Effective immediately, Icarus has taken control of HCOL from HCRealms.com due to a fundamental difference in that HCRealms believes HeroClix Online League to be a "Family Game", and Icarus is aligning it more as a Sweepstakes and/or Gambling Activity (Expect that post to be deleted; I'll save it below).

So, not like we had a say (because they took it without discussion), HCRealms is no longer operating HCOL.

I'd like to thank everyone who participated in HCOL 1 & 2. We will continue to honor the League Prizes and those missing their prizes (specifically the dice), will be sent out soon.

That being said; we will no longer be providing prizes for League 3 (since we pay for that out of our budget; never got anything in return ... it was always a losing proposition for us).

I will continue to support HCO as it is the only way I can play the game.

I totally understand; just outlining that because we are not longer operating the league, the prizes that were providing (T-Shirts, Dice, Maps, etc.) are no longer part of the deal.

The prizes they provide are good enough for me. Can't wait for the league to begin

1st Place
• 51 Single-Figure Virtual Boosters or Tabletop Brick
• Set of 4 Virtual or Tabletop Limited Edition Figures


2nd Place
• Set of 4 Virtual or Tabletop Limited Edition Figures


3rd/4th Place
• One Virtual or Tabletop Limited Edition Figure


Participation:
• TBA (must play 16 games to receive)

Weekly Drawings* (3 Drawings; 1 prize per winner):
• One Virtual or Tabletop Limited Edition Figure (occurs the first four weeks)

* Must have played 4 games that week to qualify.

Weeky Fellowship

• Virtual LE from TBA

Personally, I'll not throw principle out the window for a few figures (real or virtual).

I'm not going to base my decision on one side of the story.

well i will. i have seen the way they handle the game. HCO died when it went paid BETA. guess who brought it back? wasnt Icarus. im glad u have a place to play but so do i, and its real, and i dont have to re-purchase my figs. its just sad that the population died so fast. (50+ all day to maybe 25) maybe due to all the real sets pumping out. i know i havent played 50% of my new clix yet. too many new sets, and another in 3 days!! w00t! maybe if Icarus charged more they could afford to pay their dev's enough to keep up with the physical game and not just the '6' fast forces figs per set. :giggity:

There's no "two sides". Are they allowing multiple players from the same household (father/son, roommates, brothers, etc) to participate? No. That's the only "side".

And it sounds like they basically used Typhon and realms then kicked them to the curb when they thought they could get away with it.

This is sound reasoning, although you may have to because it looks like we're not going to get a straight answer from Icarus as to the real motivation behind cutting HCRealms out of the league entirely.

They've posted a bland announcement about moving the league over on their forums, emphasizing fairness to all players as their motivation for keeping the one entry per household rule. Their reasoning seems to be along the lines that the league should operate as if it were a sweepstakes and not as if it were being held at a physical venue, where family members play in the same tournament every week and it's not a big deal 99.924% of the time.

Let's say you agree with their decision, fine, what about unilaterally cutting HCRealms out of the league process? It's extremely classless to treat your volunteers (who you came to in the first place because you NEEDED players) this way, and hypocritical of them to straight copy/paste the league infrastructure over to their site. This is the real issue, and I don't think you'll ever see them respond to it publicly, or even toss out a "Thank you to all our volunteers."

It's the latest in a long line of WTF? decisions by WK/Icarus. Seriously guys, WE WANT TO GIVE YOU OUR MONEY, but when you act like autocrats you make it difficult.

But do what you like, Freedom. The competition should be a lot thinner this time around, at least.

As I said, that is a rule that has been in effect since the beginning. Their side seems pretty solid to me. All this because they won't change a rule that has been in place throughout every league for months. Collusion destroys leagues, too, and it would open up all kinds of problems if they were to change the rule. And to make an exception for one person would not be fair to the rest of us.

Again, I'm only hearing one side of the story, a side that seems set on wanting HCO to fail unless they get their way. And I play Fantasy Football online and there are always steps taken to prevent collusion in them as well. So, it's not operated like a sweepstakes, but the same as some other online games. And with good reason. Can you imagine the mess there would be if we were 3 weeks in and, come to find out, that the guy in 1st place has several accounts and has been stacking his wins with them? I've seen it happen in FF and it totally destroys the league. There will be a vocal few on here screaming for a boycott and trying to discourage new players from joining, while most of us just want a place to play. Some of us don't even have a venue to play in and it's our only choice.

Have we ever seen Procter and Gamble, AT&T, Goodyear Tires, Microsoft, or any company of note say only 1 person per household can buy their products? WizKids is run by a bunch of morons.

This is a very sad situation, but I'm not surprised in any way by this. I have disliked HCO as a service and product since Day 1 and while I see the benefits to people who don't have local venues to play at, the price point at the beginning and the requirement to pay for the software is unacceptable to me especially with the recent advancements of FTP model games.

Hopefully Icarus comes to their senses, but if they follow any sort of business sense they'll bankrupt themselves before they admit mistakes.

I am a writer for Comics Bulletin, we did reviews for Icarus and I have been receiving press materials from their people.

I have just mailed my contact and told her to no longer forward me information as it will not be passed forward to promote HCO in any way even within our own staff.

---
Dear Ms. Jenkins,

Due to the behaviour of Icarus Studios in regards to the Heroclix Online Leagues that were in cooperation with HCRealms.com, I will no longer be passing this information to the websites with whom I participate. I have unsubscribed from the lists and will not
be supporting HCO in any way going forward.

Sincerely,
Christopher Power
Comics Bulletin
---