by Emilio Gutierrez
Hey Apex Insiders!
It’s been a while for me, but after a few months hiatus and only hitting Top 4s and some Top 2s at the events I did play in, I finally won my first event since 2017! I played at the $1k Trial at Majestix this past weekend (Feb 15).
Here’s what I ended up playing:
(Click to Buy!)
Infinity 75
Vulture prime 50
Lydea Mallor 79
Wesley Crusher 15
Big Tony 15
Joker Gas Canister 3
Doc Ock Arms 10
Power Plant 30
Gamma Bomb 5
Zatanna ID 5
Hawkeye ID 5
Hulk ID 5
Iceman Student ID 3
Total: 300
Maps: Amok Time, Gotham Waterfront, Genosha
Well, so here’s how I came up with the team. I was almost going to play my Infinity Gardener build that I took to a trial several months back, but play-tested it a few days ago and just didn’t have the faith in it that I used to have. (Pro Tip: if you don’t have faith in your build, don’t play it. It’d be like going into a match with your coach and friends not believing in you. You gotta trust your build)
So the day before the tournament, I hit the drawing board. What did I like about the team? (Infinity) What did I not like about that team? (It doesn’t do enough damage or score enough points) And lastly, Why did that team not feel right? (The pieces just freaking died). So I went back to the drawing board (read: Units section) and thought about what I could do to fix it by looking back on other teams I played before as well as pieces I haven’t played yet to see what options I had.
Well, it came down to this. I gotta play Power Plant (at least until they call me the Power Plant guy) and I gotta play Infinity because infinity and the Power Plant are literally best friends. Seriously, almost all the rings compliment Infinity really well. Then I thought about my last team I loved, (Tangent Green Lantern, Colossals and Vulture Prime), then I thought about pieces I’ve been dying to play: Lydea Mallor. I got to thinking and found a way to fit all three of these ideas together, and thus you have the build listed above.
So the Vulture Prime, Big Tony, Wesley Crusher, Joker Canister and Doc Ock arms mostly speak for themselves: Pump Vulture, clean up the pieces then clean up the map. With those pieces + Power Plant, on my second turn, it’ll take two actions to get Vulture Prime to +2 Speed, +3Atk, +3Dmg. The way it works is you spend turn one giving the Vortex Beam (TK/Flight) to Big Tony or Wesley, TK the arms to the Birdman, equip the Birdman. Then turn two, you Free Place thing with Infinity, spend an action with infinity to pop the gas canister, perplex with Tony and Wesley, TK another 6, sidestep up, burn a ring (for the sweet +1 stats), and you’ve got a 7 square charge [9/2 + 1 (ring) + 1 (Infinity’s passive trait)] with giant reach, basically reaching from row 2 to row 22 in a turn [24 if you get to sidestep twice with Vulture] swinging for a 14 atk, 6 damage Flurry with battle fury. You know what this combination is capable of and that’s exactly why I played it. It’s 93points of the build dedicated to that vulture swing, which IMO is a fair point sink to threaten that much damage turn 2 without dedicating too much to it.
The other big (you might even say Colossal!) part of the team is Infinity. Her resume reads: 75pts, 12-Range, 2 bolts with Outwit, Precision Strike and Barrier. Only 4 clicks of life, but she generally gets away with it. She can be super annoying with her -1Rng/-1Spd to the opposing team but most importantly, she synchronizes amazingly with the Power Plant. Electro Blast ring? Gives her +1 Range, Damage and an extra bolt. Flame Blast? Penetrating/Psy-Blast and Energy Explosion. Black Light? Drop her free Smoke in their squares and they have -3Rng/-3Spd for their turn (Turning a 10spd, 7rng Running Shot into a 2Spd/4rng Running Shot). It’s not scoring any points, but you can bet it’s annoying as hell. And that’s just to name a few. Her 12 range with 2 bolts was also very helpful since she can pick off some damage from halfway across the map and possibly score some points. And at 75points, she can Call in Hulk, Hawkeye, or Iceman for some extra attacks.
Lastly, the only piece on the team I haven’t played before was Lydea Mallor. She’s not played too much and I can see why. 79pts is probably the worst point value she could have been because she’s SOO close to being to Call Green Arrow in for a turn, but I guess she just doesn’t have his number (eyy!). Here’s the thing about Lydea, she gets talked about a lot and obviously against Battery teams she can be detrimental. But…In my opinion, I don’t think she’s worth it. Yeah, I got to take a ring one game, a sin in another game, a Phoenix Force Fragment, and a Mandarin ring in another, but it just couldn’t shake the feeling that I spent almost 80pts [but not quite 80pts, ugh] to set my opponent back like 5 points in their plan on average. None of my opponents seemed to really be set back by her taking a relic and since I wasn’t themed, I rarely got to go first and take a ring off of a Battery. She did some attacks and absorbed some hits, but bottom line, I put her on the team ‘cause I wanted to try her out and now that I did, I don’t think I would spend 79pts [again, UGH] to play her again.
Brief rundown of the event, there were 11 high caliber players, most of which placed high and a bunch of previous events, (looking at you Rob, Tony, Steve, and Richard,) and definitely play more than me. Really, the event could have gone to any of us, so don’t take my advice and analysis to be weighted any more than theirs just because I won. If anything, their advice is worth more because they play more.
Anyway, there were a few highlights of my Swiss rounds, my first round was a loss against Rob Gallagher and his Green Lantern/Danger Room Construct team. We played Lydea “wrong” technically game-wise it was a legal play, but it obviously wasn’t optimal since he went first and let me take his ring. I positioned poorly and miscounted that Knockback against the constructs is still only one square because of their Max 1-damage thing. This left a HUGE miscount in damage that led to the loss. The fun part about this game though, is that in a last ditch effort move to get points, I assigned Disintegration Beam to Lydea and attempted to Disintegrate the Green Battery. I rolled Crits. It happened. Everyone cheered. There was a standing ovation. Then the next turn proceeded to lose the whole game.
My second round was against Kristian Trujillo playing a double starter Hulk Pandora’s box team. The be succinct, he used a Harley Quinn call in to disable Vulture and Infinity, but I was able to call in Hawkeye with Lydea on the following turn and decimate his team. The great part about this game though, was after we tallied up and turned in points, we sat there for a while and just discussed the game. What could he have done differently for a different outcome? We played out different scenarios over and over about our positioning and choices [not dice, IMPORTANT] to see how the game could have gone differently [think Dr. Strange checking out all the different possible futures]. And I cannot stress this enough, if you lose [or even win a game] one of the best things you can do is discuss the game with your opponent. What could you have done differently to win [if you lost] and what could you have done differently to win better [if you won]. Normally I see players discuss these ideas as if “what if the dice came up this way, or if I hit that Senses, then it’d be different” but this moment with Kristian was enlightening. We both got to become better players because of it. And improving yourself as a player by talking about your games with other players is one of the best things you can take away from a tournament. If you want to get better, my advice is don’t blame your dice, and talk about your decision making (Editor’s Note: Emilio as a player embodies everything that a high-level player should be because of his mindset, as illustrated in this right here).
Round 3 was against Chris Stats, one of my friends from my playgroup and one of the worst players I’ve ever seen. No, to be honest he’s really great. He’s an unusual team builder playing a team that we’ve been trying to perfect over the last few years, the Mistress Death, Doctor Locke, Groot team. This team has a lot of moving parts I don’t want to get into here, but you should know that it has four colossals, and six Walking Woods. Meaning Vulture has an All-you-can-eat buffet, and that’s exactly what happened. I did everything I had to for the Vulture combo and his team was wiped by the end of turn 2. 300-5, where his only points were the Joker Canister and a ring I burned.
My Top 4 match was against Richard Medina, he’s won against me in a top 4 match a while back with the Celebrity Lex team and this time he was playing Mini Shredder, Lydea and a bunch of Carnages, Surtur and Groot with Power Plant. After a comedic start where both of our Lydea’s stole each other’s Vortex Beams from the Plant, this SHOULD have been an easy match. I mis-positioned and he called out a Green Arrow with Mini, doing four damage to Vulture [which shouldn’t have happened] and set me back the next few turns. This match was littered with misplays where I missed an opportunity to Vulture in and KO everything except Mini and Lydea, but it culminated in the last misplay being he brought in a Super Friends Firestorm towards the end of the game, allowing me to easily call in Iceman to KO it to take the game. Again, I could have blamed the dice here where I missed a 6 to KO his Mini, or when he rolled a 4 to miss an attack against my called out Hawkeye, but it really comes down to I missed an opportunity to Vulture his whole team, and he misplayed by putting Firestorm on the board. It was a learning opportunity for both of us. [It ended 165-168 my favor]
On the other hand, the finals match was against Rob Gallagher again, who I seem to get paired against frequently in top cut matches! He’s a great player and I think we both played optimally until the last few turns when his Gamma Bomb could have gone off to detonate my whole team except Lydea, but he opted to try and shut down his own Gamma Bomb because it also would have detonated his whole squad except Sabretooth. It’s a tough position to be in that I wasn’t jealous of. Basically, this game boiled down to me having the last turn and I needed attack with Infinity with a 10-Atk gainst a 17-ESD Magneto and an 18-ESD Tri-Sentinel. I called in Zatanna to have a Prob out and said a silent prayer as I rolled the dice, hit the 10 and that was game. I picked up an extra 105pts to clench the game at the last second. Rob’s a great player and I think he played the game the best that he could, leaving it down to dice in the end.
All-in-all, this team was solid, and I enjoyed playing it. I’m not sure if I would run it again because while the Vulture thing is satisfying, it’s very preventable and requires a little bit more set up than I’m comfortable with. I don’t think Lydea is worth the 79 [UGH] point investment unless you have 79pts left over and she fits your theme, [like on a Slate team] but even then it’s a small gimmick to pay a lot for. Anyway guys, that was the team I played! If you ever see me on Facebook, feel free to message me to talk about the game or whatever teams you have cooking! I’m not always available, but when I am, I’m more than happy to just talk about the game with you!
Remember, when in doubt, Perplex the attack!
Unless that’s Pat’s thing. If I can’t say that, let’s say I ended with, “If you want to get better, don’t blame your dice, blame yourself.”
