Have a guy at my venue that loves to play dr. strange and astrals. The question with the new sideboard rules is if a figure is KO does it return to your sideboard. I'm asking for the figures that started on your sideboard and those that started on your force. Thanks in advance for any responses.

If the fig started on your force, it's kind of a moot point cause KO is KO, no bringing back unless you have Mr. Fantastic or Mr. Sinister (wow, weird coincidence). If they started on the sideboard, like say an Astral Strange, I'd say it goes back to the sideboard since Strange can always pop another one out.

Figures that are added to your force are not part of the sideline. You can keep adding as many as you can.

So the "sideline" or "sideboard" or whatever we're calling it isn't really officially defined as such, right? Like, it doesn't have an official name. Oh, wait, no... it's "Replacement figures."

So before, there were essentially two subheadings that covered every figure you owned [or had access to], being the ones on your team right now, and those not. Any game effect that generated new members of your team could be drawn from this second pool, and that rule hasn't changed. As of the new rules, there's now a third essential subheading, which is "Replacement" and covers alt-dials you have access to through Alter-Egos, Split/Merge, and Morph [and... maybe something else], right? But the Replacement pool can only be changed by replacing, such that if I start with Tony Stark and Iron Man on the board, and Iron Man is knocked out, I can't now AE Tony into that Iron Man. Because the KOed Iron Man is in Pool B [as defined above, the 'everything else' pile].

The Replacement squad [or Sideboard or Reserves or whatever] is a second/supplementary team you build before the game, and remains as such through the tournament.

Right? Wrong? Right.

Does this mean I'm going to have to start filling my sideboard with CA 003 HYDRA Agents, instead of replacing the KO'd one with the KO'd one?

Also, I'm doing text searches on the Rulebook and Player's Guide but am coming up with nothing. Where are the Sideboard rules printed?

The "sideboard" limit that is mentioned in the new PG only applies to REPLACEMENT characters.

Characters that are added to your force during the game such as Astral Stranges, Ultron Drones, Multiple Men, etc., DO NOT count as part of your sideboard.

You can have as many as you want, or as little as you want and use the same models over and over again.

I don't know about all these "pools" your talking about, but you would have had to identify the Iron Man as a potential replacement for Tony Stark, using up one of your replacement slots. I see no reason why you couldn't identify a character on your force as a potential replacement for another character on your force. You just wouldn't be able to do the replacement, if the Iron Man hasn't been KO'd yet.

Can you clarify (or point us to rules section that clarify) :

- the differences between: The force VERSUS The replacement figures (sideboard) VERSUS Figures that have been KOed VERSUS Figures that are "outside of the game"

- How figures that are brought from "outside of the game" interact (or not) with the "sideboard limit"

- If figures from the "replacement reserve" can be brought in game by "bring from outside of the game" type effects

- If figures that are KOed can be brought in game by "bring from outside of the game" type effects multiple times

- If figures that are KOed are effectively removed from the game and considered outside

- Where figures that are replaced (being in the force at the beginning then changed with the ones from the replacement reserves) goes ? outside of the game, sideboard, elsewhere

- Can i say a figure that is on my force is also on my replacement list of figures, and use it for replacement when it is KOed (if all other conditions are met)

Because it's alot confusing for me.
Thank you !

Surely I don't need to list Iron Man on my force sheet twice. If that were the case, then if I start with a Batman and a Robin, hoping to merge them into Batman/Robin duo, I'd need to use up 3 slots on my replacement figures list, else I'd be unable to split back into Batman and Robin.

Yeah, you probably don't need to.

Maybe, a pool party system is the way to go.

It's not quite the same thing. With the AE, you are saying that a figure applies twice. Once on your force and once on your sideboard. The AE mechanic only ever works one way. The only question here is whether the same physical figure can be listed as both part of your force and as part of your sideboard or if you would actually need 2 copies of that figure.

With the Split/Merge mechanics, they are more fluid and when you use one, you automatically get to use the other (assuming that all qualifying conditions are met). If you split Bats and Robin duo into two separate qualifying figures, those figures now have a 'merge' property attached to them (the pts qualification no longer needs to be met to merge for that particular pair of figures only). This property would also, by necessity, need to include at least one other figure: Bats and Robin duo. Because of this attached property, I'd say that all figures involved automatically qualify as either part of your force (because they started on your force or were brought in via the mechanics) or on your sideboard (because they started on your sideboard or were placed there by the mechanics). So, you would need to list either the split figures (if you start with the duo) or the duo figure (if you start with the individual qualifying figures) on your sideboard. The split/merge mechanics will change the properties of the figures accordingly.

The single biggest reason the sideboard was implemented was because we were starting to have A TON of different ways characters could flip flop around and it was quite literally starting to drag out the games. Anyone who has sat and waited for their opponent to dig through their tackle box to find exactly which Batman they wanted to turn Bruce Wayne into knows what I am talking about.

So, in order to limit the confusion and amount of time this was taking, you have to decide ahead of time what you will be using. You are saying, "These are the characters I am potentially going to use. I must write them out and have them as readily available as I have the rest of my team."

In this regard, swaping out Tony for an Iron Man that has already been KO'd is fine: he's already on your sheet and you can readily locate him.

It is the Replacement Characters section of the rulebook, page 6.

Maybe it's just me being anal about these things, but I always pull my figures I plan to have as my sideboard and have them available at the table. Now, because some group of numnuts can't be bothered to be organized, I have to reduce the amount I can take.

Even in that case, though, we were still presented with many, many options. A player might have all versions of Batman, or Iron Man, or whatever already laid out... but maybe they haven't really thought about what exactly they might do with them. And so you AE Bruce or Tony and then sit and try and decide exactly which one to use of the ones you've got laid out.

Presumably, if you are forced to pick a handful of characters ahead of time, you've at least thought a little bit about how and when you might want to use them. Thus the selection process is then a bit faster.