Post vets, we have ryad with her flippity-doo kturn antics, and marek making sure the crit counts. Now, in my experience, I certainly understand that actually getting Rex to flip a bunch of crits can be difficult, but when it does hit, it can be dandy. But mostly all I see around here is "Vessery or go home," notwithstanding the new pilots or x7s.

So first off. Why vessery? A free target lock, okay. It's nice. But am I misunderstanding? Can he just keep locking and rerolling every time he rolls, until he's satisfied with all three dice hitting/critting? Is that the secret? That would explain why he's so powerful, should that be the case.

But otherwise, considering a /D ion can strip another shield, flip that to a crit if needed, plus a primary attack to follow and offer another crit opportunity, why not rexler?

Me and bio both love Rexler it kind of puzzles us why others don't see his power.

I like him more than Vess, or did last time I played with my defender about 6 months ago). With Vets coming out i'll try both, and am eager to try Ryad and really want to play Steele (even if only because its him)!

Stele with x7 and calculation is an efficient killing machine paired up with a tie shuttle to provide either locks or focus tokens.

Rex's problem is the lack of action economy and synergy (either with other ships or the new defender upgrade cards). His ability ties him pretty strongly to taking a Focus action but he cannot use that Focus to increase his number of hits or dodges. You can give him the x7 Title so he can at least gain an Evade token some of the time but that means he is limited to his primary 3 dice attack. You can give him the HLC or /D title for more firepower but they increase his already considerable cost without providing action economy.

With 3 dice primaries and no easy means to boost them, my feeling is that it is hard to generate more crits with rex than you would roll naturally. Against low agility targets like the rebel Big ships, he should do well enough as stacking crits is really bad for these guys (apart from Chewie). But against other Aces, his ability struggles to pay for itself unless you invest further in something like a Fleet Officer to dish out extra Focus tokens.

He is not bad. He is still a PS8 Defender but my feeling is that other pilots benefit more from the new toys in the Imperial Veterans box. He is still a big threat with Predator and HLC but he always was and he still costs nearly half your squad points.

PTL rex with x7 and mk.ii is a beast, bio favours predator but both are great in skilled hands.

I'm liking this conversation, mainly because it's taking my mind off of the referendum result today.

Rexler Brath (44)
TIE Defender (37), Ion Cannon (3), Predator (1), TIE/D (0)

Scimitar Squadron Pilot (22)
TIE Bomber (16), TIE Shuttle (0), Twin Ion Engine Mk. II (1), Fleet Officer (3), Systems Officer (2)

Maarek Stele (34)
TIE Defender (35), Calculation (1), TIE/x7 (-2)

Brath is expensive. And you're paying more for PS than you are for his ability, inline, say, corran were the ability is a great buy as well.

Vessery, on the right squad, can get better-than-predator, especially with the TIE/D version where you get to reroll drive on both attacks without using you're action at all.

Even the first target lock, or a single door, is worth 3 points, and he's getting even better than that.

This is why he's so scary at first glance. And carefully flown, he's an offence monster.

...But not one without caveats. I guess we'll see how much the realities of his piloting sink in yet.

I've had some thoughts about Brath and how to use his ability. I'm actually leaning toward giving him Rage and Mk.II engines along with some other toys. He's got enough green to quickly burn off the stress and it really won't cause him too much trouble if you time it right. Sure it won't be great with x7, but imagine it with TIE/D or even the classic HLC. I was also considering it with Prockets for the ability to reroll and flip cards in the same turn.

Won't have the action economy of some of the other Defender pilots. But it sure will give you a serious strike for very few additional points.

At 37 points base, you need to single handedly be able to take out third of an opponents list, but three green dice doesn't work against focus fire, and only 3 attack dice with one action won't kill an ace without luck. His ability is "win more" in that he makes lucky rolls amazing (where you felt damage and didn't spend your focus) so what is he good against? Low adjility large ships (with no turrets) and cheap filler generics.

[...] he should do well enough as stacking crits is really bad for these guys (apart from Chewie).[...]

Rexler's ability is inmune to Chewie's ability, since they are not drawn...

Post vets, we have ryad with her flippity-doo kturn antics, and marek making sure the crit counts. Now, in my experience, I certainly understand that actually getting Rex to flip a bunch of crits can be difficult, but when it does hit, it can be dandy. But mostly all I see around here is "Vessery or go home," notwithstanding the new pilots or x7s.

So first off. Why vessery? A free target lock, okay. It's nice. But am I misunderstanding? Can he just keep locking and rerolling every time he rolls, until he's satisfied with all three dice hitting/critting? Is that the secret? That would explain why he's so powerful, should that be the case.

But otherwise, considering a /D ion can strip another shield, flip that to a crit if needed, plus a primary attack to follow and offer another crit opportunity, why not rexler?

Note - you can reroll each die only once.

As said before by others, there are too many conditions to Braths ability:

1. he has to have a focus and not spend it for defense or his attack (if you roll eyeballs it's either no damage or no ability) until cards are dealt to the defender

2. the defender has to roll a worse defense result (the ships that are crippled by crits don't care about unmodified attacks against them)

3. the damage cannot go into shields for the ability to have any effect

Vessery with Ion and the new title has TLs for both attacks and one focus to use for either of them.

You don't need criticals to kill a ship. Consistantly large numbers of regular hits work out better.

Vessery had a problem in the past not just because defenders were over-costed but the good imperial ships did not come with target lock actions. Now with the Inquisitor, Omega Leader and ATC Tie Advanced the time is right for Vessery to shine.

Rex will benefit from the new crew card handing out focus tokens. I think part of the problem is simply having a token to flip a hit up. With more of a token stack he'll be able to modify attacks *and* flip a card

x7 Rexler seems pretty powerful to me, more or less the Empire version of Poe Dameron, at more or less the same cost, too, as well as similar preferred EPTs (VI and Predator). A free evade every turn is about on par with a regenerated shield, with having to go fast being slightly less of a drawback than having to go green. Agility 3 is pretty much on par with Autothrusters at agility 2; better in arc at ranges 1-2, worse out of arc and at R3. Poe has a slightly more powerful ability, but like Rexler's it only works when he gets to focus, and he is two points more expensive.

Post vets, we have ryad with her flippity-doo kturn antics, and marek making sure the crit counts. Now, in my experience, I certainly understand that actually getting Rex to flip a bunch of crits can be difficult, but when it does hit, it can be dandy. But mostly all I see around here is "Vessery or go home," notwithstanding the new pilots or x7s.

So first off. Why vessery? A free target lock, okay. It's nice. But am I misunderstanding? Can he just keep locking and rerolling every time he rolls, until he's satisfied with all three dice hitting/critting? Is that the secret? That would explain why he's so powerful, should that be the case.

But otherwise, considering a /D ion can strip another shield, flip that to a crit if needed, plus a primary attack to follow and offer another crit opportunity, why not rexler?

Vessery's ability is great because rolling unmodified dice is a super disaster, and rolling double modified dice is much better than single modified dice. It's going to get you extra damage in.

Rexlar's ability is hard to trigger, he's more expensive, and even if you do trigger it you're at best flipping up a direct hit or something, which is one extra damage. Vessery's ability is going to get you more extra damage in.

Rexy's nothing but rng, and that'll just fial so **** much

Vess gives full mods easily, Rexy has to lose full mods to coin flip facedown cards your target may or may not have after he attacks

personally, there's enough crappy rng in the game as is; don't need to add more of it with a 37 point cost base

Post vets, we have ryad with her flippity-doo kturn antics, and marek making sure the crit counts. Now, in my experience, I certainly understand that actually getting Rex to flip a bunch of crits can be difficult, but when it does hit, it can be dandy. But mostly all I see around here is "Vessery or go home," notwithstanding the new pilots or x7s.

So first off. Why vessery? A free target lock, okay. It's nice. But am I misunderstanding? Can he just keep locking and rerolling every time he rolls, until he's satisfied with all three dice hitting/critting? Is that the secret? That would explain why he's so powerful, should that be the case.

But otherwise, considering a /D ion can strip another shield, flip that to a crit if needed, plus a primary attack to follow and offer another crit opportunity, why not rexler?

Simpler than that

he can have 3 actions

1 from ability

evade from title

and focus from...erm...focus action

at a discount.

that just goddamn ROCKS

If it's not broken or over powered, it's not "competitive".

EDIT: Should have added this to ensure I was tongue in cheek.

If it's not broken or over powered, it's not "competitive".

when there's lots of "broken and overpowered" things,

there's no broken and overpowered, there are just "at competitive level" and "below competitive level"

If it's not broken or over powered, it's not "competitive".

when there's lots of "broken and overpowered" things,

there's no broken and overpowered, there are just "at competitive level" and "below competitive level"

Yeah, it was tongue in cheek. I think what I mean is that there are only so many ships that are at a certain power level for whatever reason. Oh, there are a number of them, but it's still a small percentage when compared to the overall total. As it is, only the best of the best will be seen at top tables. So...the most super powered ones. Rexlar isn't in that category.

I'm looking forward to running a list with Rex at PS10, but that's really the only reason I can see running him. If his ability ever triggers I might actually poop a bit.

Rexler Brath (37)40

Veteran Instincts (1)

Tractor Beam (1)

TIE/D (0)

Twin Ion Engine Mk. II (1)

Black Squadron Pilot (14)15

Crack shot (1)

Black Squadron Pilot (14)15

Crack shot (1)

Black Squadron Pilot (14)15

Crack shot (1)

Black Squadron Pilot (14)15

Crack shot (1)

To put things in perspective though, you can put Steele in the same list with the same upgrades and have a 2 point initiative bid at PS9 and have an ability that might actually work. Or you can upgrade the Tractor Beam to an Ion Cannon.

I, for one, am looking forward to trying out Rexlar alongside Tomax Bren with Flight officer and Cool Hand, as well as another ship at PS 8+. That enables Rexlar to get his double focus, and you have two other ships to strip shields for you first before Rex fires. It might not be super competitve, but it's sure to be super fun!

Vessery gets a free lock every time he attacks. I think it's pretty obvious why he's so good. With TIE/D, he gets a free lock for BOTH attacks.

Vessery, TIE/D, Tractor Beam or Ion, and Crack Shot. Block an ace with a buddy, then Vessery tears into them and either moves them in front of allies or makes them blockable again next turn.

Unlike some other pilots, Rexler cannot be judged in a vacuum. He is one of the worst pilots when big ships are scarce and one of the best pilots when big ships are popular. He will ruin a meta full of low agility high hull ships but be basically without text (and thus without reason to use him) against a meta full of 2-4 hull high agility small ships.

Rexy's nothing but rng, and that'll just fial so **** much

Vess gives full mods easily, Rexy has to lose full mods to coin flip facedown cards your target may or may not have after he attacks

personally, there's enough crappy rng in the game as is; don't need to add more of it with a 37 point cost base

What's RNG?