This mission requires that Imperial players move 4 neutral character tokens around a maze-like corridor path to get them into a prison cell on the opposite side of the map. A large separated platform is set up around the center of the far side, so the prisoners must get close to it. Models can move up a ladder into the space, where they get overwatch on the whole board especially longer range heroes like Loku (duh), Fenn, and Mak. In my case, Loku and MHD-19 got up top and basically became impossible to kill while Jyn and Ghaarkan made advancing both the prisoners AND the imperials nearly impossible.

The problem: There is no obvious limit on which characters can go up the ladder as long as they are small figures. And this means that the rebels can simply boost the prisoners up the ladder, at which point they are nearly impossible to retrieve in a timely fashion. And the Rebels can easily block the prisoners to force them to stop at or near the ladders. If the Rebels position right, even chasing a prisoner up the ladder is useless because they will drop down and immediately be forced back by the Rebels again. Or they'll be positioned to simply block Imperial models from getting up and through.

Is this mission winnable as Imps, or should I chalk this up as an intentionally easy Rebel mission?

BTW open groups were HK droid Elites, E-Web Elite, and Officer Elite. I think I probably should have replaced the E-Web with something else, maybe an Elite Probe Droid or even an ATST.

The prisoners are not figures and don't gain movement points; each of these stops them going up the ladders.

EDIT: Okay they are figures, they still don't gain movement points.

When I played it the imperials could easily make a chain of activation to get a prisoner more or less out of reach, this worked for a couple of prisoners but then the rebels finished cleaning up the middle areas and managed to lock everything down (I can't remember if they got two or three through in the end).

The rebels can interact with them to move them though. How do they move without movement points? Did I misread how it works?

I don't have the book in front of me, but, I am pretty sure you spend an action to move them up to X number of squares. And, iirc, the imps can't activate them if they are within Y distance of a hero.

I don't have the book in front of me, but, I am pretty sure you spend an action to move them up to X number of squares. And, iirc, the imps can't activate them if they are within Y distance of a hero.

That makes it even more absurd, because there are multiple points on the map where the corridor is only 3-4 squares wide. Herd the prisoners into a bubble and they're basically impossible to move without completely incapacitating multiple heroes.

I don't have the book in front of me, but, I am pretty sure you spend an action to move them up to X number of squares. And, iirc, the imps can't activate them if they are within Y distance of a hero.

That makes it even more absurd, because there are multiple points on the map where the corridor is only 3-4 squares wide. Herd the prisoners into a bubble and they're basically impossible to move without completely incapacitating multiple heroes.

Like I said, I don't have the books in front of me. I am pretty sure about the Way they are moved, not sure about the blocking, tho.

The wording is "push the figure x spaces" (6 for imperial, 3 for rebel), this doesn't imply movement points.

Also observe that it takes four interacts for the IP to claim a token even with 1 rebel interact and the IP has more figures so they can spread out across the map for easy access. Basically you shouldn't get involved in an extended tug of war (and the rebels certainly shouldn't be able to huddle all the prisoners into a corner, their shouldn't be that many on the map at any given time.

Looking back at the initial and reserved groups I realize that you totally shot yourself in the foot with open group choices. You chose things that are good at wounding heroes in a mission where that won't get you the win, Royal Guards, Snowtroopers, Trandoshans or Hired Guns are the good choices here (basically things you can put on the board and push the prisoners around).

I think there are a few misconceptions here:

1. Rebel heroes do not prevent imperial figures from pushing the prisoners. Prisoners can always be pushed (provided you can get adjacent to them) by both sides. Rebels need to succeed on the attribute test.
2. Prisoners are pushed by counting spaces. This ignores impassable terrain (the dotted red lines) and difficult terrain (the blue spaces)! So from the blue point, disregarding the outpost, you need 3 interactions + 1 space to get to the cell. BUT see point 3.
3. When counting spaces to a space in the outpost, you can ignore walls and figures. This means you can technically push a prisoner onto the outpost, but not over it. You do need to get up and push it down again of course, but with fast figures, this should be doable. The risk is that the rebels then block adjacency to that prisoner and you need to make one of them withdraw before you can push it again.

I think when you pack cheap and/or fast units (Hired Guns, regular Officers, RGs), this mission shouldn't be that bad. It mainly depends on how well the rebels can disrupt your push chain for the 3rd and 4th prisoner.

This was actually the first mission I won as the Imperials. The rebels in my group actually thought it was a little unfair on them, and this was with us playing point 1 in Jacenat's post wrong (so we had them not being able to go through impassable terrain).

The thing was the rebels got too focused on killing things and so I got the first two very quickly. The third was more of a trouble, and the 4th was reasonably close. If they had been more careful about what they were doing then they would have been able to seriously disrupt my plans.

I was mostly using regular stormtroopers and snow troopers for this. Relatively cheap numerous etc, meant that I got the first 2 in within a turn. The third took two turns, and the last also took 2, but if I had been a little weaker could have taken longer.

I'll have to disagree, Jacenat.

In Constant Vigilance the prisoners are neutral figures. Figures cannot move or be pushed into impassable terrain or through impassable edges. (See Impassable Terrain.)

Also, Push does not use Counting Spaces (so walls do matter), but the figure is moved the specified number of spaces - one space at a time, ending in any valid space. (See Push - no mention of Counting Spaces, only moving a figure. See also Move upto X spaces, it does not go through impassables either - it only ignores extra costs.)

I.e. Push is not a placement within X spaces like Pounce is.

I.e. Push is not a placement within X spaces like Pounce is.

Correct, this is why figures take damage when they get pushed into walls.

~D

I played this as the first side mission in a core campaign, and with all cheap troops that were 2 points per figure (officers, hired guns, stormtroopers) plus all the Imperials that are already on the board and start spread out to form a nice conveyor belt, I'm not sure it's possible for the rebels to win without killing 2 figures each activation.

I remember we figured out that the Empire had to interact with a prisoner 4 times, and the distance from the start to the cell was such that the rebels had to successfully interact with the same prisoner token twice to force the Imperials to spend another action. But if the imperial just floods the board with cheap units, including officers to interact and then move someone to follow the prisoner, it's pretty impossible to stop the imperial from interacting at least 3 times a turn and successfully push the prisoner.

I.e. Push is not a placement within X spaces like Pounce is.

Correct, this is why figures take damage when they get pushed into walls.

~D

Well I have to disagree here. Pushing does not deal damage, regardless of if you push the target into a wall or not. Force Throw does deals damage, though not because it does push figures.

Right. There is no such thing as pushing figures into walls. The Push itself does not cause any damage.

There may be other abilities or mission rules in play that cause damage before of after being Pushed. (Stampede, Force Throw, or conceivably a mission rules that makes the figure suffer damage if it ends up adjacent to a wall - although adjacency to a wall is not well-defined in the game.)

My win/loss ratio (as the Imp player) isn't all that great, but after the first 2 rounds, I knew this would be easily won. I actually started holding back a little (attacking some more rather than go all out in push mode). In the end, we got to the 6th round, but one of the Rebel players (who's been the team stragitist) went after the wrong Imperial figure which allowed me to push the last prisoner in. She beat herself up pretty bad about it, but honestly, what didn't help is another Rebel player hanging around where the prisoners first enter the game. After that 4th one came out, there wasn't really a need to stay there. He should (imo) have made a beeline to the near the cell to do my last second push backs. Oh well... Hoth Campaign is now 2 to 2. I'm really liking the Hoth missions and how varied they are.

I had no chance on this mission.

The imps start in a strong position, and can very easily get one or two quickly.

The trouble was that, while you're doing this the rebels can start cleaning up your troops.

By the time you're going for the third prisoner, you might not even have enough troops to get it all the way to the end.

Clever Rebels should have no problem with this mission at all. (Kill stuff, as no Imperial Units = no-one to push the prisoners. Focus on non-activated units each time. Finish of deployments before they can reinforce. Really basic stuff. No brainers)

Very Clever Imperials might stand a chance if rolls go their way, and they spam cheap troops to keep the conveyor belt running.

Also, what's this nonsense about sending the prisoners up in the spotter position? Push doesn't allow this as you require movement points to go from ground to top, which push doesn't provide. (unless I'm mis-remembering the mission rules?)

The prisoner rules were already cleared up above.

I agree on the hardness though. If two rebels take spots on the 'treehouse' (one being Loku, who can attack anything anywhere with certain accuracy), and the others near the bottom center, then the imperial has very little chance to even fight for the win.

Played that recently at threat level 4. The mission depends how geared the rebels are and what heroes are showing up.

I wounded Loku in round 2. That decreased his range and made the other think about going up there. You can use the prisoners for blocking LOS for rebels not in the tree house. And watch out, that the rebels don't outbox you by pushing one prisoner in a corner and have him surrounded by heroes. Then you have to withdraw one hero. Could be tough. Also remember that you get threat, when you defeat a hero. And time your reinforcement and prisoner movements with the mission events. If Loku does not kill the HK Assasins, go after him with them. Their reroll abilities can be very handy.