So, we are slogging our way through a campaign with four rebel players. It is our first time playing this game (or any game like it) but our Imperial player has a few games with other groups under his belt. He chose the "Subversive Tactics" imperial deck and it seems he has produced Nexu that are almost unkillable. His ability to put so much strain on us (and therefore wound us as we hit our endurance max very early each game) is just brutal. Add to this the fact that Nexu gain extra evades when we attack while strained AND can add an armor to their defense results for each evade they have means they get something like 3 armor an 1 evade without even rolling a defense die.

This is brutal.

Also, all the strain effectively means we have no special abilities to use because we're always so tired. And the game sessions are MARATHONS with this situation. We played one mission last night that lasted for almost 4 hours. I read some other more experienced groups talking about playing two missions in one sitting and I was just flabberghasted. Did y'all play all day on a Saturday or something?

Please tell me he's doing something wrong and this is not allowed in the rules some how. The game stopped being fun for us the moment he earned the "Oppression" card to start just giving out strain/evades. And the Nexu just keep coming back. It doesn't even feel that much like Star Wars any more since - although they do appear in Episode II for a bit - those killer cats don't really scream Star Wars to me like a squad of Stormtroopers or Darth Vader.

I have noticed on the boards here that many people say don't use the Subversive Tactics deck with new players. But they follow that up with something about experienced players being able to easily beat the ST deck. Experienced players, I beg of you, share your wisdom so we can hopefully have some of the fun back in our game.

For reference, our team is Garkhan, Jyn (good grief this character sucks - and my poor wife is sentenced with playing her), Mak and Biv.

From what I've seen on here - choose abilities that don't cost strain, or ones that let you recover strain. Don't forget that you can spend 1 surge to recover 1 strain each attack. Also, most missions don't require you to defeat all enemies, so stay focused on the objective and don't get bogged down in fights. The Nexu + Subversive Tactics is definitely a tough one, but nexu's still only get 1 attack per activation so maybe just ignore them and keep going for objectives?

Yeah, most people choose not to use the Subversive Tactics deck, even though it is powerful, because it does seem a little anti-fun especially for new players.

As for your characters - none of the characters are really bad, but maybe this particular class and group choices is bad for Jyn, I'm not sure.

What class cards have you chosen for your characters? Maybe there are some better choices that could help you against the subversive tactics deck.

The :"Subversive Tactics" deck is commonly known as the HARD MODE deck. If the rebels are not experienced players, the Imperial player may want to consider switching decks....unless you're up to the challenge!

As far as Cunning and the Nexu are concerned, im not seeing a way with this deck to produce 3 blocks and 1 evade without rolling the defense die. Which upgrades does your Imperial player have in play? (Prey Upon Doubt for sure, probably Oppression for the free evade, but that's a 4XP card, and the combo would produce 2 evades and 2 blocks. But Prey Upon Doubt can only be used once per round)

The :"Subversive Tactics" deck is commonly known as the HARD MODE deck. If the rebels are not experienced players, the Imperial player may want to consider switching decks....unless you're up to the challenge!

As far as Cunning and the Nexu are concerned, im not seeing a way with this deck to produce 3 blocks and 1 evade without rolling the defense die. Which upgrades does your Imperial player have in play? (Prey Upon Doubt for sure, probably Oppression for the free evade, but that's a 4XP card, and the combo would produce 2 evades and 2 blocks. But Prey Upon Doubt can only be used once per round)

You are correct on Oppression and Prey Upon Doubt - but there's one more card he uses that I cannot recall the title - it lets him give us one strain and one wound after we finish our attack. And since we are often already max on strain at that point it essentially lets him give us a wound without having to roll dice. Also, note that if you use Prey Upon Doubt on a character that has max strain already they cannot choose to take the strain so it's a free evade as well. Soooo frustrating...

The upgrades we have for Jyn are Rolling With It, the one that has three different abilities listed on it and cheap shot. We also bought her a DL-44. She consistently does nothing (or rather, fails to accomplish anything on her rolls) and then gets wounded. Honestly, I've never seen anyone use Jyn effectively and the other players I've talked with say she's the worst character in the game. Which is a shame because the character looks so cool on paper. But so far she has failed to kill more than 3 things in 5 missions. Now, last night she DID successfully hack a computer our one shining moment of success in the slobberknocker of a mission.

That would be Surgical Strike, and another card that gets exhausted. Like I said, ST is the toughest deck (or at least top 2) to play against. Remember the key to the game is having fun, if you are getting steamrolled and arent having fun, perhaps it is time to discuss your options with the Imperial player?

So, we are slogging our way through a campaign with four rebel players. It is our first time playing this game (or any game like it) but our Imperial player has a few games with other groups under his belt. He chose the "Subversive Tactics" imperial deck and it seems he has produced Nexu that are almost unkillable. His ability to put so much strain on us (and therefore wound us as we hit our endurance max very early each game) is just brutal. Add to this the fact that Nexu gain extra evades when we attack while strained AND can add an armor to their defense results for each evade they have means they get something like 3 armor an 1 evade without even rolling a defense die.

This is brutal.

Also, all the strain effectively means we have no special abilities to use because we're always so tired. And the game sessions are MARATHONS with this situation. We played one mission last night that lasted for almost 4 hours. I read some other more experienced groups talking about playing two missions in one sitting and I was just flabberghasted. Did y'all play all day on a Saturday or something?

Please tell me he's doing something wrong and this is not allowed in the rules some how. The game stopped being fun for us the moment he earned the "Oppression" card to start just giving out strain/evades. And the Nexu just keep coming back. It doesn't even feel that much like Star Wars any more since - although they do appear in Episode II for a bit - those killer cats don't really scream Star Wars to me like a squad of Stormtroopers or Darth Vader.

I have noticed on the boards here that many people say don't use the Subversive Tactics deck with new players. But they follow that up with something about experienced players being able to easily beat the ST deck. Experienced players, I beg of you, share your wisdom so we can hopefully have some of the fun back in our game.

For reference, our team is Garkhan, Jyn (good grief this character sucks - and my poor wife is sentenced with playing her), Mak and Biv.

First off, you have no support characters. Without a support character you're going to have problems no matter what you play against. You should have one of Gideon, Saska, or MHD-19 on every team, or Diala or Loku with all support abilities.

Second, you have Garkhan and Biv, both of which are very strain heavy and probably the 2 worst characters to be playing against Subersive Tactics.

Third, Jyn is easily the best of those 4 characters. However picking Roll With It, which costs strain, obviously isn't a great choice. Rather than that and Smuggler's Luck (3xp total), you want Get Cocky (3xp) which can get rid of 2 strain per round. The DL-44 may not have been a good choice either as it relies on surges for it's damage, and you'll see a lot of those disappear from evades plus you want those surges to use removing strain anyway. In this situation it certainly isn't worth it's 500 credits unless you are making use of both of the mod slots on it (which is a big part of why the gun costs so much).

Subversive Tactics just makes you rest a little more often than other decks, but it deals less damage and gives less defense to the imperials because of it. The fact that you ALSO don't have any support characters means your team is going to be taking even MORE rest actions.

Since you're not having fun I'd recommend you go back and change a few things. Go back to Jyn's regular blaster and get the 500 creds back and get Get Cocky rather than those 2 other abilities. Spend the credits upgrading Mak's gun, because 2 blue is horrible. Swap MHD-19 for Biv and get him a Bacta Radiator and spend his actions pulling Adrenaline out of the supply deck so he can suck 7 strain and 4 wound per round off the team and give a focus. You'll find things are far easier then.

So, we are slogging our way through a campaign with four rebel players. It is our first time playing this game (or any game like it) but our Imperial player has a few games with other groups under his belt. He chose the "Subversive Tactics" imperial deck and it seems he has produced Nexu that are almost unkillable. His ability to put so much strain on us (and therefore wound us as we hit our endurance max very early each game) is just brutal. Add to this the fact that Nexu gain extra evades when we attack while strained AND can add an armor to their defense results for each evade they have means they get something like 3 armor an 1 evade without even rolling a defense die.

This is brutal.

Also, all the strain effectively means we have no special abilities to use because we're always so tired. And the game sessions are MARATHONS with this situation. We played one mission last night that lasted for almost 4 hours. I read some other more experienced groups talking about playing two missions in one sitting and I was just flabberghasted. Did y'all play all day on a Saturday or something?

Please tell me he's doing something wrong and this is not allowed in the rules some how. The game stopped being fun for us the moment he earned the "Oppression" card to start just giving out strain/evades. And the Nexu just keep coming back. It doesn't even feel that much like Star Wars any more since - although they do appear in Episode II for a bit - those killer cats don't really scream Star Wars to me like a squad of Stormtroopers or Darth Vader.

I have noticed on the boards here that many people say don't use the Subversive Tactics deck with new players. But they follow that up with something about experienced players being able to easily beat the ST deck. Experienced players, I beg of you, share your wisdom so we can hopefully have some of the fun back in our game.

For reference, our team is Garkhan, Jyn (good grief this character sucks - and my poor wife is sentenced with playing her), Mak and Biv.

First off, you have no support characters. Without a support character you're going to have problems no matter what you play against. You should have one of Gideon, Saska, or MHD-19 on every team, or Diala or Loku with all support abilities.

Second, you have Garkhan and Biv, both of which are very strain heavy and probably the 2 worst characters to be playing against Subersive Tactics.

Third, Jyn is easily the best of those 4 characters. However picking Roll With It, which costs strain, obviously isn't a great choice. Rather than that and Smuggler's Luck (3xp total), you want Get Cocky (3xp) which can get rid of 2 strain per round. The DL-44 may not have been a good choice either as it relies on surges for it's damage, and you'll see a lot of those disappear from evades plus you want those surges to use removing strain anyway. In this situation it certainly isn't worth it's 500 credits unless you are making use of both of the mod slots on it (which is a big part of why the gun costs so much).

Subversive Tactics just makes you rest a little more often than other decks, but it deals less damage and gives less defense to the imperials because of it. The fact that you ALSO don't have any support characters means your team is going to be taking even MORE rest actions.

Since you're not having fun I'd recommend you go back and change a few things. Go back to Jyn's regular blaster and get the 500 creds back and get Get Cocky rather than those 2 other abilities. Spend the credits upgrading Mak's gun, because 2 blue is horrible. Swap MHD-19 for Biv and get him a Bacta Radiator and spend his actions pulling Adrenaline out of the supply deck so he can suck 7 strain and 4 wound per round off the team and give a focus. You'll find things are far easier then.

These are good pieces of advice. I don't know if our Imperial Player will let us go back and change things but it's worth a shot.

Question - you say Subversive Tactics doesn't give much defense to the Imperials - but from our perspective it is all about the defense. What makes you say this out of curiosity?

In the case of the Nexu, yes, he gets a lot of defense. But that's only 1 unit, and some of the effects only occur once per round. Other than that, his units won't survive very long, because he doesn't have anything to boost their health or defense die like other decks have.

Question - you say Subversive Tactics doesn't give much defense to the Imperials - but from our perspective it is all about the defense. What makes you say this out of curiosity?

Other decks are worse. Cloaking Device will give every member of a squad a white die on top of their normal die, it's pretty punishing attacking troopers that average over 3 block and can dodge, worse when that same squad also has Arc Blasters so get blast + stun on the blast on every attack. Combat Vet + Assault Armor will make a squad pretty impervious and hit harder. Even Reactive Armor turning 5 health Droids into 7 health with a guaranteed block makes it pretty tough to kill without wasting too many actions on it, particularly if it's also getting immunity to pierce, worse still if it did an Explosive Entry and the Rebels are all weakened and then it tosses a Mortar on them for good measure.

So, we are slogging our way through a campaign with four rebel players. It is our first time playing this game (or any game like it) but our Imperial player has a few games with other groups under his belt. He chose the "Subversive Tactics" imperial deck and it seems he has produced Nexu that are almost unkillable. His ability to put so much strain on us (and therefore wound us as we hit our endurance max very early each game) is just brutal. Add to this the fact that Nexu gain extra evades when we attack while strained AND can add an armor to their defense results for each evade they have means they get something like 3 armor an 1 evade without even rolling a defense die.

This is brutal.

Also, all the strain effectively means we have no special abilities to use because we're always so tired. And the game sessions are MARATHONS with this situation. We played one mission last night that lasted for almost 4 hours. I read some other more experienced groups talking about playing two missions in one sitting and I was just flabberghasted. Did y'all play all day on a Saturday or something?

Please tell me he's doing something wrong and this is not allowed in the rules some how. The game stopped being fun for us the moment he earned the "Oppression" card to start just giving out strain/evades. And the Nexu just keep coming back. It doesn't even feel that much like Star Wars any more since - although they do appear in Episode II for a bit - those killer cats don't really scream Star Wars to me like a squad of Stormtroopers or Darth Vader.

I have noticed on the boards here that many people say don't use the Subversive Tactics deck with new players. But they follow that up with something about experienced players being able to easily beat the ST deck. Experienced players, I beg of you, share your wisdom so we can hopefully have some of the fun back in our game.

For reference, our team is Garkhan, Jyn (good grief this character sucks - and my poor wife is sentenced with playing her), Mak and Biv.

First off, you have no support characters. Without a support character you're going to have problems no matter what you play against. You should have one of Gideon, Saska, or MHD-19 on every team, or Diala or Loku with all support abilities.

Second, you have Garkhan and Biv, both of which are very strain heavy and probably the 2 worst characters to be playing against Subersive Tactics.

Third, Jyn is easily the best of those 4 characters. However picking Roll With It, which costs strain, obviously isn't a great choice. Rather than that and Smuggler's Luck (3xp total), you want Get Cocky (3xp) which can get rid of 2 strain per round. The DL-44 may not have been a good choice either as it relies on surges for it's damage, and you'll see a lot of those disappear from evades plus you want those surges to use removing strain anyway. In this situation it certainly isn't worth it's 500 credits unless you are making use of both of the mod slots on it (which is a big part of why the gun costs so much).

Subversive Tactics just makes you rest a little more often than other decks, but it deals less damage and gives less defense to the imperials because of it. The fact that you ALSO don't have any support characters means your team is going to be taking even MORE rest actions.

Since you're not having fun I'd recommend you go back and change a few things. Go back to Jyn's regular blaster and get the 500 creds back and get Get Cocky rather than those 2 other abilities. Spend the credits upgrading Mak's gun, because 2 blue is horrible. Swap MHD-19 for Biv and get him a Bacta Radiator and spend his actions pulling Adrenaline out of the supply deck so he can suck 7 strain and 4 wound per round off the team and give a focus. You'll find things are far easier then.

i'm currently running a campaign and my players chose Diala, Garkhaan, Jyn and Mak.

of the 4 I find them all annoying for different reasons as the imperial player

Diala and her bloody re rolling for the group benefits and her high survivability almost always entails me to wound her last as she takes up so much effort to wound that i lose more of my figures from the rest of the party if i go for her first

Garkhaan has the ability to single handily clear up troopers with very little ease. that charge is really strong and combined with his wookie rage and fortitude, he's a killing machine.. but pretty easy to wound when focus fired, so i'm usually targeting him first seeing as he's the first to get in my face anyways

Mak, probably the most difficult figure to deal with because of not being able to shoot at him when he's at range 4, which is quite often easy considering he's usually shooting at range 6+, piercing 2 armor on the attacks and laying the smack down

Jyn is probably the least annoying as her quick draw ability is fairly easy to avoid due to her needing to have the line of sight on you when you activate to use it

so while i can't speak for Jyn being the worst hero, she definitely is out of the group i'm currently in, so i'm not sure i would take your advice on her being one of the best

So, we are slogging our way through a campaign with four rebel players. It is our first time playing this game (or any game like it) but our Imperial player has a few games with other groups under his belt. He chose the "Subversive Tactics" imperial deck and it seems he has produced Nexu that are almost unkillable. His ability to put so much strain on us (and therefore wound us as we hit our endurance max very early each game) is just brutal. Add to this the fact that Nexu gain extra evades when we attack while strained AND can add an armor to their defense results for each evade they have means they get something like 3 armor an 1 evade without even rolling a defense die.

This is brutal.

Also, all the strain effectively means we have no special abilities to use because we're always so tired. And the game sessions are MARATHONS with this situation. We played one mission last night that lasted for almost 4 hours. I read some other more experienced groups talking about playing two missions in one sitting and I was just flabberghasted. Did y'all play all day on a Saturday or something?

Please tell me he's doing something wrong and this is not allowed in the rules some how. The game stopped being fun for us the moment he earned the "Oppression" card to start just giving out strain/evades. And the Nexu just keep coming back. It doesn't even feel that much like Star Wars any more since - although they do appear in Episode II for a bit - those killer cats don't really scream Star Wars to me like a squad of Stormtroopers or Darth Vader.

I have noticed on the boards here that many people say don't use the Subversive Tactics deck with new players. But they follow that up with something about experienced players being able to easily beat the ST deck. Experienced players, I beg of you, share your wisdom so we can hopefully have some of the fun back in our game.

For reference, our team is Garkhan, Jyn (good grief this character sucks - and my poor wife is sentenced with playing her), Mak and Biv.

First off, you have no support characters. Without a support character you're going to have problems no matter what you play against. You should have one of Gideon, Saska, or MHD-19 on every team, or Diala or Loku with all support abilities.

Second, you have Garkhan and Biv, both of which are very strain heavy and probably the 2 worst characters to be playing against Subersive Tactics.

Third, Jyn is easily the best of those 4 characters. However picking Roll With It, which costs strain, obviously isn't a great choice. Rather than that and Smuggler's Luck (3xp total), you want Get Cocky (3xp) which can get rid of 2 strain per round. The DL-44 may not have been a good choice either as it relies on surges for it's damage, and you'll see a lot of those disappear from evades plus you want those surges to use removing strain anyway. In this situation it certainly isn't worth it's 500 credits unless you are making use of both of the mod slots on it (which is a big part of why the gun costs so much).

Subversive Tactics just makes you rest a little more often than other decks, but it deals less damage and gives less defense to the imperials because of it. The fact that you ALSO don't have any support characters means your team is going to be taking even MORE rest actions.

Since you're not having fun I'd recommend you go back and change a few things. Go back to Jyn's regular blaster and get the 500 creds back and get Get Cocky rather than those 2 other abilities. Spend the credits upgrading Mak's gun, because 2 blue is horrible. Swap MHD-19 for Biv and get him a Bacta Radiator and spend his actions pulling Adrenaline out of the supply deck so he can suck 7 strain and 4 wound per round off the team and give a focus. You'll find things are far easier then.

i'm currently running a campaign and my players chose Diala, Garkhaan, Jyn and Mak.

of the 4 I find them all annoying for different reasons as the imperial player

Diala and her bloody re rolling for the group benefits and her high survivability almost always entails me to wound her last as she takes up so much effort to wound that i lose more of my figures from the rest of the party if i go for her first

Garkhaan has the ability to single handily clear up troopers with very little ease. that charge is really strong and combined with his wookie rage and fortitude, he's a killing machine.. but pretty easy to wound when focus fired, so i'm usually targeting him first seeing as he's the first to get in my face anyways

Mak, probably the most difficult figure to deal with because of not being able to shoot at him when he's at range 4, which is quite often easy considering he's usually shooting at range 6+, piercing 2 armor on the attacks and laying the smack down

Jyn is probably the least annoying as her quick draw ability is fairly easy to avoid due to her needing to have the line of sight on you when you activate to use it

so while i can't speak for Jyn being the worst hero, she definitely is out of the group i'm currently in, so i'm not sure i would take your advice on her being one of the best

I think you're playing a different game than the rest of us if you're having trouble getting to range 3 on Mak while finding it easy to never give Jyn a single target. You might want to check your line of sight rules.

Gaarkhan's charge ability isn't strong, it just lets him move 4 for 2 strain rather than 2. It's to help compensate for the fact that he's not using a ranged weapon and it is one of the worst movement abilities in the game. It is worse in every way than Fenn's free 2 movement point ability which can be used on any ally, or Jynn's 3 movement abilities which cost no strain which means she rarely if ever even needs waste an action on movement. Diala isn't anything special for suvivability, her reroll ability is typically just going to cost a strain to save a wound which ultimately does nothing, even Jynn's ability to pull 2 strain off per turn can make her more survivable than Diala.

I think you're playing a different game than the rest of us if you're having trouble getting to range 3 on Mak while finding it easy to never give Jyn a single target. You might want to check your line of sight rules.

I also find it easy not to give Jyn line of sight; you just move your first figure from the back of the group to the front so it blocks her LOS, then move the rest through it. It makes you play a little awkwardly at times, but it is fairly easy to avoid.

Getting to range 3 on Mak is hard when he has Disengage. You basically need to start out at 4 range from him if you want to get close enough to shoot him with a 4-movement figure, because he can move 3 away from you. But before he picks that up yeah he's not that hard to get close enough to.

The DL-44 by itself is not great against Subversive Tactics because you need to use the surges to get the most out of the blaster (it has arguably the two best surge abilities of any pistol in the game).

However, if you put the Tactical Display on it you're going to get an extra surge. Now you can get your +2 damage AND remove a strain.

The other thing to consider later in the game is Gunfighter or Gunslinger or whatever it's called. It costs no strain and let's Jyn use surges from a second pistol she didn't fire. The DL-44 surge abilities combined with the Sporting Blaster's dice is just sick against Subversive Tactics. I found it to be at least. She straight abused the Royal Guard Champion with that equipment setup for me once.

Against the Nexu I would recommend using her starter gun until you have the Tac Display though.

Speaking of the Tac Display, it should probably be a priority Tier I item in any game you play, but it is essential against Subversive Tactics. The Balanded Hilt is as well. If you have both you're getting two extra surges/round as a team.

On your character upgrades focus on abilities that don't cost strain, give extra endurance, help relieve strain or can give you focus (because the focus die will give more surges).

I think your IP may be abusing his abilities too though. Most of that stuff is once per round...

Another idea on Nexu that are too hard to kill with early weapons... Stun them and get out of Pounce range.

Mak's Disengage is not quite as useful in a game without Diala or Gideon. Supply Network is extra useful against Subversive Tactics. Execute is highly useful against ST also. It let's you remove strain on kill shots if I remember right. On the 2 XP options Jesswandi gives him a bit more survivability and a chance to get Focus. Target Acquired takes strain to use.

I would like to point out that your IP sounds like the kind of guy no one really likes to play with... He's not just using the most difficult deck for inexperienced players, he's power gaming with it at the expense of theme, fun and even realism.

Mak's Disengage is not quite as useful in a game without Diala or Gideon. Supply Network is extra useful against Subversive Tactics. Execute is highly useful against ST also. It let's you remove strain on kill shots if I remember right. On the 2 XP options Jesswandi gives him a bit more survivability and a chance to get Focus. Target Acquired takes strain to use.

I would like to point out that your IP sounds like the kind of guy no one really likes to play with... He's not just using the most difficult deck for inexperienced players, he's power gaming with it at the expense of theme, fun and even realism.

How does disengage synergize with Diala and Gideon?

Also - he may be power gaming, but I would argue that Nexus being stressful to fight makes a LOT of thematic sense

Mak's Disengage is not quite as useful in a game without Diala or Gideon. Supply Network is extra useful against Subversive Tactics. Execute is highly useful against ST also. It let's you remove strain on kill shots if I remember right. On the 2 XP options Jesswandi gives him a bit more survivability and a chance to get Focus. Target Acquired takes strain to use.

I would like to point out that your IP sounds like the kind of guy no one really likes to play with... He's not just using the most difficult deck for inexperienced players, he's power gaming with it at the expense of theme, fun and even realism.

How does disengage synergize with Diala and Gideon?

Also - he may be power gaming, but I would argue that Nexus being stressful to fight makes a LOT of thematic sense

With Gideon... It's just a good way to balance how much risk you let him take after moving with Command or a good way to try and work in 7 extra move points/round.

Nexu - I laughed. Seriously though, other than causing stress they don't work very well. They should be eating storm troopers too.

Mak's Disengage is not quite as useful in a game without Diala or Gideon. Supply Network is extra useful against Subversive Tactics. Execute is highly useful against ST also. It let's you remove strain on kill shots if I remember right. On the 2 XP options Jesswandi gives him a bit more survivability and a chance to get Focus. Target Acquired takes strain to use.

I would like to point out that your IP sounds like the kind of guy no one really likes to play with... He's not just using the most difficult deck for inexperienced players, he's power gaming with it at the expense of theme, fun and even realism.

How does disengage synergize with Diala and Gideon?

Also - he may be power gaming, but I would argue that Nexus being stressful to fight makes a LOT of thematic sense

With Diala... If you haven't done this yet it's a ton of fun... Force Throw an Imperial figure within three spaces of Mak.

With Gideon... It's just a good way to balance how much risk you let him take after moving with Command or a good way to try and work in 7 extra move points/round.

Nexu - I laughed. Seriously though, other than causing stress they don't work very well. They should be eating storm troopers too.

Why wouldn't you just Force Throw Mak instead, save him a strain and keep his Disengage available?

Anyway, if Mak is running in the wrong direction and splitting himself off from the rest of the group, I'm fine with that as Imperials, I wouldn't even waste my time shooting at him, he's losing the mission all by himself.

Activating Disengage as Dialla is definitely a situational move. I usually have done it to get Mak three spaces forward though. It works better than using FT on him sometimes because it deals damage, moves someone else you'd like to move and can be used to help him gain an angle to Ambush inside the Covert 4 space sphere.

Also... I said I don't like Disengage as much against the ST deck. Diala I still would probably use, but she goes from 1a or 1b to not nearly as strong as Fenn.

Mak has one ability that lets him remove a white die from an opponent's pool for an attack, which can be very powerful against the Nexu. He's one-shotted (or nearly) several Nexu in the game I'm running.

Mak has one ability that lets him remove a white die from an opponent's pool for an attack, which can be very powerful against the Nexu. He's one-shotted (or nearly) several Nexu in the game I'm running.

We've had Mak 4 times now, first time the player gave him the 2 red disruptor which was a mistake and he sucked with it. Next time the player just didn't use him very well and he was pretty ineffective. Last time it was in Twin Shadows and he never got an upgrade gun for whatever reason and man 2 blue dice are bad. This time I'm playing him in Hoth and we're still in tier 1 upgrades and haven't had a good gun come up. 2 blue dice ugh, it's like he's shooting BBs. He'll definitely be the first weapon upgrade though, wow what a bad gun.

Mak has one ability that lets him remove a white die from an opponent's pool for an attack, which can be very powerful against the Nexu. He's one-shotted (or nearly) several Nexu in the game I'm running.

We've had Mak 4 times now, first time the player gave him the 2 red disruptor which was a mistake and he sucked with it. Next time the player just didn't use him very well and he was pretty ineffective. Last time it was in Twin Shadows and he never got an upgrade gun for whatever reason and man 2 blue dice are bad. This time I'm playing him in Hoth and we're still in tier 1 upgrades and haven't had a good gun come up. 2 blue dice ugh, it's like he's shooting BBs. He'll definitely be the first weapon upgrade though, wow what a bad gun.

Mak has one ability that lets him remove a white die from an opponent's pool for an attack, which can be very powerful against the Nexu. He's one-shotted (or nearly) several Nexu in the game I'm running.

We've had Mak 4 times now, first time the player gave him the 2 red disruptor which was a mistake and he sucked with it. Next time the player just didn't use him very well and he was pretty ineffective. Last time it was in Twin Shadows and he never got an upgrade gun for whatever reason and man 2 blue dice are bad. This time I'm playing him in Hoth and we're still in tier 1 upgrades and haven't had a good gun come up. 2 blue dice ugh, it's like he's shooting BBs. He'll definitely be the first weapon upgrade though, wow what a bad gun.

Why was the disruptor a mistake?

Mak lacks both strain removal abilities and movement abilities. Not having extra surges on the gun to get rid of strain means he'll have to give up shots to rest more often. The limited range means he's going to have to be giving up actions to move or spending strain to move and so resting more often, giving up more shots.

Mak isn't strain heavy when he starts but most of his abilities cost strain so the further in the campaign you are the more he needs a gun with extra surges to bleed off strain or he's not going to be using abilities or he's going to be resting. The fact that the gun can't take any mods for better accuracy or to give surges is really the nail in the coffin for ever using that gun with Mak unless you have other characters compensating for it. If Gideon is pulling 2 strain off him every turn for instance you might be able to get by, but you're better off just using a different gun.

Mak's Disengage is not quite as useful in a game without Diala or Gideon. Supply Network is extra useful against Subversive Tactics. Execute is highly useful against ST also. It let's you remove strain on kill shots if I remember right. On the 2 XP options Jesswandi gives him a bit more survivability and a chance to get Focus. Target Acquired takes strain to use.

I would like to point out that your IP sounds like the kind of guy no one really likes to play with... He's not just using the most difficult deck for inexperienced players, he's power gaming with it at the expense of theme, fun and even realism.

How does disengage synergize with Diala and Gideon?

Also - he may be power gaming, but I would argue that Nexus being stressful to fight makes a LOT of thematic sense

With Diala... If you haven't done this yet it's a ton of fun... Force Throw an Imperial figure within three spaces of Mak.

With Gideon... It's just a good way to balance how much risk you let him take after moving with Command or a good way to try and work in 7 extra move points/round.

Nexu - I laughed. Seriously though, other than causing stress they don't work very well. They should be eating storm troopers too.

Huh, that Diala one is interesting - I hadn't thought of that interaction. Disengage is still really good without it though.

As for the Nexu, I guess they're trained? Maybe with some sort of shock collar that the Imperials trigger if they attack Stormtroopers? If the Empire is going to the trouble to bring them in I have to assume they have a way to control them

The upgrades we have for Jyn are Rolling With It, the one that has three different abilities listed on it and cheap shot. We also bought her a DL-44. She consistently does nothing (or rather, fails to accomplish anything on her rolls) and then gets wounded. Honestly, I've never seen anyone use Jyn effectively and the other players I've talked with say she's the worst character in the game.

Well of course Jyn will be terrible if you waste her xp on Roll with it and Cheap Shot (she's still extremely squishy with roll with it at the strain you take to use it means you recover 1 less health (negating it's effect) when you heal, cheap shot gives 1 extra damage on a portion of her attacks which will not usually be high). Smuggler's Luck is okay but imo it's better to just go straight for get cocky, gunslinger and sidewinder.

More in general it sounds like your IP is, knowingly or not, being a bit of a douchebag; general consensus is that the Imperial player has an advantage the first time the rebels play (especially if the IP already knows the game), he's compounding that by using subversive tactics and even more so by using nexu with it.

I think subversive tactics is a really well designed deck and very flavorful. That said the flavor comes from being monstrously unfun to play against because it stops the rebels using their abilities. It also requires different (and probably deeper) thinking to play against than the other decks which is another problem. It's a huge mistake to run subversive tactics against a new group of rebels.

On Mak: He only lacks movement and strain recover if you don't get them for him, disengage and execute are both damned good.