I'm running a campaign using just the Core set, and have played through the same campaign as a Rebel player. Both times, the Imperial player won not a single game. So, what are we doing wrong? For reference, the Rebels are using Finn, Gideon, Diala and Garrkhan. I'm using ... I can't remember the names; the Upgrade dack with Combat Medic and enhanced armour, and the Agenda deck with ISB Agents in.

A couple of missions have come close - but only in that the Imperial side nearly won. I lost the penultimate mission last week (the one where General Weiss starts off in a corner and his AT-ST comes up in the lift) foolishly by moving him out of his office too early, so he got gunned down by Saboteurs, but in other missions, it doesn't seem like I can do anything; I deploy troopers and Finn or Gaarkhan can kill off an entire Deployment Card-worth of models in one go, and if that fails, Gideon tells them to try again.

So, what have I done wrong? Did I screw myself over with my choice of Upgrade and Agenda decks, or am I just not very good at this game?

When playing the imperial you need to consider a few things.

The threat level of the mission. You will need to look at the open groups and decide which ones are useful for the mission considering how much threat you will get per round. You don't want to pick a threat level 10 open group on a mission with only threat 3 as it takes over 3 turns to get it out without any regrouping.

If the opponent has access to any allies you need to consider if they bring them how many points you may get on first turn to get extra troops on the ground.

you need to focus fire. a lot of the missions are key to heroes being uninjured so if you get them turned over you need to move on to the next if the mission allows them to not be useful after this.

think about how you move your troops to block lines of fire or move fire and move again to stop them from getting maximum use

as for troopers you might want to split them up a little so that thry can only kill 1 or 2 of the squad to allow better reinforcing.

look over the mission at the start and make sure you know when key things happen and if you can make them be more in your advantage.

The Imperials typically have the advantage so you are likely doing something wrong with the rules like not getting enough threat. You should probably review the rules and watch some of the videos of people playing online.

and watch some of the videos of people playing online.

But beware that people don't necessarily get the rules right even if they have a video camera.

See also https://www.boardgamegeek.com/thread/1319188/what-are-some-crazy-or-common-rule-breaking-mistak

But it could also be that your strategies don't work against the exact rebels heroes played by the rebel players, which makes it hard to suggest anything else than generic suggestions:

- Focus on wounding one hero at a time, preferably the one who has already activated.

- Use stun and bleed when possible.

- Learn to use cover - do not put your figures to the slaughter - force the rebels to use move actions instead of strain-moving and attacking twice.

- Try to keep advantage in the number of activations - if you can't, save threat so you can make one big deployment.

- When rebels get more powerful, use cheaper units. - it still takes an attack to defeat one

- Use Squad Training, it is more powerful than you think.

I should probably have asked this question earlier in the campaign, and at this point it's too late to change the Upgrade or Agenda decks, but thanks for the comments.

If anything, I've been having too much Threat (see the Add Threat Equal to Twice the Threat Level topic), and I've been trying to take down one hero at a time. It just seems really difficult to do so. In the last game, I got Finn down to 2 Health remaining, then ran out of models to attack him with, and he then hid behind his colleagues. The most I've ever managed was to Wound 2 out of 4 Heroes before they won.

I've almost certainly made poor choices when it comes to deployment; I've certainly made poor use of Scum units, since most of the missions have been in Imperial bases, and that just seems ... wrong.

The real deathtrap for me seems to be deployment - I have to bunch them up, and then Gaarkhan or Finn kills them all before I get a chance to do anything with them.

Here are a few tips for deployment:

I found the nexus extremely viable in these situations. They are extremely fast and can be deployed far away from the heroes without putting them out of combat. Also even if you deploy them near the heroes, they cannot use blast and cleave to boost their damage output.

Also the droids are worth a consideration for the latter reason.

If there is no safe spot to deploy your units to, try to make it as cumbersome as possible for the heroes to kill them off, or save up threat and deploy more units at once, so they have to decide how to handle them.

If there is only one safe spot at the other end of the map, it's viable to supply bigger groups there and move them to the action (against blast).

Always keep the surprises in mind. Saving your threat to deploy 2 or 3 groups alongside your 2 free groups will destroy the heroes' planning and do a ton of damage, often simply overwhelm them out of nowhere.

also

Riot granades can be used to get the focus off garkhaan and heroes nearby, if he built that route, because he must use up his focus when testing his attribute.

I agree this game is heavily weighted to the Empire specially the first play through. The rebel playears do not know what is coming so if you read ahead you can make a plan to their movements. The second time through if you get the same missions not so much because then the rebels know what is coming and can plan for it. But still weighted towards the Empire even if they know what is coming.

I have played the campaign and now on twin shadows and I can say the only way that we have won was because the Empire player screwed up or allowed us to win.

For the Empire player build for bleeds and stuns on as many different troops as you can. Bleeds are deadly they take an action to remove and you get nothing else and of you do not deal with it then you take a ton of damage and get stained out all the time. So it is deadly, both games the Empire player used Stormtrooperso with bleed abilities and Transdoians.

Also make sure you spread out so cleaves and Finns blast is useless.

Honestly, once the threat reaches 4 per round, I need to purposefully hold back so the rebels can win some missions.

Brute Force at 4 threat per round was a total slaughter, the rebels didn't even scratch one console.

The constant deployments of stormtroopers, elite stormtroopers, heavy troopers, and elite heavy troopers all costing 1 less threat PLUS assault armor PLUS combat veterans was just way too much.

Honestly, once the threat reaches 4 per round, I need to purposefully hold back so the rebels can win some missions.

Brute Force at 4 threat per round was a total slaughter, the rebels didn't even scratch one console.

The constant deployments of stormtroopers, elite stormtroopers, heavy troopers, and elite heavy troopers all costing 1 less threat PLUS assault armor PLUS combat veterans was just way too much.

I think people having trouble as Imp are using mostly non-troopers. Storm Troopers are the most efficient deployment card and just constantly flooding with them rather than saving up points keeps pressure on. Once you get things like arc blasters or combat vet coupled with a defense like assault armor or cloaking device, a 2 point trooper becomes a real hassle to deal with and can put out lots of damage.

Honestly, once the threat reaches 4 per round, I need to purposefully hold back so the rebels can win some missions.

Brute Force at 4 threat per round was a total slaughter, the rebels didn't even scratch one console.

The constant deployments of stormtroopers, elite stormtroopers, heavy troopers, and elite heavy troopers all costing 1 less threat PLUS assault armor PLUS combat veterans was just way too much.

That's a beautiful list of units. I use nothing but Imperial units for my open groups. I love the overwhelm with the boys in white.

Honestly, once the threat reaches 4 per round, I need to purposefully hold back so the rebels can win some missions.

Brute Force at 4 threat per round was a total slaughter, the rebels didn't even scratch one console.

The constant deployments of stormtroopers, elite stormtroopers, heavy troopers, and elite heavy troopers all costing 1 less threat PLUS assault armor PLUS combat veterans was just way too much.

I'm assuming you're referencing "military might" when you say brute force?

As was pointed out to me, Endless Reserves (the 2xp ability) only works when you deploy a trooper unit, not when you reinforce a trooper. Makes a huge difference.

I felt the pain though; elite snowtroopers with endless reserves and assault armour was a brutal combo; it was very hard to kill them all in one round and the imperial player saved so much threat because of that.

Honestly, once the threat reaches 4 per round, I need to purposefully hold back so the rebels can win some missions.

Brute Force at 4 threat per round was a total slaughter, the rebels didn't even scratch one console.

The constant deployments of stormtroopers, elite stormtroopers, heavy troopers, and elite heavy troopers all costing 1 less threat PLUS assault armor PLUS combat veterans was just way too much.

I'm assuming you're referencing "military might" when you say brute force?

As was pointed out to me, Endless Reserves (the 2xp ability) only works when you deploy a trooper unit, not when you reinforce a trooper. Makes a huge difference.

I felt the pain though; elite snowtroopers with endless reserves and assault armour was a brutal combo; it was very hard to kill them all in one round and the imperial player saved so much threat because of that.

Brute Force is the name of the Wookiee Warriors side mission. Though honestly every mission with Military Might at this high threat per turn will probably be the same.

It turned out my luck changed when we played the last mission, Last Stand. Elite Stormtroopers with Assault Armour and benefiting from Combat Medic are rather powerful, even against a tooled-up Fenn Signis. I Wounded Diala in the first turn, and the Royal Guard I deployed by the first door held up the Wookiee long enough for me to Wound him too. The other two took a beating too (although Fenn managed to sneak off with one point of damage remaining before being Wounded and promptly healed back up to ten), but it was all over before they got through the second door.

All in all, a bit disappointing; Having the Rebels romp through the rest of the campaign and then lose right at the end seems a little ... anticlimactic.

That's exactly what happened to me, Andrew - we as Rebels won every single mission up until the last one, where

From a story perspective, it made sense - we flew too high for too long and the Empire dispatched appropriate force. It was still fun, but a little disappointing to have lost the campaign due to a last second reveal on the final mission.

They never even saw Vader - they were still two locked doors away when they were all cornered in a corridor.

See that bit in Return of the Jedi where Han and Leia and the Rebels are about to set the charges in the shield generator and that officer comes in, calls them "you Rebel scum" and arrests the lot of them? It's as if that was the end of the film.