We're down to the last four!
Avengers vs Guardians of the Galaxy!
Seems like a long time since I could walk a city block without seeing construction equipment. No wonder, with all the costumed creeps smashing up every office block and apartment in sight. If the Avengers don't have shares in Fisk Construction, Wilson must have his people in cahoots with their people somewhere down the line.
As our space is invaded yet again by a cavalcade of armed rodents, berserk cyborgs and monosyllabic shrubberies, is it really the same old tired line-up of ex-cons, rogue science experiments and rehashed military recruitment poster boys we have to depend on for America's safety? That's what the Democrats delivered, folks, disappointment you can count on!
J. Jonah Jameson
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Guardians of the Galaxy
After Pootle's absolute hammering of the Defenders in the quarter-finals, the Guardians get Nebula back to complete their full killing roster. With powerful board control and attrition abilities, these plucky heroes continue to impress.
Tactics are: Crew of the Milano, Galaxy’s Greatest, Daughters of Thanos, Deadly Duo, We Are Groot
Avengers
The first Avengers team that broke through to the semi-finals was only 15 Threat, so to match the Guardians' 17 Threat, some adjustments were needed. Iron Man gets upgraded to Invincible Iron Man, and Hulk becomes The Immortal Hulk.
I think that may invalidate some of the tactics cards, but we're going to handwave that instead of replacing them, to free up Monkey's thinking time for smashing things.
Tactics are: Anger Management, Avengers Assemble, Gamma Launch, Ricochet Blast, Bird of Prey
Deployment
Our first crisis is Terrigen Clouds Sweep Over City (which is what happens when Terrigen Crystals are exposed to water at the correct temperature, as if you didn't know that). These have two Mist Cloud tokens to secure for 2VP each, but they will float around and poison people too.
The second crisis is an old classic: Struggle For The Cube Continues - a total of five Cube Fragments to pick up (a character can hold more than one), with the slight drawback that it will burn your face off.
This means there's a potential for 9VPs to be won in a single round, so the scores could get very high, or else be very hotly-contested.
The Avengers set up on the south of the map, with Captain America and The Immortal Hulk on the left.
Invincible Iron Man and Ant-Man position themselves in the centre.
On the other side of the table, Rocket and Groot set up on the left.
Gamora, Nebula and Star-Lord take the centre.
Drax is sent out to hold down the right flank.
Avengers have priority and we're away!
Round 1
The round begins with a scramble for all the tokens. Ant-Man begins by securing the eastern Mist Cloud, and shrinking down to increase his defensibility.
Nebula and Gamora, who took a long detour to pick up the north-west Cube Fragment, head upfield, also towards the eastern Mist Cloud.
Groot moves to contest the Mist Clould, and though Invincible Iron Man hits him with his Repulsor Mk 2, the barrels behind Groot prevent him from being pushed off the point. Iron Man grabs a Cube Fragment as consolation.
Rocket scampers onto the Mist Cloud, securing it for the Guardians, and helps himself to a Cube Fragment on the way.
With nothing immediate to smash, Hulk collects a Cube Fragment and leaps into the centre of the board.
Star-Lord picks up the final Cube Fragment in the centre and then tries to back away from Hulk as much as he can.
Things are less crowded by the west Mist Cloud: Captain America flies to secure it, and Drax ambles forward in a vaguely threatening manner.
The round ends with one Mist Cloud apiece, and the Cube Fragments fairly evenly split. Much damage and Poison conditions are then doled out, and the opening scores are tight.
Avengers 4 : 5 Guardians of the Galaxy
Round 2
With fewer team members, Avengers are usually going to keep priority. Accordingly, Hulk goes first and unleashes a couple of Smash punches directly at Star-Lord, followed by throwing a portakabin at him.
Amazingly, Star-Lord survives this attack with a couple of points of damage remaining, flies over to the easter Mist Cloud to catch a breather, and Hulk is left to ponder what went wrong there.
After taking an Element Gun blast from Star-Lord, Iron Man unleashes a Billion-Dollar Punch on Groot that the flora colossus manages to withstand. Iron Man does it again and, this time, throws Groot off to one side. Rocket is left without his bodyguard, although Iron Man has no more attacks to exploit this.
Which means that Groot's next move is to lumber up and declare We Are Groot, which heals up all his nearby team-mates (and save's Rocket's bacon, who had taken damage from the Cube and Mist Cloud, and was about to go down).
Rocket tries to gun down little Ant-Man, who evades the shots and jumps onto the Mist Cloud, contesting it. Even Nebula has a try, trying to pick him off with a Blaster Pistol shot, but finding insects difficult to target.
The confusion over who owns the Mist Cloud is decided when Gamora goes in swinging and dazes Iron Man with her God Slayer. The Cube Fragment falls to the ground and no-one is in a hurry to pick it up.
The one bright point for the Avengers is that Captain America's leadership allows a character to move and remove damage when an ally is dazed or KO, so Hulk advances right into the thick of it.
On the quieter side of the battlefield, Captain America charges onto the Mist Cloud and hits Drax with his Shield Throw, knocking him back. He does it again, and Drax is now back where he started and well out of attack range.
However, the sharpest mind in the Guardians is not thwarted, and moves twice to get back on the objective, before using The Destroyer ability to fling Captain America away and claim it!
That final move ended a rough turn for the Avengers. Both Clouds and three Cube Fragments are in the Guardians' hands, against a single Fragment held by Hulk. On the upside, an almighty ruck appears to have broken out over the eastern Mist Cloud.
Avengers 5 : 12 Guardians of the Galaxy
Round 3
Hulk begins the round once again, and this time, he's not messing about. He throws a Smash into Groot, followed by a construction vehicle, then another Smash that throws Groot into Gamora.
By the time he's done, two of the Guardians are dazed before they can even activate!
Scrambling to recover, Rocket opens up on Ant-Man with both Plasma Rifle and Hadron Collider, finally dazing him.
With so many heroes down, there are a lot of Cube Fragments up for grabs. Iron Man begins his activation with a Billion-Dollar Punch that dazes Rocket and places Iron Man right in the middle of it all.
Tony then scoops up all three Cube Fragments and also secures the eastern Mist Cloud (which is somewhere beneath a dazed Groot). This could be fatal to him in the Cleanup Phase, but it might also save the game.
Trying to shift him, Star-Lord flies in and shoots Iron Man with his Element Gun, but cannot get through to do enough damage. He does, however, take the Mist Cloud objective (because he's healthy and Iron Man is injured), and if Drax also holds the western Mist Cloud, that would be enough points to win.
With the game at stake, Captain America turns on the afterburners. Using Avengers Assemble, he moves forward, then uses a move action and a charge action to cross from one side of the board to another and get into Shield Throw range of Star-Lord. A single point of damage would be enough to push Star-Lord back and keep the game going.
However, Star-Lord blocks every attack. At which point Pootle, very sportingly and perfectly legally, uses Star-Lord's Winging It token to reroll one of his successes - Star-Lord is pushed off the point and the game goes on!
It's a reversal of fortunes in the VP stakes: Star-Lord still has his Cube Fragment and Drax is uncontested on the other side, so that's 3VP.
However, in addition to the Cube Fragment Hulk holds (and no-one is getting that off him), Iron Man is holding three Fragments and securing the Mist Cloud, totally a whopping 6VP. The resultant backlash does KO Iron Man and send the Fragments scattering, but it's the way he'd want to go.
Avengers 11 : 15 Guardians of the Galaxy
Round 4
With Drax looking pretty immovable on his Mist Cloud, you might think the Guardians are assured victory, but there are enough VPs to be had in the eastern scrum to send the Avengers just past the finish line.
Hulk begins, as he always does, with a Gamma Burst that KOs Groot. He then Smashes Gamora and throws her into Nebula.
Gamora is KO, Nebula is dazed, and the Guardians team is already looking pretty thin on the ground.
Ever the hero, Peter Quill decides to leg it. He's only on a few points of damage left, but is still holding a Cube Fragment, and scoring the VP from it would be a winning move.
While Drax twiddles his thumbs, Captain America awaits his activation - all he needs to do is fly around to collect the last two scattered Cube Fragments and the Avengers pull off an unlikely 18-17 win.
But Rocket has other ideas. He opens up on Captain America with his Plasma Rifle. Sam ducks behind his Vibranium Shield to weather the first shot, but just loses his final point of damage to the second volley. He's dazed and there is no-one left to pick up the Fragments!
And with that photo-finish, the Guardians of the Galaxy cling onto victory and secure their place in the final!
Avengers 16 : 17 Guardians of the Galaxy
Back at the Bullpen
What a great game to watch! I thought it was all over for the Avengers but (with a little help), they came back to make a real contest of it.
Hulk turned out to be both the star and liability of the team. His third and fourth round actions were exactly what was needed - taking two or three at a time. It was just a shame he blew an enormous raspberry in his second round. On reflection, I think the lower-threat Hulk would have done better here, with more attacks and a beam weapon. Although, on the flipside, he was so invincible, no-one bothered to target him.
Despite letting the team down in a couple of key moments, I liked the speed of Captain America and his leadership ability (this is the first game it really kicked in). Ant-Man once again did very well. I don't think we saw much from Invincible Iron Man, but what can you do when you fill your pockets with Cube Fragments?
The Guardians appear unstoppable, even more so now Nebula is back on the team. They're a great combination of many small threats and Pootle is playing them well ... will he take them all the way to the title?
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So farewell to the Antvengers. I'd like to say I was surprised that the IT playboy blew himself up by over-reaching. Or that relying on a mindless marauder to do all your heavy lifting might backfire. Or even that the cream of this Gen Z line-up of snowflake supers got kicked to the curb by a squirrel-shaped nutjob and the Rocketeer in a flasher mac.
What's to say? We get the heroes we deserve.
J. Jonah Jameson
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