by Patrick Yapjoco
Ever since Themed Teams were introduced in Heroclix, there has been much debate whether or not one should play Themed Team or not in a competitive environment. One the one hand, not worrying about Theme means you open you have a wider array of options. On the other hand, having the benefits of Theme means you have synergy and probably map control, but at the cost of having a much smaller pool of figures to choose from. When ATAs were legal in Modern, that was the overwhelming reason to play Themed Team. With ATAs like Midnight Sons, you were incentivized greatly to play Theme. With ATAs no longer around, should one still play a Themed Team? Although we don’t see it as much now, there have been more and more reasons to play Themed Teams, as WK has upped the synergies of keyword-related effects. Other than the fanboy reason (or comic book purists), there should be 3 main reasons to play Themed Team: Themed Team Probability Control, Map Choice, and Team Synergy. I believe you need at least 2 of the reasons to play one, otherwise, the benefits aren’t enough (mainly, a larger pool and choosing more efficient characters). You should really have all 3 reasons covered to maximize the benefits and to justify narrowing your figure pool.
