After putting together a list useing 1 isd-1 devastator and 2 vsd-1s in order to make the most out of Vader I am disappointed.

He seems that at optimal shoot range and throwing 6+ dice he would still only increase damage by maybe 2-3 points and at a reduced cost I think I would per fer screed.

What are your thoughts and experiences?

Depends on how Confident you are to getting to Close Range against Rebels.

Screed *loves* that Close Range dealio, with Black Dice.

Vader might be content to assist with purely Red-Die Duels.

Vader on the ISD 2 and Gladiators were able to reliably get multiple hits and accuracy results. . . .

He is a Commander that is as good as the dice you are rolling

I find your lack of faith... disturbing.

He is a Commander that is as good as the dice you are rolling

This.

Each commander favors certain list compositions.

Screed is mostly useful to *guarantee* that a special critical ability goes off, whereas Vader is designed to make your normal damage dice statistically MUCH more damaging in general.

Screed has more guaranteed damage when you need it, but Vader gives you more potential damage over the course of a game. Screed wants special critical abilities, Vader wants to drown people in dice.

Also, it helps if every time you activate Vader you yell out "Keep firing, A##holes!"

I knew it...I'm surrounded by a##holes!

Haha Rick Moranis.

I don't think Vader is necessarily only to be used with pure big ship lists. You can get a lot of rerolls with Vader's Raiders (especially if they've gone plaid *high five stasy*)

FFG had a missed opportunity. They should have Vader discard officer cards to have him trigger his ability. Or bring up an additional commander and discard that commander to do something cool.

FFG had a missed opportunity. They should have Vader discard officer cards to have him trigger his ability. Or bring up an additional commander and discard that commander to do something cool.

I don't know that they did. I think they quite cleverly included this very detail.

The "Injured Crew" damage card forces you to choose and discard a defense token, so if discarding/spending defense tokens represents harm to your crew, it's reasonable to suggest that Vader's ability involves strangling the nearest uniformed british guy to inspire the gunners to aim better.

Haha Rick Moranis.

I don't think Vader is necessarily only to be used with pure big ship lists. You can get a lot of rerolls with Vader's Raiders (especially if they've gone plaid *high five stasy*)

2-3 increased points of damage? Well that's Akbar territory and Vader has a reduced cost relative to him so...

Vader helps at every range, including close/medium whereas skreed deals mainly with crit effect upgrades

You don't need big ships with Vader; just fistfuls of dice, and that INCLUDES GSDs. The greater the numbers, the less risk that the spent token will bite back (not getting shot or opponent is spreading damage) and the more rerolls you get

The big destroyers are nice because they pour on the red dice, but the VSD is a bit of a clunker. Remember to give tractor beams.

Also IMO devastator is a horribly situational card. Avenger ftw.

2-3 increased points of damage? Well that's Akbar territory and Vader has a reduced cost relative to him so...

Vader helps at every range, including close/medium whereas skreed deals mainly with crit effect upgrades

You don't need big ships with Vader; just fistfuls of dice, and that INCLUDES GSDs. The greater the numbers, the less risk that the spent token will bite back (not getting shot or opponent is spreading damage) and the more rerolls you get

The big destroyers are nice because they pour on the red dice, but the VSD is a bit of a clunker. Remember to give tractor beams.

Also IMO devastator is a horribly situational card. Avenger ftw.

At long range rerolling 1-2 red dice maybe, MAYBE increased my damage by 1 (again achieveable with screed with less cost) and unless I am throwing 5-8 RED dice I no longer see him as cost effective

The only situation in which Vader doesn't help are: You rolled great or you are already getting pounded and need the tokens.

Since rolling great doesn't happen all the time that's good. If you are already getting pounded, rerolling might be better to take out an attacker. I'd think the contain token is the best to spend on an ISD, generally. (Unless it's gotten hit some.)

Also I think Relentless is by far the best ISD. 2 command tokens, matching a Neb-B? Hell yes. Though Avenger is definitely second.

The amount of times I've thrown Blank-Blank-ACC-ACC from the frontside of a VSD with a Concentrate Fire Dial...

... Vader I think is situationally better for me.

2-3 increased points of damage? Well that's Akbar territory and Vader has a reduced cost relative to him so...

Vader helps at every range, including close/medium whereas skreed deals mainly with crit effect upgrades

You don't need big ships with Vader; just fistfuls of dice, and that INCLUDES GSDs. The greater the numbers, the less risk that the spent token will bite back (not getting shot or opponent is spreading damage) and the more rerolls you get

The big destroyers are nice because they pour on the red dice, but the VSD is a bit of a clunker. Remember to give tractor beams.

Also IMO devastator is a horribly situational card. Avenger ftw.

again At best he seemed to increase damage by 2-3 (maybe) at the cost of a defense token when I was throwing 6-8 dice ( at a range screed would have gaerenteed 1-2 extra damage without spending a token and costing 10 points less)

At long range rerolling 1-2 red dice maybe, MAYBE increased my damage by 1 (again achieveable with screed with less cost) and unless I am throwing 5-8 RED dice I no longer see him as cost effective

we do remember that Skreed tosses dice away, right?

it's not a free crit result; the only way he's increasing your damage is if you roll 2 blanks

even on black dice, he's only breaking even on one or less blanks. What pushes him over the edge are crit effect upgrade cards.

Vader don't need none of that

2-3 increased points of damage? Well that's Akbar territory and Vader has a reduced cost relative to him so...

Vader helps at every range, including close/medium whereas skreed deals mainly with crit effect upgrades

You don't need big ships with Vader; just fistfuls of dice, and that INCLUDES GSDs. The greater the numbers, the less risk that the spent token will bite back (not getting shot or opponent is spreading damage) and the more rerolls you get

The big destroyers are nice because they pour on the red dice, but the VSD is a bit of a clunker. Remember to give tractor beams.

Also IMO devastator is a horribly situational card. Avenger ftw.

again At best he seemed to increase damage by 2-3 (maybe) at the cost of a defense token when I was throwing 6-8 dice ( at a range screed would have gaerenteed 1-2 extra damage without spending a token and costing 10 points less)

At long range rerolling 1-2 red dice maybe, MAYBE increased my damage by 1 (again achieveable with screed with less cost) and unless I am throwing 5-8 RED dice I no longer see him as cost effective

we do remember that Skreed tosses dice away, right?

it's not a free crit result; the only way he's increasing your damage is if you roll 2 blanks

even on black dice, he's only breaking even on one or less blanks. What pushes him over the edge are crit effect upgrade cards.

Vader don't need none of that

Hes alright but if you are going to invest that many points in your commander you might as well go with Tarkin who brings much greater flexibility. Leading shots and Ordinance Experts can give comparable effects for most ships without sacrificing defense.

Do not underestimate the power of the force.

Hes alright but if you are going to invest that many points in your commander you might as well go with Tarkin who brings much greater flexibility. Leading shots and Ordinance Experts can give comparable effects for most ships without sacrificing defense.

similar, but far lesser

not only do you pay additional points for them, but they're range restricted (and Leading Shots dumps a die)

you basically invest in those if you want to use the flexibility of another commander without sacrificing the dice fixing of skreed or vader

FFG had a missed opportunity. They should have Vader discard officer cards to have him trigger his ability. Or bring up an additional commander and discard that commander to do something cool.

We still have the Veteran Captain for exactly this situation. After a spectacularly failed roll, you say "I want that ship, not excuses!" while discarding his sorry @$$!

Hes alright but if you are going to invest that many points in your commander you might as well go with Tarkin who brings much greater flexibility. Leading shots and Ordinance Experts can give comparable effects for most ships without sacrificing defense.

similar, but far lesser

not only do you pay additional points for them, but they're range restricted (and Leading Shots dumps a die)

you basically invest in those if you want to use the flexibility of another commander without sacrificing the dice fixing of skreed or vader

Unless you are running Tarkin the cost of putting one of those on all of your ships plus a different admiral will probably be the same as Vader. The big draw back to Vader is that many ships need all of their defense tokens every round so the only practical time to use it is is on the mostly unimportant Contain token or an evade if you are only going to be taking range one shots that round.

Vader is also, quite appropriately, the quickest way for the Devastator to dump it's tokens if you need extra firepower. It's also insane with him.

Drop 2 tokens and you now have a basic attack of 10 dice forward, with a full re-roll if you spend a token. That's without any upgrades or Commands.

Yeah...it'll die. But not before other stuff does....

FFG had a missed opportunity. They should have Vader discard officer cards to have him trigger his ability. Or bring up an additional commander and discard that commander to do something cool.

I don't know that they did. I think they quite cleverly included this very detail.

The "Injured Crew" damage card forces you to choose and discard a defense token, so if discarding/spending defense tokens represents harm to your crew, it's reasonable to suggest that Vader's ability involves strangling the nearest uniformed british guy to inspire the gunners to aim better.

We're Space Nazi's not British guys, thank you.

FFG had a missed opportunity. They should have Vader discard officer cards to have him trigger his ability. Or bring up an additional commander and discard that commander to do something cool.

I don't know that they did. I think they quite cleverly included this very detail.

The "Injured Crew" damage card forces you to choose and discard a defense token, so if discarding/spending defense tokens represents harm to your crew, it's reasonable to suggest that Vader's ability involves strangling the nearest uniformed british guy to inspire the gunners to aim better.

We're Space Nazi's not British guys, thank you.

Personally I dont see a competition between screed and Vader, it just appeared like that as you have used VSD/ISD Is in your example - black dice are the only ones really giving a damage advantage (before ACMs or anything, that is) with screed, as the sacrificed die is compensated 9/10 times by the hit+crit on blacks. With any other die color the chances are good that you are sacrificing a usefull result to activate screeds ability. I would still expect to see most imperial fleets with diverse range armaments and the more blue/red dice you bring, the more vader outshines screed if you look at net damage.

There is still a ton of opportunities for screed, and with new crit effects on the way he will shine on his own, especially with that cheap price tag. But if your fleet is build with the pure damage to the face mantra, Vader is your guy.