Hello folks! After another month of playtesting, some cards were still not quite in the right place yet, and so here are the (hopefully) final changes for season 11. It is important for us to get enough data before making adjustments, so please help us by sharing your feedback in the Discord and reporting your playtest games!
First up is Dr. Royce Hemlock’s unique Command card, Cloned Reinforcements. Being able to respawn a 4 or 5 cost Trooper has proven to be very potent, especially if you can get a double activation off of it, if the group activated before being defeated that round. To help mitigate this, we made the returned figure’s deployment card exhaust if the entire group had been defeated. This shouldn’t change too much for multi-figure groups but should decrease the tempo swing which occurred when you redeployed a Dewback or other large single figure groups.
The next change is to Fifth Brother’s unique command card, You Will Not Deny Me. The previous version of this Second Chance lookalike unintentionally made Fifth Brother eternally unkillable in a late-game situation where the imperial player didn’t need to defeat any hostile figures. This was quite the game-breaking interaction, and so we added a fall-off condition and removed the Recover 2 from the card to make it not as futile to shoot into Fifth Brother, knowing he can die as soon as it falls off. This should help avoid any of the negative player experiences where this one card could indefinitely stall the game. Additionally, it does not increase the number of attacks required to kill Fifth Brother, since it no longer Recovers damage. This will make Fifth Brother play somewhat similar to Maul in this regard, which will be helpful for the expensive melee figure that he is, with few other options for survivability.
The final command card we will be modifying is Vader’s Lord of the Sith. Vader is notorious for boasting an explosive combo game with Parting Blow, Dark Energy, Looking for a Fight, etc. This newest toy meant that with the right cards in hand, he could quite consistently defeat any 2-3 figures in a single activation, without any chance at counterplay from the opponent. It also incidentally allowed him to reposition for Palpatine’s granted attack and his end of round attack, leading to even more destructive power. To diminish this burst potential, we are changing this card to only be played outside of Vader’s activation. This means he will be more reliant on out of activation attacks or cleanups from other figures, and it will be slightly harder for him to be well positioned. Additionally, he can no longer combo it with a self-triggered Parting Blow, so the Stun from Parting Blow will still be relevant. Note, however, that this still works during his End of Round attack. We hope this will give the opposing player more time to react and will alleviate the bitter feeling of seeing your list implode in a single activation sequence.
Next on the adjustment list is the one and only Royal Guard Champion. His buffs in season 11 have made him a menace both offensively and defensively, a bit too much so. After extensive testing and number crunching, we found that RGC was nearly the tankiest figure in the game, close to rivaling Vader, which is definitely more than we intended. His defensive reroll coupled with a white die meant that he often survived a large number of attacks, which in turn meant that he was bound to dodge every so often. Overpower also granted a great offensive buff, being able to reroll the pesky triple blocks or the crucial evades or simply rerolling into a better red die. As such, we have made a slight change to Overpower, so where he can now only reroll his own dice. This should lower his overall damage and defensiveness ever so slightly, and we hope this will place him in the perfect spot balance-wise. Still, it is a buff compared to the FFG card for both offense and defense.
Finally, we have a minor change to The Armorer. While her supporting abilities are great, she herself has felt a bit understated compared to other figures in her style. Notably, her health was quite low and being melee, she was often being killed quite fast, before her kit could truly shine. We are thus bumping her health up to a total of 10 in hopes this makes her less prone to folding over so quickly. This takes her in line with other 6-point melee figures.
That’s it for now, so have fun throwing dice, blasting, and swinging across the galaxy with all the newest changes!