Very long post.

I hadn't really played Heroclix much in a while, but I really like Sealed Box tourneys and Marquees have been good to me.

I arrive at the Marquee and there are many players waiting for it to start. Some players choose not to play and in the end we have 9 players. A decent show, but an odd number means byes. We crack our packs and I got the following clix:

E Selene 59
E Moon Knight 27
E SWAT Heavy Weapons 21
R Calypso 29
E Corsair 29
R Moloid 6
R Brood Queen 50
R Umar 54
E Brood Warrior 20
E Rhino 108
R Rhino 81
U Warlock 61

Take some time to build a team and see if we came up with something similar. I'd like to hear other people's opinions.

Not an amazing pull by any means. The first notable thing is that I don't have any devastatingly powerful figuress. No high power unique or must play beast (like Ulik or Nebula). No perplex. No 1st click outwit. NO VETERANS!!! Oh well.

Warlock's leadership and very solid stats make him a no brainer. Rhino's charge and almost-beast nature make him a tempting choice. But I HATE that low defense. Plus he will have a huge target on him due to the implied threat he represents plus the point reward for focusing on him. I thought about both for a while but wasn't happy. That defense is just, well bad. I look around and see several Kravens, Nebulas, Uliks, a Captain Marvel, and a Beta Ray Bill. Frown. I start putting together a Swarm Team with 8 clix as follows:

E Selene 59
E Moon Knight 27
E SWAT Heavy Weapons 21
R Calypso 29
E Corsair 29
R Umar 54
E Brood Warrior 20
U Warlock 61

In hindsight, I am very fortunate to end up with this solid team. No superstars but alot of pretty good figures.

Round 1. Ken with V Nebula, R Nebula, V Meteorite, some other clix. Yes 2 Nebulas.

Ken is this cool kid who is still learning some. Early on I move Moon Knight up into Stealth with an object and Selene next to him. HE positions both Nebulas on Elevated terrain with flying Mastermind sponges. I overtake a building with the V Nebula after TKing Moon Knight, smashing the Brood sponge and taking a chunk out of the V Nebula with Umar thanks to Probability Control (more on this later). This was all like 2nd turn or so and caused me to push several figures but I felt I had to or his Nebulas would have there way with me. His very powerful team and some solid maneuvering put him into a good position the next two turns and he really made me sweat but 2 consecutive critical misses pretty much ruined any game he had left. Thanks to Calypso for one of those. I win with very little dead and cleaning his board. I can't even explain how huge one of those critical misses was.

Round 2 Bye. I go to buy something to eat but feel to lazy to go anywhere but the grocery store next door. They don't have a sub stand and they aren't making sandwiches at the deli. After much consideration, I buy a fresh 8 pc of fried chicken and a cuban bread from the deli/bakery section and some soda and have a very barbaric, greasy, delicious lunch of hand torn bread and fresh fried chicken. This WAS a highlight. That chicken was good. Sorry for the tangent. I wash my hands and wipe my beard and get ready for the next round with my belly full.

Round 3 Oren. With Beta Ray Bill, Selene, Meteorite, and 1 other figure I can't remember. Ouch.

Oren is a very good player who I hear wins his share of tournaments and who has beat me in our one other meeting. I win the flip and choose in doors because I fear his Beta Ray. With literally double the figures as he has, I remember what my pal Silver Lantern did to me one game when I played Despero and he played some little guys and won. I just would run speedbumps into him while my ranged guys plinked him for 1, for 1, for 1, etc. Then for 2, 2, dead. It worked. And within no time I had lost 2-3 lesser characters and taken out half his team. A huge bloodbath ensues. I remember a dying Umar coming in in the clutch with her late Barrier. When the dust clears I have a couple guys and he has one Phaser that can just run away forever with some time left. Being the cool opponent he is, he tips his figure over and extends the hand. A true sportsman.

At this venue, if there are only 2 undefeateds, a final match happens. It's a very cool system. I was unaware of this and was arguing against it and started to make a big deal about it but just shut up and started to play the finals. Lucky I did, because according to points, I was second. Phew!

Final Round - Robert (I'm pretty sure that was your name...sorry dude) Adam Warlock, Calypso, Spiderman, Angel R and lots of other figures. Team very similar to mine.

Robert is the other undefeated. We start playing and I come out swinging. I take out Spiderman on the 2nd turn with SS object TK plus Umar. Thanks again to Calypso. Within short order, I have lost my Calypso and he has lost Spiderman, Angel, and another figure or two. I have the clear advantage except...most of my figures are beat up and his remaining 2-3 are fresh. Including a very intimidating Adam Warlock with that nasty 17 defense sitting in hindering terrain. My highest attack at that time was a 9. He picks off 1 character then another. Soon it comes down to me having to dying characters on the run and Umar otranging his slightly beat up Warlock. Eventually, I hit him again and in short order, I am able to finish the game. A very close game. I made the mistake of letting his Warlock stay fresh WAY too long. I have a habit of doing this and every player has the horror stories of a lone, fresh U Wasp or V Doc Ock taking on insurmountable odds of beat up characters thanks to their defense. This almost happened to me. Take out those high defense guys first!

I win!! Kraven is mine!!! I had a great time and this gave me the Heroclix experience I had been longing for for some time now. A cool time playing a fun game.

In hindsight

E Selene 59 - TK. Period. She's not very good, but TK makes her an autoplay in Sealed.

E Moon Knight 27 - People are torn about this guy but for 27 points, what more could you ask for? Early he is a monster as he will run into your opponents and they HAVE to deal with him as he will invariably have an object. Again, he's only 27 points. A great figure.
E SWAT Heavy Weapons 21 - Beh. EE came in handy once but wasn't a bg deal. Never used SHIELD ability.
R Calypso 29 - My MVP. Prob control is SO good. I never MCd but I probably affected a good 10 dice rolls to my favor.
E Corsair 29 - Solid player. Mid to late game, that BCF is a very welcome sight and I used it twice.
R Umar 54 - My workhorse. 10 Range. Great powers. I would be happy with her in pretty much any CM sealed box event.
E Brood Warrior 20 - Taxi. Cheap. Toughness.
U Warlock 61 - A very good piece. His D is great. He gets Willpower mid dial. His move is an amazing 12. Another guy you should be happy to see in a Sealed tourney.

Hope you enjoyed to read.

Eugene

WHAT'S UP EUGENE!!!
Dude call me to play or PM me. I am off till mid January. Good to see you around again and congrats on the tourney win, you deserve it man!

Congrats - although I have to disagree with your assessment of Selene.

Her E version is great. 10 attack, toughness, Mind Control, a little EE, and Steal Energy. For less than 60 points. I think she can be very effective. Put her on hindering she gains a 17 defense - and ammo if needed.

Both the R and E version were really effective on my teams.

how does winning 3/4 tourneys sound ? plus the fact i almost had a 4th win, but it was a result of bad/lucky rolls...

anyway, heres the breakdown:
1st tourney: pulled a nova (hot sculpt ), used her a E venom and other support figs to aid them. nova is a beast w/ the right support figs, too bad cap marvel puts her to shame really bad (i need him ). i got to the finals w/ out much trouble until i faced my regular nemesis, he had a ery effectve team of U silver surfer, V nebula, and R Black queen, the result of this was a lot of lucky rolls, and bad rolls for my opponent. i got a hoppening running shot off on surfer that was a crit hit ^^, i slowly took surfer down from there, but he was able to take out all my other figs first. the final few rolls came down to my half beaten nova vs his very dmg'd surfer and nebula, i was lucky to barely win through lucky rolls, it was an exciting match to say the least.

2nd tourney: only 3 people showed and venue had limited boosters, i only got 1 CM booster :'(, judge let me augment w/ any marvel and i chose xplosion for cheap good stuff (which i never got >.<). only 2 matches, so i first went against another surfer , luckily the guy never knew how to use him, or it would have been a tough match, it would have been a hard one if not. i won by a semi land slide, only losing a few figs. the last match against my main rival again, was interesting to say the least. it was a mexican stand off from roof top to roof top in the marvel outdoor starter. it was a back and forth battle until it came to the end where my R taskmaster was facing his R kraven, both dmg'd a click or two. taskmaster ended up kicking the can due to kravens higher dmg. so i got 2nd and we had a roll off for fellowship since it was only 2 of us, so i won and got a WWIII .

3rd tourney: another ineresting tourney, my pulls were quite carpy, but i got decent figs, but what really made my team work was the combo of these figs: E elektra, R moonknight, and R daredevil, plus kree warrior for obligatory "shield" use (pun intended). my main bruiser was V absorbing man, who would have thought? he's a beast, his decent AV high dmg w/ lots of life and dmg reducing powers is awesome. the DV is the downfall of course. my secondary attacker was E umar, which is another fantastic piece. my first match was again, against my main rival, how trivial. anyways, he had V nebula and umar, both of them are killers, i was luckily enough to get the roll off, so i chose the avengers indoor mansion, effectively neutering his range , being able to keep absorbing man away from outwit made him do his job for a long time. i won my 2nd match against BRB. my last and final match was a mirror match sorta, swarm type strategy w/ TK and ranged for a mobile ranged striker. this came down to my absorbing man vs. V selene and a semi beaten R umar. keeping them based through taxi'ing absorbing man a bit. this let me kill off one at a time. i got the final blow, and V absorbing man is still king, the whole tourney, he never got ko'd i dont believe he even got to toughnes, absorbing man is quite the fig, i'll have to use him later , this got me my 2nd krave. oh yeah, one guy pulled a surfer and suprisingly fielded an almost mirror team of the previous surfer's team.

4th tourney: no silver surfers in here thankfully, but only 2 U's were pulled, dormamu and another beta ray bill. again i built a swarm/stealth team which greatly helped against thost ranged guys while keeping venom and V Umar out of range through perplex to snipe away at opponents team.

and thats about it, 3 LE kravens, and 1 LE Angel, i'd say this weekend was pretty good .

I put together a pretty good team this time and ended up winning it all for once.

Here is what I pulled:
E Archangel
V Archangel
E Corsair
V Magick
R Moloid
V Elektra
U Captain Marvel
R Moon Knight
E Marrow
R Black Queen
R Daredevil
R Spider-Man

Here is the team I came up with:
U Captain Marvel
R Black Queen
V Elektra
V Magick
R Moon Knight

Marvel was a gambit but looking around at some of the other big guns people were using, I had to take him. He matched up with the best of them - U Hulk, E and V Ulik, E and V Absorbing Man etc. The Black Queen with Telekinesis flinging Captain Marvel around was nasty and Vet Elektra was truly nasty and a great bargain for the points. Needless to say, I got pretty lucky this time around.