I run ekylo and 2 FO troopers. With a good draw I can get all the blasters equipped quickly, and create a super trooper. That takes the heat off kylo and all the blasters are redeploy, so I get a second super trooper.

I also have a FO tie and a speeder bike for support shenanigans, and they have solid dice

I don't really understand how people are saying eJango/eVeers can burn through Vader by turn 1-2. I mean, yes, it could possibly happen, but it's mathematically hugely unlikely. Turn 1 if you equip a weapon and then get an absolutely perfect god roll, you can maybe do 8 damage. That's assuming you roll perfectly and the Vader player has no dice manipulation, which also is a huge "IF." The probability of this happening just seems extremely unlikely. Maybe it happened to someone one time, but to argue that Vader isn't a solid deck because of it is silly.

On the other topic going on, I do agree that a lot of the 3 character decks seem strong. I have been running eGrievous/Dooku and I like how it matches up against 3 unit teams a bit better than Vader/Raider. The reason for this is because Grievous is a hard hitter, much like Vader, but if he dies then Dooku can still stand his own against 1-2 characters. Raider? Not so much. In Vader/Raider, if Vader dies you pretty much know it's over. Vader is certainly tankier at 13 life, but I use a lot of defensive dice to keep Grievous alive.

I personally only believe Vader is over-rated for the very reason you stated. It is a solid team but it is very much putting all your eggs in one basket. If your opponent can take vader out you're probably done. I think banking on 13 hp's is riskier than most people admit because, well because he's vader.

I don't really understand how people are saying eJango/eVeers can burn through Vader by turn 1-2. I mean, yes, it could possibly happen, but it's mathematically hugely unlikely. Turn 1 if you equip a weapon and then get an absolutely perfect god roll, you can maybe do 8 damage. That's assuming you roll perfectly and the Vader player has no dice manipulation, which also is a huge "IF." The probability of this happening just seems extremely unlikely. Maybe it happened to someone one time, but to argue that Vader isn't a solid deck because of it is silly.

On the other topic going on, I do agree that a lot of the 3 character decks seem strong. I have been running eGrievous/Dooku and I like how it matches up against 3 unit teams a bit better than Vader/Raider. The reason for this is because Grievous is a hard hitter, much like Vader, but if he dies then Dooku can still stand his own against 1-2 characters. Raider? Not so much. In Vader/Raider, if Vader dies you pretty much know it's over. Vader is certainly tankier at 13 life, but I use a lot of defensive dice to keep Grievous alive.

I personally only believe Vader is over-rated for the very reason you stated. It is a solid team but it is very much putting all your eggs in one basket. If your opponent can take vader out you're probably done. I think banking on 13 hp's is riskier than most people admit because, well because he's vader.

That's somewhat true. He's like a huge tank that you have to protect, but if you do he just wrecks the field. I know a lot of people go agro with him, but I prefer a more defensive build that ensures he will be around a while. I think that right now with the limited options for filling the 9 leftover team points, we don't really see Vader's true power. Raider just isn't optimal. I think future sets will print something that matches Vader well, and then we'll see him really shine. His card by itself is very strong, just not optimally paired yet.

So I guess we seem to agree that the problem with the deck is the Raider, and not Vader himself.

I think that right now with the limited options for filling the 9 leftover team points, we don't really see Vader's true power. Raider just isn't optimal. I think future sets will print something that matches Vader well, and then we'll see him really shine. His card by itself is very strong, just not optimally paired yet.

I think the exact opposite. Tusken Raider not only fits Vader's cost neatly, he's a high-damage (three sides), melee focused (two sides melee) character who brings in yellow cards. I'm not sure what you expect to get which would fit any more optimally than the Raider. I don't believe Vader will get a better partner anytime soon.

Vader's ability also does not seem to have much room for growth. Don't get me wrong, it's a powerful ability, and FFG could make cards which specifically deal with that ability. But unlike many other characters, there's not a large class of cards which will inherently make Vader better. Han will get new Ambush cards to play, Finn will get new Red Villain Weapons and Vehicles to stock, Veers will get new supports to control, but Vader's ability will always just be that discard. Worse, when (because it's not really an *if*) we get new versions of Vader, this Vader will have to compete with them.

Vader may well remain a powerful card through many sets, but I believe he is at the peak of his power right now.

A friend of mine and I have tested most of the combos mentioned here. Vader/raider being the exception and veers/Jango is the strongest deck so far.

Grevous/Dooku, Han/Rey etc decks get smashed most of the time.

I have a 3 storm trooper + raider control deck that does ok but the rest just lose most of the time.

I have a Leia/Ackbar deck that I still need to test against it.

I was shocked at how badly most supposedly top tier decks get wrecked....

First off no one is saying Grevious/Dooku is good. It's actually mediocre at best. Grevious, while he hits hard, cannot cheat his damage in and tends to die quickly.

Veers/Jango is fine. It's aggressive. It will beat a lot of midrange decks and it can out pace a few control decks. However I do not believe it will beat a good 2 character deck that can put out damage quickly and isn't as glassy. Most of the time it will lose to a good Rey/Han deck. It's the slower deck (Rey/Han can out aggro you). Vader/Raider also will give it a hard time. Ackbar/Luke might also.

A friend of mine and I have tested most of the combos mentioned here. Vader/raider being the exception and veers/Jango is the strongest deck so far.

Grevous/Dooku, Han/Rey etc decks get smashed most of the time.

I have a 3 storm trooper + raider control deck that does ok but the rest just lose most of the time.

I have a Leia/Ackbar deck that I still need to test against it.

I was shocked at how badly most supposedly top tier decks get wrecked....

Most likely because you don't know how to play them. Every deck needs a specific mulligan strategy, as well as how it approaches every different match up. The right ingredients without the proper recipe, you still end up with a hot mess instead of a cake.

Every deck needs a specific mulligan strategy

This right here is my one big fear for Destiny and why I may personally bail on it the further I get into understanding it. Gold fishing specific cards, when your odds are out of 30 cards, and recycling to get a perfect hand of 5 is a little too easy. If a super 5 card combo doesn't exist yet it will and I personally don't like any game that devolves into who wins depends on first draw. I quit magic for the same reason and that was more than double the odds. There are no card based resources in this game their really is no reason, outside a set up for a ridiculous combo, that you should be able to mulligan anything. Magic does it for the reason you may seriously be dead in the water without mana. You draw into all 5 overpriced cards in Destiny it's either a stroke of bad luck or you built your deck poorly. Nothing stops you having characters out though you are not helpless.

Every deck needs a specific mulligan strategy

This right here is my one big fear for Destiny and why I may personally bail on it the further I get into understanding it. Gold fishing specific cards, when your odds are out of 30 cards, and recycling to get a perfect hand of 5 is a little too easy. If a super 5 card combo doesn't exist yet it will and I personally don't like any game that devolves into who wins depends on first draw. I quit magic for the same reason and that was nearly double the odds. There are no card based resources in this game their really is no reason, outside a set up for a ridiculous combo, that you should be able to mulligan anything. Magic does it for the reason you may seriously be dead in the water without mana. You draw into all 5 overpriced cards in Destiny it's either a stroke of bad luck or you built your deck poorly. Nothing stops you having characters out though you are not helpless.

I love the mulligan rule in this game, it's a nice middle ground between Magic's throw everything back and Ashes of the Phoneixborn that lets you just start with 5 cards of your choice.

Every deck needs a specific mulligan strategy

This right here is my one big fear for Destiny and why I may personally bail on it the further I get into understanding it. Gold fishing specific cards, when your odds are out of 30 cards, and recycling to get a perfect hand of 5 is a little too easy. If a super 5 card combo doesn't exist yet it will and I personally don't like any game that devolves into who wins depends on first draw. I quit magic for the same reason and that was more than double the odds. There are no card based resources in this game their really is no reason, outside a set up for a ridiculous combo, that you should be able to mulligan anything. Magic does it for the reason you may seriously be dead in the water without mana. You draw into all 5 overpriced cards in Destiny it's either a stroke of bad luck or you built your deck poorly. Nothing stops you having characters out though you are not helpless.

I think this is a matter of how one perceives the deck mechanic in the game. Certainly an instant win 5 card combo would be bad for the game. However I look at the small deck and mulligan differently than you. I see it as an attempt to make the game less draw dependent and let players play their deck as designed. Jango/Veers wants to start the game with a Jetpack and/or Holdout Blaster although any gun will do. That start doesn't break the game and the way the game is designed increases your chance to get it. Another example are your abilities to discard cards at the end of the turn and draw up to five cards.

It seems to me that the dice introduce enough randomness into the game and the deck mechanics are designed to give players as much control of their destiny as possible, making the game more dependent on player skill and less on luck.

That's my point though, it's a dice and card game at the same time, it should have a heavy luck element. If you want the freedom to play your deck the way you intended why bother to have a deck at all? There should always be that random chance factor, this isn't a mini's game.

That's my point though, it's a dice and card game at the same time, it should have a heavy luck element. If you want the freedom to play your deck the way you intended why bother to have a deck at all? There should always be that random chance factor, this isn't a mini's game.

A heavy luck element? You want luck to be MORE of an element than it already is?

The mulligan rule isn't mitigating the luck of the draw that much, it's giving you 2 changes to try and draw what you want. It's certainly not mitigating it much (if any) more than allowing rerolls by discarding to try and roll what you want.

I think the luck factor is in a nice sweet spot, you have some ways to mitigate it but can still fall short because you know...dice and a randomly shuffled deck of cards.

I would be surprised to see characters less than 7 points come out.

Jawas and Ewoks?

I guess I just see it differently. It just seems like a lot more control than it should be. 30 cards, every card can have 2 copies, you draw 5 then get to keep what you want and recycle the rest. I sucked at probabilities in school but a 30 card deck, shortened to 15 with a controllable mulligan just seems heavy handed at odds to get exactly, or very close, to what you want. I just don't see that as good an idea as some of you. Just have to wait and see how it pans out.

That's my point though, it's a dice and card game at the same time, it should have a heavy luck element. If you want the freedom to play your deck the way you intended why bother to have a deck at all? There should always be that random chance factor, this isn't a mini's game.

When I play Destiny I feel like my decisions win or lose the game and that the dice rolls and card draws are elements I use to my advantage when they're good or have to play around when they're bad, which is good in my opinion. If I felt that the draws or dice rolls consistently determined the winner I would quickly lose interest. I don't need to spend ccg amounts of money for a luck fest when I could simulate that for virtually no expense. For me personally, Destiny hits the sweet spot.

I guess I just see it differently. It just seems like a lot more control than it should be. 30 cards, every card can have 2 copies, you draw 5 then get to keep what you want and recycle the rest. I sucked at probabilities in school but a 30 card deck, shortened to 15 with a controllable mulligan just seems heavy handed at odds to get exactly, or very close, to what you want. I just don't see that as good an idea as some of you. Just have to wait and see how it pans out.

It's probably less than you think.

http://stattrek.com/online-calculator/hypergeometric.aspx

Population size: 30 card deck

Number of successes: 2 of each card

Sample size: 5 in your starting hand

Number of successes in sample: 1

The odds of drawing one of any card you have 2 of in your deck are about 28.7% so less than 1/3 of the time. Keep any of those cards and try to draw again and it goes down by about 4-5% for each card you keep.

As a small contribution, a fresh outcome of the first tournament in my área (Brazil):

1st place - eRey/eQGJ

2nd place - eRey/eQGJ

3rd place - eRey/eHan

4th place - eRey/eQGJ

I kid you not.

As a small contribution, a fresh outcome of the first tournament in my área (Brazil):

1st place - eRey/eQGJ

2nd place - eRey/eQGJ

3rd place - eRey/eHan

4th place - eRey/eQGJ

I kid you not.

That makes some sense as most people have eRey quickly available and supply is so low. e(anything else) is tough to get right now.

As a small contribution, a fresh outcome of the first tournament in my área (Brazil):

1st place - eRey/eQGJ

2nd place - eRey/eQGJ

3rd place - eRey/eHan

4th place - eRey/eQGJ

I kid you not.

That makes some sense as most people have eRey quickly available and supply is so low. e(anything else) is tough to get right now.

are lots of people seriously having that much difficulty finding product right now?

i managed to get 4 boxes, i have an epic version of everything except Poe Dameron, and i could always buy singles at my FLGS if and when i want him bad enough (prices are too high atm and i'm going to wait until it drops) and most of the players in our area seem to be roughly the same boat as I am, just trying to finish off completing the entire collection of 2 of everything. I think i need about 10 legendaries to complete a full set

As a small contribution, a fresh outcome of the first tournament in my área (Brazil):

1st place - eRey/eQGJ

2nd place - eRey/eQGJ

3rd place - eRey/eHan

4th place - eRey/eQGJ

I kid you not.

That makes some sense as most people have eRey quickly available and supply is so low. e(anything else) is tough to get right now.

are lots of people seriously having that much difficulty finding product right now?

i managed to get 4 boxes, i have an epic version of everything except Poe Dameron, and i could always buy singles at my FLGS if and when i want him bad enough (prices are too high atm and i'm going to wait until it drops) and most of the players in our area seem to be roughly the same boat as I am, just trying to finish off completing the entire collection of 2 of everything. I think i need about 10 legendaries to complete a full set

No, not really. Some logistics issues, but nothing out of norm. And we get eKylo just as easily as eRey. If I had to guess, it was a meta call with some Rey fanboyism.

Extra info: 12 players, 3 eReyGon-Jinn. 5 Rey overall, 3 troopers, 2 Han, 2 Leia, 2 Kylo, 1 Ackbar. In case you're wondering.

Top 3 from yesterday's local tournament:

1) eJango + 2xFO StormTrooper

2) 3xFO Storm Trooper + Night Sister

3) eRey + Padawan + Hired Gun

As a small contribution, a fresh outcome of the first tournament in my área (Brazil):

1st place - eRey/eQGJ

2nd place - eRey/eQGJ

3rd place - eRey/eHan

4th place - eRey/eQGJ

I kid you not.

That makes some sense as most people have eRey quickly available and supply is so low. e(anything else) is tough to get right now.

are lots of people seriously having that much difficulty finding product right now?

i managed to get 4 boxes, i have an epic version of everything except Poe Dameron, and i could always buy singles at my FLGS if and when i want him bad enough (prices are too high atm and i'm going to wait until it drops) and most of the players in our area seem to be roughly the same boat as I am, just trying to finish off completing the entire collection of 2 of everything. I think i need about 10 legendaries to complete a full set

No, not really. Some logistics issues, but nothing out of norm. And we get eKylo just as easily as eRey. If I had to guess, it was a meta call with some Rey fanboyism.

Extra info: 12 players, 3 eReyGon-Jinn. 5 Rey overall, 3 troopers, 2 Han, 2 Leia, 2 Kylo, 1 Ackbar. In case you're wondering.

Notable takeaways from this:

No Darth Vader

No Jango Fett

No Jabba the Hutt

It looks like the local meta we are looking at in the sample isn't lining up with expectations.

As a small contribution, a fresh outcome of the first tournament in my área (Brazil):

1st place - eRey/eQGJ

2nd place - eRey/eQGJ

3rd place - eRey/eHan

4th place - eRey/eQGJ

I kid you not.

That makes some sense as most people have eRey quickly available and supply is so low. e(anything else) is tough to get right now.

are lots of people seriously having that much difficulty finding product right now?

i managed to get 4 boxes, i have an epic version of everything except Poe Dameron, and i could always buy singles at my FLGS if and when i want him bad enough (prices are too high atm and i'm going to wait until it drops) and most of the players in our area seem to be roughly the same boat as I am, just trying to finish off completing the entire collection of 2 of everything. I think i need about 10 legendaries to complete a full set

No, not really. Some logistics issues, but nothing out of norm. And we get eKylo just as easily as eRey. If I had to guess, it was a meta call with some Rey fanboyism.

Extra info: 12 players, 3 eReyGon-Jinn. 5 Rey overall, 3 troopers, 2 Han, 2 Leia, 2 Kylo, 1 Ackbar. In case you're wondering.

Notable takeaways from this:

No Darth Vader

No Jango Fett

No Jabba the Hutt

It looks like the local meta we are looking at in the sample isn't lining up with expectations.

As a small contribution, a fresh outcome of the first tournament in my área (Brazil):

1st place - eRey/eQGJ

2nd place - eRey/eQGJ

3rd place - eRey/eHan

4th place - eRey/eQGJ

I kid you not.

That makes some sense as most people have eRey quickly available and supply is so low. e(anything else) is tough to get right now.

are lots of people seriously having that much difficulty finding product right now?

i managed to get 4 boxes, i have an epic version of everything except Poe Dameron, and i could always buy singles at my FLGS if and when i want him bad enough (prices are too high atm and i'm going to wait until it drops) and most of the players in our area seem to be roughly the same boat as I am, just trying to finish off completing the entire collection of 2 of everything. I think i need about 10 legendaries to complete a full set

I think its more of a LGS issue. None of mine have product, sure I can get it online but as a more casual gamer I'd prefer to buy a few packs each time I visit and not boxes.

It's probably less than you think.

http://stattrek.com/online-calculator/hypergeometric.aspx

Population size: 30 card deck

Number of successes: 2 of each card

Sample size: 5 in your starting hand

Number of successes in sample: 1

The odds of drawing one of any card you have 2 of in your deck are about 28.7% so less than 1/3 of the time. Keep any of those cards and try to draw again and it goes down by about 4-5% for each card you keep.

This isn't correct. I think that looking for exactly 1 success is skewing the sample, because it's ignoring cases where you draw both copies.

If you're looking for a single copy of a card, you've got a 31% chance of getting it in your opening hand. If you mulligan aggressively for that card, it's 52.4% or so.

Even combos aren't too bad - if you're looking for a single copy of two cards you've got about a 24% chance of hitting it with an aggressive mulligan.

From interviews with the designer, they've very much intended that draws are more reliable than a lot of CCGs. Between the flexible mulligan and the ability to potentially cycle your hand every turn, the odds are VERY high that you're going to get the cards you need, and quickly. Hopefully they'll remember that while they're testing, but good bad or otherwise it is an essential part of the game design.