Empire at War Preview is up!

[Abyss 376]

Thoughts:

Thrawn looks solid. He's obviously not going in an aggressive deck, but he's going to open up a lot of nasty options. At 17 points there's some actual deck building options with him, but really? Him and Unkar already feel like BFFs. Imperial Inspection, tons of discard, tons of money....Unkar's a ****, and I think everyone's going to hate this guy with a passion for the same reasons.

Prepare for War, well free money is nice. But you have to be going first, and then it costs you tempo. Unlikely to see play, though I guess it's at least in the faction that might get use out of it with it's ways to steal the battlefield.

Ruthless Tactics could be interesting if we see anything with 2 cost or more. As it is, increasing something by 1 is likely not going to be worth it.

The Day is Ours is expensive. But it does get you the battlefield effect, and obviously there's a theme in red with controlling the battlefield. Might be a sleeper depending on what else is in the set. Also, does this win the award for 'Card art that least looks like it should be on a neutral card'?

Ezra is going to see a lot of play just because of his cost, obviously. Fairly sure he's terrible as elite because 10 points for 7 health is absolute garbage, but he'll be the 7 point filler in a lot of decks. His special is actually pretty nasty - assuming of course that the opponent doesn't just spend the money.

Quick Escape is bad. Should have been something like 'you can't resolve dice this turn' so that you could at least claim the battlefield, or be 0 cost. There's be sometimes when it's worth it, but not often enough to make up for all the times it's a terrible deal.

Mace Windu, pretty sure he's bad. But he's going to be **** fun to try and make work.

Master of the Council - one word. WOW. I don't think it's going to be as good as it looks, but come on. Who doesn't want to try this? Sadly, it's probably just going to get abused by ****ing Rey.

[Abyss 376]

So, thinking about it a bit more- Thrawn/Plutt 2017 is going to troll the **** out of Palpatine.

Go first? First action activate Thrawn, call 0. Discard Holocron.

Go second? They play Holocron, play Imperial Inspection. They roll Holocron special, do you activate Plutt for the shot at bouncing it, or just activate Thrawn and call 3/4 to discard whatever they wanted to play?

Or the big one - Thrawn/Plutt actually has a pretty legit chance of getting a first turn win if it pulls both Crime Lord and Ace in the Hole. You can get the necessary money off two of their dice, and both Thrawn and Plutt have the focus to make it reliable. Meanwhile call 1 with Thrawn to remove control events.

 

[tunewalker 182]

11 minutes ago, Abyss said:

So, thinking about it a bit more- Thrawn/Plutt 2017 is going to troll the **** out of Palpatine.

Go first? First action activate Thrawn, call 0. Discard Holocron.

Go second? They play Holocron, play Imperial Inspection. They roll Holocron special, do you activate Plutt for the shot at bouncing it, or just activate Thrawn and call 3/4 to discard whatever they wanted to play?

Or the big one - Thrawn/Plutt actually has a pretty legit chance of getting a first turn win if it pulls both Crime Lord and Ace in the Hole. You can get the necessary money off two of their dice, and both Thrawn and Plutt have the focus to make it reliable. Meanwhile call 1 with Thrawn to remove control events.

 

not to mention I think with thrawn's resource sides a legit slow deck that pulls in a bunch of vehicles and then has him call 0 or 1 to get dice control out of their hand and we could see huge AT-ST plays, I really love the 2 resource side on him, other then elite him though I have been struggling to think of 16 point characters that may want him as a 1 dice support, but ya Him + unkar seems like some sort of control money making machine from hell.

[MegaSilver 2,867]

Use Friends in Low Places Turn one to look at their entire hand.

[Krazed 12]

2 hours ago, MegaSilver said:

Use Friends in Low Places Turn one to look at their entire hand.

It's so sad that Street Informants is Hero.  Thrawn could use him some street informants.

[Psalm 112 66]

I think Maz  E-Mace is gonna be really good.

[Kyle Ren 6,817]

This is a little off-topic, but the art on both Ezra and Thrawn are really good, in my opinion! They don't look cartoony at all to me, even though their official canon appearances are both in the Rebels show. I like Rebels a lot, but I also like consistency of art style/quality. These cards are examples of very realistic, cool, and high-quality artwork.

[ScottieATF 2,867]

22 hours ago, Buhallin said:

While this is true in isolation, practically speaking it's very unlikely.  By the time you're in his range to kill characters, there's a good chance you've got a lot of upgrades.  It's not "Does Mace roll a blank?" it's "Do you blank on Mace and every one of your upgrades?"  Vibroknife has already made most defenses irrelevant, so it's "Do you roll a blank on all your dice AND have you been super unlucky and not drawn a Vibroknife?"

It's a decent ability, but it's hardly going to change the game, and I suspect that once it all falls out his point cost will make him binder fodder.  But I could be wrong

 

I think it's odd to approach this ability from the standpoint of a fresh round in which you're rolling Mace in with a bunch of upgrades dice.  In that situation you probably roll enough to kill without his ability.  Though his ability still is there if you don't or if you'd rather use your actual damage on the next target or if they would normally pop the Vibroknife out of your pool to try and force you into a Force Illusion.  I also see it from an end of the round standpoint where you've already expended your Vibroknife and most other dice to get them to that 2 health.  The fact that any Mace die at that point is a kill really ups the power of the Vibroknife as now you have less situations where it runs out when you need to finish something off.  

[SWO Daddy 101]

So what are the odds on getting Mace Windu's Lightsaber in this set?

[RybackStun 15]

3 hours ago, SWO Daddy said:

So what are the odds on getting Mace Windu's Lightsaber in this set?

We've seen this before with another character, potentially the title IS his lightsaber, similar to how Overkill is Baze Malbus' "weapon".

[jimbrewersbro 13]

So when do we think stores will start accepting pre-orders. I think both MM and CSI are out of the pre-order business for Destiny, but I may be mistaken. 

[The Penguin UK 1,301]

I think I'm going to aim for a eEzra/eSabine as my deck, if it works. Should give some good ranged damage and some nice economy, especially if there's some good low cost yellows in the deck. eJyn works as well...

[Engine25 2,910]

Does The Day is Ours grant initiative to the player after his opponent has already claimed?  Seems like it does, because it's worded differently than cards that grant you the battlefield effect, but I could be wrong. 

 

Seems like a cool place in the design and makes it more worth the cost of you have more actions than your opponent, so he claims, but then you can say "Nope, battlefield is mine."

[Joelist 148]

Windu's ability is actually very good. Basically it means the only way to prevent a character down to 1 or 2 health from being defeated is to remove Windu's dice. Otherwise no matter what he rolls he defeats the character.

[DJRAZZ 56]

Another strange light side character. Mace is high cost and tricky to use. Why can't the light side get a break. Don't get me wrong Mace looks strong just hard to fit.

[Amanal 2,557]

5 hours ago, Engine25 said:

Does The Day is Ours grant initiative to the player after his opponent has already claimed?  Seems like it does, because it's worded differently than cards that grant you the battlefield effect, but I could be wrong.

You get to claim the battlefield, which is going to allow you to play it's effect and perhaps trigger cards that trigger when you claim the battlefield. So you could trigger a Planetary Uprising with this card and have your opponent take the damage in any case. So this may be doing more than just having you play first next turn.

I find that as it says "Claim the battlefield" and claiming the battlefield is a rather specific action you may take, that the card is clear enough but because of the wordiness of previous cards you find yourself second guessing your reading of the card based on those other cards.

[Stranglebat 16]

On 6/18/2017 at 1:45 AM, ScottieATF said:

I think it's odd to approach this ability from the standpoint of a fresh round in which you're rolling Mace in with a bunch of upgrades dice.  In that situation you probably roll enough to kill without his ability.  Though his ability still is there if you don't or if you'd rather use your actual damage on the next target or if they would normally pop the Vibroknife out of your pool to try and force you into a Force Illusion.  I also see it from an end of the round standpoint where you've already expended your Vibroknife and most other dice to get them to that 2 health.  The fact that any Mace die at that point is a kill really ups the power of the Vibroknife as now you have less situations where it runs out when you need to finish something off.  

Its a pretty decent execute that gets around every type of last ditch mitigation except heals and second chance. I mean it would just kill a character that had 2 health with 3 shields 2 force illusions and an armor plating. Not to mention what ever else the new set has. Yes alot of times you will be better servred resolving damage and dealing more to the next target but the option is great to have in your arsenal. 

On top of that it doesn't care what side you roll. 

[Stranglebat 16]

6 hours ago, Amanal said:

You get to claim the battlefield, which is going to allow you to play it's effect and perhaps trigger cards that trigger when you claim the battlefield. So you could trigger a Planetary Uprising with this card and have your opponent take the damage in any case. So this may be doing more than just having you play first next turn.

I find that as it says "Claim the battlefield" and claiming the battlefield is a rather specific action you may take, that the card is clear enough but because of the wordiness of previous cards you find yourself second guessing your reading of the card based on those other cards.

It says to Claim, as opposed to "as if you claimed" in new orders or "take control" in lock down. 

Its literally just 2 resources to circumvent the only 1 may claim per round rule

[Stranglebat 16]

7 hours ago, DJRAZZ said:

Another strange light side character. Mace is high cost and tricky to use. Why can't the light side get a break. Don't get me wrong Mace looks strong just hard to fit.

He doesn't look tricky at all just expensive which is limiting. The rest of this set needs to be spoiled before we know his true value

[Traxlenak 70]

On 6/16/2017 at 1:23 PM, Kieransi said:

I do not deny that his ability might be the best mill ability in the game, but his cost is very prohibitive since he can't do damage. If they'd made all his dice sides one instead of two and maybe dialed back his hit points by one and then reduced his cost, he'd be great. I just think that his dice's inability to inherently mill, do damage, and only one disrupt side (so low chances for Imperial Inspection) makes him kind of a boat-anchor to your squad. I could be wrong, I just don't think he's great. Thrawn/Unkar will definitely be tier 2, but I'm not sure it can beat the tier 1 decks without some help. It's pretty easy for an opponent to kill Unkar, and after that Thrawn, despite his shenanigans, will be a sitting duck. 

I think you might be underestimating how good he will be with 12 hit points and all of the damaging Red/Yellow supports in this game to utilize with tons of money from Unkar's ability

[Hennessy 40]

Thrawn and Mace Windu, both would be in current card pool great. However we have to wait for the rest of the set. Ezra is good for the opportunity of 7 point character (however because he is unique he is still worse than Stromtrooper). 5 character dice hero decks listed in other topic are imo tier 3 at best. The Day is ours is scary as hell believe me, it will be nasty in the even more brutal way, than New Orders are now.

I am convinced there will be Darth Maul as blue legendary villain and hopefully we will see either Hera Syndulla or Ahsoka Tano.

Edited June 19, 2017 by Hennessy

[Engine25 2,910]

1 hour ago, Stranglebat said:

It says to Claim, as opposed to "as if you claimed" in new orders or "take control" in lock down. 

Its literally just 2 resources to circumvent the only 1 may claim per round rule

You still get things that trigger on claiming, but do you take initiative back from your opponent for next turn? 

[Stranglebat 16]

39 minutes ago, Engine25 said:

You still get things that trigger on claiming, but do you take initiative back from your opponent for next turn? 

As you are claiming the battlefield yes you get to go first. You basically just do what the rule book says under claiming the battlefield.

[Krazed 12]

20 hours ago, jimbrewersbro said:

So when do we think stores will start accepting pre-orders. I think both MM and CSI are out of the pre-order business for Destiny, but I may be mistaken. 

Last I heard from MM they were not taking pre-orders.  Will have to get my fix somewhere else.  Maybe Gencon, if I can actually buy that much from them.

[Engine25 2,910]

5 hours ago, Stranglebat said:

As you are claiming the battlefield yes you get to go first. You basically just do what the rule book says under claiming the battlefield.

That's what I thought, but I wasn't seeing that on anyone else's posts, so was curious if I was misreading.