Jek is amazing. I feel like in a few waves, we'll see an upgrade that puts him up there with the current powerhouse pilots.

He's basically a maverick that no other pilot can keep up with. Even against a TIE Defender, he'll win out due to having more actions with Push the Limit. R5-D8 will keep you topped off most games. Statistically, if you shed 1 stress with his ability and also use R5-D8 every turn, you'll repair more often than you take damage. But you can go many rounds without taking damage at all, so can feel free to gain a TL, or Boost with an Engine Upgrade.

I would put PtL, R5D8 and Improved Hull on him.

In 86% of cases Jek can K-Turn without damage or take damage and repair it (and maybe take a TL action via PtL). The extra hull point makes this less of a gamble. This should maybe executed after his shields are already gone, as R5D8 cannot recharge shields.

Porkins with Experimental Interface?

Whats the thematic reasoning behind this card anyway ?

His lard protects him from stress but instead stresses the ship to the point of damaging it ?

Yeah, I still blame the movie for not explaining why Jek spontaneously explodes other than "He's the fat man"

The ability is from Jek attempting to control his fighter after a server malfunction. He stay optimistic when other pilots would have bailed. However if you take a look at the flavor text from a card in the Decipher CCG game it provides an explanation why he crashed.

Now combine that with the Wave 5 Debris cloud and you see how the ability and the Debris Cloud effects tie into the movie. Jek flew through some debris (And rolled a critical hit), he tried to remove the stress (and rolled another hit.) Did it again for some reason and blew up.

I really don't understand the appeal of R5D8 with Porkins. The biggest penalty for taking stress is losing your action, so if you clear stress to regain your action and then immediately spend that action on repairing the damage you took to clear the stress you haven't really gained anything. And with an x-wing's limited action bar the only thing you can gain out of an extra action is a target lock. So why not just take predator for a "second action" that doesn't need PTL and works even when you k-turn?

I really don't understand the appeal of R5D8 with Porkins. The biggest penalty for taking stress is losing your action, so if you clear stress to regain your action and then immediately spend that action on repairing the damage you took to clear the stress you haven't really gained anything. And with an x-wing's limited action bar the only thing you can gain out of an extra action is a target lock. So why not just take predator for a "second action" that doesn't need PTL and works even when you k-turn?

Interesting way at looking at the balancing mechanic of the negative effect with an overall good card. While others try to marginalize it with things like R5-D8. You look at why not just maximize the benefits of the powerful ability. Reminds me of the Leroy Jenkins card in hearthstone. It had a terrible ability to balance it out. Some tried to protect it with AOE or Taunts, but once people figured out how to chain that card instead and now it just got nerfed.

Come to think of it you could attach both the Jek, Predator can boost his attack and R5-D8 can fix his problems. Might be point heavy but when you got a 4 firepower Pilot skill 7 that can dump stress could be pretty powerful.