And you don't even need to draw line of fire!

Which is fortunate as the last time I drew Line of Fire to another poster, the feds came after me. I guess that's what you get for forum sniping.

You're so right, too.

Stealth seems so powerful in HeroClix because range is so powerful in HeroClix. Stealth completely counters ranged attacks.

Some folks think being based should counter Stealth. That's not realistic. Does Frodo wearing the Ring suddenly become visible just because Gollum is wrestling him? No! Not until Frodo takes that B/C/Fangs damage and loses his Stealth SP can Line of Fire be drawn to him.

Others think adjacency should allow for Line of Fire. While I see some value in this position (Sharpshooters would certainly like it when fighting Stealthers) and don't think it would break Stealth completely, I really don't think it's a needed change, either.

I agree with you here.. People complain about stealth, but It always bugs me how dominant range in this game is. It's VERY hard to play a melee oriented team. Even if those melee characters have something like HSS Range is still dominant. Why is Old KC Superman >> Than KC Captain Marvel.. Could it be.... The Range?? wow..

If we were to play a game that everyone on the field had 0 range so all attacks were close combat, how much effect would Stealth really have other than some powers here and there (outwit and such). In terms of combat it wouldn't have an effect..

So it doesn't seem to be to me a big issue that there's something like stealth balancing the game from some of those 10 square big hitting ranged characters that are fairly dominant.

I LOVED the Frodo example! That never came to mind. You certainly could see Gollum on him but couldn't see where frodo actually was, so how would you know the best place to actually hit (unless you had some kind of special ability so sense such things). You're completely correct.. It wasn't till he took some "fang" damage that he became visible (clicked his dial until his finger came off!).

But stealth is not invisibility. They are two different concepts.

Hey, I dunno if you guys heard about this, but

Stealth= AWESOME.

Invisibility is visual stealth.

I hadn't heard that.

How come Invisible woman Pre-special powers had stealth if it's not also representative or invisibility?

Well, other reasons that stealth seems so powerful is that it is incredibly inexpensive. There are even multiple characters around 6 or 7 points with stealth. To be able to completely counter one of the (otherwise dominating) strategies for a handful of points does seem a bit extreme.

Couple that with the prevalence of stealth (thanks to the popularity of Gotham City characters) and you have a ubiquitous inexpensive ability that stops one major strategy dead. Characters that cost over 200 points can be completely neutered by adding a few 6 point characters to your team.

To use a rock-paper-scissors analogy, if range attack is paper and if stealth is scissors, someone who plays scissors gets to play another whole team in addition to scissors. You play paper, I play two pairs of scissors (or maybe scissors *and* paper, in case a rock team shows up) because I can afford more characters to trounce you with since scissors/stealth are so cheap. You lose twice as quickly. I guess you wish you had played rock instead.

So what's wrong with that?
Not every team is gonna be equal. I mean what team you bring and how it's going to fare against another team is going to be a random variable.
I could decide next week to bring the "rock" and you decided to switch to a paper style team right?
Even then. It's not like the all stealth team can't be countered.. heck there are FREE (no cost to your team) ways to counter (hello bright lights).

So now you've got an option to take your rock paper scissors.
Play Paper while your opponent plays scissors then pull out your rock and say, "oh I win again."
It's not like there aren't ways to deal with stealth.

Someone who plays an all batman team is easily countered with.. Bright lights, trick shot, hss pieces, superman allies, ultimates, certain special abilities, pulsewave, etc...

Stealth is a pain to deal with.. But no more than those ranged combat HSS pieces that can run and gun and hit for some serious damage meanwhile leaving your team helpless to attack back..

Also.. a quick search of the units section nets me alfred and joe chill as pieces with stealth.. certainly neither of them are bringing to the table much that's going to make me sweat (unless it's an all Wild card team in the case of alfred).

And unless I'm wrong.. The cheapest options for stealth with outwit (ie the ones that are likely to screw up your game) are still black panther (rookie) and oracle..
One of which has been complained about since the beginning of the game but 1 click of outwit with 15 def is hardly anything to worry about getting rid of.. and oracle doesn't start with outwit and has even worse numbers..

Of course maybe i'm missing something because generally I don't think that stealth stops one major strategy dead any more than impervious stops a swarm team full of lower damaging pieces dead..

Or could it be that Cap has a bunch of powers that don't work with his HSS and so he'll never use them. And lacking superstrength, his damage isn't as uber as Superman's. By the time Cap has superstrength, Superman has both superstrength and RCE, so he can choose close or ranged damage of 7. And Superman has 7 clicks of move and attack. Captain Marvel has only 5. And Superman's attack is higher and stays higher. And Superman's defense is higher on every click that it's not equal to Cap's.

Superman outshines Cap in virtually every way for a mere 9 more points. Cap does have a few clicks of outwit in the middle of his dial, but that's too little too late.

I'm not saying the range doesn't make Superman better than Cap. I'm saying it's one of many many factors that makes Superman better than Cap.

I agree with you here. But even in home games where Cap's powers were allowed to work with HSS (as my old roomie and I tried it to see if that's how we think he was intended to be designed) HSS+EW << HSS + ranged combat

Stealth is good because it makes you a better player. It requires players to think outside of the box and come up with different strategies. I recently played a home game against a friend who was using a Batman Ally team with lots of barrier.

Arggghhhh. Three moves in I tipped my pieces over Chess-style to signal a surrender. It was just no fun and I just didn't want to play against that type of team. But, I picked up my pieces, re-thought my strategy and slowly whittled his pieces down. Thanks to Air Walker's Regen and an inordinate amount of luck with Rocket Raccoon's SS and Prob, I managed to kill all of his team. It was painful and not quite so much fun as the standard shoot-outs and slugfests we all love so much, but it made me a better player.

I hate Stealth and I hate Batman Allies who'd rather hide in the shrubbery than fight, but it does serve its uses.

I've always considered the concept of "invisibility" to be a subset of the larger Stealth concept. Sort of like Hindering Terrain and Water Terrain.

ergo:

Agreed!

I agree with you.
I just can't see the argument that stealth =/= invisibility.
dependent on the character it is.