Just finished our third game of IA. Diala has two abilities (at least the way we are playing them) that are driving me nuts.

1. Force Throw without LoS

Can she really force throw Darth Vader without having LoS on him? Seriously?

2. Battle Meditation

Full damage wipe on rest + focusing either self or ally? That's pretty OP

I'd love the community's wisdom on both.

Thanks.

1. Force Throw does not require line of sight, just that the target is within 3 spaces. See Counting Spaces. Also, Force Throw takes 2 strain and requires pass on the insight test (it does not fail often, but it does sometimes).

2. Battle Meditation is good, but not OP for its XP cost (and sometimes the insight check fails unexpectedly). She can do it only twice per round. She can only move 2 per round then. (She can't Force Throw herself.)

Diala suffers strain like candy, so she does not usually recover any damage when resting, just strain. (And just leave her last so she doesn't get any extra utility from double rest.)

Her best ability is still Force Adept.

Force Adept, Force Throw and Battle Meditation are my favorites for Diala as support. If she doesn't get to be support due to other characters filling the role, then she won't get much use for Battle Meditation.

As the Imperial player: Put both Diala and Gideon on the same team though and I'll switch to Dungeon Master / storytelling mode.

She doesn't need LOS for Force Throw it simply says within X spaces.

What do you mean full damage wipe? Like if she double rests?

Double rests are great for the Imperial player because it means a hero probably just used 20% of their actions for the entire mission to do practically nothing.

...and ninja'd.

I agree wholeheartedly with a1bert.

As the Imperial player: Put both Diala and Gideon on the same team though and I'll switch to Dungeon Master / storytelling mode.

What do you mean exactly? Thank you

Both Gideon and Diala make the other heroes so much better that it is a real struggle playing against them unless you keep winning every story mission. (If imperial wins Aftermath, the rebels have easy coasting through the core campaign.)

Gideon with Masterstroke does not need any items because he uses Command + Masterstroke and Rest. You can save credits for one or two big guns. You can give him Laminate Armor for protection. Your best damage-dealer can attack 4 times on a round, Mobile Tactician lets Gideon keep up with the rest of you, and with Air of Command he can keep away from the action.

Diala can Force Throw figures (hostiles or friendly depending on what needs to be done, even when either or both are stunned!) and thus does not need to defeat hostiles to get next to objects, blocking strategies are thus very hard implement. If you put up a Nexu which Diala can't throw, she Precise Strikes it. With Battle Meditation she focuses the other heroes so they never take more than one attack to defeat a figure (and Force Adept helps too).

Add Mak, who can Disengage when Diala throws a hostile figure close enough.

Add Fenn, who has Tactical movement and every hero is more or less exactly where the rebels want them to be. (Admittedly, not always where they need to be.)

With all of that the imperial player will have a real challenge ahead.

(But then again, some people like me enjoy a challenge.)

As the Imperial player: Put both Diala and Gideon on the same team though and I'll switch to Dungeon Master / storytelling mode.

What do you mean exactly? Thank you

Imperial Assault is normally played as a competitive board game, same as monopoly or any other. On the other hand, in a table top RPG, the storyteller/DM/GM acts as a *facilitator to the game, making sure everyone has fun.

He's saying if the rebels have both Gideon and Dale on the same team, it would be impossible to win, so he might as well just try and make sure everyone has fun.

Actually I will not allow Diala in my games ever again.... She is just too OP with the ability to negate 1 Defence die making sure her attack allways is successful and gets full dmg, then uses forcethrow to finish off whatever she did not kill with the attack and then rest to recover strain. She can also use strain to move. All these actions are legal in 1 turn as the force throw is not an action?

You can do that. I don't think any hero is overpowered by themselves. You can always work around the abilities of a single hero. Only good synergy between heroes and good team play makes the heroes quite powerful. (Diala and Gideon on the same team though make the other two so much better than they would be without them that it's quite a challenge to play against them.)

Diala's best ability is Force Adept, but it's only available if she has not suffered strain upto her endurance. (Relentless is a good counter.)

Force Adept can only reroll one attack die and Precise Strike takes 2 strain, so it's not that good ability if you keep throwing low-cost Stormtroopers at her - or rather, keep them well away from her so she needs to move. Force Throw also takes 2 strain, it uses up focus if Diala has it, and it can still fail.

Since when did space magic start requiring line-of-sight? Pretty sure Luke had his eyes closed when he moved his lightsaber out of the snow.

OP, being OP compared to your stormtroopers and skirmish deployment cards is kind of what defines ALL of the heroes in this game. If you want all of the figures to be the same power level, skirmish is what you are looking for.

I find it bizarre how many "fans" will ignore the OT when criticizing the flavor of this game. A lot of people need to give the EU a break and go watch the real movies once in a while.