Battle report Rebels double officer vs Empire Veers

Posted on August 20, 2019August 21, 2019 by jocke01

This is my first battle report on this blog and sadly I can’t present you with a heroic rebel victory, but an imperial victory with rebels fleeing home to lick their wounds and learn from their mistake.

I haven’t played legion since earlier this summer due to work and the 2 places I do most of my playing is closed during the summer. It was fun to finally get a game in and it was against one of my old oppoents who I have the bad habit losing against.

I decided to give my double officer vehicle list a try.
797 points Rebel Alliance

Commander
Rebel officer – esteemed leader 55p
Rebel officer – esteemed leader 55p
Corp
Rebel troopers – z-6 trooper, astromech 70p
Rebel troopers – z-6 trooper, astromech 70p
Rebel troopers – z-6 trooper, comms specialist, comms relay 76p
Rebel troopers – z-6 trooper 62p
Support
At-rt – rotary blaster 85p
At-rt – rotary blaster 85p
At-rt – rotary blaster 85p
Heavy
X-34 Landspeeder – Ryad azadi, m-40 ion blaster, rps-6 rocket gunner 154p

I faced a Veers led imperial force

800p Empire

Commander
General Veers
Corps
Stormtrooper squad – dlt19 trooper
Stormtrooper squad – dlt19 trooper
Stormtrooper squad – dlt19 trooper
Special forces
Death troopers – dlt-19d trooper, weapon config
Death troopers – dlt-19d trooper, weapon config
Royal gurad – electrostaff guard, recon intel
Heavy
Occupier tank – dlt19 rifle pint, first sergeant arbmad

We played at my friends house so we used his terrain, including some plant pots. I at least contributed with my newly painted barricades. I choose to be blue player and we ended up with Clear conditions, intercept the transmition and battle lines. I deployed my 3 at-rts in a line spread out and focused 2 groups of corps and officers on either flank while my speeder ended upp far right facing his occupier. He focused heavy on the right flank leaving only 2 stormtroopers on the left.

My initial plan was to save my speeder for my last activation and try to focus on the left and centre transmitions while still threaten the right on forcing him to focus his attention there.

Round 1
Command cards
Assault vs Maximum firepower

I gave out order to my 2 at-rt’s to the right and to my landspeeder, while my opponent gave it to Veers. His first activation was a random drawn special forces and he choosed a death trooper squad who walk forward and took a long shot at my astromech squad deployed right and did a full barrage of 7 hits and after cover I rolled 5 blanks, losing everyone except my duros leader pictured in the left bottom courner. So right of the bat, I had an uphill battle. The occupier and some dlt’s just managed to drop my right at-rt, really wished I hadn’t lost my astromech :(. My landspeeder did a nice 3 dmg at long range on the occupier and ionised it so I was still hopeful.

Ion shark delivers 3 dmg and an ion token to the tank, nice vengence for the first attack.

On the left flank things looked better, his troopers advanced on the objective, but I managed to drop 2 of them and taking no wounds in return.

End of round I had lost 5 troopers in my right astromech squad and 1 at-rt. His maximum firepower did only managed to put 1 wound on my speeder. Sadly my counterfire only managed to drop a single death trooper, but at least his tank took a beating of 3 dmg and had 1 ion token. My brave second officer bravely fled the right flank and went towards the centre.

Oh brave sir Twi’lek so bravely ran away…

Round 2
Command cards
Covering fire vs Imperial dicipline

My plan was at first to ambush my speeder since I didn’t think my opponent was going to burn his second 1 pip card on turn 2. After the dmg I took last turn I felt that I needed some defence in order to save my remaining troops and try to contest some objectives. Thanks to comms jammer I could give order to my speeder and I got first activation after the die roll.

Expecting to go second I saw and took an opportunity to spread some dodge tokens and activated my lone squad leader before he got taken out, going dodge then attack to give out a dodge token. My opponent didn’t have range to order his tank and gave orders to his death troopers to rearm/swap his weapon configs. Since he had 5 orders in his stack I felt it unlikely for him to activate his tank before my speeder.

You get a dodge token and you get a dodge token!

Sadly he took a gamble and drew the top token in his stack and of course it’s heavy. This stopped my double tap ion to shut down his entire activation, but at least I stopped his move+ aim action and again my speeder only took 1 dmg from the tanks attack.

Meanwhile in the centre I moved up my officer towards the middle objective followed by my mobile cover at-rt and astromech squad. Sadly his grenade config bypassed my cover and delivered 3 wounds on my officer despite guardian. My astromech squad moved into objective range and avenged my officer by dropping 2 death troopers and give my officer a dodge token thanks to my command card.

His second stormtrooper squad went into the forest to contest the cenre objective and a long range death trooper squad managed just to get trough 1 wound on my offices after cover, dodge and guardian. Very close, but not enough :(. On the left my at-rt and officer attacked his stormtrooper squad who sat behind cover with a dodge token. My leftmost trooper squad tried to finish the squad off and then moved into the middle. Here is one of my big mistakes, I should have taken the safe route and stayed with my trooper squad left to secure that transmition instead of going centre. My eye mesurement was off and I just missed reaching the centre objective with my leader and I got greedy instead of taking safe objective points. Meanwhile his last 2 royal guards who had gotten some stray fire and a rotary blast managed to rally and double moved to charge my astromech squad behind the at-rt.

Hey, guys where are you going? The terminal is this way!

End of turn my right troopers had survived some shooting thanks to their dodge tokens. The speeder slow moved speed 1 with ryad and gave the tank another salvo while split firing the drivers 2 white dice towards the stormtrooper squad near the objective. Here my hope vanished, my ion blaster/rocket attack rolled 1 red, 2 black and 5 white delivering only 2 hits which he blocked :O. No damage and no ion and just to add salt to the wound, my driver rolled 2 blanks with his pistol. Well nothing more to do than recover the blaster and ryad and try again next turn.

Sir, that rocket just bounced of the tank…

Due to my greed and my opponents good movement the empire took the lead with 1-0 starting round 3.

At least I get to use my nice metal tokens.

Round 3
Command cards
Sabotaged communications vs Assault

I suspected my opponent to put down a 2 or 3 pip cards and I wanted to go first while negating his card which I did. Bonus points if you remember that I have neither an operative nor special forces in my army, it’s the price of going full genereic. Still I was after the first activation more than anything and I couldn’t reach my speeder with my remaning officer so sabotaged communications it is.

I started to feel the force was against me. My first activation was corps and I went aim-shoot with my comms squad trying to finish off the death troopers out in the open. However despite an aim token I only managed to get 3 hits which they all saved. (Did I mention I dislike death troopers?).

Veers gave out some aim tokens and did a potshot that didn’t do anything. I got my speeder and decided it was time to turn the tide so I went a comp move of 3 with ryad and moved into flank position. I fired my rocket into the occupiers weak side delivering 3 crits that only resulted in one dmg and the ion blaster + driver pistol managed 4 hits on the stormtroopers, yet only 1 trooper died. I think the speeder worked fine and did everything acoording to plan, but after round 1 his red dice where way to hot for me to do any real dmg. I felt that at least my build and plan worked fine, despite the poor result.

He did some long range shooting on my at-rt since I had my troopers locked into melee with his royal guard, a fight which they managed to win and the astromech could treat the at-rt.

It’s weird how often my rebel troopers beat roal guards in close combat.

The lack of ion gave the tank a full turn of action so move – free aim into attack on my speeder. 2 natural crits and 2 via impact followed by 4 blanks = Kaboom!

End of round, his left stormtrooper squad leader had panicked and my at-rt fired 5 hits into his death troopers who swatted it like flies after they had mowed down 4 troopers leaving me with 2 squad leaders and 1 astromech.

A last ditch effort to stop him from holding the right objective. Aim – shoot and only 2 hits that is negated by cover.

Round 4
Command cards
Ambush vs Push

I stared defeat in the eye, but I felt that maybe I can get a victory point at least. Ambush beat his push and I decided to give order to my officer and then only have support and corps in the stack.

Okey guys here is the plan, I run and you die.

I draw a random order and got corp and tried to take down Veers who stood in the open with 1 wound. Sadly I rolled only 2 hits and caused 1 wound. His deathtroopers started to put down my lone squad leaders and my last effeort to get a point kind of sums up the match for me. My officer rolls blank into blanks after aim.

So at the end of round 4 I conceded, I had no chance to win unless I could hold 2 points during round 6 while my opponent held 0.

End of battle thoughts
I had a good time finally playing legion again as well as playing with my friends 14 month old puppy. It’s easy to blame the dice after this match, but it was just one of the factors. I find that my plan to use my speeder against the tank was fine, yet I didn’t get the result I wanted. The dice did not work for me in that regard. I think there was 3 factors that contributed to the loss.

Rng
My attack dice failed me several times despite aim tokens and my opponets defence dice blocked much higher than average. The first attack that butchered my astromech squad was a hard blow and the 1/5 chance to pull the heavy order token my opponent did was also lucky.

List buildning
I think I had to many vehicles and while the speeder worked, I think it couldn’t get the support it needed. I find that I had to few troopers to support my vehicles and contest objectives. Having no operative nor special forces when using only generic command cards feels like a missed opportunity. The rotary blasters didn’t work that well, even with aim I got pretty average rolls. I think with 3 walkers I could use flamers as more of a threat.

Battleplan and tactics
I did a greedy move during round 2 that cost me a victory point and I think I spread out my forces to much and I should probably avoid battle lines in my list since I didn’t have much long range firepower. Also my opponent played really well and focused his units in the right positions .

So I had fun time, but faced a hard loss. I made a few misstakes and will use this to learn and adapt. My modified list uses dissaray instead of battle lines in my deployment cards and removing the landspeeder for more troopers. This list gives up the anti-tank landspeeder and goes more offensive with 2 flame walkers. 1 rotary and mark 2 medium blaster trooper can work as fire support. The rebel veterans can hunt enemy characters and royal guards while the sniper team gives me a special forces unit as well as some flexible long range dmg.

Rebel Alliance 798
Commander
Rebel officer – esteemed leader 55p
Rebel officer – esteemed leader 55p
Corp
Rebel troopers – z-6 trooper, astromech 70p
Rebel troopers – z-6 trooper, astromech 70p
Rebel troopers – z-6 trooper 62p
Rebel troopers – z-6 trooper 62p
Rebel veterans – cm-0/93 trooper, rebel veteran, hunter 97p
Mark II medium blaster trooper 38p
Special forces
Rebel commandos strike team – dh-447 sniper 44p.
Support
At-rt – flamethrower 80p
At-rt – flamethrower 80p
At-rt – rotary blaster 85p

That was my first battle report and sadly it was not a victory, but a very informative defeat. I apologize for the picture quality, I wasn’t planning on recording the match for a report. in the future I plan to use a better camera and take some more detailed pictures. If you enjoyed this battle report pls tell me in the comments and if you like my stuff pls consider supporting me on patreon: https://www.patreon.com/Rebelsguide

Support, Unit Analysis

At-Rt Unit analysis

Posted on August 13, 2019August 24, 2019 by jocke01

“Hey, why didn’t I get to be in Rouge one?”

Unit introduction

The At-Rt (all terrain recon transport) is a clone wars era scout vehicle and works as a mobile fire support unit for the rebel alliance. At first I was lukewarm to the At-Rt being in the core box. I thought: “they couldn’t put out a core box before going to clone wars era, ugh”. However it grew on me and thanks to the alliance refit of the arc-170 in x-wing and the rebels episode where they find an abandoned clone wars base a story started in my head. A rebel force attack an imperial base that they heard have low security. When entering the facility, they find out why the security was so lacking. It’s a surplus storage facility, where they find old blaster, non functioning equipment and a large number of At-Et’s. Despite having weak armor and weapons the rebels make the best of it and since they lack spare parts and plans for maintenance. I wanted my forest world recon walkers to look muddy and rusty with the old paint job from their episode 3 appearance. Decommissioned from the empires service in favor of more advanced modern vehiclems the rebels use what they get and it’s really fitting the David vs Goliath relationship of the rebels vs empire with an at-rt going up against the at-st.

Before the dark times…wait that is pretty dark

The rebel at-rt is in my opinion the most balanced unit in the game. I’m not saying it’s the best unit in the just the most balanced in both internal balance (compared with other rebel units and options) and external balance (compared to other faction units and options). It has 3 weapon options and they are all viable picks despite being very different. I often find myself annoyed at some design decisions where I just don’t understand the reasoning, but with the at-rt almost everything went right. You might think that I claim the Rt is perfect and it’s not, but close. I have 2 gripes, one being that it should have been armor 2 and surge-block. However since armor was an all or nothing keyword when it was desighned I will let it slide. The second thing is that the climbing vehicle is rarely useable and I would have preferred it just being unhindered by difficult terrain instead. You might of course find yourself on a table with a bunch of things to clamber on, where you can get cover or good line of sight. However this is not often the case in my experience.

Unit options and abilities

The At-Rt comes in at a base cost of 55p which sounds cheap, but you often want to take one of the 3 weapon options pushing the cost to 80-90p. It has a nice speed of 2 with a medium sized base that gives it quite a good mobility. 6hp and 4 resilience threshold is fine for the price and the armor keyword makes it pretty resilient to non impact weapons, however with a surgeless white dice defense, most crits will go through so don’t expect more than one block each game. Except for the 3 weapon options, the only upgrade it can take is comms. Surge-crit helps in its anti armor role and its melee weapon is not to be overlooked, 3 red dice with impact is not bad. Like mentioned before it has the armor keyword, so all normal hits than aren’t flipped via impact are canceled. It has clamber vehicle and expert climber so it can move just like a trooper with grappling hooks. Thanks to its base size it moves about an extra 1.5 small base lenght compared to a normal trooper.

Guest appearance of Pao

The at-rt got 3 weapon options. The first and cheapest is the Flamethrower which comes in at 25 points. It has only range 1 and instead of a fixed dice value it gives 2 black dice per miniature in the defending unit that is in line of sight. This combined with the blast keyword makes this a nightmarish weapon vs trooper squads, especially other rebel troopers or the soon to come cis. The more models the more dice and blast takes away cover so the effectiveness is increased vs lighter armor. 2 black dice per miniature with an average of 0.625 hits per die gives you pretty good odds of getting at least as many hits as defending models in every attack.

The second and slightly more expensive is the Rotary blaster at 30 points. This is the true utility weapon of the unit if not the entire rebel faction. 5 black dice at range 1-3 with surge-crit and no keywords it is the jack of all trades. With its range, dice pool and surge-crit it can hurt both vehicles and troopers alike, but not as effective as the other 2 weapons to their specific targets. It’s the go-to weapon if you don’t need specific anti-tank or anti-infantry firepower in your list.

The third weapon is the Laser cannon which has the longest range 2-4 and highest price at 35. This gun was the sniper before the sniper teams came out. It has 2 black and 1 red with impact 3 making sure that any hits that go through cover turns into crits. Due to the range you can often just sit and go aim-shoot with a 2-3 hits every time. This gun isn’t that effective vs troopers since heavy cover nullifies most of your dice if you don’t roll crit or surge, but vs imperial vehicles you can often count on 2-3 crits every attack since they don’t have easy access to cover.

Build and tactics

The fire chicken

At-rt 55p
Flamer 25p

Total 80p

This is the cheapest one you can get with a weapon hardpoint. You might considering putting a hq uplink on this one to combine with “sorry about the mess” or a unique 1 pip cards as this unit screams last-first activation. The range 1 is limiting, but if you spend a turn double moving and then first activate for a move shoot next turn, you can cover a lot of distance and get the drop on an unlucky trooper unit. I suggest taking 2-3 of this unit since it’s gonna be a priority target for your opponent and it has to survive on the way to it’s targets to get any firepower from it, so having a pack makes it much harder to deal with than a single one. Han solo is a great commander for these ones, since his reckless diversion can help them walk up the battlefield without getting shot at. The “sorry about the mess” hq uplink or improvised orders can give you a nice last first activation to guarantee a burned enemy unit. I think of these ones as flaming missiles rather than fire support. You should pick on target to go after and hope you can get there before being shot down, any turns after that is just a bonus. If you are faced with a single model unit, remember you have a nice 3 red melee weapon.

The Z-6 big brother

At-rt 55p
Rotary blaster 30p

Total 85p

This is the basic At-Rt fire support. It works very well with your rebel troopers, commandos and any trooper unit with a range 3-4 weapon. It’s gun does an average of 3 hits, which is just shy of what a Z-6 trooper squad does, however it doesn’t lose any attack dice when suffering wounds unless you get weapon destroyed after you reach your resilience value. It also doesn’t care about suppression like troopers, so you can often do an aim-shoot to increase your dmg output. This is the At-Rt’s main strength, it’s a workhorse that delivers until its destroyed. I want my enemy to shoot att my rts because then my troopers can do their job and don’t lose effectiveness . Even with 5 wounds and chance of only having 1 action per turn from the damaged vehicle, the rotary blaster still spits out average of 3 hits per shot. Using a group of commandos with the rotary At-Rt is like giving them a mobile heavy cover that also have a gatling gun.

Sniper RT

At-rt 55p
Laser cannon 35p

Total 90p

This is a stable anti-tank platform, but it has limitations when attacking infantry. The range however let’s it stay out of range of some impact firepower and stray blaster bolts and it doesn’t have to move all that much. A speed 2 move with the medium base + range 4 is a long distance on the battlefield, so this unit can work as a sniper when single models units present themselves out of cover. While the range 2 can feel limiting, you can just run into melee if someone gets that close. This is a unit that I could take 1 of, but it works fine as a pair. 2 of these can really put some consistent hurt on any ground vehicles you face when they aim-shoot together, speeders are harder targets these days with their often cover 2 protection that blocks your impact. Ironically their favourite targets are other At-Rts which they will make short work of.

Tips and tricks
Since they have so few upgrade slots I figured I would do a general tips and tricks section instead.

Reversing
I find that a lot of players, myself included forgets that ground vehicles can reverse. This has the obvious advantage of getting out of range from enemy weapons or melee units like Vader. However it can also help with getting units in your fire arc, even better than pivot does.

Mobile cover
Even without weapons the At-Rt is a big cylinder of light cover (heavy with low profile or suppression) that can be placed where you need it. 3 naked At-Rt’s only cost 165p and that is 18hp with armor walking towards your opponent. I haven’t played with weaponless At-Rt’s, but I am tempted to do a melee rush list with them, if you want to see battle reports with that kind of army please consider supporting me on patreon.

Displacement
When you are moving into melee with a trooper unit that has 2 or more models, you can often manager to displace one model, while moving into base contact with another. That way you give the unit 1 suppression from displacement as well as attacking them. You can also do a little dirty move when displacing your own units, that way you can displace your own unit leader in order to move then further ahead. Sure they get 1 suppression, but if it’s late in the round it will just go away in the end phase.

At-Rt’s place today
With the newest addition of tauntaun riders, the rebels have access to 3 different support units. I find that At-Rt’s work best with Han Solo or the generic officer. Leia and Luke works best with troopers due to their abilities and command cards, not that you can’t take At-Rt’s with them just that they prefer trooper focused armies. Jyn works well with most things that can take care of themselves if you use inflitrate. The tauntaun riders have better mobility and strike hard vs troopers with red dice save or better. The laser turret gives great firepower at range 4 for cheap, but the lack of mobility can be exploited by your opponent. Both are great options, but the At-Rt’s strenght is the advantage of armor and no courage as well as flexible weapon options.

List idea: Vehicle heavy. This is a list that I think can go against the new meta of more and more trooper units and less vehicles and impact. This army can march up the board and throw out dice. Rotary blaster works against most targets and the landspeeder is kited for anti-tank.

Rebell alliance

Rebel officer
Esteemed leader
55p

Rebel officer
Esteemed leader
55p

Rebel troopers
Z-6 trooper
Astromech
70p

Rebel troopers
Z-6 trooper
Astromech
70p

Rebel troopers
Z-6 trooper
62p

Rebel troopers
Z-6 trooper
Comms specialist
Comms relay
76p

At-Rt
Rotary blaster
85p

At-Rt
Rotary blaster
85p

At-Rt
Rotary blaster
85p

X-34 landspeeder
M-40 ion blaster
Ryder Azadi
Rps-6 rocket gunner
154p

Total: 797p

This is my analysis of the At-Rt. A fine unit that still holds up. If you are curious about the Landspeeder pls let me know in the comments, I would love to do an analysis of that unit. If you like my stuff, please consider supporting med on patreon: https://www.patreon.com/Rebelsguide

Special forces, Unit Analysis

Rebel Commandos unit analysis

Posted on July 30, 2019August 24, 2019 by jocke01

Rebel commandos analysis

General Solo?, is your strike team assembled?

Rebel commandos is probably the expansion for the rebels with the most value since you can field 2 units out of the box and you get 7 very nice minis. This was the first rebel special forces and they are essentially rebel troopers on steroids, the strike teams are on the other hand just like the name entails, a small unit that strikes critical targets.

Rebel commandos (unit)

Like I said commandos are rebel troopers on steroids. They come in at 60 points for the base unit of four models so 15 points per model compared to the 10 point trooper. They keep the same defence die and weapon, but they have a lot of nice keywords to make Them stand out. Like fleet troopers and rebel veterans they got surge-hit and sharpshooter 1 on top of that. In defence they got low profile which is great thanks to their courage value of 2, that allows them to get heavy cover from suppression while requiring 2 to lose their action after rally.

Unit options and abilities

Commandos have access to 2 different heavy weapons, but no personel upgrade. In top of that they got access to gear, comms and training. They have several abilities:

Low profile which gives them heavy cover if they got light, this is a nice ability to have since some terrain should be light and they can get heavy from hiding behind at-rt’s or emplacement troopers or just out in the open of they have suppression.

Scout 2 that allows them to make a speed 2 move when deploying, nothing gamebreaking, but depending on terrain, deployment and objective cards this is an ability that shouldn’t be overlooked since they can get a great position outside deployment or move into claim position for objectives.

Sharpshooter 1 this is great since most shots vs other infantry will be at least light cover, it’s almost like adding an extra hit to their attack rolls.

put me and this here sniper rifle anywhere up to and including one mile of Emperor Palpatine with a clear line of sight, sir… pack your bags, fellas, war’s over

They got 2 heavy weapons to choose from, one being the DH-447 sniper rifle. This weapon is special since it got range 1 – infinite, making it a great weapon for splitfire since it can always reach a target. It adds 1 white dice over the standard rifle which isn’t too exciting, but it has pierce 1 and high velocity which don’t allow dodge tokens to be used…providing it’s the only weapon in the attack. So just to compare with a Z-6 trooper squad which is in my opinion the gold standard.

Average hits

Z-6 troopers: 3.5
Commandos sniper: 3.5

So at first light it’s the same, but adding the pierce and sharpshooter on a standard stormtrooper squad in heavy cover we get:

Average wounds

Z-6 troopers: 0.75
Commandos sniper: 1.875

More than twice amount of dead bucketheads!

This is in a control environment of course, but my point is don’t let the amount of dice fool you. Against lighter armor the commandos advantage decreases and increases vs heavy armored targets like death troopers. A commando squad with a sniper gives you a quality attack that excels vs imperial targets. The downside is that your commandos die just as easy as normal troopers when fired upon, while low profile helps a bit of course.

The second weapon option is the proton charge saboteur which is a different kind of weapon option than other units have. It does not add any dice or keywords to the attack pool, instead it’s an area weapon that needs to be charged then detonated. So unlike exhaust weapons you don’t have to recover it, but you have to spend an action to arm a charge within 1 of the unit leader. After a charged is placed any friendly unit with “detonate proton charge” can detonate it after any unit have performed an action. When detonated the charge performs an attack vs every unit att range 1 of the token and line of sight including friendly units. The proton charge model uses the commandos ranged weapon of 1 black die, but the real advantage comes when using the charges since you get to attack every unit in range and los. I will speak more about proton charges, their effect and how to use them in a future analysis. You can have a maximum of 3 proton charge saboteurs in your list and that’s a potential 18 charges armed (3 saboteurs x 6 rounds), more likely it’s 8-12 and you need at least one unit left with detonate proton charge to use any placed charges. So a commando unit with a proton charge saboteur can be a base unit combined with 2 strike teams with saboteurs.

Upgrades

Commandos can have a plethora of different upgrades. Grenades, gear, comms and training.

I don’t usually take grenades on commandos. Frag grenades is a decent dmg increase, but restricted att range 1 for a unit that prefer attacks at range. Frag grenades seems overkill when you already have sharpshooter 1 and if you want anti tank then the proton charge is a better use than impact grenades.

There is a lot of gear that’s useful. Recon Intel to get a scout move of 3 is perhaps not necessary, but fun and can give you a nice alpha strike with scout move-move-shoot or scout move-shoot-move back depending on deployment. Environmental gear is a solid choice as your commandos can turn difficult light cover terrain into free heavy cover terrain and it helps your scout move. Emergency stims is just as good here as on other expensive units. Grappling hooks is also a great thing with scout, as you can scout move into a climbable terrain piece then during your activation you can climber-shoot. Targeting scopes is usually a never take for rebels, but combined with the hunter training card it’s actually a valid choice.

Comms is not as pick and choose friendly. Comms jammer doesn’t suit commandos as they prefer long to mid range. Comms relay can be used with sabotage communications to great an upgrades ambush card. Hq uplink is the one I use the mosh, just to get the extra uses from Luke and Leia’s 2 pip cards and to ensure control of when I can activate my commandos and I prefer this over long range comlink.

Comms Combo!

Training is a powerful category, but pretty specific in it’s cards. Tenacity is just a no take since single wound units can’t be wounded. Duck and cover is a good one as it combines with low profile, however it is expensive and in the wake of death troopers, Palpatine and Bossk the empire have a fair number of suppressive weapons. This can make duck and cover as risk as you can easy help your opponent to suppress or even panic your commandos. Endurance is good, but not really necessary unless you run into a lot of the aforementioned suppressive weapons on a regular basis. My favourite is the hunter card. It’s not to expensive at 6 points and it suite the commandos offensive capabilities perfect.

Builds and tactics

The classic commandos

Rebel commandos 60p
Sniper 26p
Environmental gear or grappling hooks 3p
Hunter 6p
Hq uplink 10p

total 105p

These guys are the standard commando squad I play. You can cut some fat by skipping the hq uplink, but I like the command flexibility. These are the rebel hunters and what do they hunt you ask? These guys are character killers. Any commander, even Palp or Darth with the immune pierce are prime targets. Commanders usually hang around with royal guards which is a free aim token piñata. They prefer to stay at mid range where they can bring all their guns to bare and their focus is to take down enemy commanders, operatives and royal guards. A trick is to splitfire the weapons between a commander and his guard to get 2 aim tokens if both are wounded. The sniper can be shot at a commander to ignore dodge and pierce can be used on a guardian hit if the target have immune pierce. The other guys throw their dice at the guards something different, with sharpshooter negating some of the cover tax of attacking multiple units.

This unit like a lot of rebel units prefers Leia as a commander. Her command cards works well, 1 pip can drop wounds on units for hunter to trigger, the 2 pip is just good and the 3 pip let’s Leia inspire and order take cover on them before they activate. Using Leia with strict orders you get very good control of suppression, you can make sure to keep one token for low profile if necessary. Commandos love at-rt supports as they can walk behind them and gain heavy cover while either shooting in base contact or through them with sharpshooter.

List example:

++ Standard (Rebel Alliance) [796 Points] ++

+ Commander +

•Leia Organa [100 Points]: Strict Orders, Esteemed Leader

+ Operative +

•Chewbacca [122 Points]: Emergency Stims, Tenacity

+ Corps +

Fleet Troopers [78 Points]: Fleet Trooper, Scatter Gun Trooper

Rebel Troopers [62 Points]: Z-6 Trooper

Rebel Troopers [58 Points]: 2-1B Medical Droid

+ Special Forces +

Rebel Commandos [107 Points]: DH-447 Sniper, Environmental Gear, HQ Uplink, Hunter

+ Support +

Rebel At-Rt [85 Points]: Rotary Blaster

+ Command Hand +

Command Hand: •Coordinated Bombardment, •Sabotaged Communications, ••Brains and Brawn, ••No Time for Sorrows, •••Covering Fire, •••Somebody Has to Save Our Skins, ••••Standing Orders

++ Total: [798 Points] ++

Created with BattleScribe (https://battlescribe.net)

The proton base

Rebel commandos 60p
Proton charge saboteur 24p
Duck and cover 8p
Comms relay 5p

Total 98p

This is another commando unit I’ve used when playing a triple proton charge saboteur lists. It’s Main purpose is to survive and detonate charges and place some on a backline objective. They can take descent potshots and the comms relay is for the sabotaged communications command card or just to boost command range to runaway strike teams. I like to play a Han&Chewie saboteur list. Han Solo’s reckless diversion help to stop fire on your strike teams and “sorry about the mess” combined with improvised orders help to guarantee a last first activation. Chewie works well with Han and His guardian helps keeping your strike teams alive.

What I see when I play reckless diversion

List example:

++ Standard (Rebel Alliance) [799 Points] ++

+ Commander +

•Han Solo [130 Points]: Improvised Orders

+ Operative +

•Chewbacca [122 Points]: Emergency Stims, Tenacity

+ Corps +

Rebel Troopers [62 Points]: Z-6 Trooper

Rebel Troopers [58 Points]: 2-1B Medical Droid

+ Special Forces +

Rebel Commandos [91 Points]: Comms Relay, Proton Charge Saboteur

Rebel Commandos – Strike Team [44 Points]: Proton Charge Saboteur, Recon Intel

+ Command Hand +

Command Hand: •Sorry about the mess, •Sabotaged Communications, ••Push, ••Reckless Diversion, •••Change of Plans, •••Notorious Scoundrels, ••••Standing Orders

++ Total: [799 Points] ++

Created with BattleScribe (https://battlescribe.net)

Final thoughts

In conclusion I think the Rebel Commandos are a valueable unit in the rebel alliance and much needed to counter the royal guard based death balls, either with hard shooting or the area damage of the proton charge.

This was my thoughts on the Rebel Commandos who are in my opinion an unit that get’s overshadowed by their strike team brothers and sisters. Speaking of wich, I might talk about them next time or perhaps I will give my thoughts on the At-Rt, make your voice heard in the comments!

Corps, Unit Analysis

Rebel specialists unit analysis

Posted on July 17, 2019August 24, 2019 by jocke01

Rebel specialists unit analysis:

“Don’t get me started on that medical droid…”

The specialist pack is a unique expansion at this point in legion. Instead of giving you a new unit it gives you 4 different personnel upgrades to your other units as well as a generic commander option. So what’s so special about the rebel specialists?

Let’s find out.

Rebel officer (unit)

This is the unit version of the rebel officer, it’s a generic commander (no unique dot in the name) and works just the same as our other commanders with 2 differences. It’s not unique so you could have 2 of these in a single list, or even 4 in a team match. They also don’t have any unit specific command cards like Son of Skywalker for example.

Unit options and abilities

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is redofficer.jpg — *Leia light*

The officer comes in at 50 points and is a light version of Leia Organa. You get inspire, take cover and sharpshooter, but only value of 1 instead of 2. A weaker blaster, melee attack and you only get 4 hp instead of 6. You get one command slot and a gear slot. So at first glance there is a lot of stuff you give up for the 40 points you save. So Leia is in my mind a far more valuable choice when you want a support character. However those 40 points can give you a lot of other stuff or you could go with double generic officers for just 10 more points than Leia.

Builds and tactics

The officer

Rebel officer 50p
Esteemed leader 5p

Total 55p.

This is the best option for the rebel officer IMO. 4hp is very easy to snipe down and if your opponent is bringing Bossk or Boba then they have an easy bounty. Esteemed leader helps a lot and gear is not really worth it, if you load this guy up to much you are better off just picking Leia. The main thing about this unit is a cheap command bubble that can give some support with take cover and inspire for your backline or power units.

So instead of thinking how to build your officer, let’s check in what kind of lists ge works well in. Luke and Leia is a classic commander pair and it’s effective no doubt about that, however you pay a minimum of 250 points in 2 models, probably close to 300p with upgrades. Leia brings her command cards of course, but in a Luke and Leia list she is mostly backline support. Here you can swap Leia for a generic officer to get points to other stuff. Likewise if you play a Han&Chewie list you sink a lot of points into those guys and a generic officer is enough for some support and you want to focus on Solo’s command cards in that list anyway. With teamwork a single take cover Still gives 2 dodge tokens when given to Han or Chewie and the inspire 1 is enough to help Han from becoming suppressed or even panicked.

The generic brothers

This is something I have been pondering lately, since Leia’s command cards and take cover don’t synergies well with vehicles I think that for a vehicle heavy list the double officer is something to consider. Vehicles are costly and they are fast, especially the speeders so having 2 command bubbles help a lot.

List:

2x generic officer

Esteemed leader
110p

1x Z-6 trooper squad 62p

1x Z-6 trooper squad with comms spec and comms relay 76p

2x Z-6 trooper squad with astromech 70p

3x at-rt

Rotary blaster
255p

Landspeeder

M-45 Ion blaster
RPS-6 Rocket gunner
Ryder Azadi
154p

Total: 798p

The landspeeder is kitted for anti vehicle and the astromech squads are meant to march up behind the cover of the rotary at-rt’s repairing as they go. The list have 10 activations and the 2 officers help with command range, inspire and take cover in a large area. The comms specialist is there for the comms relay that helps getting orders to your speeder or other vehicles with cards like covering fire. This list uses both 2 officers and 2 astromechs so try it if you have 2 specialists boxes and tell me how it went.

Specialists (personnel upgrades)

Officer

The officer personnel upgrade cost 19p and gives the unit +1 courage and inspire 1. He also uses the units weapons and profile so for a rebel trooper squad he is 9p more expensive than the extra trooper. With the amount of suppression the empire gives out, it’s always nice to have some extra inspire, especially from a corps unit. The big thing is the courage 2 however. Your commanders courage value helps against panicking, but having courage 2 means you need 2 suppression tokens after rally to lose your 2nd action, this is great. It also means that your unit can have a suppression token that increases their cover while still operating at maximum efficiency. For a rebel trooper squad this isn’t that life changing, you get to take a dodge action a little more often. For a trooper squad with ion though this is huge, since you want to recover that the gun as possible. Normally your opponent just needs to score a single hit on your ion squad before their activation to have a 66,6% chance of them being suppressed when activated. Another unit that really needs their second action is fleet troopers, regardless of heavy weapon choice since they will need to move often to get into range with their range 2 pistols. So if you have the points it’s a well worth add, to any fleet troopers squad or trooper squad with an exhaust weapon.

Comms specialist

A comms specialist gives your unit a comms upgrade slot and you have to add a comms upgrade to the unit. The interesting part is that the specialist cost 9 points and like the officer it uses the same profile as the unit it’s added to. So if you add this to a fleet trooper squad you get an extra trooper for just 9 points, of course with the caveat of buying a comms upgrade. You can think of it like a discount on the comms upgrade, as well as the opportunity to give one to a corps unit. So what kind of comms upgrades so we have and what should we take?

Comms relay 5p

This is the cheapest one and it gives you some extra order control and range. Like I pointed out earlier it can help to give orders to speeders or other units that moves ahead of the army and moves out of command range, this can be achieved by giving the vehicle a comms upgrade, but this is cheaper. It also combines well with the covering fire command card since that specifies 3 corps units, this could give an order token to a vehicle, commander or well anything other than a corps unit. The effect of the card triggers with corps unit of course, but 2 is enough to give you activation control for your corps. I would use this on comms specialist in a rebel trooper squad when using vehicles or a lot of special forces/operatives or if you run a single commander.

Hq uplink 10p

FFG have a history of putting Toryn Farr on good cards and this is no exception. It suites units that really needs and order like a single heavy or lone special forces unit. You will have a pretty good chance to draw corps order token from your stack anyway so it’s not super crucial. There is 2 things about this though, if you play a Luke and Leia list it gets a little bit more value. Both their 2 pip command cards gives out bonuses when a trooper unit is issued an order, it doesn’t have to be order from the commander so the hq uplink lets you get more bonuses out of those cards. The second thing is the Solo trick. Solo’s 0 pip command card that guaranteed gives you priority combos with hq uplink, His card gives order only to himself, but with hq uplink you can get a first activation with another unit like a scattergun fleet trooper squad.

Long range comlink 10p

“Yes, it’s bears armed with sticks…no I’m not drunk”

You will most likely be able to stay within command range so I don’t recommend taking it.

Comms jammer 15p

You will have a hard time getting to range 1 and even harder to stay alive there so this is more suited for faster units like the landspeeder or airspeeder.

Astromech

This little guy comes in at only 8 points and gives the unit repair with 2 charges as a free action. Unlike the officer and comms dude he doesn’t have any arms to hold a blaster so you don’t get to add any attack dice from him, ge also gets removed last from dmg (except for the unit leader). I really like the astromech since the rules changes to repair allowing the mech to repair repulsor vehicles. This changed the potential targets from 1 to 3 and makes it much more useable. Add this dude to a Z-6 trooper squad and pair them with an at-rt and you got a potent formation where the troopers can stay behind the cover of the at-rt and repair it when needed. At-rt’s comes in at a minimum of 80p if you buy a weapon hardpoint and with only a ⅙ chance of blocking dmg they will be wounded very quickly. The astromech can give your vehicles 2 extra health or remove the crippling immobilized dmg token from a flamer at-rt. The repair to repulsor vehicles is a nice bonus, however I recommend pairing these dudes with at-rt’s. Losing 1 black attack die from a trooper squad is a small price to pay for a potential extra attack with a at-rt that would have been destroyed otherwise.

Medical droid

Very close to his astromech cousin he has the noncombatant keyword and gives a free action with 2 charges although this is for troopers and not vehicles. Unlike the astromech it doesn’t only remove wounds from damaged troopers, it can also restore a model to it’s mother unit. With the restriction that the model died in the current round and it’s mother unit is still alive. Models with multiple wounds gets restored with 1 hp remaining.

The medical droid is expensive though with 18 points and non-combatant it’s a heavy investment. So you really want to use both charges before the game is over and hopefully in something more expensive than just a rebel trooper. It’s about target priority with the medical droids, where can you get the most value and greatest effect. I remember seeing a table with how much wounds were worth in points depending on point cost and armor save and It’s true that expensive wounds can be a priority and depending on the save, you get more out of the wounds sure. I however also look at what effect the extra wounds or models can bring. So for example Chewbacca and wookies have a terrible save as they only block ⅙ hits, however they have very good offence. If you restore a wookie to a unit with tenacity, you get 2 black and 1 red dice extra of they can make a charge before taking more hits, same with Chewie as his offence in both melee and ranged is great, it is worth it to keep him alive. So while I still agree that using medics on targets with high cost and good save, I recommend that you don’t always go that route and think about what needs healing right now.

I decided to put down a list of units that pair extra well with medical droids:

Luke every wound on Luke is precious, he will most likely take about a quarter of your points and with red defence with deflect and immune pierce, he isn’t a fun target for your opponent to shoot. Since he is such a priority for your opponent, you might as well make it hard for them.
Han with the reckless diversion command card, you can force your opponent to shoot at han if possible. Thanks to low profile he will almost always have heavy cover and uncanny luck on that. He isn’t super tanky, but he will be a great dmg sponge for one round when your other units can operate almost without danger. A medical droid or two can help him survive a round like this, the more shots against han the better since it will keep your other fragile units alive.
Sabine same reason as Luke, she has very good save and is a huge threat.
Commandos and strike teams these units have the same durability as a normal trooper, but much higher cost. Keeping these units alive is key. The trick with strike teams is to try and Keep 1 member out of sight so ge can’t be targeted by hits. Then you use your medical droid to restore the lost model. This can make proton charge teams an endlessly annoyance in games.
Emplacement troopers coming in at 70 points minimum, this is a great unit to heal, since they will mostly be hit by sniper dmg that only deals 1-2 dmg at a time.
Pathfinders again price is a factor, but also the danger sense, the more shots they take the more dice they can throw in defence. A unit like this can be very hard to eliminate if placed on an objective and has a medical droid as support.

So that’s my analysis of the rebel specialist pack, agree disagree? You have some great tactics or lists with the specialist?

Let me know in the comments!

Rebels guide to the galaxy

Rebels guide to the galaxy

Rebels guide to the galaxy, a guide to help your rebels forces succeed in Star Wars Legion

Tag: wargaming

Battle report Rebels double officer vs Empire Veers

At-Rt Unit analysis

Rebel Commandos unit analysis

Rebel specialists unit analysis