G.I. JOE and COBRA are arriving to reinforce the ranks of the Valkyrie in Valhalla! This wave will introduce more soldiers, agents, and ninjas to fill out your Heroscape ranks. Let’s take a look to see how this all fits within the current Heroscape contemporary meta. 

New Low Point Cost Common Figures

When trying to create an Army for an event, we are often left with points that don’t quite add up to the total we need, so we finish out the Army with what we call filler units. Isamu (10 points) and Marcu Esenwein (20 points) have been staples in countless Armies over the years because of their low cost and versatility. G.I. JOE introduces two fantastic units that will also fulfill this filler role: the Battle Copter and COBRA Flight Pod, both of which are common heroes with the Battle Ready ability. We discussed the power of the X-Flex in a previous article, but Battle Ready is the epitome of the X-Flex. Your opponent must always be aware that, as long as they see an Order Marker on your Battle Copter or COBRA Flight Pod, you could switch your Order Marker for a line or explosion attack. Battle Ready gives you board control with just an X Order Marker. 

The Copter and Flight Pod have 2 Life and 4 Defense, which gives them some survivability, and Flying gives them the mobility to move around the map. The Copter has more Move and Range with its line attack, but a well-timed explosion from a Flight Pod can absolutely wreck Heavy Gruts crowding around Grimnak. I fully expect to see Battle Copters and COBRA Flight Pods in tournament-winning Armies. 

COBRA Troopers – A Soon-to-be Staple In The Contemporary Heroscape Meta

The COBRA Flight Pod comes in the same box as the COBRA Troopers. The Troopers look unthreatening at first, with their base Attack of 1. However, when we put all the pieces together, they may very well be the most dominant Army currently and are poised to take over the competitive meta. The Troopers get boosted with adjacent Unique COBRA figures and bond with Warlords and Profiteers, giving them some similarities to Arrow Gruts and Swog Riders. 

So what do you bring with the Troopers? With the incoming COBRA Warlord and Profiteer Heroes, plus all the Warlords in All-Time, the Troopers have 11 bonding options, second only to the Scions of Icaria (link).

Serpentor has great stats, and with his Double Attack of 4, he wants to be on the front lines. Cruelty For Its Own Sake lowers the Defense of all surrounding figures. This does a few things: it increases his attack beyond 4 (assuming the opponent isn’t fielding Ranoc Vipers), and it disincentivizes you from placing your own figures adjacent to him. Since the Troopers want to be adjacent to their unique COBRA Heroes, this makes him less than ideal for them, but he will shine in All-Time in a Roman Legionnaire build. 

COBRA Commander is one of the few ranged Warlord bonders, but Cutlassss of COBRA gives him much-needed stabbing power if he gets up close and personal instead of relying on his ranged attack. Where he really shines, though, is with I’ll Get You Next Time. COBRA Commander can do all types of things with this: hide behind a ruin, advance closer to your opponent’s support units, jump on a glyph, or slip away from melee attackers.  Concentrating attacks on his 3 Defense/6 Life is going to be tricky for your opponent. He is likely a middle-of-the-road pick for both Troopers and Legionnaires. 

Destro introduces Tech Glyphs to Heroscape with his Gunrunner ability: Jump Pack, Nanite Shielding, and Nanotoxin Coating (see Destro’s link for these cards). There are many different ways to incorporate these glyphs into your Army, such as flying to height with the Jump Pack, using the auto-shield once per round with Nanite Shielding, or having Nanotoxin Coating dealing an extra wound—perhaps giving you just the edge you needed to pull ahead in a close game. Beryllium Steel Mask gives Destro much-needed defense against ranged attacks to make up for his low Defense value, and Personal Arsenal gives him two attacks per turn. Teaming him up with Troopers gives you six ranged attacks with just one Order Marker!  This can absolutely devastate unique-heavy builds that lose efficiency as soon as they take their first loss. 

The Troopers really need multiple Unique COBRA figures to be successful. Fielding both Destro and COBRA Commander can give you some utility, but that is almost half of your points in a typical 500/24 Army build. This is where the Crimson Twins come into play.  

The Twins have several interesting abilities. One Twin Feels What The Other Twin Feels gives them a shared Life pool, so you have to be careful with how you position them. The Greatbow Archers only need one of them in range to take them both out, which encourages more conservative placement. Business Operations helps develop your other units and themselves, but Bankroll is where it really gets interesting. The Twins allow you to make support heroes (or any other hero) COBRA so they can buff the Troopers passively—Raelin is COBRA now! Who knew? (But is she really?). The Twins can also make other Warlords in All-Time COBRA so the Troopers can both bond with them and use Coils of COBRA. 

Between the Twins, Cobra Commander, Destro, and whoever the Twins bankroll, you have 4 Unique COBRA units to use Coils of COBRA with the Troopers. It is a slow-moving but powerful Army and prefers to camp somewhere on the map and wait for the opponent to walk into all those ranged attacks. Quick-moving Armies with multiple activations and placement disruption could cause the Troopers issues, though. Also, using the Glyph of Dagmar for a key initiative switch will often allow your opponent to jump into the fray and take out your Troopers with their low Defense. 

Ninja Synergy Doubles Up In Contemporary

We’ve briefly discussed Storm Shadow and Snake Eyes when we discussed the Tanuki Tricksters in an earlier strategy guide while analyzing Tanuki Aruki. Snake Eyes is great at taking out support figures with Assassinate 2 and has more survivability on approach with Evasive 2, while Storm Shadow is better at taking out squads with Whirlwind Assault. Nanite Smoke Grenade can help support your figures that need extra defense, but be careful—if that unit dies, your opponent can now get the shadow boost. 

Jinx and Kamakura add some much-wanted Ninja bonding into Heroscape. Learn From The Master lets you use Storm Shadow or Snake Eyes or dust off some of the long forgotten All-Time Ninja heroes (Otonashi, anyone?). Coordinated Takedown plus Phantom Walk lets you move freely and target units that may be adjacent to Tanuki Tricksters or Ninjas of the Northern Wind for a hard-hitting attack. Adding Isamu to Jinx and Kamakura creates a 100-point pseudounique squad that runs around and attacks whatever it wants (and is incredibly fun!).

There’s so much more to explore with G.I. JOE, with all the Soldier, Ninja, and Agent synergies. We are excited to see what Armies the community comes up with.

And now that you know, Knowing is Half the Battle! Until next time, Happy Scaping!

(photos by Vecna)