I feel ashamed. Because i did not read this card correctly. I dismissed Kylo Ren (Crew) as a 'meh' card because i actually thought he would have the same situational effect as Maarek or Boba Fett. Namely that you have to get a crit through on hull.

It seems not... As i have been taught, if one of your crits goes uncanceled on a shield, you just deal a previously selected pilot crit to the ship.

Damaged Cockpit? Blinded Pilot anyone? He can just delete your pilot skill, then while he is at it prevent you from shooting.

It also kills most low hull high shields ships in 2-3 rounds of shooting. not much you can do about it.

And it's actually not very difficult to pull off quite shockingly. Unlike let's say Proton bombs, or Boba crew.

Rear Admiral Chiraneau (46)
Veteran Instincts (1)
Kylo Ren (3)
Mercenary Copilot (2)
Gunner (5)
Engine Upgrade (4)

Total: 61

View in Yet Another Squad Builder

This just says: "Hi we are Chirpy and Kylo partying with all our friends in this fat Decimator, please leave a message after the tone, oh, and you are also PS0, mmkay? *Heavy respirator breathing* BEEP"

If Range 2 is good enough for you, just invite Ysanne instead of the merc copilot, and if you bump a lot, add title to the ship.

So far for the facts!

Now the following on a more personal base, so be warned:

I am not exactly happy to see this. It completely hoses, well anything that has a Pilot skill to speak about. Especially however (again!) Rebel aces, most scum aces and some imperial aces. And a lot of other lists too actually.

Rebel Aces rely on their shields to protect them, and have low agility and mostly no evade. There is just nothing at all they can do against this build that would prevent them to get dealt one Blinded pilot after the other until all are out of the deck or they are just dead. If they got high PS then this will probably also be deleted.

Even worse, the only one that could hope to evade these attacks most of the time, Corran Horn will just need to take 2 points of damage, which is totally possible as he was never about evadeing everything but rather mitigating and regenerating. Poe should easily be hit with gunner and probably takes 2 blinded pilots and dies without ever firing a shot. Falcons, K-Wings, ARCs, not much they can do against this. At least they have the hull to survive for a bit.

I really absolutely detest seeing this, because they just needed to get rid of TorpScouts to make any room for rebels in the meta again. And now they will soon bring this, which is probably just as bad. Probably even worse because it also affects the few viable builds they had left under Torpscouts.

The worst thing however is that will most probably push anything out of the meta again that does not either completely avoid Damage or is a Kylo Ren Build itself. I mean this will result to Palpy vs Kylo, will it not? The shuttle doesnt care about any of the pilot crits and Soontir evades everything from a PWT, so he doesn't care at all about Kylo as his gameplan is not getting hit anyway. Defenders rely mostly on mitigation, not complete avoidance of damage and will probably be affected.

I just don't like where this is going, because it sure as hell will narrow the meta by a lot again, and that's just something i hate to see. Just my 2 cents

So what could the different factions do to somehow handle Kylo?

Rebels:

1. Braylen Stramm or Stresshog going in first! Kylomobile can deal blinded pilots to him easily, but it does need to shoot and action him first or he will stress it out for days so that it will never be able to take an action again.
2. Biggs. I hate how necessary he is for Rebels but this just makes him even more mandatory. Sure Kylo can do whatever to him, but the other ships are safe at least as long as he is there.
3. Chewbacca? You are dealt the damage card so Chewie should work fine.

Scum:

1. Assaj Ventress, for the same reasons as Braylen, but it's probably not as effective because it deals less stress.
2. 4 TLTs just dont care about most pilot crits and are the bane of any decimator. But as i know people here, most will prefer to see as few as them as possible in the meta XD
3. Boba Crew. Just throw the nuisance out the airlock real quick!

Empire:

1. Palpshuttle plus super dodgy friends. Seriously FFG you seem to not get enough of Palpy and Soontir. Because this makes those 2 the choice again.
2. Howl (no, not the Tie pilot) with the wolves. If you can't beat them... Play Kylo, and hope to get off the first blinded pilot.

These are just the counters that came to mind immediately. Of course playing Determination on all your guys is also an option, but who would want to do this... Maybe if it gets really bad and we all see the dark side way too often we will be forced to play it.

The best news is probably that there are only 2 blinded pilots (so at least he can only prevent 2 shots, but that buys a decimator a lot of time actually) and 2 damaged cockpits in the deck... So if a lot of damage goes on your hulls fast enough, they might be dealt as facedown cards and Kylo can't pick them... No only joking, this would mean you are losing anyway, and pretty badly!

Conclusion:

I am probably way overestimating the impact that Kylo will have on the meta, but then, maybe not. Can you please tell me that i am, just to comfort me? Please tell me everything is gonna be fine... I just dont want to see the meta go back to 2-3 same lists because of this yet again... XD

nvm - miss read the post

I haven't a clue; I'm just staring to understand it a bit. If anyone wants a great breakdown, spin up podcast 28, heychadwick and the guys do a sweet job dissecting the Ups Shuttle...

I am probably way overestimating the impact that Kylo will have on the meta, but then, maybe not. Can you please tell me that i am, just to comfort me? Please tell me everything is gonna be fine... I just dont want to see the meta go back to 2-3 same lists because of this yet again... XD

If he got super popular determination would as well, totally nullifying him. He may be end up being strong and giving some lists fits (that is a good thing, but can't take over since he has a built in counter that basically ANY build can implement.

lol too long didnt read

He may be end up being strong and giving some lists fits (that is a good thing)

Yes it is. It'll finally stop getting a certain friend of mine to stop playing his pet list, since I have a counter that involves Kylo Ren that I think his list has like a .01% chance to beat.

Wouldn't be so bad if the original Action was only Range 1 - then at least his ride would have to put itself in harm's way to assign it.

As someone who likes to fly swarms, Kylo make me happy. He punishes two ship lists the most.

Kylo Ren: Yet another reason to fly Biggs

But really, if you were flying ARCs you were flying him anyway

Small things though

1 kylo is an action and can therefore be stopped

2 damaged cockpit isnt a huge deal when cheri probably out ps you regardless

3 blinded pilot is huge but there are only two of them

Kylo Ren: Yet another reason to fly Biggs

But really, if you were flying ARCs you were flying him anyway

Small things though

1 kylo is an action and can therefore be stopped

2 damaged cockpit isnt a huge deal when cheri probably out ps you regardless

3 blinded pilot is huge but there are only two of them

And if you weren't flying ARCs, you weren't flying Rebels properly.

I know how your brain works Fickle

My brain works!?!?

My brain works!?!?

When ships with insane wingspan are involved, yes.

I will totally take Determination if there's even a hint of Kylo being in play. As soon as I see a batshuttle from across the room, I'm changing EPS on my best pilot unless it's a vital upgrade to my build?

Why? At the very least I'm spending 1 point to render 3 points ineffective against my best ship. Or I could well be turning a 34 point shuttle into a damage mitigating machine by ensuring that the first damage I get in any round is discarded. There's no 'may' in the pilot ability.

I'll be doing my best Foghorn Leghorn impersonation as determined Darth Vader fires on his shuttle 'Now boy, that ain't no dark side yer showin me, that ain't even the shady side (quit trashing yer cockpit with yer lightsaber and listen to me son). Now come on over here boy and I'll show you how the real dark siding is done!'.

Everything is going to be fine. I don't know how, but you told me to say that, so I'm saying that.

As pointed out above, swarms are hit the least by this because you are stopping 1/6 to 1/8 of the list with that Blinded Pilot crit. And Decimators can really get chewed up by swarms, what with 0 agility and all. Sure, they could try to run away with Engine Upgrade, but then you're not using Kylo Ren. That isn't to say that swarms are auto-win against Kylo, but they do help mitigate his effect. Hopefully the meta will not completely push out swarms so they can be there to help shut down Kylo.

Hey! I just had another thought. What about Draw Their Fire? You pull crits away from the target, and since the one drawing fire is not the one with the condition, the face-up crit doesn't go on that ship.

He may be end up being strong and giving some lists fits (that is a good thing)

Yes it is. It'll finally stop getting a certain friend of mine to stop playing his pet list, since I have a counter that involves Kylo Ren that I think his list has like a .01% chance to beat.

Not only does it hurt low health ships, he hurts low agility ships too, as they can rarely avoid a crit.

And as Obi points out, Bossk is my main way to deal with Aces, and now he'll die readily with no impact in the fight as he'll be double Blinded Pilot. I may have to switch to Determination but Crack Shot is vital to deal with Aces IMO. I don't know. We'll see.

It's one of those things that has a variable value. Against some lists, it will have little impact. Against other lists, it'll be game deciding as you Blind the best enemy ship twice. That's not good design. In fact, it's terrible design, and continues the trend of match-up influencing a game more than player skill.

Take Bossk, for example. Against a Kylo Chiraneua, Bossk will get Blinded in the first two combats, at which point Chiraneau is now easily behind Bossk. That turns a 35-45 point Bossk into a ship that is unlikely to get to attack a single time during a game. What?

Better have a big bid so that in the mirror match your Chiraneau can Blind their Chiraneau twice before it even gets to shoot...

Hopefully Kylo Ren pushes Corran Horn out of the meta

Hopefully Kylo Ren pushes Corran Horn out of the meta

yeaaaaa so palp and ren in 1 list..... I small broken

Hopefully Kylo Ren pushes Corran Horn out of the meta

As well as every other 2 hull ship in the game, that isn't behind a token stack/palp defence because of the way crits are removed last one will get through.

I want to be wrong about kylo but his ability is just too powerful and will hate out certain ships even more than they already are

It's one of those things that has a variable value. Against some lists, it will have little impact. Against other lists, it'll be game deciding as you Blind the best enemy ship twice. That's not good design. In fact, it's terrible design, and continues the trend of match-up influencing a game more than player skill.

Take Bossk, for example. Against a Kylo Chiraneua, Bossk will get Blinded in the first two combats, at which point Chiraneau is now easily behind Bossk. That turns a 35-45 point Bossk into a ship that is unlikely to get to attack a single time during a game. What?

Better have a big bid so that in the mirror match your Chiraneau can Blind their Chiraneau twice before it even gets to shoot...

Wait, Bossk is not alone there and if in such situation (1 more ship, 180 degree arc) you are not able to keep RAC in the arc then, let me say this - you should lose. Even if one makes Bossk PS 0 then you still can throw 3 or 4 dice attacks on RAC if you are smart enough. And he really does not like that with no green dice or other mitigation other than escaping the arc.

You still need to do action with Kylo, which means you do not boost which means you do not arc dodge which means you will get down very quickly.

Definitely, Kylo is not an auto win and I do not see him spreading more than 2-3 crits during a game. EDIT: and to do that he will probably stay in some bad spots to give out the card and get some "love" with shots from his opponent. Even Corran means two rounds of bad or very bad positioning. For not guaranteed success (green dice).

The problem really is the 1-3 range and that you reliably can get a crit with chirpy on 1-3 if you take the mercenary and gunner

As you might have seen in my original post, i know i could be wrong about the meta shift here, but i do honestly think Kylo is really poor game design. Not because it's almighty powerful, but because it probably comes down to a point where you either play him or hardcounter him.

Not only that but he will also make a few lists good again that most of really don't want to have back. Ultra high PS PWTs, Soontir Palpmobile.

And it punishes rebels again for not having high agility aces. They will be pushed further into Ghosts, TLTs, Biggs, Stressbots. And then the whining against these will start over again because some people just don't understand that Rebel players would love to play something else but are constantly not allowed to by the meta. They are now in a great spot with Rey and all of their high PS pilots viabke again after Torpscouts. In comes Kylo and should he ever become a thing we are back to the starting block!

How does this interact with Draw Their Fire and Xizor? I'm guessing that those will work normally, as they stop the ship with IWSYTDS from suffering a critical damage, and the ship suffering it instead doesn't have the condition? But the card and condition will stay in place.

We wil be never back there again.

Not with Crackshots, not with defenders x7, not with high ps rebel aces that hunts down any Soontir easily, not with (nerfed) but still viable u-boats and other shiny scum powers like Zuckuss or 4-LOM (who may both be used against this beautiful Fel and his 'great' mods are not so great anymore). Not even with Feedback array and BMST... Or even auto-Tractor Beam in some scum lists...

The variety at the moment is so great that building "hard counters" is almost impossible and if you are so much scared of Kylo, then go on, hard counter him and I am sure you will lose to most of other lists flying around..

How does this interact with Draw Their Fire and Xizor? I'm guessing that those will work normally, as they stop the ship with IWSYTDS from suffering a critical damage, and the ship suffering it instead doesn't have the condition? But the card and condition will stay in place.

It looks like that's right. Uness you got hit by more than 1 crit, you are able to evade it with those abilities.

Kylo Ren (Crew) is a toolbox card. You take him because a single ship is straight hard countered by Corran Horn - as I had the displeasure of rediscovering twice on Saturday - and you want to hedge your bets against that.