Before we get too far, here are the dials.

#203 One Who Knows
Team: Defenders
Range: 10 //
Clicks of Life: 8
Points: 123

12 11 17 3

10 10 16 3

10 10 16 3

10 9 15 2

8 9 16 3

8 8 16 2

8 8 15 2

6 7 15 4

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

Based on:

#045 V Starhawk
Team: Defenders
Range: 12 /
Clicks of Life: 9
Points: 144

10 9 17 2

8 10 16 3

9 10 15 3

9 11 16 2

8 10 15 2

7 9 15 1

8 9 15 1

9 8 14 1

10 8 13 4

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

KO KO KO KO

LE One-Who-Knows’ Gains vs. Veteran Starhawk
Still a Defender, the One-Who-Knows adds one target, a dash of 12 movement, and an additional click of Phasing over Vet Starhawk. Offensively The One picks up two more clicks of Energy Explosion. On the defensive side, The One makes a number of gains including an additional click of Energy Shiled/Deflection, two more of Toughness and two more clicks with a 16 defense. The One wraps up with another shot of Probability Control, two more of Outwit, and two more of three (3) damage.

LE One-Who-Knows’ Losses vs. Veteran Starhawk
The One takes two big hits right away. He/She drops a click of life as well as that all too rare 12 range. Getting whittled down to a 10 range is a palpable loss. Other noticeable reductions are the absence of Pulse Wave and Support, two fewer clicks of Invulnerable, one less each of Willpower, Ranged Combat Expert and 10 attack. Didn’t he/she see all of that coming? Heh. So much for cosmic awareness.

Neutral Dial Tinkering
There is quite a bit of general tinkering with The One’s dial. Some of it is truly innocuous while other bits may be real deal-breakers. Which is which? Now that would be telling. The One gets sort of a double-decker Phasing sandwich as his/her movement powers progress Phasing/Running Shot/Phasing/Hypersonic Speed/Phasing. Having already had lunch, the Vet opts for the simple RS/HSS/Phasing combo. The One gets his/her PC split to the top and bottom of the dial, while the Vet packs it all in the trunk. With regard to damage reducers, The One’s are at the bottom whereas the Vet puts his in the middle of the dial. All of that mutsyfutsing may be as convoluted as The One’s backstory, but it does end up making a difference in the overall scheme of things.

Cards That Work
A couple of cards immediately spring to mind with regard to The One. Infiltration is a splendid Battle Field Condition, allowing him/her to start in the game six squares beyond his/her traditional starting area so long as he/she is in hindering terrain. Like you’d want The One anywhere else anyway. Armor Wars is another worthy consideration. It will help make sure his/her damage gets through any defense in the early game without sacrificing a thing. His/Her ES/D only prevents hits, but if he/she does have to eat one there aren’t any damage reducers to circumvent. And by the time The One does get them, he/she’s near death and most of his/her best clicks are behind him/her at that point.

The One is already tough to hit, thanks to the ES/D & PC cocktail at the start of his/her dial. To add to the insanity, Heightened Reflexes may still provide an out should a foe land a blow.

If ol_Dut had to Choose
LE One-Who-Knows vs. Veteran Starhawk? This character’s bio has got to be proof that sometimes, just sometimes, crack-addicted, chain-smoking monkeys, with brains severely ravaged by syphilis and years of watching “Bosom Buddies” re-runs translated from English into Japanese, Hebrew, pig-Latin, French, Chinese and then back into English again, occasionally get to write comics if they promise to be very, very good, take their medication and refrain from flinging their poo at the new guy in Accounting (even if he really is a huge dork and totally deserves it). Make no mistake, the One Who Knows may be a gender confused, misogynistic schizophrenic with battered wife syndrome and delusions of grandeur, but he/she’s also one heck of a figure.

Parked in hindering, ES/D provides a 20 defense from range. With PC in play it will be almost impossible to hit him/her. I’m KO’d proof. The Vet’s opening Running Shot would certainly be nice to have, however, given the defense and PC it‘s a worthwhile trade-off. Suddenly moving some of that PC to the top instead of leaving it all at the bottom of the dial doesn’t seem so neutral. Down the dial, The One’s swap of Outwit for Support allows him/her to contribute in a more offensive capacity. And really, unless thing’s are going completely pear-shaped, who in the world is going to need the click two and three Support that the Vet has? Let’s face it, if you do really need that early dial Support there are more pressing problems than the lack of Support. Outwit, combined with a 10 attack and three (3) damage makes The One a menace. The following click with the Outwit/Psychic Blast tandem allows him to rip through a target’s defenses and save the Outwit to help the rest of the team. The late dial damage reducers, coupled with an upswing in damage potential courtesy of RCE and a natural four (4) on his/her last click make The One a real bit of trouble in the late stages of the game. And although his/her attack value on that last click is just a (7), thanks to PC he/she’s got two chances to make certain that four (4) damage finds someone to mess up. With 12 different and fun powers, an amazing first click and a veritable mountain of offensive capability, how could my choice be anything but the One-Who-Knows?! Splitting the PC to the top and bottom of the dial makes an enormous difference in the power and playability of the piece. The One is definitely a must-have from the Supernova LE ranks.

Just to add to the pandemonium, feel free to mix it up a little bit – put the Aleta sculpt on there sometimes when you feel like a nut, and the Starhawk sculpt on there when sometimes you don’t. You’ll fit right in with the wacky bio. And for you DC fans, grab the One-Who-Knows now, wait a few months, and then put the new Dr. Fate sculpt up there. I’m just sayin’.

Quick and Dirty Price Tag
Everything has its price. For abject confusion mixed with a liberal dose of power, that price is about $15. Although that’s really only $7.50 per person here. What a bargain! This deal’s getting better all the time!

That’s all for this week. So unless I get drafted by Marvel or DC I’ll be back next week with the frequently promised but as yet to be delivered Dr. Donald Blake. Thanks for reading!

awesome review as usual

If the rest of the review hadn't been decent, you would've gotten slapped with some negative rep. for slammin' Henry / Hilde and Kip / Buffy.

I haven't laughed so much in ages as I did reading the intro to this article!

Great work as usual, ol_Dut!

Cheers - StellarX

Great review...though you forgot the time they were actually seperated into two different bodies except the Hawk-God decided to teach them a lesson and fused thier hands together...

One who Knows second click is worth the whole totality of points. My problem is that half of the move attack clix have low AV. You look at starhawk his move and attack Av is high. One who Knows cranks out more damage for lower points. So I see the OP reasoning for picking the one who knows.

I hadn't really looked at the dial much. Definitely a different piece. I agree that the PC up front is nice and that the lack of Support is kind of a non-issue. The last click is pretty odd though, with the lowest attack value on the dial paired with the highest damage and the lowest defense value with the best damage reducer. Unfortunately there were 15(!) people at the tournament for him/her and my Skrulls didn't represent quite well enough.

First, this is a review for One-Who-Knows and then POOF! It's also a review for Starhawk! :D

Awesome job man, and you speak the truth about the comic writers being mindless monkeys sometimes...

Thanks for the review.

Each of these are very nice pieces. I had a chance to play a Squadron Supreme/Defenders TA-pure team (no ATA thank you) and the Vet Starhawk was amazing, esepcially with the ability to Running Shot into 12-range of a TKer (or the payload), so I am reluctant to sacrifice that first hit potential.

The One-Who-Knows is a very good piece, and I'd happily drop it onto a theme team. The dual-target screams for Armor Piercing, especially with Energy Explosion. It's hard to believe that this figure costs about the same as the Experienced Hulk from Infinity Challenge!

The Defenders TA got lots of love with this set, I'm expecting the JSA to get a similar set of options in a month or two

Fused together , where did you get that from ? From the Guardian comics I read in the 70's only one could be in our plan of existence at a time. They would simply trade places not fuse .

Just won the One Who Knows last week, and I must say that Im not sure how much I love the dial. The prob up front doesnt hurt, but the low defense and relying on the energy sheild can be risky for someone that is a midline player on your team...

Good review as always.

One-who-knows is one-of-many great LE's in Supernova!!!

man, this review is useful and halirious. GOOD ONE!

Thanks for the great review, Dut! You pretty much summed up my exact feelings about One-Who-Knows! I'm hoping to win him/her this Saturday! A much better deal than the Vet!