Greetings HeroClix Fans!
It’s time for another HeroClix preview from the upcoming Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles HeroClix: Heroes in a Half Shell set! Today, we are pleased to present the head of the Foot Clan’s New York branch and arguably the Turtles’ most famous foe. Please welcome Oroku Saki (aka Shredder)!
Based on his initial appearance in the 1984 Mirage Comics series, this version of Shredder has a point value of 50 and is built for close attacks. He has the standard speed, attack, defense and damage symbols and a fairly consistent set of combat values. His dial features two special powers in his defense and damage slots, respectively. Shredder’s defense special power, You Cannot Beat Me, Even Four to One, boosts his defense value by +1 for each opposing character within 3 squares. Shredder’s damage special power, Head of the New York Branch of the Foot, lets him use Leadership with a twist: On a successful roll for Leadership, Shredder can potentially remove action tokens from up to two adjacent friendly characters with the Foot Clankeyword regardless of point value. Head of the New York Branch of the Foot should be particularly useful if Shredder leads a swarm of low-point Foot Ninjas to add an extra action to your action pool and free up friendly characters for attacks by removing their action tokens.
The special powers aren’t the only interesting thing about Shredder. During his first battle against the Turtles, Shredder detonated a thermite grenade in a last-ditch attempt to destroy them. As a nod to this moment in TMNT history, Shredder has a trait called Thermite Grenade which comes into play when he’s KO’d from an attack. When Shredder is KO’d, all characters within 3 squares of the same elevation of the square he last occupied are dealt 3 penetrating damage. Thermite Grenade is a devastating trait for opponents who unwisely choose to get too close to an already weakened Shredder.
If you wish to include Shredder on a themed team, he has the Foot Clan, TMNT Villain and Martial Artistkeywords as options.
You’ll want to hold back Shredder initially to get some use out of the Leadership from his Head of the New York Branch of the Foot special power to add an extra action to your action pool and remove action tokens from teammates so they can keep wearing down opponents. The popular combination of Charge and Blades/Claws/Fangs at the start of Shredder’s dial will get him into a fight quickly and potentially deal plenty of damage. Should Shredder fall in battle, hopefully you’ve softened up any nearby opponents to give them a parting gift of penetrating damage from the Thermite Grenade trait – just make sure to keep your own characters out of the 3-square area of effect!
Thanks for reading! Join us again as we reveal more exciting characters and highlight strategies and team builds from the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles HeroClix: Heroes in a Half Shell set. Until then, keep on Shreddin’!
