Now that the core set is out and all the expansions for Wave 1 have been announced, what's next?

Will it just be more expansion blister packs with each wave, like X-Wing? Or will there be additional box sets with accompanying expansion blister packs?

Will each Wave have a theme? For example:

• Location based: Tatooine, Endor, Coruscant, Hoth, Lothal
• Episode based: Empire Strikes Back; Return of the Jedi; Rebels
• Faction based: Scum and Villainy

And speaking of factions, will there only be 3 factions? Or will there be more:

• Smugglers and Scoundrels
• Black Sun
• Hutt Cartel
• Tusken Raiders
• Jawas
• Pirates
• Ewoks
• Mandalorian
• Naboo Guard

What large-based figures will we see?:

• Rancor
• Rebel mounted on Tauntaun
• Stormtrooper mounted on Dewback
• Rebel e-web
• Speeder bikes
• Wampa
• Jabba the Hutt
• Banthas

What else will we see?:

• C3P0
• R2-D2
• Lando Carlrissian
• Gamorrean Guard
• Storm Commandos
• Rebel Commandos
• Rebel Officers
• Dark Troopers
• Wookie warriors
• Ezra Bridger
• Kana Jarrus
• Zeb Orrelios
• Sabine Wren
• Inquisitor
• Juno Eclipse
• Mara Jade
• Ahsoka Tano
• Darth Maul

For Wave 2, it can almost be guaranteed that there will be:

• Boba Fett
• Bossk
• 4-LOM
• Zuckuss
• Leia Organa

Based on some conjecture that I was engaged in over on this thread; http://community.fantasyflightgames.com/index.php?/topic/130907-spoilers-time-period/

...I would be all in for a Shadows of the Empire themed expansion, similar in scope to a Descent "big box" expansion, with its own full-sized campaign to replace the one in the Core box. It's a good time to drop it in because;

• The LCG and X-Wing are both currently dabbling in materials directly connected to that theme; X-Wing saw Dash Rendar released in Wave 5, Xizor and Guri are coming up in the Scum wave. The LCG just dropped that theme in the recently released deluxe expansion
• It can show off the timeline mechanic for campaign missions, dropping "Shadows" in the "5" band, which will eliminate the Rebel player's ability to run the Han Solo mission, since thematically he'd be in carbonite at that point
• New "big" allies/villains in the form of Leia, Luke circa "Empire Strikes Back", Dash, Xizor, Guri, Boba Fett, then flesh out the ranks of mooks on either side to include groups for Black Sun goons, Bothan spies, etc

Of course if it follows Descent's release pattern, I believe that means we get the small box first, which may pass up the mini-campaign mechanic and just provide more supplemental missions for the side mission deck, along with a specific Side Mission to enable a new hero for the Rebels, and a new Imperial Agenda to add in a new Villain. Leia seems like an obvious addition for the Rebels, regardless of what the next expansion holds.

Given that Imperial Assault seems to have more of an emphasis on allies in the form of "big" characters, as well as small squads of helper-mooks, and that they need to keep infusing these things in to accommodate the skirmish game, I hope that the game doesn't run too wild with adding so many Hero characters for the players to use, as Descent does.

Just my 2 credits, for whatever they're worth.

I would be happy with an expansion that has ship cooridoor tiles - to make it look like you've boarded a ship.

I too would love to see a Shadows of the Empire themed expansion with Dash and Leebo as playable characters (not allies.)

Agreed on the ship tiles. There are plenty of iconic locations that could do with addressing, but boarding actions and Hoth jump to mind first.

I think it'd be really great if a little ways down the road they introduced a third faction for the Crime Syndicate to have a 3-way game for missions / skirmish. It'd most likely be an easy fit for Skirmish, but could also have some really neat implications for campaign.

I would like to see an big box expansion where the Imperial Player is a corrupt Imperial or a crime lord and primarily uses Mercenary characters. The Agenda system would work the same with the same card backs, but it would have a host of new agendas more oriented toward crime lords. It would also have a new class deck or two that explore this mercenary theme. Perhaps one class deck is a Hutt cartel and the other is Black Sun. Where the base game has Imperials sprinkled with Mercenaries, this one would feature mercenaries and a few bought-off corrupt officials.

I doubt it will happen, but it sounds cool. And the movies lay precedent for this because when Luke, Leia, Chewie, and Lando infiltrate Jabba's palace, there is no sign of Imperials throughout the whole mission.

I hope we'll eventually see the following:

Leia, C-3PO, R2-D2, Obi-Wan, and Lando for the rebels (would also like some alternative rebel fodder)

Emperor for imperials (ditto re: additional imperial fodder)

Jabba and a bunch of bounty hunters for scum (ditto re: scum fodder... though I'm k without Ewoks for now

I think it'd be really great if a little ways down the road they introduced a third faction for the Crime Syndicate to have a 3-way game for missions / skirmish. It'd most likely be an easy fit for Skirmish, but could also have some really neat implications for campaign.

Well there is the "Scum" faction for deployment cards, which gives you the Nexu, Trandoshan Hunters, and Iggy Pop. It's already a viable Skirmish faction out the box as it is.

In terms of the "Imperial Player" being representative of a crime syndicate, like Black Sun or what have you, that's as easy as my Shadows of the Empire comments above.

Sprinkle in a bunch of Agenda sets and class decks that are more thematically linked to organized crime, add in your Guri/Xizor/Jabba type villain characters for the "Imperial" player, and you're off to the races.

As for playing a 3-way skirmish mission, I think that might put a wrinkle into their publishing strategy for Organized Play. As it is, these maps are a great size for 2 players, but a third wouldn't fit, and they'd have to publish a whole sub-set of skirmish materials to accommodate it. For now, I would imagine a 3-way skirmish will exist in the Board Game Geek aftermarket.

An AT-AT with new Hoth themed map tiles and campaign.

What I'd really like to see is a campaign expansion where the heroes (and most of the enemies, barring the occasional Imperial entanglement) come from the mercenary faction. They'd just be trying to take down some rival crime syndicate, and only toward the end do they discover how their story unexpectedly impacts the war. It would serve the dual purpose of providing a different angle on the SW universe for campaign play, and fleshing out the merc faction for skirmish.

I think it'd be really great if a little ways down the road they introduced a third faction for the Crime Syndicate to have a 3-way game for missions / skirmish. It'd most likely be an easy fit for Skirmish, but could also have some really neat implications for campaign.

Well there is the "Scum" faction for deployment cards, which gives you the Nexu, Trandoshan Hunters, and Iggy Pop. It's already a viable Skirmish faction out the box as it is.

In terms of the "Imperial Player" being representative of a crime syndicate, like Black Sun or what have you, that's as easy as my Shadows of the Empire comments above.

Sprinkle in a bunch of Agenda sets and class decks that are more thematically linked to organized crime, add in your Guri/Xizor/Jabba type villain characters for the "Imperial" player, and you're off to the races.

As for playing a 3-way skirmish mission, I think that might put a wrinkle into their publishing strategy for Organized Play. As it is, these maps are a great size for 2 players, but a third wouldn't fit, and they'd have to publish a whole sub-set of skirmish materials to accommodate it. For now, I would imagine a 3-way skirmish will exist in the Board Game Geek aftermarket.

I meant more along the lines of an Imperial player vs a Rebel player and a Black Sun player. Rebs and Sun would both have two 'heroes' each, fighting for different objectives on the same map. Imagine a mission that takes place at a droid fabrication facility. The Rebels might have an objective for the mission to destroy all the terminals and setback production. The Black Sun might have the objective to steal a prototype droid.

I would like to see a Rebels expansion set in the time period 2, that or expand on Tatooine.

I'd love to see more rebel generic troops. The empire has a ton of generics, which is important for the campaign game, but there needs to be a ton more generic rebels. This could include rebel officers, hoth troopers, hoth commanders, rebel commandos. Of course, there are plenty of generic imperial troops available: hoth troopers, scout troopers, sand troopers. We can also see heavy variants, eg. Heavy stormtroopers with bigger guns/ more health etc.

Another interesting expansion would be to have imperial heroes face off against a rebel player.

I think it'd be really great if a little ways down the road they introduced a third faction for the Crime Syndicate to have a 3-way game for missions / skirmish. It'd most likely be an easy fit for Skirmish, but could also have some really neat implications for campaign.

Well there is the "Scum" faction for deployment cards, which gives you the Nexu, Trandoshan Hunters, and Iggy Pop. It's already a viable Skirmish faction out the box as it is.

In terms of the "Imperial Player" being representative of a crime syndicate, like Black Sun or what have you, that's as easy as my Shadows of the Empire comments above.

Sprinkle in a bunch of Agenda sets and class decks that are more thematically linked to organized crime, add in your Guri/Xizor/Jabba type villain characters for the "Imperial" player, and you're off to the races.

As for playing a 3-way skirmish mission, I think that might put a wrinkle into their publishing strategy for Organized Play. As it is, these maps are a great size for 2 players, but a third wouldn't fit, and they'd have to publish a whole sub-set of skirmish materials to accommodate it. For now, I would imagine a 3-way skirmish will exist in the Board Game Geek aftermarket.

I meant more along the lines of an Imperial player vs a Rebel player and a Black Sun player. Rebs and Sun would both have two 'heroes' each, fighting for different objectives on the same map. Imagine a mission that takes place at a droid fabrication facility. The Rebels might have an objective for the mission to destroy all the terminals and setback production. The Black Sun might have the objective to steal a prototype droid.

I totally get what you're saying, which is what my final paragraph was referring to. I don't disagree that running the 3 factions (Rebels/Imperial/Scum) that come with the game as a free-for-all would be interesting, I just don't see them investing a lot of resources at the onset to make this happen officially. If you meant an actual "Black Sun" type faction above and beyond the Scum faction already in the game, then that'll be really far off.

More realistically, they'll probably work it into the keywords on the Deployment cards, then have a Command card say something like "All Black Sun units get X"

Anyways, like I was saying before, for Organized Play, I doubt they would go that way, simply for keeping the easier-to-manage 1v1 format going.

For Campaign play, it could get a little fiddly with having to deal with upkeep for a third faction at the end of each mission. You'd have to find a narrative way to keep all these missions strung together in a way that makes sense that all three factions would continually be butting heads over things. What would happen then if the Rebels wanted to run one of the existing side missions that doesn't support this third faction in its setup? It would create an entire sub-product that wasn't necessarily easy to integrate with the main line, which can be confusing for the consumer.

Patience, the community will develop 3-way and 4-way Skirmish maps in due time, especially if we can get more tiles into the pool that match up with the existing environments.

I was talking about this to another guy at a game shop. We came to the conclusion that like Descent there will be deluxe expansions with 6 or so figures and a good amoutn of cards and missions to round out factions and big box expansions for each different time period (hopefully with new campaigns and different versions of the movie characters).

Since we are in time period 3, I'm guessing the time periods are 1) directly prior to Start Wars, 2) Star Wars, 3) Current campaign, 4) Empire Strikes back, 5) between the movies around Shadows of the Empire (EU), 6) Return of the Jedi, and 7) leading up to the new movies.

Either way, if FFG keeps the quality up and power creep minimal they will have my money for both X-Wing and Imperial Assault.

I would like to see "attachment" for named Allies/Villains (Items/Agendas) to let them "grow". Maybe increasing their Threat value...

I am eagerly awaiting a Jaba set. I would probably squeal like a 7 year old girl if I could see gamorean guards, rancor monsters and whatnot.

Inspired from the opening scenes in Episode IV, we should see boarding missions and tiles. Also, I would get pretty excited to see all the odd aliens from the bar scene.

Finally, I want to see several more wookies!

I would love a set of wookie grunts !!! I'd also love it if starkiller was rereleashe could be used by both sides

The biggest thing I want to see in a Wave 1.5 is more generic bad guys. We'll have all the rebel troopers and saboteurs and even AT-STs we want (GEN Weiss can make a regular walker, too), but I can't get more Imperial troop types without getting another starter box. So please release the box set Imperials as boosters.

And my wishlist for Wave 2 includes a stormtrooper with a long gun. Either as a new squad of gunner plus two generic troopers or as a 1 or 2 point upgrade or attachment to an existing squad and dealing a red for one of the damage dice with his big gun with a +1 or +2 accuracy.

And then what the rest have said. I'd ask that most of the basic figures from the original trilogy get relesed before expanding into the prequels or EU.

So, preferably, Wave 2 has Leia. Dude, talk about the biggest omossion in the basic set, especially for the one mission. R2 and 3PO, just because. And Boba Fett and another of the bounty hunters. The stormtrooper with the big gun. And maybe a Death Star trooper. And Gamorreans, 'cause we need 'em for the EotE starter box.

Wave 3 - Lando and his boys, and a pack with a couple of generic astomechs, Rebel Endor commandos and Hoth troopers. Snow trooper variants (change the card art and models, but the stats should be good), scout troopers, speeder bikes and counters so the Rebels can play, too (difficult to implement their speed with the size of the boards so this might be a mini box set with a big folded map type board specifically for speeder bike missions). The rest of Vader's hunting party. And more Jabba stuff, with his expansiveness, the rancor, some other assorted thugs.

Wave 4+ - go nuts with all the Prequel and EU and new trilogy stuff you want. Probably needs a new box set/campaign or two at this point.

I think we'll see a new campaign box much sooner than that. We might get one more wave of figure packs to round out the current one (especially since Leia and a way to get more Stormtroopers for skirmish short of buying a whole 'nother core box are conspicuous by their absence), but I'll be shocked if there's any more than that before a new campaign box (which, I'm calling it now, will include Boba Fett so as to make it a must-buy for most fans).

I'm really hoping for the campaign boxes. Don't care so much about having every ally as a mini. I'd rather see more missions and packs of guys that will hit the table all the time.

I really want to see Leia! I was actually a little disappointed that she wasn't in the first wave. (As disappointed as one can be considering my intense love of Imperial Assault so far.) I think I would love even more to see her as the centerpiece of a small campaign expansion... and although I love the art on her SWLCG "Fleeing the Empire" objective, I have a feeling that we're going to get her in the Episode 4 dress.

Hoth probably feels too much like rushing away from the Yavin aftermath, and I think FFG want to sit tight on the timeline for a while before running off into Empire. So Leia organizing and fighting with a small group of rebels trying to capitalize on their victory would feel like such a fitting and awesome small campaign for me.

While I'm at it with my wishlist, although Leia is clearly primarily a 'leader,' I would really like a portrayal of her with one really potent personal offensive capability rather than a series of buffs - she does always end up squarely on the front lines.

Looking at the Descent expansions, they have a healthy amount of monsters without seeming packed . I know they don't have a skirmish mode, but trying to use their expansions as a model, I would include Leia and a few groups of Alliance Commandos to help populate the Rebels some more. For the Empire, an extra group of Stormtroopers, maybe a pair of Stormtrooper 'Heavy' units with the Sandtrooper model carrying T-21s (!!!), and as for the lieutenant level baddie? Maybe a Stormtrooper Commander? I would make his or her model without a helmet on and also wearing a pauldron to really differentiate the trooper and to offer something unique looking for painters.

18-20 models feels within in the range of a boxed campaign... the only thing that gives me pause is the continued lack of Scum and Villainy models. Maybe they would be included in the missions but as tokens in order to continue sales of villain packs? The only thing I would say about that though - they would have to be released simultaneously. I know there are groups like mine that weren't super huge fans of using character tokens in the campaign.

Man, wishful thinking is fun.

If we are doing wishful thinking, I hope they release an expansion that makes the game a full co-op (a la Forgotten Souls and Nature's Ire in Descent).

I concur, a Jabba set with a Rancor and Gamorreans would be awesome!

I would like to see more original ideas as far as villains or bounty hunters go. Like a bounty hunter that is a playable campaign hero but in Skirmish he/she is part of the Mercenary Faction.