Battle for Breath 2026: Battle Report

Hello and welcome back!

Today I'll be covering my performance and the games I played recently at Battle for Breath, a fundraising event for Cystic Fibrosis, at which we were 30 attending players.

Before I go into the games themselves, I'll cover the list I brought to the event.

Characters

Storm: The only leader in my list, Storm provides a very unique leadership with the colloquially called "X-Men Jump" which basically lets you give a character an almost full medium move for 1 power, provided they are not holding an extract. As a character, she is still somewhat fragile but I think the changes to crisis pool have been very favorable to the style of gameplay she favors.

Beast: Another all star, Beast has always been a workhorse for X-Men. Thanks to his mobility and resilience, as well as having a very accessible throw, he is a reliable role player for the list.

Domino: Domino has some of the best offensive output for her threat and arguably even a threat above. She can either serve as a resilient extract holder or can help fight off very attrition focused lists.

X-23: Another fairly brawly model, X-23 helps bring out more offensive pressure while also being very mobile to help play some of the new scenarios (mostly sources and pay to flips).

Emma Frost: A relative newcomer to my competitive X-Men list, Emma's latest update has made her a very reasonable choice under most X-Men leaderships. Thanks to her ability to displace models on either normal or diamond form, in addition to being more resilient. She also brings Headmistress as an affiliated card which opens up more mobility options.

Logan: Much like Domino and X-23, Logan brings out some offensive pressure, in addition to great mobility, access to displacement and great pay to flip stats, making him a very solid role player on the table.

Doctor Voodoo: One of the all time staples for X-Men Gold, Doctor Voodoo brings one of the best extract steals available in the game, that is mostly held back by the fact the model is relatively immobile, which is fixed by Storm's leadership. While the apparition of source extracts makes him somewhat a worse performer and not as much of an every game piece as he was in the past, he still brings invaluable tools as both a decent brawler and an extract stealer.

Omega Sentinel: A brand new model released relatively recently, Omega Sentinel seems like she was tailor-made for X-Men. With a long move, access to two rerolls on attack, a charge and rerolls on pay to flips, she provides a very reliable work horse that can both dish out damage and play the scenario extremely well.

Prowler: Similarly to Omega Sentinel, Prowler brings a lot of what X-Men tend to both look for and excel at. With his high mobility, decent offensive output and inherent ability to play both pay to flips and source extracts well. He fits right in with what this list wants to do.

Blue Marvel: The most recent terror of MCP. Blue Marvel brings incredible damage, excellent control and defensive tech for both himself and your other models. With a 6 dice builder at R4 that count counts, a R3 throw that throws characters medium and his defensive reroll bubble at R3, the only thing he's missing is movement compression which he can trivially get with X-Men Gold makes him nothing short of terrifying to face.

Games

Game #1: X-Men Gold vs Midnight Sons. Shi'ar Empress/Unexpected Guests (17)

Teams: Storm, Beast, X-23, Doctor Voodoo, Omega Sentinel vs Else Bloodstone, Dr. Strange, Werewolf by Night, Baron Mordo

Going into this game, I wasn't too sure about what to expect since I had very little experience against Else Bloodstone, so I opted to play relatively cagey during the opening round. Because I was playing 1 model wider than my opponent, I knew I was going to get last activation. So I kept Omega Sentinel to flip one of the secures and get an early advantage. During round 2 I was able to take an activation away from my opponent and steal an extract giving me a big swing turn that my opponent couldn't recover from before I closed the game 18-10

Game #2: X-Men Gold vs Spider-Foes. Strike Team/Scientific Samples (17)

Teams: Storm, Beast, X-23, Doctor Voodoo, Omega Sentinel vs Green Goblin, Electro, Rhino, Lizard, Rocket Racoon

Going into this game, my plan was to out rotate my opponent, try to take over as many secures as I could with my squad and break the extract parity with Doctor Voodoo as soon as I could. With the extract on Rocket, I was able to steal it relatively early. Combined with a dice spike from X-23 to steal a Rhino activation, it let me take a controlling VP lead and keep the extracts away from my opponent more efficiently. Even with the swing turn and Robbery from Rhino, I was able to flip a contested secure with Omega Sentinel to seal the game away 18-11.

Game #3: X-Men Gold vs Guardians of the Galaxy. Power Overload/Alien Ship (19)

Teams: Storm, Domino, Emma Frost, Omega Sentinel, Blue Marvel vs Adam Warlock (Bonded Soul/Reality), Moondragon (Mind), Rocket Racoon, Nebula, Baron Zemo

Going into this game, I knew I had to bring tools to control Adam Warlock and fight my way out of the scenario combination. With 7 VPs on the board and two scenarios that damage models, I thought I was in for a rough time. I took a risk round 1 of going down on extracts and letting my opponent take the lead to apply more offensive pressure with Blue Marvel by enabling him with Storm's leadership, forcing out Indomitable on round 1. My opponent and I traded attacks, but with first activation I was able to take an attrition lead and get the first two KOs relatively early on round 3 by removing Zemo and Moondragon with Blue Marvel, Omega Sentinel and Emma Frost. Being ahead on attrition allowed me to take back the VP deficit and thanks to Blue Marvel throwing Adam Warlock every round, it eased a lot of offensive pressure on my models and let me run away with the score 16-11.

Game #4: X-Men Gold vs Shield (Invaders). Mutant Madmen/Inhuman Weaponry (18)

Teams: Storm, X-23, Logan, Omega Sentinel, Doctor Voodoo vs Namor, Hawkeye, Rescue, Baron Zemo, Omega Sentinel.

Going into this game, I knew I had to take a somewhat unorthodox squad, since the presence of both Rescue and Omega Sentinel were liable to make Beast's life pretty hard even if the scenario combination was one of his preferred set ups. During squad construction I debated a lot between picking Doctor Voodoo and Prowler and ended up picking Doctor Voodoo as a tool to break parity on extracts when I could. Thanks to a pretty aggressive round 1 play from my opponent, I managed to take a commanding lead on both scenario and attrition early in the game and trade my Doctor Voodoo for both Baron Zemo and Hawkeye. Unfortunately for me, not picking Prowler also meant my team was not as mobile and I couldn't rotate on secures as well as I could've had. Combined with a few missed uncontested pay to flips it eased the pressure on my opponent enough to allow him to come back into the game with continued aggressive plays, taking my Logan off the board and winning 15-16.

Unfortunately for me, that was the end of the event and I was left unable to play the last round because I am still recovering from a major injury and reconstructive surgery which had left me unable to play for a few months already. I had a great time playing MCP again especially with friends and for a good cause.

Overall, I'm very satisfied of my performance and my list, especially because it had been a while since my last in person tournament and I didn't know if I was still able to physically play MCP. I want to take the time to thank all my opponents in this event for being considerate and accommodating of my condition, I want to thank the TO and all the people who donated time and money for Cystic Fibrosis (for which over 10k was collected!)

Thanks for taking the time to read this piece and as always, don't forget to have fun!