfun for any team that needed the mobility.
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Exhaustion: As if pushing weren’t bad enough, this one doubled the damage for doing so. Worse, it swung the action advantage even FURTHER in Willpower’s direction.
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Disbanded: Nothing’s worse than seeing all those points paid for those team abilities on your team go up in smoke upon this card’s reveal. The one BFC even Galactus fears.
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Bright Lights: Woe to any team that actually used Stealth as a defense. It’s worthless with this BFC on the field. Used almost exclusively to punish players who abused the black Speed power, it also gave a really strong advantage to range-heavy teams.
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Deep Shadows: This card is mean because Stealth can be mean. But Stealth has a built-in dependence upon hindering terrain that usually limits the degree of its meanness. This card gives all the advantages of being hidden and none of the drawbacks. UnF.U.N. Why the hell was it reprinted over and over and not its more F.U.N. cousin, Darkness?
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Malice: The meanest card out there, bar none. It forces teams to take damage any round it doesn’t attack. Supposedly an anti-turtle tactic, it actually rewards turtle teams more than any other so long as it has a healer available to absorb the self-damage. Meanwhile, it can set up the killbox for teams that CAN’T bide their time, anymore, because of this #$^$% card.
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Usually, Heroclixin’ devotes the first full week of the month to a Top Ten countdown of something. But battling the happy fatigue that follows the great Labor Day weekend nerd prom called DragonCon makes this one short and sweet as yours truly takes a short, sweet break from Heroclixin’. Readers new and old can use the time to catch up on older articles.
Next week, look for the usual rotation to start again:
Monday: Card Art, where I explain my choice of art for DC feats, BFCs and ATAs after WizKids stopped licensing art from DC comics;
Wednesday: F.U.N. Fights, a semi-regular feature of battle reports
Friday: an occasional F.U.N. Friday article starring a team or a figure I’d like to run, or other commentary on the game;
and Token Totin’ Tuesday/Thursday, the photographic record of how characters with Super Strength can visibly and practically hold the game’s object tokens.