If you're upset about character selection and you know it then your blog will surely show it and you'll make a post like this

Next Wednesday, thanks to magical forces beyond our understanding, WizKids is going to be releasing their (hopefully not-last) set of Assassin's Creed Heroclix- ON TIME.  For a company that has made release-date push-backs a part of their repertoire for the past three years, this is no small feat.  The reason we know it will not be late is thanks to the also-as-frequent-but-not-quite-as-magical shipping screw up that landed the set about a week early into the hands of some eager-to-spoil Heroclix players.

In case you're interested in such things, you can go and check out the spoiled dials here.  Just be sure to tell them that brojase sent you.  I carry a lot of weight in that community, I'm somewhat of a big deal.  Actually, that's not true.  I think that most of my posts get ignored by...well, everybody.  

I'm not going to go through each individual dial and analyze it- that would take forever, and I'm pretty sure that most of you have lost interest just in these couple of paragraphs surprisingly not a record for my blog.  I'm basically just going to go on a rant about a couple of egregious oversights- because while I'm still excited to get this set and see it on the battlefield, WizKids still made some pretty big bonehead mistakes that need to be poked fun at.

1) Character selection matters:

Since you're supposed to start off with a positive when you're giving feedback, I will say this about the characters that WizKids put into AC clix- at least there was no obvious money-grubbing "alternate" costumes that you usually see on toys and action figures, a la 'Casual Friday' Batman or 'Post-Labor Day White Pants-wearing Batman' or 'Thor in Donald Blake shirt'.

Also known as "Chad Kroeger goes to Asgard"

That said, they really effed up the character selection.  Let's break down who they put into the two sets (Brotherhood and Revelations each got a six figure mini-set):
Brotherhood

1. Ezio- Obvious.
2. Mario Auditore- Died in the beginning, but a critical player from ACII.  Passable.
3. La Volpe- Love him here.
4. Bartolomeo d'Alviano- Ditto.
5. Cesere Borgia- The villain of the story.  Had to be here.
6. Octavian de Valois- Had to wikipedia him just to see who the heck he was.  Questionable inclusion.

Revelations

1. Ezio- Again, it's the Ezio show.
2. Prince Ahmet- I guess he's the villain of the story...
3. Yusef Tazim- Other than the hot young chick, this is Ezio's only friend in Constantinople. 



Ezio, my eyes are up here...

4. The Guardian- Who
5. The Bombardier- Is
6. The Vanguard- This???

Other than three "The" characters in Revelations (multiplayer characters for those who are into that sort of thing), it seems to be fairly solid selections overall.  So why devote an entire blog post railing against something that is outwardly decent?

Because this are some pretty blatant omissions here. 

Let's just get the guards out of the way here.  I'm not a businessman, so I can't know for sure- but I would think that when you have a set of twelve characters that you are releasing with a flat rarity in displays of 24 (so far all accounts indicate that each display contains two full sets), there will quickly come a point of diminishing return on a consumer's investment and it will be very easy to complete the set and thus no reason to continue to buy blind boosters in the store (thus potentially costing you money). 

But if you fill up some of those slots with 'generic' characters- characters that are desirable to have in multiples- well, doesn't that increase the amount of purchases?  It would have to, right?  People are more likely to blindly buy something when there is an increased opportunity that the blind purchase will pay off above and beyond what they paid into it.  That's not really happening with the set list as it is now.  But with a few guards or generic assassins?  Seems much more likely.

But enough about the red shirts- let's talk about some of the big name characters that they missed out on.  Even non-Assassin's Creed fans will recognize some of these names:

1. Leonardo da Vinci
2. Niccolò Machiavelli
3. Rodrigio Borgia
4. Claudia
5. Subject 16
6. Desmond
7. Altaïr
8. Minerva, Jupiter, Juno (WizKids has shown that they can do power interpretations for one-off characters or very powerful beings like Uatu who don't really demonstrate their powers...so I would have minimum reservation about them interpreting the First Civilization peoples)
9. Caterina Sforza (If Mario gets to be in the Brotherhood set, then Caterina would have just as much claim to it even though she's more prevalent in ACII)
10. Harlequin (If they're going to do Multiplayer character figures...how can they not make Harlequin?)

Most of the names on the missing list have varying degrees of "What the heck were they thinking?" in terms of exclusion, but the two biggest omissions by far are Leonardo da Vinci and Altaïr. 

I get it that not everyone who plays Heroclix is a fan of Assassin's Creed, so this was already a niche property within a niche property.  But in my opinion (and many others if you are to believe what people write on the Internet), having a da Vinci figure would have completely changed people's buying habits.  Because all of a sudden, you aren't just buying Heroclix from a video game that you may not have ever played (or cared about)- you're buying the chance to have freaking Leonardo da Vinci on your team!  LEONARDO DA VINCI!!!

That's why I think WizKids making clix based on the super hero movies is such a great idea.  I care nothing about Lucius Fox as a Heroclix figure.  But you bet your sweet bippy I'm nerding out for Morgan Freeman to do battle with the forces of darkness.  And I don't need plain-clothes Tony Stark running around on the map.  But Robert Downey Jr.?  Heck yes I'll drink to that!  Now factor in hundreds of hours playing these Assassin's Creed games and multiply it by- again- Leofreakingnardo da Vinci, and you have quite possibly the most anticipated civilian Heroclix figure of all time.

Except, no.  Somebody somewhere thought that it'd be better to have Octavi-whatever de Valwhogivesacrap in the set that now fewer people are going to buy.  

As for Altaïr...he may not be an actual historical figure, but to those of us who have played this series since its' genesis he will always be the one that took our Leap of Faith virginity.  And that's a special, special moment in a nerd's life.  The frustrating thing here is that it's not like it'd be a stretch to include him- he's on the freaking cover of Assassin's Creed: Revelations!

Granted, he's like a shadowy ghost standing behind Ezio

2) You sunk my flagship.  

While there is no direct correlation between sets themed around one figure (think Hammer of Thor, Web of Spider-man, Hulk, Superman, etc.), the kick-assness of that figures dial, and how well those sets sell- the popular perspective is that in those character-themed sets, the main character should kick ass.  It's their set, after all.   

Assassin's Creed clix gave us two versions of the main character; unfortunately, neither one of them seems to truly capture what makes Ezio great.

Pictured: What makes Ezio great

I've already written at length about the Brotherhood version of Ezio.  At that time, any initial disappointments were tempered by the fact that there was still one more, unknown Ezio dial lurking out there.  One more chance for them to recreate Renaissance-era Batman at the height of his powers, wisdom, and influence- but this time with bombs and a hookblade!  I bit my tongue, swallowed my disappointment, and waited anxiously for Ezio: Part II.

This is what they gave me.

First of all (again, really trying to be kind of positive here), I'm glad that the grenade mechanic is making a return in this set.  It's a wonderful way to replicate the bombs from Revelations, and it's just an all-around cool tool to have in the Heroclix tool box.  Of course, WizKids screwed it up and gave him only 1 grenade to use- the smoke grenade.  Smoke grenade???  That's like going to an all-you-can-eat pizza buffet and just eating salad.  I know we're not talking about smoke grenades.

Plus he's already got the power to make smoke.  He's got that power in spades.  It's called 'Smoke Cloud' and while it's largely a useless power, at least Ezio has it on every click.  Every.  Single.  Click. 

Ugh.

They couldn't have given him a click or two of energy explosion (caltrop or datura bomb),  pulse wave (splinter bomb), quake (wielding a pike), incapacitate (throwing knives), penetrating/psychic blast (pistol/crossbow), or poison (poison blade)?  Apparently Ezio, after years of fighting against the Templars, somehow thought it would be okay to sub out all of his awesome weapons and just load up on mini-fog machines.  Oh well, at least he can lay down a smoke cloud on turn one and then push to attack next turn without fear of pushing damage because he has indomitable.

Wait a second- he doesn't have indomitable?

OH MY GOSH!!!  How can Ezio not have indomitable?  It's an essential component of the character.  Geez, Prince Ahmet gets it.  Even Yusef Tazim gets it.  But Ezio doesn't get it?  Come on, WizKids.

You could make an argument (that I would laugh at) against Brotherhood Ezio getting it.  But in Revelations, he's like 52 years old and still running around on roof-tops and jumping into hay piles.  In the beginning of the game he actually gets captured and is just about to get hanged when he turns his execution on his captors and escapes.  LIKE A BOSS.

I'll spare you my diatribe on his defensive powers.  Suffice it to say that in my humble opinion, the dial designers have never played a game of Assassin's Creed and instead decided to purposefully sink the flagship character of my favorite video game series.



Despite my frustrations I'm still buying the set, which I realize means that I'm either a hypocrite or an idiot.  As consumers, our words mean nothing to these corporations- but our wallets mean everything.  It would be a million times more effective for me to voice my displeasure with some of their choices by just abstaining from the product entirely.  Unfortunately, that's not how I'm wired.  Here, in America, that's not how we're wired.  We want everything now, the way we want it, and...well, we'll still buy it even if it's late and not really what we were thinking...but we're going to take to the airwaves and let everybody know that the Powers That Be sure did slap us in the face in their giving us what we don't need and taking our money all the way to the bank.

PIC- Thor- http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5270/5651772371_a1d5a36a79.jpg
Sofia- http://guides.gamepressure.com/assassinscreedrevelations/gfx/word/1751616812.jpg
Ezio- http://www.totalvideogames.com/img/uploaded/www.totalvideogames.com_69738_AC2_S_052.jpg

Love+Love=Ermahgerd

Question- when was the last time your mind was blown?  If you didn't answer 'right this second', then you're wrong.  Because it's about to be.  Check this action out.

You're welcome.

Yes friends- it's Assassin's Creed and Heroclix, brought together, like a chocolate/peanut butter combo delivered direct to the fringes of society.  I'm in, like, nerd heaven.  I love Assassin's Creed.  I love Heroclix.  To have them both together at the same time...well, it's as if you like a girl, and you also like her sister, but you can't decide...so you just decide to start dating their mom.  That's what it's like for me.  That's what I'm feeling right now. 

That said, I don't believe that I'll see the perfect iteration of Ezio in Clix form until I get to heaven.  So I do have some nits to pick.  Overall I'm pretty stoked though.  So stoked that I decided to bring you my thoughts, in blog form.  Which I'm guessing you probably already figured out.

Warning- I'll probably reduce myself to quite a bit of Heroclixese here with a little Assassinish mixed in with zero form of  translation.  I'm a terrible ambassador of my passions.  Sue me.

(Wait, wait, don't sue me- because the only items I have of value are my clix and my Assassin's Creed PS3 collection!!!!!)

What I like:

1) The pose.  I'm not too crazy about the picture of the sculpt- there's just so much detail and color in the Ezio costume and this picture makes it look like they captured exactly none of that.  Nonetheless, it's a classic Ezio pose, and very reminiscent of a Renaissance-era crotch chop.

2) The Team Ability- I'm guessing you probably don't know much about Heroclix.  Let me just tell you that stealth is pretty spectacular.  In a game where range rules, the man who can't be seen is king.  True, there are ways to circumvent stealth, but by and large, stealth affords our friend Mr. Auditore here a very effective layer of protection.  The average figure is gonna have to mosey on over to our friend here and hope that they doesn't roll doubles 1s, 2s, or 3s (or 4s if they have a sucky attack value).  Because if they do, they're gonna get a hidden blade right to the face (or something...more on that in a minute).

For the most part, the team ability really a pretty cool representation of the combat system.  They attack, they miss, you attack, you hit (and usually kill, but that wouldn't make a very fun Clix ability).  Apparently most of the local militia (also known as 'guards') were pretty much terrible combatants, dressing up in their expensive armor every morning and waiting for some ridiculously skilled assassin to engage them in a duel and then kill them.  Gloriously. 

3) Most of the powers are pretty accurate and feel authentic to the experience of Ezio.  

Name of power (actual Heroclix power).  You with me?

• Roof running (Leap/climb)- Let me just tell you that I've played four Assassins Creed games and the joy and thrill of the Leap of Faith never gets old.  NEVER.  The idea of jumping off of stories high buildings- backwards, mind you- into shallow bales of hay and/or bushes of flowers goes so far over the line of Ridiculosity that after a couple dozen of these jumps, you start to rationalize how you're able to jump right out of the hay bale and continue running through the streets.  After a hundred or so, you start to believe that not only is this feat humanly possibly, but that you yourself could do it too.  After that, your wife ties you up and throws you in the trunk every time your family stops at a building taller than ten feet.  You bet your sweet bippy that every single time I move Ezio off of some elevated terrain, I'm going to be making the eagle screech while I pick my figure up off the table and drop him onto his back in the next square. 
• Altaïr's Armor (Invulnerability)- This is such a clever nod to the game play, it's not even funny.  In the game, Altaïr uses a mystical relic, the Apple of Eden, to create the perfect armor, made out of some new mystery metal (probably unobtanium) that is extremely strong (maximum health), unbreakable- and light enough to allow "complete freedom".  Ezio usually obtains this towards the end of game play, after collecting the six seals to unlock the tomb (or something).  Assuming that most characters in the Clix-creed system have damage values of 1-2 (again...more on that in a minute), his armor will be de facto impenetrable.  Well played, WizKids...well played.
• Poison Blade (Poison)- One of the most discreet ways to kill foes is by jabbing them with the hollow blade filled with poison.  It's super effective because it's not a flashy kill- you just sort of step up to them and stick them quickly with the blade, and then the punctured person starts to flail around like a zombie doing the Monster Mash, and everybody just sort of stands back and watches (or gets nailed by a wayward zombie arm) until the deceased falls to the ground and you can totally loot them of all their stuff (if you can tolerate people talking about your blasphemy).  My two favorite things to do with poison are: 
• Go up behind a group of guards and stab one of the ones in the rear (note: I'm stabbing a guard in the rear of the group, not stabbing a guard in his personal rear), and then just watch as the rest of the guards continue on their rounds.  Either that or I get bored and just go kill the rest of the guards.  
• Bribe a herald (which cost 500 florins), stick him, and then wait until he stopped spazzing and get my money back.  I know he's just doing his job, telling all the people about the dangerous assassin, but come on, man- 500 bones?  That's a lot of dough, and I'm not made of money.  Not until late in the game, anyways.

 4) I'm 33 years old.  I've been married for seven years.  I have two children.   I graduated from college.  And I guffawed out loud when I looked up at my open Ezio-clix tab and saw that it said "Ass-creed".  Hehe.  Hehe.  Hehe.  "Ass-creed".

Of course, the grass is always Tuscan Ember-er on the other side, and signore Ezio is no exception.  Here's what I don't like:

1) If any Heroclix figure EVER deserved a special power granting combat reflexes and super senses, it's Ezio.  I mean, that's sort of the whole 'parry/dodge' combat system.  You basically just hold down that L1 button when you're being attacked, time the counter just right, and go into berserk mode with the chain kills.  I would have rather seen Ezio's defense peak at a natural 17 and have a special power granting him those two defensive powers (CR/SS) than the natural 18 with mastermind- that's how Ezio fights. 

Speaking of Mastermind....

2)  The presence of Mastermind, period.  I don't like it.  On the HCRealms discussion board, one dude eloquently described the Mastermind-special power as representing the Assassin's guild (which at this point Ezio was pretty much in charge of) and how they'd lay their lives down for the cause.  I'm actually fine with that, for the most part.  I just think that in the Clix combat system, his abilities would be better represented by the CR/SS combo.

Especially since they named the power 'Blend'.  'Blend' is obviously not sloughing off damage to some simpleton who is too inspired to know any better.  'Blend' is when Ezio is chilling with a compact group of civilians and your screen flashes wavy green and all of a sudden the guards can't see you.  In a perfect world, I would have combined 'Blend' with the team ability and made it so that Ezio could use stealth if he was adjacent to one or more friendly characters.  

3) If you've played the Assassin's Creed games, you know that Ezio is basically Batman in the 1400s.  Armed to the teeth, he has probably a couple dozen weapons to choose from and even though he doesn't have them all at once (his clothes are pretty much a bat belt though), at any given time he can kill a guard by:

• Hidden blade
• Poison blade
• Shooting a poison dart
• Throwing knives
• Dagger
• Sword
• Pistol (built into his gauntlet)
• Crossbow
• Bomb

And they represent this by a 4 range and 1 target????  I think his ranged capabilities would have been better represented by a special power giving him a choice of either 4 range with 3 targets (the throwing knives) or 8 range with 1 target (crossbow).   To me, that would have pretty much made any other shortcoming inconsequential- the fact that they missed the opportunity amplifies them instead.

Additionally, the number of 1s and 2s on the damage slot is a little disconcerting.  Would a couple of 3s killed anyone?  I mean...you know what I mean!  Sure, he's a mere man- I don't expect any Hulk-level shenanigans here.  But if Ezio comes across any sort of damage reduction at all (which, in a set bound to be populated with suits of armor, is not out of the realm of possibility), he's basically going to end up dealing out more paper cuts and scrapes than he is awesome death blows.

Pictured- Ezio dealing out awesome death blows

4)  A couple of other powers were missed, pretty egregiously I might add.  First off, his hidden blade.  I know, I know- the card says Hidden Blade (Close Combat Expert).   But when I'm ramming my hidden blade into that guards skull, it doesn't feel like I'm having my damage increased by 2- it feels like I'm dealing penetrating damage (to his brain.  And now he's dead.  BOOM).  That screams 'Exploit Weakness' to me.  Especially if they lined it up with his blades/claws/fangs, giving him the potential to deal 6 penetrating damage.  Powerful?  Sure.  But this is Ezio freaking Auditore.  This guy should be able to one-hit KO street level characters and strike fear into the hearts of more powerful foes.  Not that he doesn't do that to a degree....just not to the degree that he could/should be.

The other power blatantly missing is some form of willpower.  Pretty much any character can have an argument made for them to have willpower- but it's one of Ezio's defining characteristics.  More than the unrivaled badassness and weapons proficiency, Ezio is such a compelling character because of his drive and determination to lead humanity to the truth- even in face of sickeningly overwhelming odds, delicious conspiracies, and the death of pretty much everyone that is close to him.  He keeps plugging along through thirty-plus years and three video games.  And in the end, he's able to walk away from it all because of the love of a beautiful woman.  Which doesn't really tie into willpower at all, but seriously- Sofia is a foxy lady.

As long as you don't look at her face.  (Sorry ladies)

Overall- I do like the dial.  I'm a little discouraged by some of the shortcomings, especially since I can't see another Ezio figure coming out from this time period (there will be an Ezio from Revelations though, which gives me hope), but overall it does feel like it could be Ezio, and with the proper support (AKA, his fellow Assassins), Ezio could very well prove to be the stone-cold killer that is near and dear to my heart.

PIC- Ezio- http://heroclix.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/ass-creed-preview.jpg
Suddenly clear Clarence- http://knowyourmeme.com/photos/296645-sudden-clarity-clarence
Ezio killing- http://www.gameseyeview.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/Assassins-Creed-Brotherhood-Photos3.jpg
Sofia- http://images3.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20110922214556/assassinscreed/images/6/68/Sofia-.png

Lord of the Heroclix!!!

Yesterday, WizKids/NECA announced that they were coming out with a couple games based on the Lord of the Rings franchise. But I only (at this point) care about the first one- you know, the one that is Heroclix compatible!!!

I'm so excited about this announcement. I mean, I was very excited when WizKids/NECA announced the Watchmen Heroclix set (which, BTWs, having the gift of future-telling I knew would begat cooler new licenses)...

because I loved the graphic novel and liked the movie...but this is Lord of the Rings. Freakin' Lord of the freakin' Rings freakin'!!!

Now, as hard as this may be to believe, not everyone agrees that this is the best thing to ever happen to humanity. Some people feel that the inclusion of Lord of the Rings into Heroclix (combined with some of the other Clix-based games that WizKids/NECA is introducing, such as Street Fighter) is going to have a negatively profound impact on the game of Heroclix, which is currently based on comic book superheroes.

I suppose I can see this- but it's a little frustrating that there is a tone of doom in gloom in their assessment. For one thing- just because the game is Heroclix compatible does not mean that the primary focus of the game is to be involved in Heroclix. I feel like the compatability factor is a latent function of the figures- that is, that they are being designed and marketed as a part of their own, independent game. The fact that they can be used as a part of Heroclix, while an awesome secondary function, is not their primary intent.

It's like Legos. Each Lego set is primarily designed to interact with other sets within any given genre. Star Wars, Indiana Jones, Ninjas- they have designs and certain pieces to go along with that theme. And yet, because they are Legos, you can use them with any other Lego set and have the pieces fit together. It opens up the option to create a myriad of creative and complex worlds. Options are not a bad thing.

Tying into the Lego concept is my second thought, which is that there is a contingent of people, of whom I am a part, that enjoy the crossing of universes. Games like Marvel vs. Capcom or Mortal Kombat vs. DC really appeal to us, because we have a flair for the creative. Our imaginations cannot be contained by the borders of one realms- not when there are other realms to explore. Now, I'm not saying that people that are against this sort of mixing are not creative- but they aren't very creative. Just kidding. I think.

I know that this is just the initial announcement, so there is still a lot of directions that this might go in. But for now- I'm very excited at the possibilities- Legolas and Bullseye squaring off, Aragorn grappling with Spider-man, or even Frodo trying to hide from Batman.

Capitalism of Earth....RISE

Okay, so just one night after I blogged about not wanting to blog about things so close to their point of origin because I was afraid of letting my emotions get in the way, I am reneging on my word and blogging about something just because I am experiencing emotion about it. If you're just tuning in to my blog for the first time, you probably missed the part where I established my penchant for hypocrisy. So this isn't anything new. It's how I roll.

Also, this blog pertains to Heroclix. If you don't care at all about Heroclix, you may want to stop reading. Or, you may want to continue reading, because you were just so intrigued by the introductory paragraph. Or maybe the first paragraph was kind of 'blah', but you made it this far, and figured 'well, I can't get that time back- might as well keep pressing on'. Whatever the case, I'm not responsible for what happens from here.

First of all, let me give you some history.

Yes, that is a creepy man groping Bruce Wayne's tombstone like 50 Cent in da club. It isn't called 'The Blackest Night' for nothing.

I suppose technically, I should warn you at this point that there are spoilers...potentially.But I feel like in life, theoretically there could always be spoilers. Shouldn't everything have a spoiler alert? I mean, anytime you are getting information that you didn't already have before- spoiler!. Take the health care bill, for example. My teacher didn't say "Oh, spoiler alert- the health care bill passed" before she told us that the health care bill passed. She just told us. Thanks a lot teacher. Thanks a lot.

Back to the Blackest Night story. Rather then sum it up for you, I'm going to hyperlink it here. And pretty much everywhere in this whole paragraph. It's not that I don't want to take the time to break it down for you- it's just that ever since I found out how to hyperlink, I have been able to share information much more efficiently. I don't have to waste time digesting it and then trying to figure out how I'm going to relate it to you- I just take the hard work that others have done, and link to it. It saves me all the work and they get the free pub. So anyways, just click anywhere on this paragraph (but here) and you will magically be able to read all about the Blackest Night story, or to be able to ignore it but at least acknowledge that I provided you with the information that you then rejected out of your own free will.

Anyways, this whole thing is masterminded by this dude Nekron, who is kind of like this bad ass C or D list Green Lantern villain. Well, up until January of 2010, when he officially became the baddest mofo in the DCU.


Moving on (and I'm painfully aware that I could be studying right now) to Heroclix, my favorite game in the whole wide world. It's based on comic books. I gushed about it here. I make it make sense here.

The game was pretty much dead for all of 2009, then this company came in and bought Wizkids, and presto! Heroclix is back again. And I fell in love with NECA/Wizkids. I loved them for bringing the game back to life, and for releasing Hammer of Thor. I loved that their sculpts were great, and that they did previews on Facebook, and that they sent figures to stores as a way of saying thanks. I loved that they decided to do a Blackest Night starter, and that they were able to score a Watchmen Heroclix set (completely with non-naked Dr. Manhattan colossal!). If NECA/Wizkids was a girl, and we were really good friends, I was just about to ask her out because I thought she was the woman of my dreams.

And then today happened. And that selfish whore took my heart and ripped it out of my chest.

Which, I suppose, is completely appropriate.

I guess that it's inevitable in a capitalist society that this sort of thing would happen. You try to have allegiance to a company, which sometimes teeters on the edge of blind loyalty and love, but the company only has allegiance to money and the making of money. So eventually, they will do something that makes you mad because it makes them money. I found out today that NECA/Wizkids did that to me.

They released some pictures of two key characters from the Blackest Night story arc- Black Hand and Nekron. Ordinarily this would be cause for a celebratory blog. But instead, NECA/Wizkids decided to pierce my heart with that big scythe thingy.

Hmmmm....good thing I have an extra couple hundred dollars laying around. Oh wait. I DON'T.

Well, at least Nekron's herald, the Black Hand, isn't a chase figure. Oh wait. HE IS.

I missed out on the World's Finest fiasco. I came back to Heroclix on the coattails of chase Supermen. I was willing to overlook the crap that was Secret Invasion sculpts. I was willing to overlook those slight blemishes for the game I love. And NECA/Wizkids was faithful to me. For a while.

But to take two of the key pieces, from one of my favorite story arcs on comicdom (definitely the one I am most financially invested in) and take two of the key players in that story, and make them chase pieces- which will each individually go for more than I am paying for my 10-booster brick of the set- and then possibly (because Black Hand is #56 in the set and Nekron is #59) have two more chase pieces in this set on top of that!!!! I don't even dare to imagine what #57 and #58 are. Because that horrible imagining will most likely manifest as reality, and then I will rue the day that NECA/Wizkids glanced my way.

I honestly thought that we were past all that capitalist crap. I felt like this new company cared. And maybe they do. Maybe there will be redemption in the wings. Maybe if I complain long enough and loud enough, they will send me free chase figures to shut me up. But until then- NECA/Wizkids, you're sleeping on the couch.

PICS: Black Hand (comics)- http://images2.fanpop.com/images/photos/5600000/Blackest-Night-Bruce-Wayne-dc-comics-5688328-700-1059.jpg
Nekron (comics)- http://afghanant.files.wordpress.com/2009/08/blackest-night-5.jpg
Nekron and Black Hand (heroclix)- www.hcrealms.com
Other picture- http://www.anti-everything.info/aefiles/bn_titan_2.jpg

The avatar of capitalist conservative heteronormative patriarchal Brito-America...or you probably know him as Superman

I was studying tonight and...well, who am I kidding. I was sort of studying, but also catching up on my HCRealms reading. For those of you who don't know, HCRealms is a forum where people who play Heroclix get together on-line and talk about Heroclix. Is it nerdy? Yes. Do I love it? YES.

There was a thread about Superman, and I came across this quote from one of the members of HCRealms about the Big Blue Boy Scout: he's "the avatar of capitalist conservative heteronormative patriarchal Brito-America".

And of course I'm up at 2:30 in the morning writing about this, because A) the kids have been trying to shake off this dang cold, and so obviously they were up coughing and woke me up, and B) I love the idea behind this quote.

I guess what I love is these terms- Capitalist. Conservative. Heteronormative. Patriarchal. They get my mind racing. When I went back to school, the very first class I took at Northern was a sociology class, and I haven't looked at things the same way since.

In social work, we talk about systems theory, and how everyone is immersed in multiple systems at multiple (macro/mezzo/micro) levels, and how these systems interact together to make us into the people that we are.

It got me thinking about something that I frequently chew on, and that is the idea of human beings as social beings...some say social animals. Whatever the case, we were born to be social.

And that means that there has to be a social order. Think of a wolf pack- from the Alpha to the Omega, there are norms that they follow in order to keep things humming along, like a fine tuned machine. Without order, it's just a bunch of dogs, running around, hoping to stumble on some scraps or a sick animal. Together, they can take down a moose.



Do some live as "lone wolves"? Yes. But their existence is not nearly what it could be. They might be stronger and more dangerous- but they'll never really be all that they could be.

Every society, every culture on our planet has some sort of "system" in place. Obviously the USA looks much much much different than say, a tribe of Amazons. But in many ways, they are not so different- there is hierarchy, there is some division of labor, there are rules, there are customs, there are ceremonies- and without these things, I'm honestly not sure how we as people would function in society.

I'm sure we all get mad at the system every once in a while, and we want to fight the system, to overthrow the system...but what is going to happen is that another system is just going to be put into place. It might not be called a "system"...and it might not even conventionally (or explicitly) look like a system. But trust me- it will be a system.

You know, several years ago, the idea of relativism was brought into my head, and rejected out of hand. Years later, while I still reject the idea in it's purest form, it has helped me to reframe the human experience. See, it's so easy to think that the way we do things is the right way, and to instantly look at the way another society runs and to judge it as "wrong".

But what is right? What is wrong? Can these concepts really, legitimately be made across cultural contexts? Look at Native Americans. European settlers and missionaries came over to this country so eager to quash a way of life and replace it with a "superior" one. How has that turned out? From your point of view, it's "savage". It's "barbaric". For them, it's "life". It's "survival". Who are we to be the judge of mankind?

So what can we deduce from all this? Hopefully something. Honestly, at this hour, I'm not sure I'm doing much more than emptying my brain so that (hopefully) I can get some sleep. I know that there is much more about these ideas that could be said. I hope that there is some interesting food for thought. At the very least, I'm tired enough to go to bed. If that's all this article has accomplished, then it is worth it.

In completely unrelated news, just a week and a half before my last undergrad Spring Break ever! I have several blog ideas on the burner...I know I say that all the time and then never come through. But I'm motivated and inspired and by the time the ides of March have come, you'll have no idea what hit you! Until next time, God bless!

PIC: http://www.worldofwallpapers.nuche.org/content/animal/canines/1024/pack-of-wolves-wolf-pack-wild-dogs-wallpaper.jpg
QUOTE: http://www.hcrealms.com/forum/showthread.php?p=4554348#post4554348

Hammer of Thor, Chariot of Goats

Go forth...um...mighty...goats?

Okay, so I play this table top miniatures game called 'Heroclix'. It's a superhero game, and I'm a big dork. So anyways, it's been around for about 6 years, and I played it when it first came out. I gave it up at one point because it had become too big a part of my life, and I was spending way too much money on it.

Fast forward to 2008. We're visiting my parents, my brother has me play a game of Heroclix with him, and I whup him. Bad. Well, maybe not a 'bad' whupping, but I beat him. So I get the itch to play again. And I figure, 'I'm older, I'm more mature. This spending thing won't get me again'.

Honestly, I am doing better than before, but I'm still the same old impulsive, wreckless, possession-lusting Jason. I don't even want to know how much money I've spent on this stupid game that I DON'T EVEN GET TO PLAY! I mean, have you ever tried having young kids and a tabletop game with miniature pieces? It doesn't work!

So what is the point of this post, you might ask. You might also ask for my phone number, and if you are a creditor, I am inclined to say 'no thank you'. Well, the point is I am FREAKIN' EXCITED about the next expansion set, Hammer of Thor. Yes, I realize that up until now, this post did not show any signs of that, but you know what? YOU CAN'T FIT ME IN A BOX! OR A CAKE! OR A MINI COOPER!

When I first got back into Heroclix, I was a 'DC' guy- DC being DC comics. I like Batman, I like Superman, I love the Green Lantern Corps, and more of the DC universe is a mystery to me. I mean, Marvel is cool (Spider-man, Iron Man, Hulk, X-Men, etc.), but I like the unknown, the unexplored, and DC has more of that to me. Maybe it's because they're comics suck, I don't know. As I've said, I'm not much of a comics reader. But I'm a DC guy.

Last summer, Marvel Heroclix comes out with an expansion called 'Secret Invasion', tied into the same-named comic miniseries in which an alien race (Skrulls) have infiltrated the hero teams, and are planning to take over the world- and no one knows who the Skrulls are (since they are shapeshifters). So the 'Buy it by the Brick' figure (10 boosters is a 'brick') was the Illuminati Super Skrull, who has the powers of Professor Xavier, Iron Man, Black Bolt, Namor, and Mr. Fantastic. Well, this intrigues me, so I buy the comics. I get hooked, 'blam!', order a brick, and to make a long story short, the pendulum swings back a little bit towards Marvel. It doesn't help DC that their own latest expansion set, 'Arkham Asylum', has NO Green Lanterns (although there are a handful of Sinestro Corps members) and a brick figure (Joker) that didn't really excite me.

Marvel? Their next brick figure, for Hammer of Thor (March 2009) is the above pictured Thor, rocking the Goat-drawn carriage. OMG, I am SO out of my mind looking forward to this set. I don't even know all the characters, but I'm ordering a case (a case is 2 bricks, so 20 boosters) so I can get 2 of those things.

So again, what is the point of this post/blog entry? It might seem to be a tad incoherent, rambly, and not well put together. Kind of like me in some aspects. I just wanted to let you all know that I am really excited about this figure, and I can't wait until March of next year!