Yeah so I am pretty much exclusively an Imperial player, and thinking back I'm pretty sure the only other time I played a rebel list was core box learning scenario while demoing the game...

I went with a Neb B (the one where crity = dmg x2), 2 heavily upgraded MC30 torpedo frigattes (for testing purposes I put expanded launchers on one and APTs on the other, both had XX-9s and ordnance experts) and Dodonas pride CR90 with TRC, fighter screen of 3 YT-2400s and 2 A-Wings.

My astonished opponent was my long-time rebel playing partner, I had him try to guess which Admiral I was using and even being an exclusive rebel player he said D-man last. I assured him that I would have to have a long shower with steel wool and Javex after playing filthy rebels.

He was running a heavy bomber list with what seemed like every ace in the game. Jan, Nym, Luke, Wedge, Dutch, Dash and a generic x-wing maybe more, I's have to check...

He also had Jainas light CR90 with TRCs, an MC80 Carrier and an Yavaris led by Reikaan.

I had initiative and decided to go first as I knew he liked precision strike in his objectives and a crit focused dodonna list would be happy to go toe to toe with those bomber victory tokens, I also figured double activating an MC30 might be disgusting at some point.

The match opened very cagey, he deployed the MC80 obliquely and last (he had placement advantage from squads) but i deployed my MC30s on either side at high initial speed thinking to pincer in. I spread out my fighters to discourage him from spliting his all other ships deployed centrally.

he did a great job in his initial movement to give me no good choices on tying down his bombers, anything i did would get my squads nuked way too early so I had to allow him 2 or 3 rounds of virtual freedom with bomber movement.

my MC30s took a reasonable beating, my CR90 died and so did the Neb-b (unfortunately I got the crit that burns a def token and he kept flipping it till i had no defense!) but the highlight was the successful pincering of his MC80. My Neb B and CR90 did his CR90 in pretty handily but yavaris and the MC80 and bombers blew them away. but after some great flying around round 3 or 4 I had my expanded launchers intel officer MC30 set up for double arc inside the front arc of the MC80 preventing him from moving and my other one side arc to his rear. I double activated the one in front for 4 heavy black and blue laced shots. I think the MC80 finally flew away (after I flew through it) after having sustained enough damage to almost kill it twice. It was disgusting.

I ended up with 18 tokens to his 14 and all his ships destroyed resulting in a 9-1 drubbing...

Thoughts on Dodonna:

-XX-9s on high damage output ships with Dodonna is a high-return synergy.

-Dodonnas pride is OK but not too amazing, with Dodonna it can be very worth it when your little 2 blue 2 red CF front arc that normally wouldnt get through the opponents shield rolls 1 blue crit and you discard it and hand your opponent just the wrong crit with a shirt eating smile on your face.

-I tried to play while observing the impact of the admiral, and to be honest, while it was a crit-fest of a game, I only remember sifting through the damage pile 5 or 6 times before he died. His ability lends itself to small based ships. Total hitpoints for 4 ships was less than what im used to for a 2 or 3 ship imperial list and when i consider the actual IMPACT of getting to select the crit vs just handing out boatloads of crits thanks to XX9s etc I would say the impact was fairly negligible. In other words, the list would have won just as handily without dodonna as with dodonna. This means that his point cost at the lowest for rebels is probably correct, his costing 20 points and the upgrade wiggle room he allows on otherwise expendable, fragile ships you would hesitate to stack points on in other lists provides sufficient value to consider taking him (if for nothing else, to confuse people who can't name more than 3 rebel admirals.)

In conclusion:

-He is costed correctly (IMO). Low point cost for low guaranteed return (yes, you might get that ONE time where you can choose a structural failure that just manages to kill a ship, but that could also have been 2 ackbar reds getting that extra damage through, or that extra activation on a dead ship that allows you to kill an enemy ship, which happened this game actually)

-He is fun to play in that while his impact is quite small, the psychological impact to your opponent is large. Your opponent may bend over backwards or play sub-optimally to avoid otherwise meaningless crits.

-I would play him again. In fact, much like my love for Ozzel because of how maligned he is, I think Dodonna is possibly very under-rated and under-played for an Admiral that is costed very correctly.

I like Dodonna. He allows you to control the pace of crits. He is not extremely consistent but if you want to cripple an ISD with 2 power failures or hit it with a Comm Noise and move it's much needed navigate to a con fire. . . Well he is your man!

I think Dodonna is effective enough. Does have uses. Especially for bomber spam.

Now Ozzel theoretically I could enjoy. In practice he rarely gets actuated. So I'd say Donna is better value.

How about you do a rieekan try next?

I find DPride useless. Not a great ability and heavy cost imo.

XX9, Minefields, Asteroids, APT, bombers, low cost for Squadrons, a choice crit for a choice ship, all reasons to love Dodonna.

As for Ozzel, since it came up, love him for largely the same reasons. Low cost gives me more stuff and his ability is fantastic for each Imp ship.

I find DPride useless. Not a great ability and heavy cost imo.

Say whaaaaaaat ?

Where the Pride shines isn't in throwing crits through shields alone. Because you choose to trigger the Crit after the defense tokens are spent, if the opponent doesn't spend any to defend against the Pride's double arc, you can completely deplete shield zones instead of triggering the crit, and you trigger it if the opponent spends the tokens. So he's found himself with a ship that has all tokens spent and 2 face up damage cards. For 45 points, that's a pretty cool support ship I find !

I haven't played anyone but him since I picked up this game. I have just found him to be that good

I find DPride useless. Not a great ability and heavy cost imo.

Say whaaaaaaat ?

Where the Pride shines isn't in throwing crits through shields alone. Because you choose to trigger the Crit after the defense tokens are spent, if the opponent doesn't spend any to defend against the Pride's double arc, you can completely deplete shield zones instead of triggering the crit, and you trigger it if the opponent spends the tokens. So he's found himself with a ship that has all tokens spent and 2 face up damage cards. For 45 points, that's a pretty cool support ship I find !

I found that while there are tricks regarding tokens etc...if you strip the shield (you can't win on Pride alone) punching through the full amount of damage is better. Especially with SW7 being an option for cheaper now.

But maybe Wave 2 opens it up more? Better cost, Reeiken over 2 turns, we shall see.

Better is relative to what you're expecting from the ship. Ion Cannons in Star Wars are either debuffing/shield strippers.

It's certainly efficient to look for damage. But, the opportunity to inflict 2 crits through a double arc is definitely not to be discounted : first of all, unless the opponent has Tarkin, he won't be able to repair both in one round. On top of that, if you have Dodonna, you have more choice in what crits to inflict, you can really fish for the nastier ones.

It's all about timing though with the Pride, it's not worth it to throw it early on in hopes of completely neuting the enemy. When you're approaching for mid-late game assaults on a hull zone that is still fresh because the enemy saw you coming, whlle he's starting to take damage cards on other zones, it's pretty cool. When you pair it with Luke, it's even more interesting for quite a good damage on the hull.

Better is relative to what you're expecting from the ship. Ion Cannons in Star Wars are either debuffing/shield strippers.

It's certainly efficient to look for damage. But, the opportunity to inflict 2 crits through a double arc is definitely not to be discounted : first of all, unless the opponent has Tarkin, he won't be able to repair both in one round. On top of that, if you have Dodonna, you have more choice in what crits to inflict, you can really fish for the nastier ones.

It's all about timing though with the Pride, it's not worth it to throw it early on in hopes of completely neuting the enemy. When you're approaching for mid-late game assaults on a hull zone that is still fresh because the enemy saw you coming, whlle he's starting to take damage cards on other zones, it's pretty cool. When you pair it with Luke, it's even more interesting for quite a good damage on the hull.

Funny but I find I almost never throw repair commands anymore. Maybe 1 per ship per game...

The big D usually ends up being my go to Admiral, mainly because of all the other toys i am trying to squeeze into my fleet. There is something to be said for being the cheapest and I expect to see more of Ozzel for the very same reason. Dodonna's ability is also very generic; i don't feel like i need to build a list around him as I do for the other Admirals. Lastly it is an incredibly fun game mechanic that i enjoy exploiting.

...hand your opponent just the wrong crit with a shirt eating smile on your face.

Stay outta my wardrobe.

Dpride is 6 points.

Thinking back to that last game I think I used the ability 1 time....so yes, I can get behind the idea that it's over costed!

A big part of the problem is that it only activates on a blue crit so you either have to pray for crits on a single or 2 (with CF) dice or go for the Blue range only CR90 which is fairly disintegration prone at medium/short range especially against an opponent who will recognize the danger and focus it down.

DPride usually needs first player and activation advantage to do its thing properly and safely. It's a last move / first move advantage I find.

I am also a fan of the General.

Well, I am taking my Dodonna the Oppressor list to an SC. Let's see how I do with it.

Dpride is 6 points.

Thinking back to that last game I think I used the ability 1 time....so yes, I can get behind the idea that it's over costed!

A big part of the problem is that it only activates on a blue crit so you either have to pray for crits on a single or 2 (with CF) dice or go for the Blue range only CR90 which is fairly disintegration prone at medium/short range especially against an opponent who will recognize the danger and focus it down.

Which is why you attack weak arcs with a CR90B It can tank 4 dice attacks without much problem. You might give the opportunity for your opponent to shoot 2 arcs a turn, but if you can land these 2 crits on them it's totally worth it !

Don't bother with the Pride on a CR90A though. You won't have enough chances of a crit.

My Dodonna the Oppressor list won a Store Championship

apt and xx-9 are not a good mix imo

D-Pride works pretty awesomsauce with SW7's. Plus, aren't you always double-arcing and CF'ing the side shot? Two cards selected from 8 I think is pretty worth an otherwise throw away ship.

apt and xx-9 are not a good mix imo

yes, and no.

Its bad because you have 2 crit effect you have to decide between so it's inefficient.

But when you are likely to play precision strike it is nice to be able to select a crit on a fully shielded ship for 15 points and possibly shield failure type crits.

It worked out OK but yeah it's not a great combo as opposed to using expanded launchers. I'm not sure I would take MC30s (if I ever play rebels again) without expanded launchers, it makes the double arc threat from these little bastards fearsome and even without dodonna the XX9s are nasty on a double arc with handfuls of re-rollable blacks.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't you only get the 15 pts for flipping a hit that's already been dealt into a crit? Not for dealing a crit, right?

Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't you only get the 15 pts for flipping a hit that's already been dealt into a crit? Not for dealing a crit, right?

It's for whenever something gets a face-up damage card. So either way. The objective does also allow for flipping face-down to face-up as well though.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but don't you only get the 15 pts for flipping a hit that's already been dealt into a crit? Not for dealing a crit, right?

It's for whenever something gets a face-up damage card. So either way. The objective does also allow for flipping face-down to face-up as well though.

Sure it is only 15 points a token but 15 to 60 points an activation adds up. I got 12 in my last game which won the game for me 580 to 348.

Yeah it adds up quick, and if you are fighting a fully shielded ship and can hand them a crit effect that turns face down you can keep canceling a die every attack to flip the card over and over scoring 15 points each time.

Reikaan can also be a dissadvantage with this objective as i actually used his shieldless, dead CR90 as a token farm using fighters to flip the same card over and over and he couldnt take it off the board. It was pretty hillarious.

So structure failure would be a great card to get on the face up.

Face up deal dmg. Apply second card. Flip down. Then flip up and repeat

Might need to look into this