As there was an even number of teams I decided that the best idea was to just act in a Judicial capacity to ensure noone had to have a bye, especially as people had travelled a fair distance to play, so the yellow ring adorned team I had prepared for the occasion stayed in its box and Mandarin, Firelord, Taskmaster and friends didn't come out to play ... it was nice to see two ther players using Taskmaster though! Due to the nature of today's event I chose to select first round opponents to a) ensure travelling compainions and players from the same venue were not playing each other first round wherever possible and b) to try and make the first round games relatively balanced.

A new record turnout for Middlesbrough as 16 players (and a Judge) set about a lond day of Heroclix at Newport Settlement Youth & Community Centre

David Hansell, being a good new player and often in his short career worthy of Fellowship was chosen to represent Middlesbrough's Games World venue against the first of our visitors from Leeds, Ben Price. David's team for the day, "High Justice" combined the raw power of Wonder Woman with the stretchyness of Elongated Man, the heat of Green Flame and the supporting artillery of Wildfire and Starfire. Ben had made the tiring (through lack of sleep as much as distance) journey to field his Marvel-ous "Rookie Rebels" with Mr. Fantastic, Songbird, Hawkeye, Captain America, Domino and the Invisible Woman. This one really was a tight game and in the end the Invisible Woman and Songbird survived to snatch a tight points victory for Ben as all David's team were KO'ed just before time was called.

Parry Cooke, who having just worked out Middlesbrough's roll of honor must qualify as a darn unlucky finalist (5 finals, 0 wins) went with a compact "Super Cheese" DC outfit today sporting Superman (Icons), Speedy, Impulse and another Speedy (Roy Harper version this time). Parry's first round opposition, clad in his 'non-geek Batman Tee-shirt' was Dave Smith and his "Villains Need Hugs Too" team. Specifically requiring a hug on this occassion were Ultron (cold metallic hug there then), Mystique, Taskmaster (I'll hug him, no problem), Destiny, Mysterio, Hydra Medic and Con Artist. Parry's cheese-tastic use of Superman did the trick as Dave, unfortunately had forgotten his Kryptonite today. Dave suffered big style at the hands of Parry, or should that be Superman and only managed to pick up a measilly 56 points for KO'ing both versions of Speedy, not that fast then eh? Parry on t'other hand raced into a very strong position thanks to the son of a dead planet. Still at least Superman was out of the way early eh Dave?

Dale de Andrade kicked off his tournament against Leeds' Knight William Bahra. Dale's team with no name was an odd looking thing lead by the huge Awesome Android (who doesn't usually tend to be very awesome at all) with offensive back-up from a Nanobot-ing Quicksilver and a support crew of four probability controllers. William's "Big Bunch of Cheddar" continued Parry's theme of using a Superman (this time a Superman Blue he had borrowed from yours truly) and a cheese related team name, this one also had Dr. Mid-Nite, Batman with Armor Piercing and Stunning Blow and Red Tornado, Superman had Armor Piercing too ... I imagine most people can guess the tactics employed in the first turn or two here then, effective as it was. Dale got stuck in and did manage to KO the Superman Blue, proving he was able to be taken out. However the effort of taking out Supes had lead to 207 points of his 'lucky crew' being splattered so he lost on points and it was another win racked up for the Superman supporters.

James Phoenix's Marvel addiction continued with his "Bad Manners" team for the day, in fact I am not sure he owns more than a handful of DC figures, no doubt you are eagerly awaiting the release of the Sinister© set eh? James' team was a big one boasting Spy Master, Ghost, Silver Samurai (yeah Silver Samurai!), Scarlet Witch, Blob, Mystique, Quicksilver and Rogue. For his first game he was paired with Peter Davies' X-Men themed "The Unexpected" with Cannonball, Cyclops, Dazzler, Wolverine, Beast, Havok and Storm. Both players have had a pretty bad run of things lately so I hoped pairing them up would kick start the day for one of them at least. Peter's team name may have implied mystery but having seen several players, with one or two notable exceptions, try and fail to conquor all with the X-Men (or the eX-Men as I like to call them) I was predicting some hurt for Professor X's boys and girls. This game actually went the distance, which surprised me and was a hard fought tactical chess-like encounter (ok I may be overdoing it a little there). However my psychic like predictions for once came true as Peter lost a close game on points.

Ste Date had chosen to use characters with defences below 20 tonight, mind you there isn't much choice with Rookies only to be fair, but he had stuck with a team built from Marvel heroes for his "Heroes For A Moderate Price". His 'Heroes For Hire'+ included War Machine, Songbird, Powerman, Iron Fist, Black Panther and Lockjaw for a bang on the nose 300 points. First round opposition for Ste was today provided by Martin Teece and his "Say Hello to Damage & Blackfire" which showcased Harlequinn, Manbat, Poision Ivy, Riddler, Mr. Freeze, The Joker and can you guess who else? The event didn't start too well for Martin here as he concentrated his efforts on KO'ing the deep dialed Lockjaw and neglected the other threats. The outcome was a highly convincing win for Ste D. who only lost the Lockjar whilst KO'ing Martin's entire squad.

James Pattison had once again named his guys and gals the "Heralds of Christine" and her Heralds today included Red Tornado, Green Lantern, Green Flame (all very colourful) and Wonder Woman and Star Spangled Kid both In Contact With Oracle. Patto faced Liam to kick off his morning and as it happened to kick off Liam's mourning as the "Team of Big Heads" suffered something of a cold start. Sinestro (Trick Shot), Manhunter, Huntress and some other support didn't have what it took to defeat the Heralds and whilst they did manage to take out three of Patto low point cost figures he saw all of his removed from the board before time was signalled. A decent start for Patto, but Liam lamely limps lowly in the league after his initial confrontation.

The third Leeds' Knight, Andrew Pemeberton had created a team reminiscent of William's but I guess was somewhat struggling for a name as it was titled "???". "???" was Superman (In Contact With Oracle and Armor Piercing), Red Tornado (In Contact With Oracle) and Dr. Mid-Nite (Flashbang) and looked fairly formidable if it did leave something of a cheesy taste in the mouth. His opposite to start things off was Paul Crosby's "The Unaffiliated Fantastic Four", actually it was more of a fantastic five with added Moon Knight and Lorelei. Andrew played Earthquake and Paul played Maddness, so I think it was plain to see two different levels of competitive play in action here. Paul tried and tried and tried, but he couldn't blow Superman's house down and then when the Earthquake hit ... well lets just say it wasn't very pretty. Paul didn't get a single point in this game, but he did show a great spirit and commitment to playing for fun and that is worth a lot too, well played Paul. Andrew took the win with ease collecting a fine total of 594 points along the way.

Patto gives Liam a thrashing on the map we like to tell Paul Brown we no longer have

JP starts the day with a win as he does for Peter Davies in his first round match up

Andrew Pemberton and Superman Mk III get off to winning ways against Paul Crosy and even manage to find time to spin round and pose for the camera

Dave kicks off his day of Superman watching by watching Parry take him to the cleaners. Oh I wouldn't want to be you next time you meet ... he WILL go hardcore

Atlantis Rises! ... and Alec falls

Parry Cooke took on James Pattison in an all Middlesbrough Games World tie on table two. Parry used Isolation as his BFC choice whilst Patto played Madness. Parry's "Super Cheese" showed once again how devastating Superman can be as it easilly pruned the "Heralds of Christine" without breaking a sweat. There was not a lot poor Patto (or Splatto as it proved in this game) could do as just had no answer to the blue and red 'S' wearing menace. The best thing I can say about this is he now knows how his opponents felt when he fielded the Veteran Icons Superman and cleaned up. What comes around goes around! : )

Table three was another GameStuff versus Leeds' Knights affair as Ste Hunt took on William Bahra. If the match on table one had made it one nil to Middlesbrough, then table two was definately a quick equaliser for Leeds. Ste tried to level the playing field a little with his Disbanded BFC, but William put that plan out in the cold by replying with an Ordinary Day. Frustration set in for the Huntmeister more than I had witnessed before as he made five consecutive passes while he watched Superman and Co. prepare for a second assault. The assault eventually came, oh how it came, and Hunt suffered at the hands of the caped one and his comrades. I don't think it would be unreasonably to say this wasn't Mr. Hunt's favourite ever game of Heroclix and the outcome wasn't flattering either as William triumphed 597 points to 0.

Ben Price and James Phoenix were the last of the round one winners, so they were destined to play each other on table four. JP Assembled his team together only to find that is was an Ordinary Day today. Both teams were using a nicely balanced mix of Marvel characters with Ben playing the Heroes and JP being the villains of the piece and the game was played out in ... Metropolis! Well you can't be comic book accurate with every little detail. Maybe they were just exploting the fact that all the Superman clones and robots were out fighting trying to win a tournament today? Well as generally tends to happen in the comics the good guys prevailed and the the villains had to leave empty handed (without a win or any points) only to reappear later (in the next round) and cause havok once more. A fine display of skill and tactics saw Ben take this one without dropping a point, but he did it in such a 'good' way that JP was still smiling afterwards. What a sport.

Best of the losers from round one were David Hansell and Peter Davies, so they faced each other for round two to try to get back in with a shout of making the last four. David's "High Justice" certainly found the high ground in this encounter as DC gave Marvel a proper spanking. Peter's Proximity Mines didn't help him to get close to David and the Radiation Leak didn't really make an impression on either team. At the end of this encounter Peter looked down and out but David was back in the running thanks to the haul of points. It was looking like it would be a very interesting third round already.

Alec and Dale also had relatively respectable points totals (ok so Dale had a respectable points total) coming into game number two and were looking for a win and to score big points to get them back in the reckoning. Dale's unnamed (or should that be un-namable) outfit didn't seem too confident after they were overthrown in their first game, but Lady Luck (or Princess Probability to be more accurate) was shinning down on him this time with all those rerolls making a big, big difference. It' s just as well that BFC's dont stack as both players played Debris this game and they would have needed a mountain of heavy and light objects if they did. Well all the extra objects on earth wouldnt have helped Alec here, unless of course all his team had Stealth and had hid in them the whole game, and Dale won comfortably thanks to the mass Probability Control at his disposal. Alec was left on 0 - 2 and his chances of progression had evaporated so his third round game would just be for pride.

David Smith's villains certainly needed some hugs after their disappointment in the first round but it was up to Liam's "Team Of Big Heads" to try to prevent them for getting the attention they craved. Poor Teamwork limted some tactics for the match thanks to Dave's BFC whilst Liam elected not to play one and just see how it went. Dave's cunning and guile enabled him to use his well balanced Marvel-ous bad guys to stomp of the inferior heroes from the DC universe. Dave's big win put him in the mix again and two of the semi-final spots were looking wide open with a whole host of players having a chance to take a spot with a 2 - 1 record and a good points score. Liams 0 - 2 with 84 points pretty much ensured he wasn't going to get beyond the Swiss Rounds today though unless there was a glut of disqualifications during round three (like about 12 disqualifications).

Lastly (and I do mean lastly ... I am cruel but I love you really) Martin Teece tried to show why he had named his team "Say Hello to Damage & Blackfire" (specifically the damage bit as he hadn't done much so far) against Paul Crosby's "The Unaffiliated Fantastic Four". With the table 'boasting' a grand total of 24 points between them it was safe to say that they weren't challenging the big guns today. But there was still the battle to finish as high up as you could to play out and for these two that began right here. Paul managed to get his points total off the mark by picking up 126 hard fought points, but the vital mark in the W column went to Martin as he cruised to victory and notched up a whole swag bag of points.

Ste Date get a smug grin on his face as Superman critically misses Black Panther and one duff dice roll effectively seals the result of this game after only seconds

Martin doing some thinking as he charges through the warehouse to get to the 'Unaffiliated Fantastic Four' as quickly as he can

Ben Price (far side of table) uses the Metropolis scene to great effect as he takes apart James Phoenix. James only this this game today mind, so a good placing for him

Huntmeister and William Bahra captured before Hunt's emotional collapse ... he is still recieving weekly psychoanalysis for post traumatic stress and may be for some time

It's hero against hero in this all DC battle ... anyone like to hazard a guess on who won?

The second guaranteed semi spot battle was fought between Leeds' Knight team mates William Bahra and Ben Price ensuring a Leeds player would qualify for the knock out stages. Ben's creating a War Zone gave William a slight headache and the Inertial Interference Field of William reduced Hawkeye's effectiveness a little to leave a finely poised and intriguing battle ahead. The raw power of Superman, Red Tornado and Batman was a little too much for Ben's Marvel heroes to cope with in the end and William grabbed the win to move into a definate last four place and have the boasting rights for the journey back to Leeds. Ben's 1124 point total had him in fourth place as they finished but one or two other players could still pip him to the last qualification place with a good win.

Andrew Pemberton was still in with a shout of making it a Leeds semi-final double if he could get around 500 points and a win. Standing in his way was Dave 'Oh God not Superman again' Smith and his unofficial homage to Judge Crimson Duck's early team building. Strangely, Andrew spent a great deal of time watching and waiting during this game appearing to be happy to take a points win (with the lower build total by 2 points). With about 15-20 minutes left he seemed to realise that this wasn't enough to make the top four and move in to attack. Dave was struggling to counter Andrew's tactic of trying to pick off the lower point characters, but the Protected Ultron proved to be something of a nuisance. The game ended with Dave having only lost 50 points to KO's thanks to his Disbanded helping his team maintain their shroud of Stealth. However as he didn't get any KO's himself all he could content himself with was being able to say he prevent a Superman from making the last four on points as he closed the event with a disappointing 1 - 2 record and finished below half way.

Stephen Hunt's Atlantean attack force managed to whitewash James Pattison's DC heroes even without the aid of a BFC. But even the full 597 points wasn't enough to get hime into a top four spot becuase of the second round mauling he had recieved from William. It was also the end of the line for Patto who, after a very promising start had not managed to get another point from rounds two and three, or as I like to say now he pulled a "Teece". Hunt not qualifying meant he was prime 'meat' for running a side event and Patto's early end meant he was likely to be playing in it.

Friends and travelling companions today (by bike from Coulby Newham ... now that's commitment) Dale de Andrade and David Hansell were opponents for the third round with half of Dale's team consisting of David's figures. Either player could reach the final with a 450+ points win, but David was looking favourite on paper with a 120 point advantage and having won pretty much all of their head-to-heads so far. David seemed fairly unimpressed with the potential four re-rolls available to Dale via his Probability Controls despite it being a power he has used to good effect himself. By the end of the match David felt he knew the difficulties of playing against multiple PC'ers pretty well. Dale won himself the match and with a score of 561 booked himself into the last four too as he squeezed Ben out of the qualifying places.

Martin's last game of the day was against JP and the "Bad Manners". Martin hadn't faired as well as he had hoped so far so was hoping to end the day with a good win to finish in the top five or six at least. JP though had other ideas entirely. Martin Rally'ed whilst JP tactically Disbanded to have a major impact on the Arkham Inmates and other assorted Batman Enemies. JP's BFC choice and his in game tactics certainly did the trick in this game as he completed the game with all of Martin's figures KO'ed and only lost poor Silver Samurai in the process. Had he done slightly better in his first encounter or not been whitewashed by Ben he could have made the last four with this stunning display, but as the dust settled he wasn't too disappointed with a very creditable eighth place.

Peter Davies and Alec Barrett played on the last table but one, hoping to pick up the win to avoid the three L's (as in Lost, Lost and Lost). Alec's "T.H.E.M." used Infiltration tactics to get a head start on their opponents whilst "The Unexpected" choose to Rally for one last surge. The rally didn't prove too effective as Peter notched up a second sucessive 0 in all the score columns as he suffered another whitewash. Alec managed to jump up the table with the win and big score to move well away from the bottom places. Even 18 point Speedy survived!

The final game of the 24 Swiss Round matches was played out between Paul Crosby and Liam Cooke on the bottm table knowing a bad result either way would leave one of them propping up the others at the bottom of the table. As it happened Liam took a win to leap away from the bottom place he had been keeping warm during this round and Paul, thanks to saving a few figures from KO all game and KO'ing Manhunter and Huntress made a late dying lunge out of the bottom place too. Both the bottom place games contentested an extra LE to give them something to play for so Liam and Alec both went home with an extra 'Thing' (Ben Grimm in fact).

The all Leeds battle to reach the final sees William triumphant and Ben just outside the top four requirement on his points total of 1124, so close to a two Leeds Knights semi

The battle to be crowned unofficial champion of Coulby Newham (until they play again of course) and Dale well and truly takes the title this week

Patto takes his medicine with a smile as Lex Luthor Jnr's orange-ringed renegades lurch into action to take on the might of "The Heralds of Christine"

In the dark dank depths of the lower tables Alec takes on Peter for pride and points

This time round Ste Date used Isolation whilst Parry chose not to play a BFC so they didn't have a huge impact on the outcome. The result was very similar to the previous game other than Parry only got 167 KO's rather than the 179 in the earlier game. This meant Ste progressed on to the final to face the winner of the other semi-final, leaving Parry to play the loser for 3rd/4th place.

The second semi-final saw Dale use his War Zone and William go BFC placeholder so this gave Dale a definate edge as he wasn't using a medic. These two had also played each other in this Swiss Rounds where William had scored a comfortable win. This time round however Dale's Probability Controlling antics helped him get the better of William and turn the result around as he only lost Scarlet Witch and demolished William's whole force. William was denied his place in the final with some multiple dice rolling tomfoolery and thus played Parry for the bronze medal spot (although of course there weren't actually any medals to give out).

William beat Parry with some ease in the Battle of Krpton and duly took third place to ensure all three competing venues had a player in the top three today.

The final saw Dale, appearing in his first ever final, use his Probability Control to score an unlikely win against his more experienced and balanced opponent (the team being more balanced - not the mental state). Dale was crowned Champion today, but everyone was a winner as 16 players and 1 Judge had a thoroughly enjoyable day and the biggest winner of all? ... HEROCLIX! Huge thanks to Wizkids and Anup in particular for supporting this event with great Prizes and letting us host a big event, hopefully there will be more to come in the future. Thanks to all the players for making the effort to come along and take part. Thanks to Ste D. for the Phoenix use and Ste H. for running his side event and thanks to Sam at Newport for hosting this event in her Centre at very short notice. You can keep the left over biscuits for Monday! Their was a five-way tie for Fellowship after a round of voting which I think indicates the level of good play around the tables, but gave me the casting decision. I thought that it was only fair that Ben took the prize for driving along and making sure we saw some new faces today, I know that dragging yourself out of bed early on a Sunday moring for a drive into uncharted territory can sometime be very hard to do, so hopefully the Hal Jordan will have made it all worthwhile and maybe we will see you again sometime in the not too distant future.

Plenty of red caped Supermen came to try and conquer at this event today, but ultimately they all lost out. Ste Date takes the award for 'Supes Sniper' snagging no less than 3 Superman heads on his march to the final. No prize for it though!

(Above) Me congratulating Dthe very embarressed but now a little less shaky Dale and handing over his wonderful prize, the very hard to come by Hal Jordan whilst (Below) I can also be seen shaking Ben's hand and giving him his award for Fellowship

"With the dust settling from the main league events, Dark Phoenix arrived to kick up a storm in a side event. Alec Barrett, Paul Crosby, Dave Smith, James Phoenix, Liam Cooke and James Pattison each rustled up 200pt teams to take on the mighty Dark Phoenix with - and a selection of her "kill and you keep" friends. But Phoenix took a round or two to arrive - with her "heralds" serving as appropriate cannon fodder for the players. Paul Crosby was first to charge into the fray - a tricky task when you're sat in a chair in the way his entire team was. That entire team being Magneto with a beat of feat card action going on. His initial dash saw him lamp merry hell out of a Doc Samson rookie that would soon fall before a second attack. While the others toyed with one or two of the figures, James Phoenix went into overkill mode, sending Banshee and Rogue in full tilt against an Umar that didn't look destined long for this earth. Alas, that didn't take into account poor James and his appaling dice rolling, which with only needing meagre fives and sixes instead served up threes and, coming soon after, twos. In fact, a series of three critical misses saw an undamaged Umar disappear in a puff of logic out of sheer sympathy. But by now Dark Phoenix herself had arrived, and a fastball special of Green Lantern TK throwing a Superboy for a charge saw the first damage inflicted. Sadly for Superboy, the retribution damage saw him depart the board. The rest of James Pattison's team was the first to bow out of the melee - earning him a sympathy Sue Storm LE for his troubles. Phoenix was angry now (the Dark Phoenix, not the James Phoenix of the misfiring dice), and made all the angrier by the man in the chair, who pitched in with his sizeable damage. She hit back and hit back hard, sending Magneto's dial spinning before Paul remembered he had Protected and used that instead with a sigh of relief. Elsewhere on the board, Liam got tied up finishing off the likes of Ravager, while Dave got into a melee with Absorbing Man and Dagger. James Phoenix, meanwhile, stuck to his task and tried to bump off Umar's chums - a couple of Ragman rookies.

Over at the main bad girl, it was still Paul Crosby inflicting the most damage, handing out another four damage with a pulse wave. Dave Smith joined in with a bit of sniping, and Alec's Quicksilver finally got in the game, but it was the careful placement of Liam's Green Lantern that was to prove effective - using his 12 range to pop in some heavy hits from afar. Alec's Wonder Woman got a hit in only to see Phoenix regenerate, but it wasn't to save her as, sensing a feeding frenzy, the players finally mobbed her, pretty much everyone getting in some licks. As the bloodshed was tallied, it turned out there was a draw for most damage inflicted, with Paul Crosby and Liam matched at 8 damage inflicted each. The scores were then thrown over to how many points worth of other figures they had killed. Liam had knocked off an experienced Ravager for 40pts, but Paul's killing of a rookie Doc Samson swung the decision in his favour - fair enough, really, as he'd gone pretty much toe to toe with Dark Phoenix from her earliest, most dangerous clicks. Well deserved, sir. May you enjoy your prize of a Ghost Widow LE with relish. As for the Fellowship prize, that went to James Phoenix - ever smiling despite the awful dice rolls. May you enjoy your prize of a Captain Mako LE with chips and mushy peas."

Not making the knock-out stages helps turn Ste Hunt into a Games Master as he runs a hybrid scenario/smackdown side event for losers (as in the game not as in LOSERS) who did not want to take part in a Battle Royale. LE's and REVs given out from both the prize pot and from Ste's own personal collection. Many thanks for the help today Ste

Ben, Andrew, Martin Dave and Peter battle it out in a sealed booster Battle Royal event ... Andrew saw what must have been one of the best ever Collateral Damage booster pulls with Veteran Green Lantern, Experienced OMAC, Veteran Speedy and Veteran Katana (if I remember the last two correctly) so the result for him was great before they even started