Can someone please let me know if I'm wrong on this one.

Can you target your own characters with mind control?


Just played my first tournament tonight and the judge was telling people that you can't do that. I felt bad for my friend who was playing and using mind control in that way as part of his strategy on his team. Needless to say the judge refused to change his mind saying that you can't do it. I showed him the rule book which says:

"You cannot target a friendly character with a damaging attack. Additionally, a character can never target itself with any attack or power—damaging or healing—unless a power specifically says otherwise."

BUT... he said it was in the FAQ's. I looked in the current July FAQ's (which I had also brought incase I needed them.) and found nothing in there regarding not being able to do that. At this point he refused to look at my print out of the FAQ's and said "you can't target your own characters with an attack". In which case we brought up that support is an "attack". Then he seemed to get mad and just said "YOU JUST CAN'T." I was in no mood to keep arguing so I stopped before I really got too mad.

If I'm totally wrong in thinking that you can mind control I appologize for the long rant. But it really annoys me that a judge, someone who's supposed to "know all the rules" makes a stupid call like this and is a jerk about it to boot. Again sorry for the rant. If you can help out with my question I appreciated it.

Sincerely,
a frustrated clix player.

Argh... Sorry bout the spelling. Wish there was an edit button.

I'm sorry to inform you that the Judge is correct.

This is one of those things that was sort of lost in translation from older sets of rules to the newer ones. When IC came out, MControl was an attack that could do damage by pushing the target fig, like Incapacitate. In more recent revisions of the rules, they turned MControl into a 'no damage' attack.
However, if you look at MControl's text, the fact that it only targets opposing characters is implied:

"It may make a close or ranged combat attack" - This always implies targeting an opposing character. Sure, sure, you pointed out to the Judge that Support is also an attack. However, that 'attack' specifically states that you target friendly characters only... there is no such text on MControl.

"...instead the target becomes friendly to your force and opposing to your opponent's force." Now, if your target is already friendly, how could it become friendly to you again?

"...upon resolving its action, each target becomes an opposing character to you and friendly to its owner's force." This is the part that I think you two must have really missed. If you target your own friendly character with MControl and follow this part of its rules, at the resolution of the action you would have one of your own figs that is both opposing to you and friendly to its owner (also you). No can do. Pretty much everything about MC implies that only opposing figs may be targeted. It doesn't specifically say so because it is an attack, and even though Support is called an 'attack' as well, it is the exception to the rule because it specifically says so in its text.

I think when reading the rules that you two may have concentrated too much on the 'damaging' part of "You cannot target a friendly character with a damaging attack". I think this phrase was just meant to set Support apart from everything else, as Support is a 'healing' attack, and it is the only way to specifically target your own character in the game (while Pulse Wave lets you 'non-specifically' target your own figs... but that's another thread ). However, I could see someone thinking (without fully taking into account all of MControl's text) that perhaps since MControl does 'no damage', that it could also be an exception to the 'damaging' attack thing. Think of 'damaging' more broadly, if it helps... Does MControl potentially 'damage' your opponents force? Sure, because you can use the MCed fig to attack that force.

When I first glanced at this thread, I wondered - why would anyone want to MC their own figs? Then I realized, oh yeah... you could take one of your own pushed characters and have them act without penalty, since the targets of MC get 'free' actions. Due to this, allowing MC to target your own figs would completely break down the action-based pushing aspect of the game... When you decide to push a fig (all but those crazy 'big' ones), the game forces you to wait a turn before you can get them going again - in other words, your best characters simply cannot act on each and every turn(at best, the ones with Willpower can do so without penalty 2 out of 3 turns), they must rest and be a little vulnerable once every 2 to 3 turns. Allowing circumvention of this rule with this MC 'cheat' would completely skew the game, as many would use nothing but cheap MC and big bruisers to dominate ("Okay, Karma will MC Thor who pushed last turn, so he can again trounce one of your figs for 5dmg for the third turn in a row," and so forth).

Don't be too hard on that Judge... he was giving you the correct ruling, even though he didn't seem prepared to give the best explanation to you.

Ah, well. I guess it was a strategy that was too good to be true. I apologize for the rant. Thanks for the help though and I appreciate your answer scholarx. That's very tricky wording there in the rules that you pointed out. Now I just feel silly

Before I started playing tournaments, there were several rules I just flat out mis-interpreted (like thinking grounded figures firing onto a roof got their range halved). The best thing to learn is to play in the tournaments. Just look at the first few as a learning experience and you can pick up some great strategy tips from watching how others build and play their teams.


It was good to see you out last night Omega Supreme! I think out of the 20 people who showed up (for the venue's first tournament), 15 of them were new to the tournament scene.

So you can put a face to a name, I played against Dan and Shane in the first 2 rounds (all the way on the end of the tables, towards the back issues) and against Jason on the "kiddie" table for the last round.

See you next week!

-Dustin

Whoops, I played Dan on the end nearest the store front first I had the Polaris/Brotherhood team.

Actually you played me in the 2nd round (btw, it's Sean ). You wailed on me with your ICWO team, remember? lol

Ahhh! Now I've got it! Sorry Sean!


And they were In contact with Magneto...btw

I'll see you next week!

Oh, it could get much worse than that....


"I attack with Thor. Then Karma MCs Thor to attack again. Then my other Karma MCs Thor to attack again.

Next turn, I push my first Karma to MC Thor and attack again. Now I push my second Karma to MC Thor and attack again. And just for fun, I'll push Thor to attack again...."

And at 300 points, you could even squeeze in a Paramedic or 2 to keep the Karmas healed up.

Yep, nothing broken about that....

And don't forget, the Karmas could also mindcontrol each other...
Karma A MCs Thor and Karma B
Thor attacks
Karma B MCs Thor as her free MC action
Thor attacks
Karma As action is complete.
Karma B MCs Thor and Karma A
Thor attacks
Karma A MCs Thor as her free MC action
Thor attacks

Thats a grand total of 4 Thor attacks for 2 action tokens! Of course, each Karma takes 3 clicks of feedback damage... but who cares?

And the point totals aint bad either...
U Thor 186 points
E Karma 49 *2 = 98 points
R Paramedic 8*2 = 16 points
Total: 300 even.

That would be a cool house rule. I'm implementing it!

And I bet you're playing this team in your first event with this house rule...

theoretically, you could do this:
Use Karma A to mc Karma B and Thor (action 1)
Thor attacks (free action)
Karma B mc's Karma A and Thor (free action)
Thor attacks (free action)
Karma A mc's Karma B and Thor...

1 action

You can only do this under the MC Friendlies house rule.

This would create an almost infinite loop... Only ends because Karma would kill herself constantly mind controlling, taking 2 damage each go round. Now on a smaller point piece... ugh...