MCP - Latest Convocation Learnings, Part 2

Note:

As, before, I'm assuming the reader has some familiarity with Marvel Crisis Protocol rules and terminology here (like knowing that TTC stands for Team Tactics Cards). If not, I'll write up an MCP primer if:

• I have any readers

• Enough of them ask.

This is part 2 of my takeaways from my latest Convocation dabbling in Marvel Crisis Protocol. It is very much a follow on from part 1, which you can find here:

Latest Convocation Learnings, Part 1

Part 1 Recap

• I needed more of a hit and run strategy on non Iron Bound Books turns.

• I didn't put enough thought into my Secure Crises.

• With three 5 threats in my roster, I had to make some hard squad choices. One more three threat, at the expense of one of the 4 threats.

• I wanted more dice fixing and Body Guard.

• Dracula was not the right splash for this roster. He just didn't have enough action economy.

  
  

The New Roster

This is the roster I came up with, changes are in italics. Again, thank you Cerebro for text.

Characters (10): Threat: 37

Ancient One (4)

Baron Mordo (3)

Doctor Strange, Sorcerer Supreme (5)

Doctor Voodoo (4)

Doctor Strange (5)

Magik (3)

Wong (2)

Clea (3)

Namor, the Sub-Mariner (5)

Luke Cage (3)

Tactics (10):

Brace for Impact (R)

Iron-Bound Books of Shuma-Gorath

Journey Through Limbo

Orb of Agamotto

Patch Up (R)

Plane of Pohldahk

Seance

The Bar with No Doors

Heroes for Hire

Prince's Protection

Secure Crisis:

Super-Powered Scoundrels Form Sinister Syndicate! (F, 20)

M'Kraan Crystal Gets Heroes Home! (, 19)

Lockdown! Security Systems Stymie Breakout (, 18)

Mayor Fisk Vows to Find Missing Witnesses (H, 16)

Deadly Meteors Mutate Citizens (I, 17)

Extract Crisis:

Fear Grips World as "Worthy" Terrorize Cities (D, 18)

Struggle for the Cube Continues (F, 17)

Skrulls Infiltrate World Leadership (J, 20)

Mutant Extremists Target U.S. Senators! (L, 19)

Inhumans Deploy Advanced Weaponry (, 18)

Unexpected Guests Crash Royal Wedding (F, 17)

The Character Changes

As I discussed, Dracula wasn't cutting it for me. Namor seemed a better choice. He has more action economy with Imperius Rex charge, and the possibility of a stagger makes makes him very tasty indeed.

Aside from the charge, he's a Long mover, blessed with extra movement. his Trident attack has an extra Short move, and his spender, Armies of the Deep, attack has the possibility of another extra Short move.

Armies of the Deep also has the possibility of enemy displacement or can cause the target to drop an Asset Objective it's carrying (though not a Civilian Objective, an important distinction). You can choose which of the three to use when you select the attack, and the chosen Effect is not gated on damage or a die trigger. It's cheap, only 3 Power for 7-die physical attack with a guaranteed Effect.

As a bonus, it's fun to announce "Armies of the Deep with a Swarm of Crabs" or "Armies of the Deep with a Wave of Turtles"

With his reroll bubble, and Prince's Protection TTC, Namor checks all the boxes. Shutting off enemy damage reduction is just gravy.

Now, I needed a 3 threat. It wasn't a hard decision. Luke Cage has a built in body guard, 4 Physical Defense, and damage reduction. Plus Heroes For Hire gives him a place, a Body Guard and an enemy Throw if Luke is still standing after the attack.

Luke is just the kind of pal you want on non Iron Bound Books turns.

The big question was who to drop to fit Luke in. I needed to roll out a 4 Threat. That was my issue with Squad building.

My choices were the Ancient One, Blade, or Doctor Voodoo.

It wasn't going to be Doctor Voodoo, He's a rock. The Ancient One would seem to ripe for replacement, but I had something of an Ancient One epiphany (see part one). Blade, on the other hand, rarely made it into my squad. Most of what I would use him for was done better by Dracula in the last Roster, and it seemed the same for Namor.

Plus, the Ancient One is Affiliated.

Hit the road, Blade.

Dropping Blade as one of my damage dealers meant that Namor was going to be in every squad which would negatively affect my 'play wide' strategy.

Team Tactics Cards

Both of my splashes have TTCs stapled to them, so I needed to drop 2.

The Book of Cagliostro was already out, one more to go.

Séance and Journey Through Limbo were keepers for their characters. I might change one Restricted card for another Restricted card, but not drop one of them entirely. The Bar With No Doors and Iron Bound Books of Shuma-Gorath weren't going anywhere.

I had to drop one of the three remaining Affiliated TTCs, Plane of Pohldahk, Orb of Agamotto, or Bane of Damballah.

Orb of Agamotto was too useful to throw away. Plane of Pohldahk is an excellent damage multiplier, but neither splash benefits from it. Bane of Damballah can hand out Root, which is a great condition to inflict, but requires a trigger and a certain positioning on my opponent's part.

In the end, I kept Plane of Pohldahk.

Crises

I was pretty happy with my Extracts, but felt my Secures needed some thought.

Lockdown, Super Sibilant Scoundrels and M'Kraan were fine. They had the "close but not too close" layout I was looking for.

Extremis is a D shape, which I didn't like. With all the healing in my roster, the healing aspect wasn't that big of a draw..

Infinity Formula is a B shape. Not terrible, but I'd prefer my secures a tad closer.

So, drop Extremis and Infinity Formula. Now what to replace them with?

This time around, I wasn't married to the "play wide, score early" philosophy. I also wasn't as concerned about tighter layouts. I picked Deadly Meteors and Mayor Fisk.

Deadly Meteors is a pay to flip, but based on Energy Defense, not Physical. That's OK. The damage on Skull wasn't a concern, because my Roster is stocked with healing.

Mayor Fisk was a bigger stretch. In the part 1 version of this roster, I was dead set against it. In general, Convocation doesn't do well in clumps It is a Secure, not a Control Objective, so no pay to flip, that's a plus. Stun is a potential problem, but Wong can strip Status Conditions and, at 2 points, is easy to fit in a squad.

How It Worked

Much better this time.

The W/L ratio was not better, but all of my games were close. The result often hinged on a die or two bouncing the wrong way. As opposed to being slaughtered or being completely outscored.

Even though a majority of my games were played against Warlock-led Guardians. Again.

I'm going to call the new Roster a keeper.

General Observations

• In general, I was more concerned with keeping characters alive rather than going really wide, which worked out really well.

• This Roster is surprisingly effective on 16 Threat Crises. Namor, OG Strange, Magik and Clea is pretty darn solid, and other affiliations can struggle if they aren't prepared for 16. With only three 16 threat secure and no 16 threat extracts, it doesn't come up that often, but it can be a surprise when it does.

• Twice my opponent fielded Squads with zero Physical attacks, just Energy (he claimed he didn't do it on purpose). At first, I was a bit miffed at wasting a TTC slot with a card I couldn't use. Later I realized that sacrificing a TTC slot to ensure I was never targeted with a Physical attack was a pretty good deal.

• Overall positioning was better.

• I was overall happy with Luke Cage in the Roster slot previously held by Blade.

• Neither Luke Cage nor Namor benefited from Moons of Munnopor or Plane of Pohldahk, but I didn't care.

• The Ancient One again proved useful, despite expectations.

Character Changes

Overall, character changes functioned very well.

Namor

Namor quickly became a member of my core team.

Namor has a delightful amount of movement shennagins. Aside from his charge, and his Long movement, he's a (triggered) extra movement in his builder and possible extra movement in Armies of the Deep, his spender.

Let's talk Armies of the Deep for a minute. Depending on the option you chose, he can displace enemies, cause the target to drop an Asset Objective (though not a Civilian Objective, an important distinction) or interact for free with any number of Objective tokens then move. All without a trigger.

AOTD is cheap. 3 Power for a 7 die Physical attack with reroll whose damage can't be reduced.

As a bonus, it'sjust plain fun to announce "Armies of the Deep with a Swarm of Crabs" or "Armies of the Deep with a Wave of Turtles"

With his reroll bubble, and Prince's Protection TTC, Namor checks all the boxes.

Look! He's over here!

Now, he's over there!

Luke Cage

A tremendous addition. Heroes for Hire, Too Dangerous To Ignore, Unbreakable Skin and a Physical defense of 4 make him the body guard of my dreams. He didn't always make my roster, but I never regretted fielding him.

Luke and Voodoo holding a flank (not my Wong, heh).

Everybody loves Luke.

General play pattern was using Heroes for Hire to place close enough to the attacker to use Too Dangerous To Ignore on subsequent attacks. Then he was in position to do some damage with his attacks and Street Fighter.

The throw on Sweet Christmas didn't hurt either.

All in all, a highly effective addition.

'Nuff said.

Tactics Cards

Not much to say. Namor and Luke's cards were as useful as expected, and I didn't miss the cards I dropped.

Conclusions

I was very happy with the Roster changes, and don't feel the need to tinker further.

Now that my Roster is stable, it's time to put it on the shelf and move on to something else.

I'm flighty like that.

-- Lex