We were just graced with the reveal of Bishop! A highly anticipated X-Man with the ability to absorb and store energy of all kinds, Bishop brings to the table many up benefits to what we can assume are his home affiliations (X-Men and X-Force) and may even have some benefits for our friendly Neighborhood Web Team! Today, we will be looking at Bishop as a possible member of your Web Warrior team. Remember, this is all speculation and my personal thoughts on the model. I can be wrong and have been wrong in the past, so please do not take this as gospel.
First and foremost, Bishop is a 4 threat model with a 3/4/3 stat line and 6/5 health. This, if we are being honest, isn’t the best stat line in the game and is rivaled by one of my favorite 3 threats in Web Warriors - The Lizard. Lizard boasts a similar stat line with some nice additions in the form of Damage Reduction and Healing Factor (1). Both of these boys are medium movers on medium bases. So, why even consider Bishop when we have a perfectly scaly boy already as a splash for cheaper? Mutant Energy Absorption (MEA). This ability works on any damage type and gives Bishop energy to boot. Considering on physical and mystic attacks Bishop has a ~37% chance to have a wild and on energy attacks he has ~46% chance, these figures go even higher under Mile’s leadership to ~43% and 52% respectively. Hitting the Wild trigger in his defense doesn’t just blank out an opposing success but may rob your enemy of crucial triggers as well. I think this is a big deal for Bishop as an inclusion because it means he is someone your opponent is going to have to be wary of attacking in fear of big retaliation attacks from his spender and throw.
Speaking of his throw, Bishop comes stock with a size 4 terrain or character throw with a medium range for 3 power. This is huge for removing obstacles from points or just performing the best CC in the game: Death. I look at this throw in two main scenarios (obviously there are more, but these are the two big ones for me):
- Bishop just tosses a character off of a point. The amount of size 5 characters is very, very low (3 so far), so having to worry about Dormammu or Sentinels (HAHAHAHAHAHA) is not something that pops up often. Bishop just being able to say “mine” on a point is a big deal, especially with how hard he is to shift from a point. This is only compounded for fighting teams in that now they have to decide if they want to try to get through Bishop and possibly give him enough power to just throw them off the point the next turn or even give him enough to do his spender so that he possibly gets a push and slow on them as well.
- Bishop shotguns his opponent for 10 dice (with a possible incinerate added for spiciness) and then throws a large piece of terrain at them. The best damage is consistent damage, and his ability to throw a size 4 piece of terrain at your opponent for 5 incoming auto-damage is nothing to sneeze at, especially if you make them burn Brace early. With a couple of damage on average coming in from his normal attack plus the auto damage from his terrain or character throw you are looking at consistently dazed or dead characters depending on your target.
Some of the downsides I see with Bishop is his lack of hard durability and his Overload ability. When I say hard durability I mean re-rolls or static defensive abilities like healing factor and damage reduction. While I touted the greatness of Mutant Energy Absorption earlier, it does require that you hit a wild. When it happens it’s gonna be great. When it doesn’t you may feel like Bishop is garbage for our faction. It will be a gamble. I know why we didn’t get something like damage reduction for Bishop and, to be honest, I am glad we didn’t. I can see how it may be thematic to have damage reduction to 0 as a way to show him better absorbing the hits along with the actual absorbing ability, but that would be insane on the table defensive wise.
Overload is also a point of concern. If you aren’t careful with your power management then you are just going to take damage. Bishop has 4 sources of power generation (damage from his builder, damage taken, MEA, and power phase). You need to dump power on Bishop as often as possible so as to not take damage, but if your opponent just decides to pump fire into you then there isn’t much you can do about being chipped, and, as any veteran of MCP knows, one damage can legitimately be the difference between dazed/dead and scoring a crucial point.
Overall, I think that if you are comfortable being up close and personal with your opponent and going last with Bishop that he may have a place in Web Warriors. It may be to early to tell just by looking at him as to whether or not he is going to be a suitable Web Warrior, as he may come with a game defining TTC such as This is a Robbery or Deception. Who knows? I know that I am personally getting this box to test him out and then dangerously flirt with X-Force sometime in the near future. What do you guys and gals think? Will Bishop be a power battery for our success, or a dim bulb left to other factions?
Till next time Web Slingers.
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