Welcome to the first article of a new series. A series where we take a deep dive into the affiliated Brotherhood characters. I will try and release a new article each week, and this week we're starting with one of my all time favourite Marvel characters - Sabretooth.
The mutant Victor Creed, called Sabretooth by many, is a feral assassin and mercenary. His mutant abilities grant him an enhanced healing rate, keen senses, and razor-sharp claws he uses to savage his foes. He is a long-time enemy of Wolverine. Their pasts intertwine through decades of conflict, and Sabretooth acts as a dark mirror of Wolverine’s suppressed savage instincts.
Character Card
Let's start by taking a look at his character card. Before going any further, I'd like to point out that what you see on his healthy side is the same on his injured side - so his card doesn't change when flipped. 6 health on both sides is about average for a 4 threat character and his long move enables him to get around the board very quickly. His defences are a bit on the weak side though, 3/3/3 is your average 3 threat defence, and Sabretooth is a 4.
Moving on to his attacks, his builder is respectable - 5 dice physical attack with a wild Bleed and wild Pierce - his spender gets even better though - a 7 dice physical attack - on a hit and a wild he gets to make a free Claw Slash attack, and gets to re-roll any dice from that attack.
Onto his superpowers and for 3 power, No Mercy allows Sabretooth to add 1 dice to his attack roll for every point of damage the target has taken up to a maximum of 3. This then potentially turns his builder into an 8 dice attack and his spender into a 10 dice attack - giving you more probability to roll the triggers on both of the attacks.
Untamed Force is essentially a hit back superpower, much like Venom's So Many Snacks. If Sabretooth was attacked within Range 2 (or uses his aggressive to move to within 2 of the attacker)- he can spend 2 power to make a free Claw Slash attack that targets the attacker.
Aggressive allows Sabretooth to move short towards the attacking character if he takes damage and Healing Factor allows Sabretooth to heal for 1 damage at the end of his activation.
Tactics Cards
The below cards are included in Sabretooths box:
Weapon X Program allows Sabretooth to spend 3 power and throw himself short. Sabretooth is a size 3 character so throwing himself into an enemy character has the potential to do a large chunk of damage or alternatively this card can be used to help Sabretooth close the gap on a target to allow him to attack twice as he only has access to range 2 attacks.
This is probably the best card in the box - X Ceptional Healing allows a character with Healing Factor to spend 3 power and reduce any amount of incoming damage down to 1. Did a Juggernaut just hit you for 10? Well spend that 3 power and he just hit you for 1 instead. It really is a great bailout card to keep him in the game. This can also be used on any other character with Healing Factor - so it has a lot of flexibility to be used on other characters too.
One-Two Punch allows an active character that's targeting an enemy and another character within 2 of that same enemy character to both spend 1 power. This then lets you add two dice to the attack - yet more extra dice for Sabretooth to throw down.
Where Does He Fit In The Affiliation?
To put it quite bluntly, he doesn't. This is because of two main problems, his attacks are both range 2 without any reliable way of closing the gap on a target without taking an action to move and the other reason is simply because he's very easy for your opponent to take off the table.
Let's talk about the former first. Sabretooth's attacks are both Range 2 and his whole package is built around killing things - so ideally he needs to be making 2 attacks per activation. The problem with this, is that if Sabretooth finds himself outside of that Range 2 - he has nothing in his kit to close that gap other than wasting an activation to move closer to the target before attacking. I think the whole idea in his design was that his Aggressive superpower was meant to be the way in which he closes that gap, but the huge problem with that superpower is that this is reliant on not only your opponent choosing to attack him, but also actually doing damage to him to allow him to move. He's desperate for a charge or a pounce.
The other issue, is that he's simply easy to kill. As mentioned before 3/3/3 is an average defence for a 3 threat character - and Sabretooth has nothing in his kit (other than a one time use X-Ceptional Healing card) to boost his defences or keep him alive. Healing Factor does not really counter this either - as he only heals at the end of HIS activation.
All that said, Sabretooth does have some play either threatening a flank in a 1v1 situation or using his long movement to threaten an opponents back secure - though there's probably cheaper alternatives who can do this just as well.
To summarise, in his current state - Sabretooth probably doesn't make it into many competitive Brotherhood rosters as there's just better options at 4 threat both in and out of affiliation. However, if your new to the game or your just playing casually at home or your local store it's definitely worth giving him a try because when he works he can really pop. Unfortunately, that doesn't happen often enough to warrant a place in a competitive Brotherhood roster.
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