by Amber Collins
Hi guys! It’s another installment of the Rules Corner, an article series where we go over rulings made within the game – whether older overlooked rules or those recently made on the WIN Rules Forum – and how they affect the greater game. Today we’re going to be talking about the importance of names. Let’s get right into it.
Since the introduction of special powers and traits a character’s name – their Code Name or Real Name – has become significantly more important than it was in the Golden Days.
Mister Doctor? It’s Strange. It Certainly is.
One of the first rulings we’re going to be looking at came about as a sort of cover all band-aid solution to having multiple designers, creating multiple figures over the course of multiple years. Heroclix, as a game, has been around for fifteen years. This has led to a few continuity errors when it comes to certain characters that have a Title. For instance Reed Richards in one set may be called Mister Fantastic and in another Mr. Fantastic. Victor Von Doom may be called Dr. Doom or Doctor Doom. Barry Allen has been known as both Flash and The Flash. Nearly every effect that calls a character by name, requires an exact match. Except in these cases.
NAMING
[C] Abbreviated titles are considered the same as their long forms for determining a character’s name. For example, Dr. Octopus and Doctor Octopus are considered the same name.
[C] A character name preceded by a definite article is considered the same as that character name without a definite article. For example, Flash and The Flash are considered to be the same character name.
So, if you have a character that gets a bonus for attacking Dr. Doom, you’ll get that bonus if you’re attacking Doctor Doom as well. If you’re looking to Call In “The Flash” (in a Golden Age game), then “Flash” can answer the call as well.
Reinforcements are very Particular
Speaking of calling in characters, the rules for a character qualifying for an ID Card can get oddly specific. As most players know by now, there are two ways for a character to qualify as an ID Character. Either their Character Name (Codename, Superhero/Supervillain name) has to match the card or their real name has to match the ID Card. This starts to get tricky when you consider that these names have to match exactly. When looking for an exact match on a character name, Iron Man MK 7 or Iron Man and War Machine don’t qualify for the Iron Man card. Likewise when looking for a character to qualify for, say, the Venom ID Card, poor M15-009 Agent Venom loses out because the ID Card is looking for the Real Name: Flash Thompson and Agent Venom’s real name is listed as Eugene “Flash” Thompson.
Thankfully it isn’t required for the character to match both the Character Name and the Real Name. So Superman Red qualifies for the Superman Card because his Real Name is Clark Kent and Kamala Khan qualifies for the Ms Marvel ID Card because her Character name is still Ms Marvel.
The trickiest part of the ID qualifications is when you get Duo Characters and Characters who have worn the same costume. For the most part, as of right now, there isn’t a single Duo Character that can qualify as an ID Character. The character names usually have an ‘and’ or ‘&’ in them, which doesn’t match the exact name requirement. For those that actually have their Real Names listed on their card (many of the older duos had a qualifying name chart instead) there is usually an ‘&’ between the two names, which also doesn’t match the exact name requirements.
Why is this tricky? Because we have characters like Superior Spider-Man and ID Cards like Ronin. Superior Spider-man’s Real Name is listed as Peter Parker, Otto Octavius. Ronin’s ID Card lists it’s Real Name as Clint Barton, Maya Lopez, Eric Brooks, Marc Spector, Alexei Shostakov. Since these names are separated by a comma and not an ampersand they are considered separate names allowing Superior Spider-Man to qualify for the Spider-man ID Card and Hawkeye, Echo, Blade or Moon Knight to qualify for the Ronin ID Card.
What’s mine is mine and mine and mine. And mine and mine and mine! Not yours!
The final ruling we’re going to be looking at in regards to the specific nature of names in the game of Heroclix is the most recently debated rule. When a special power, ability, trait etc refers to a specific character, it only ever refers to that singular instance of that character. If your force includes more than one of the same character, when their card refers to them by name it is only referencing that one character.
For example:
HEALING FACTOR: When Wolverine clears action tokens, you may heal him 1 click
If your force includes one than one Wolverine but only one of them is UXM #006, only that Wolverine may heal when clearing actions tokens.
This rule also applies to any game effects produced by said character such as terrain markers, special markers or even Bystander tokens. If a character produces bystander tokens their powers only look for or are affected by their own bystander tokens even if your force includes more than one of the same character. This rule has been hotly debated due to the Civil War LE King Namor (CW#111 Namor).
IMPERIUS REX!: Give Namor a power action to place adjacent an Atlantean Warrior bystander -or- Give Namor a double power action to place adjacent two Atlantean Warrior bystanders. You may not use this power if there are more than 4 Atlantean Warrior bystanders on your force.
Namor’s ability to create Atlantean Warriors has a limit. However this limit is only placed on the specific Bystanders that particular Namor has placed. While any one Namor may only place 6 Atlantean Warriors, if there are multiple Namor’s on your force, there may be more than 6 Atlantean Warriors are the maps. For this ruling we go to the WIN’s Heroclix Rules Errata & Clarifications under the Bystanders clarifications.
[C]When a game effect allows a character to create bystanders, the effects of those bystanders and effects that created or applying to those bystanders only apply to the specific character that created the bystanders and not all same named characters, same named bystanders, or characters that can also create the same named bystanders.
Bonus Section! Breaking the Fourth Wall!
In true Deadpool fashion one of the recurring themes within the set was character’s whose powers included the wording “character with “Deadpool” in its name” such as Blind Al and Weasel. This allowed both of those figures to use their powers on not only Deadpool but also Evil Deadpool, Lady Deadpool and Deadpool and Bob (and for some Golden Age fun the upcoming Pirate Deadpool) Since the effects weren’t looking for an exact name, just ones that included the name Deadpool, it gave their powers a freedom that is very rarely awarded in Heroclix.
In all other cases when we’re talking about names in Heroclix, we want exact matches or that specific singular character.
