Welcome back to another edition of X-Men at WTC! I'll be going over the different X-Men list people are bringing to the event, combing through affiliated characters, splashes, Team Tactics cards and scenario selection. Out of 33 teams, 22 chose to bring an X-Men list, making it tied with Criminal Syndicate for the most popular affiliation of the event.
Leaders and Leaderships
Let's go over the different leaders, leaderships and flavours of dual affiliations.
First, we have Storm at a whooping 22 inclusions. Making her a potential leader in every single X-Men list this year and one of the most taken models of the event. This is not really all that surprising, since she has been performing extremely well since both the last scenario rotation as well as the latest errata, which gave a lot of love to the Uncanny X-Men. Out of these lists, 6 are sporting a second X-Men leadership, with Xavier coming out second at 5 inclusions, and Cyclops being carried by a single brave player.
We have some dual-affiliations present here as well, all being pretty unique, with one bring a combination of Storm and Steve3, one with Storm and Black Bolt for a Inhumans dual and lastly a time-tested classic for Storm and Cable for an X-Men/X-Force duo.
Affiliated Models
Beast (21) is the most taken model after Storm and will not be a surprise for a lot of people. He stood the test of time as a strong, resilient and reliable model for the affiliation. His innate mobility, his inexpensive 50mm base for the X-Men jump as well as his excellent power economy makes him a key piece on pay to flips, which X-Men a running a lot of this year as well.
Emma Frost comes in third place this year with 16 inclusions. Thanks to two consecutive waves of buff this year, Emma's flexible control tools, with displacement on her builder and on a superpower on both Normal and Diamond Forms makes her a resilient control piece thanks to her suite of defensive abilities and health pool.
Iceman (15) follows Emma as one of the most taken models in the affiliation. Thanks to his recent health update, Iceman's mobility, area denial and ability to slow opposing models in addition to sporting a 50mm base makes him a valuable second pick for a mobile pay to flip team after Beast.
Logan (14) is back in force if we compare his inclusion to the year prior. The omnipresence of Apocalypse and Shang-Chi being things of the past gave Logan a window to make his grand revival. As a mobile brawler with excellent pay to flip stats, he remains a model that has a lot of what Storm's X-Men Gold is looking for, while also bringing another source of displacement.
Now we venture into the models that are taken in between 25-50% of lists
Magik (10) comes in as the first pick of mobile brawler at 3 threat. As the most inexpensive starter for Professor X's leadership while being able to move around the board, threatening opposing models and bringing a limited form of displacement with Journey Through Limbo, she definitely has a place in the lists she's taken in.
Gambit (8) was the first one to actually surprise me on that list. As a model that's fairly static, in a scenario rotation that emphasises movement and action compression. Gambit still brings a solid damage output and size 3 displacement on a an affiliated 3, giving him a role in the lists that included him.
X-23 (8) is next as another mobile brawler. While not as popular as she once was, X-23 still fills an important role in some of the X-Men lists as a different option to Magik. I suspect that, because she didn't receive any changes in the latest changes, some players are proportionally lower on her as a character than they were before.
Domino (7) comes up next as another model that was historically more popular in the affiliation. With her niche as a kaiju killer and very offensively driven model, the current scenario selection favours a lot of relatively wide maps and makes taller lists not as commanding as they've been in the past, her impact is not the highest it's been under Storm.
Coming last in this category is Angel (6) who provides a 3rd option of affiliated 3 with a 50mm and brings very useful displacement with Hostile Takeover, and can reposition allies as well. While not as popular as Beast or Iceman, he still offers a good alternative to them for the team format.
The last group of affiliated models I think falls into either a narrow niche, a subjective preference, or a concession of the team format.
Professor X (5) leads the group here mostly as an alternative leader to Storm and to provide flexibility for certain match ups or to force different decision points from the opposing player. Nightcrawler (5) and Multiple Man (5) bring additional tools with their mobility and contribute to the advantage Storm has on pay to flips. Other affiliated models present here are Shadowcat (3), Honey Badger (3), Rogue (2), Psylocke (2), Cyclops (1), Colossus (1), Bishop (1), Jean Grey (1), Cable (1) and Jubilee (1). With both Cyclops and Cable providing alternative leaderships. There's only 3, not so surprising, exclusions from the affiliated model lists with Phoenix, Wolverine and Havok not being taken in any of the lists. Phoenix and Wolverine have never performed as well as most of the other models taken in the variety of X-Men lists, while Havok is relatively recent much like Multiple Man and Jubilee, I suspect he hasn't been taken because he competes with other similar brawlers that are not very prevalent in the current scenario packet.
Unaffiliated models
The selection of unaffiliated model is one of the widest it's ever been for X-Men at WTC, with only 2 models being in more than 3 lists, which means there is a lot of personalisations, team format concessions, or dual affiliated choices.
Omega Sentinel (12) is by far the most popular splash for this iteration of the WTC. Coming in just over half the lists, she provides a complimentary option to Logan as a mobile pay to flip specialist that can also brawl if the need arises.
Blue Marvel (9) comes in second for very different reasons. Thanks to his inherent resilience, very strong offensive output, solid control option and defensive support, he provides a kind of catch all answer to some of the match ups X-Men doesn't like to see across the table, while X-Men Gold provides him with one of the most important thing not available on his kit; action compression.
Something worth noting, 3 players have chosen to bring out dual affiliated lists, starting with Storm-led X-Men and adding Steve3 led Avengers, Inhumans, or X-Force, to offer complementary alternatives to play or provide different options to deal with scenario combination or match ups their pilots prefer playing over Storm.
Much like the list of least picked affiliated models, I suspect most characters after Omega Sentinel and Blue Marvel, are picked as specific solutions to difficulties encountered by the list, personal preferences, concessions to the team format or to complement a second affiliated leadership or the dual affiliation. Here are the additional models taken for those who are curious; Ghost-Spider (3), Toad (3), USM (2), Doctor Voodoo (2), Nova (2), King T (2) and Black Bolt (2). The next models are the ones that only appear in a single list; Werewolf by Night, CGR, Sentinel Prime MK4, Namor, Juggernaut, Steve3, Luke Cage, Gwenom, Wrecking Crew, King Black Bolt, Gorgon, Medusa, Lockjaw, Enchantress, Mirage, Prowler, Corvus Glaive (Reality Gem), Proxima, Moondragon (Mind Gem), Black Cat, Red Skull2, Hulkbuster, Dr. Strange, Clea and Spectacular Spider-Man
Team Tactics Cards
For the Team Tactics Cards, there is a pretty clear consensus about what are the top cards with little to no surprises amongst the most popular choices.
The first group is composed of Xavier's Dream (22), To Me, My X-Men (22) and First Class (22) which are all taken in every single X-Men list. With the prevalence of pay to flips and existence of source extracts, First Class is pretty much a given. To Me, My X-Men is another very popular card thanks to it's inherent flexibility and it's ability to open up strong round 1 lines of play under Storm. Lastly, Xavier's Dream is a card that needs no introduction or justification as one of the best cards, if not the best card in the affiliation.
The next group of cards share a similar theme of defensive tech. With X-Men Gold usually wanting to score and close out the game as fast as possible, bring defensive cards to let you survive and keep a VP advantage as long as possible. Fall Back (16), Survival (15), Children of the Atom (15), Sacrifice (15) and Recalibration Matrix (12), Instant Recovery (8), Brace for Impact (6), Patch Up (5) and Indomitable (4) all fit that category.
We also have 3 fairly popular character cards with Headmistress (12) for Emma Frost, Cerebro (9) while probably mostly used with Emma, can still be played by Professor X and Jean Grey and lastly Journey Through Limbo (9) for Magik.
The remainder of the TTCs much like the characters, are mostly character cards, dual affiliated cards or tech cards for certain situations and they are; Warpath (2), Call for Backup (2), Multitasking (2) with Joint Effort, Seance, Avengers Assemble, Do You Know Who I Am, Heroes for Hire, Stronger Together, Inhuman Royal Family, Terrigenesis, Royal Guardians, Wisdom of the Ancestors, Confront the Demon Bear, Jonathan the Unstoppable, Mind if I Cut In, High Tech Heist, Execute, Extinction Event, Gotta Get Some Air, Cosmic Obliteration, Mental Domination, Crimson Dawn and Cat and Mouse appearing all once.
Crisis
Much like the TTC, most of the crisis are in a place where there is a pretty clear consensus about which ones to bring. First, let's go over the secures. Guardians Save Shi'ar Empress comes in every roster with 22 inclusions. X-Men Infiltrate (21), Strike Team (21) and Mutant Madmen (20) follow suit with an overwhelming amount of inclusions, showing a very clear preference for wide pay to flips. Following them is Power Overload (11) in half of the lists, as a 5th fast scoring secure, on the wider side to make rotation and control easier. Infinity Formula (6) as a similar pick of wide scoring map, but is probably more taken thanks to it's threat level, which X-Men is usually more comfortable on than higher threats like Power Overload. Then we have the secures which are not quite as popular or are there for the second affiliation and leadership, with Scoundrels (3), Safe Shelters (3), Deadly Meteors (2) and Assault Ships (1), with no appearances of Lockdown or Wedding Party as they are some of the slowest and brawliest secures in the current rotation.
The extracts follow a similar pattern, albeit not as pronounced as the secures. Wide and fast-scoring set-ups are the most popular, with Scientific Samples (19), Unexpected Guests (16), Inhuman Weaponry (16), Spider-Infected (15) and Senators (12) being taken in the majority of lists. The last extract seems like a more divisive choice, as Skrulls (10), Sentinel Schematics (7), Surprise Assault (6) and Jailbreak (5) being not quite as popular, and finally Experimental Soldiers (3), Savalged Supplies (1) and Alien Ship (1) either being present in low numbers or not at all.
Overall, we can see that X-Men has a very clear place and strength in the current scenario packet, in addition to it's usually popularity, which explains why they're tied for the most popular affiliation of the event. I don't think there ever was an instance of WTC where X-Men had such a clearly definied role and preferences for their team compositions, which definitely makes it interesting to see where people choose to vary and what they think will perform well at the event.
I would like to thank all of the people who made the event possible, the WTC Comittee, the players and event organizers, as well as Dan for providing easy documents to parse through all the numbers.
Thanks for reading this article and as always, don't forget to have fun!
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