I foresee Double Jango/Double FN-2199 being played.

I wonder how well Luminara/Jedi Acolyte/Padawan will do as well.

I still think Vader/Raider will do better than Double Palpatine for Blue Villains.

Poe / Maz has quite a bit of power. Poe / Rey as well.

For villains...

• I think Nines will show up in the premiere aggro decks. Pairing him with Jango is one option, but I think eNines/eVader (DA) has even more potential as a brutal early game deck (less speed, but much more damage)
• I agree that eVader/Raider still seems strongest, but I fully expect ePalp and eVader/Royal Guard to make the rounds. eVader (DA)/eKylo could make a convincing pair, with Command Shuttle and Throne Room.
• Both Krennic and Unkar offer new possibilities for Villain control decks, and I expect some kind of Krennic/Jabba/Unkar mill deck will be popular.
• Some Villain attrition decks. 2x Stormtroopers/2x Guavian Enforcers (or 1 Enforcer and 1 TIE Pilot) are threatening in their own right, but once Endless Ranks enters the mix things get a little out of control.

For heroes...

• I think a Planetary Uprising deck with Snap could be strong. eHan/eSnap seems like a good pair there.
• ePoe/eMaz will be a fearsome combination for anyone who can scrape enough vehicles together.
• I don't think Hero mill decks can quite compete with the villain offerings, but there might be something around Jyn. I like eJyn/Ackbar as a sort of updated hybrid-Lukebar that can play for mill victories.
• eHan/eRey just gets stronger.
• Qui-gon blue decks received a ton of new shield-based cards which seem great.

These are decks that I'm interested in, have seen others talk about, or expect to play at some point soon. It will take a while for the meta to settle down, though... we saw this in Awakenings. While some strong deck archetypes were apparent pretty quickly (Vader/Raider, Han/Rey), others took months to unfold (Jango/Veers took off after a couple of weeks, turned into variants like Jango/2x Trooper or eBala/Jango/Trooper, and only after a few months did people land on the Phasma variant which has been popular lately). Some decks, like Lukebar, rose and fell over a month or two. I'm very curious to look back on this post in a few months and see how wrong I was!

13 minutes ago, sionnach19 said:

• I don't think Hero mill decks can quite compete with the villain offerings, but there might be something around Jyn. I like eJyn/Ackbar as a sort of updated hybrid-Lukebar that can play for mill victories

I saw a nasty deck from Tiny Grimes: Padme/eMaz/Snap

Second Chance, Ammo Belt, and Lone Operative. That's a lot of damage to chew through.

@wakefieldbw Interesting... all that health stacking makes it a bear to chew through, but I also worry that it's a slower mill and lacks the control Villain decks have (Jabba/Krennic can steal your money as well as your cards, and they have bigger discard numbers). The survivability is bonkers (and probably infuriating for your opponent!), though I wonder how reliability you can pull off the near-invincibility.

Yep. The weakness of that deck is Villain mill.

I like eJabba/blue chump/ gun chump for Loose Ends (Trooper, Ascension Gun) and No Disintegrations.

I've been having success with eJabba / eUnkar. I don't actually mill any cards off there deck. I just make sure I empty their hand every round, and make sure that they can't kill me in 6 rounds.

I like that you, too, thought of Luminara/Acolyte/Padawan! I think there's no way it'll make it to the meta though. I guess you could take Emperor's Throne Room and claim with your character dice on the table to do a ton of damage, but it's just too tricky to set up otherwise.

Luminara is very odd. I find it hard to find a good use for her. What about eLuminara/eRey? The number of dice means Luminara more consistently rolls her specials, and you can just think of them as being weaker versions of the +2 side on Lure of Power?

Honestly, though, no Luminara deck is going to be anywhere near the meta.

Put together a couple tentative lists, but need to create "ideal" versions on TTS to test.

I like Emperor and Bala as a way to splash yellow and possibly punish folks who focus on Palp first. I don't have all the cards I'd want to make the list, but it does give my rPalp some use.

"Royal Vader" looks like it's going to be really painful.

I'm working my way towards a physical copy of "Vader 2199" (eVader DA & eFN-2199), and I like it better than the Jango setup. I feel like you want to focus dropping weapons on FN-2199, so Jango's roll-in feels a bit limited. eVader doesn't really mind that at all, though.

I think mill in general is going to be the standout this wave, though. Heroes and Villains got some really solid access to new cards that do a lot of hurt on an opponent's hand/deck. Dooku/Jabba and a deck build on keeping the opponent's hand empty? Good luck taking Dooku out in time. Con Artist, Loose Ends, Blackmail... Just a lot of rough new drops.

• Both Krennic and Unkar offer new possibilities for Villain control decks, and I expect some kind of Krennic/Jabba/Unkar mill deck will be popular.

I though this too, as te Imperial Inspection abuse is pretty obvious. However, I have to admit, that after quite long playtesting, Vader Sith Lord + eJabba is the ultimate control suite currently available and the milling potential is still the same. Yellow/red dice mitigation is not sufficient to keep both of your characters alive for 5-6 turns, unlike the blue+yellow. A lot of specials means, that you Cunning is actually crazy (reliable Force Throw and Mind Probe and sometimes twice per round omg!) plus you are really able to kill one of the opponents team members except against heavy defensive decks (because you have more damage on that Vader die than Krennic has + Mind Probe + Force Throw and Choke deals damage while manipulating the dice pool). I even managed to kill that stupid Poe/Maz deck, his battleground is not going to win him a game. Hoever, to be honest, still think that aggro Vader (Raider or RG) is more deadly than Jabba variation with mill, despite the fact Jabba version is one of the most interesting decks I have ever palyed.

19 hours ago, sionnach19 said:

@wakefieldbw Interesting... all that health stacking makes it a bear to chew through, but I also worry that it's a slower mill and lacks the control Villain decks have (Jabba/Krennic can steal your money as well as your cards, and they have bigger discard numbers). The survivability is bonkers (and probably infuriating for your opponent!), though I wonder how reliability you can pull off the near-invincibility.

Its a quick mill with con artist and cunning. I have milled someone by round 3 with my Padme/Esnap/maz deck

21 hours ago, Kieransi said:

I like that you, too, thought of Luminara/Acolyte/Padawan! I think there's no way it'll make it to the meta though. I guess you could take Emperor's Throne Room and claim with your character dice on the table to do a ton of damage, but it's just too tricky to set up otherwise.

Luminara is very odd. I find it hard to find a good use for her. What about eLuminara/eRey? The number of dice means Luminara more consistently rolls her specials, and you can just think of them as being weaker versions of the +2 side on Lure of Power?

Honestly, though, no Luminara deck is going to be anywhere near the meta.

It will be a supper fun deck, but I agree that it won't make the meta. With the new set realise, 7 health characters are in danger of first round death.

I think Jabba, Unkar, and Night Sister could be a huge mill combo

What do we think about Stormtroopers now that SoR is out? Do they have a place? Just good filler still or do you think a deck based around them could work?

1 hour ago, Kdubb said:

What do we think about Stormtroopers now that SoR is out? Do they have a place? Just good filler still or do you think a deck based around them could work?

2 Trooper 2 Tie Pilot combo looks like fun. I'll be trying it out tomorrow. I notice that it has no dice mitigation to speak of and that's a problem. Still it should be fun.

On 5/8/2017 at 11:09 AM, Kieransi said:

I like that you, too, thought of Luminara/Acolyte/Padawan! I think there's no way it'll make it to the meta though. I guess you could take Emperor's Throne Room and claim with your character dice on the table to do a ton of damage, but it's just too tricky to set up otherwise.

Luminara is very odd. I find it hard to find a good use for her. What about eLuminara/eRey? The number of dice means Luminara more consistently rolls her specials, and you can just think of them as being weaker versions of the +2 side on Lure of Power?

Honestly, though, no Luminara deck is going to be anywhere near the meta.

I agree Luminara is odd. I like her but struggle to find a team for her.

Her dice are good enough. Her special is great on the surface. It's dependence on other character dice make it problematic when you consider her point cost and the difficulty of finding pairings for her. In a vaccum her cost would even be ok with more health.

At the end of the day we have a character who is a team player but costed in a way that limits her ability to find a team. We can only hope that a future set allows her to shine.

In the current environment I'm thinking eLuminara/eRey or Luminara/Maz/Rey (or Acolyte). While her ability clearly favors generic teammates, I think it's strong enough with uniques, if you can find her a team.

4 minutes ago, Starbane said:

I agree Luminara is odd. I like her but struggle to find a team for her.

Her dice are good enough. Her special is great on the surface. It's dependence on other character dice make it problematic when you consider her point cost and the difficulty of finding pairings for her. In a vaccum her cost would even be ok with more health.

At the end of the day we have a character who is a team player but costed in a way that limits her ability to find a team. We can only hope that a future set allows her to shine.

In the current environment I'm thinking eLuminara/eRey or Luminara/Maz/Rey (or Acolyte). While her ability clearly favors generic teammates, I think it's strong enough with uniques, if you can find her a team.

I tried eLuminara/eRey last night, and it was a monster! Honestly, my opponent wasn't playing a tournament-winning deck, but I still destroyed his squad by round 3, ad he did have a lot of health and dice mitigation on the table. I combined Force Training, Jedi Robes, and other things that build up the economy with Force Speed for action efficiency and a ton of expensive blue upgrades. It was really a nasty deck! I took Moisture Farm as the battlefield (for even more economy), and the fact that I had Vibroknives in there meant that all his shields did nothing to save him. Actually a really good deck! What's funny is that I didn't even use Luminara's ability that often. The one time I used it was with Rey's dice to turn 1 resource into 3! And I think that's the big advantage. Luminara's special works on anything, not just damage. I'm surprised by this, but I actually think her cost is appropriate! I wouldn't like to see her paired with anything much more powerful than Rey.

1 hour ago, ozmodon said:

2 Trooper 2 Tie Pilot combo looks like fun. I'll be trying it out tomorrow. I notice that it has no dice mitigation to speak of and that's a problem. Still it should be fun.

I tried it, and it's fun if you can get the economy and action efficiency working for you. Luckily, Wingman, Squad Tactics, and Supply Line all work pretty well for that. You could also try Drudge Work, but it's really only useful if you're desperate.

50 minutes ago, Kieransi said:

I tried eLuminara/eRey last night, and it was a monster! Honestly, my opponent wasn't playing a tournament-winning deck, but I still destroyed his squad by round 3, ad he did have a lot of health and dice mitigation on the table. I combined Force Training, Jedi Robes, and other things that build up the economy with Force Speed for action efficiency and a ton of expensive blue upgrades. It was really a nasty deck! I took Moisture Farm as the battlefield (for even more economy), and the fact that I had Vibroknives in there meant that all his shields did nothing to save him. Actually a really good deck! What's funny is that I didn't even use Luminara's ability that often. The one time I used it was with Rey's dice to turn 1 resource into 3! And I think that's the big advantage. Luminara's special works on anything, not just damage. I'm surprised by this, but I actually think her cost is appropriate! I wouldn't like to see her paired with anything much more powerful than Rey.

Congrats on the success with Luminara.

Since you didn't use her special much, I wonder if she brought enough to the table that you wouldn't be better off using QGJ?

If you just had a better deck, played better, more luck, or some combination of the three I don't think that necessarily proves Luminara's viability as a contender. I think we are looking for ways she is critical to your success.

33 minutes ago, Starbane said:

Congrats on the success with Luminara.

Since you didn't use her special much, I wonder if she brought enough to the table that you wouldn't be better off using QGJ?

If you just had a better deck, played better, more luck, or some combination of the three I don't think that necessarily proves Luminara's viability as a contender. I think we are looking for ways she is critical to your success.

Like I said, the one time I really used her ability was with Rey's 1 resource side to get 3 resources, which allowed me to stick One With the Force on Luminara. Maybe not super useful, but that ability to inject high levels of economy into the deck seemed really good for my insanely aggro style (I had a total of 25 dice upgrades in that deck)!

If you compare QGJ and Luminara, they're the same cost and Luminara has one less health, but other than that the only difference is the special and QGJ's two shield sides on his dice. With vibroknife so common, shields are a little meh right now, so I think Luminara's 1 focus is better than QGJ's 1 shield, and I like her special better than his 2 shield. QGJ's special is nice, no doubt, but I just really like the level of aggro that Luminara adds by not having all those shields.

I bet if you did a ton of playtesting, QGJ/Rey would win maybe 10% more games than Luminara/Rey, but Luminara is just better suited to my play style, given her ability is so good at generating tons of economy and her dice also has that highly useful focus side.

That, and I build with what I have. I don't have QGJ, but I have 2x Luminara in my collection. That's probably influenced my opinion too!

I've been playing around with a Poe/Maz deck and it is an absolute blast to play. When it works it is just awesome, and leaves the opponent sitting there helpless. Instead of the usual weapons package I put in the Ammo Belt/Second Change combo to keep Maz alive longer, and included Planetary Uprising to just steal wins if Poe dies. Also Maz's Goggles are a beast on Poe if they target and kill Maz first. It's biggest weakness seems to be Palp decks, because the spread of damage just isn't there, so that could be a problem. At the same time you can mulligan for Falcons and try to single target him down that way, but it's a bit tougher. I think the deck will be a legit contender in the meta.