Hello Guys,

I waited until after i finished the Core Campaign to post this.

Few Considerations:

1 - I was a Imperiaal Player

2 - I won the campaign

3- The rebels were: Gideon - Mak - Verena - Gaarkhan

4 - The players full throttle (every expansion ever released)

Ok so after all this i wanted to get an input on Verena Talos, specially her close quarters power.

Even tho i won the campaign i found this hero power extremely overpowered.

I explain.

At a certain point she gets 6 endurance. She moves when she use Close encounters. She becomes focused when using Close encounters.

She can easily do 5 or 6 attacks per round, using her ability + Gideon Masterstroke. For 2 strain each and using her ability in any rebels turn (the trigger is simply a enemy defeated adjacent to her). So Masterstroke is one attack + close encounters.. another Attack + close encounters.. On he turn... rest.. 2 attcks plus close encounters x3.

She alone was responsible for taking down 6 imperial figures in the first round..and Gaarkhan didim even activate! My guys were shred to pieces..

Anyhow.. i wanted to know if u guys are having the same impression that Close Quarters show be nerved somehow..like once per round or something.(like jynn). I'm wondering if it was supposed to work this way.

Even amongst the other heroes she is far far ahead in power. No group of rebels is formed without her in the roster. This also contributes to the unbalance.

Thanks All

For her to activate her ability - she needs to be adjacent to the enemy... so the imperial player needs to be more careful about how to position their figures. Its kinda like playing checkers - position badly, and your opponent runs over you. But position them better, and her advantage is immediately gone.

Also - she was designed with the larger maps of Hoth in mind, rather than the core campaign, but there's no reason to not use her in the core.

And finally - you won... so obviously she wasn't overpowered enough...

Another solution is to use groups that give more powerful, but fewer units. Like Elite Royal Guards instead of Elite Stormtroopers. Or even Heavy stormtroopers instead of storm/snowtroopers.

Just finished Hoth playing against her and will be playing Twin Shadows using her. She's a good target for stun and weaken and she'd usually be the one I'd end up using Beaten Down on. I didn't really have too much of an issue fighting her. Try moving away from her rather than towards her, if she's using all her actions moving to get beside targets she's not attacking or resting. The only time I really found her problematic was when I had big clumps of units I couldn't disperse for one reason or another.

Verena is definitely a very powerful character, even without Gideon. She is an absolute beast in smaller maps and I agree that she is probably a bit too strong in the base campaign. The Hoth campaign is much larger and more spread out and her ability is a bit tempered.

I'm playing in a campaign where the rebels are running Fenn (with stuff that gives him blast 3), Gideon with masterstroke (give out 3 commands or two commands a turn), and Vererna and Loku. Loku is the only one that I'm not sweating bullets about. And honestly I could care less about Gideon.. but Fenn fire 4 times a turn blasting everything to bits if I make the slightest mistake is a fun killer. Verena doesn't even need Gideon but on a larger map with stun and bleed to handout it was ok (just okay).

I think stacking blast 1 and blast 2 is ridiculous and verena is just as bad.

Yeah, the new Blast attachment (was that TS? or RtH? can't remember) was a neat idea, but doesn't seem well thought out in combination with Fenn. Giving someone else access to Blast 1 is worth X credits, but upgrading Fenn's Blast 1 to Blast 2 that early in the campaign is *way* more potent.

Would it be considered heavy handed if as the Imperial player, if I hand down some errata stating that blast can not be stacked (because already being able to blow a unit of royal guards off the table with blast 2 and 4 attacks with Gideon wasn't good enough), and also having Verona's close quarters can only be used during her activation (thus hopefully Gideon is encouraged to interact with someone else other than Fenn every single turn)?

Is blast 3 reasonable towards the end of the campaign? I was dealing with it starting on game 3 I think... we're on game 6.

Would it be considered heavy handed if as the Imperial player, if I hand down some errata stating that blast can not be stacked (because already being able to blow a unit of royal guards off the table with blast 2 and 4 attacks with Gideon wasn't good enough), and also having Verona's close quarters can only be used during her activation (thus hopefully Gideon is encouraged to interact with someone else other than Fenn every single turn)?

Is blast 3 reasonable towards the end of the campaign? I was dealing with it starting on game 3 I think... we're on game 6.

Blast 2 is 4XP so it would have had to be mission 4 assuming they won at least 1 of the story missions, otherwise it would be mission 5 before he could have it.

The Blast 2 costs strain, the blast 1 costs a surge. He can't keep that up for very long at all. Considering you can render it completely useless by not standing beside a friendly figure or make it a disadvantage by standing beside an enemy figure it's not that big of a deal. His blast and Verona's close quarters do not synergise at all.

Would it be considered heavy handed if as the Imperial player, if I hand down some errata stating that blast can not be stacked (because already being able to blow a unit of royal guards off the table with blast 2 and 4 attacks with Gideon wasn't good enough), and also having Verona's close quarters can only be used during her activation (thus hopefully Gideon is encouraged to interact with someone else other than Fenn every single turn)?

Is blast 3 reasonable towards the end of the campaign? I was dealing with it starting on game 3 I think... we're on game 6.

Blast 2 is 4XP so it would have had to be mission 4 assuming they won at least 1 of the story missions, otherwise it would be mission 5 before he could have it.

The Blast 2 costs strain, the blast 1 costs a surge. He can't keep that up for very long at all. Considering you can render it completely useless by not standing beside a friendly figure or make it a disadvantage by standing beside an enemy figure it's not that big of a deal. His blast and Verona's close quarters do not synergise at

4 endurance... 4 strain... two turns in a row, getting 4 shots per turn, without needing to rest, plus doesn't Fenn get 1 back at the end of each turn that he isn't adjacent to something. There was a mission where I had one spawn point and the imperials had to storm the stronghold and the rebels were defending. Unless I did the mission wrong, I was reinforcing/deploying as I could. The hero's activate first and blow everything off the deployment spot. The last mission had long hallways. I was 5 spaces up a hall way, another 9 spaces away from Fenn in a different direction. Gideon commanded him to move, was still within ran so the did it again, the fenn activated... combat moved 2, strained 2... double blast 3'd the royal guards that I thought were safe being nearly all the way on the other side of the map around the corner. I make them work hard and getting a blast off is rare, but sometimes I have no choice and its devastating. Then Fenn activated first on the next round and that was the end of the royal guards. The rest of the that mission I had no models on the table...

The players previous squad ... diala, garkhaan, fenn and seska we're so easy to deal with that I didn't use my agendas, we restarted after I went 5 and 1, now its about the opposite. Just looking for balance. I think the previous squad Fenn didn't get Blast 2 until mission 5 or 6. And never got the piece of gear that gave him blast 1 for a surge. And also without Gideon it wasn't broken, and I think the last mission I gave no blast opportuntiies.

I don't understand how people are racking up so much kills with Verena, I've found her CQ attacks are usually severely underpowered until she gets her 4xp card, which is still only once per turn. I could see how she might be effective against 3 hp units, but our Imperial player only used Hired Guns early on which punish Verenas shenanigans and then starting favoring elite troopers wampa and Droid once the threat level got high enough. Verenas been a solid hero so far, but she had to be carried in the first few games before she got Point Blank and she still needs major assistance to kill more than two enemies per activation.

I think Ops real problem is Master Stroke. That skill is generally considered to be overpowered enough to be Gideon's first xp buy, and I could see how it could synergize with Verena to create a monster, but I think that says more about Master Stroke than Verena. the same thing can be said about Masterstroke and Mak with No Escape who becomes an Imperial killing machine gun.

No Escape exhausts, so it does not become more powerful with Masterstroke. It is plenty powerful against high-Health figures on its own though. And that is reason enough to start using cheaper figures.

You're right, No escape does exhaust. I would still like to know how and at what point in the campaign Verena starts reliably taking out more than one undamaged 5+ HP enemy per turn WITHOUT Master Stroke. Her normal attacks are powerful, but Close Quarters attacks are just too weak to actually carry a chain of kills unless there are a bunch of figures next to her that already have damage.

Here's my Verena build going into the 8th mission, I just got Master Operative so haven't been able to use it yet. I rushed Point Blank shot to make her attacks good enough to kill something every turn and then got Combat momentum on the same mission thanks to a +2 xp reward. We got the BD1 for Diala after I had gotten PBS, she then got her lightsaber and is using it with balanced hilt.

Xp: point blank shot, momentum, master operative

Equip: DH17, spread barrel, BD1, Laminate Armor, Survival Gear (great mobility item on the Hoth maps with all the blue terrain)

Gideon with masterstroke (give out 3 commands or two commands a turn)

How does your Gideon give out 3 commands a turn?

Verena Prey's on squads that focus on numbers. Give her tough nuts to crack and her ability wont be able to trigger as often.

This might not be all that simple to achieve because a decently built Verena can reliably kill even elite stormtroopers in single actions, anything has or gives armor and health to your figures is a priority with her around.

In the early campaign you will want to deploy Heavy stormtroopers and Trandoshan hunters against her. Mid campaign Elite troopers become your friend.

Also, positioning is key. If Verena has to Strain everytime she wants to combo a "Close & Personal" that will naturally lead to her becoming strained out, preventing further chaining, stress is Verena's natural enemy.