So, now that SoR has been out for almost a week and hopefully we've all had a chance to test out the new cards, what do you all think are the strengths and/or weaknesses of the different factions?

To me, cards seem to fall under a few broad categories:

Damage Amplification - cards that use dice already on the table to deal massive amounts of damage to enemies.

Mill - cards that force an opponent to discard lots of other cards

Dice Mitigation - cards that help you remove your enemies' dice

Healing - cards that help you heal damage from a character

Economy - cards that help you make a lot of money

So, after looking at it, it seems that the six different factions all have some amount of these five things, but in different balances.

Red heroes have a lot of damage amplification, economy, and some cheap healing with Combat Medic. However, they're really lacking on good mill and dice mitigation options. They also don't have anything that heals a ton of damage or makes things really cheap.

Blue heroes, on the other hand, have tons of options for healing and Destiny and It Binds All Things make their costs a completely different scale. They have some options for dice mitigation and mill, but their damage is pretty minimal (other than character abilities like Luminara and Qui Gon.)

Yellow heroes (my fav!) have tons of healing potential with Second Chance/Ammo Belt and Draw Attention. They also have pretty solid mill potential (not along the lines of villains, but still nasty) and they get tons of die mitigation. Their economy is still somewhat weak sauce, with Black Market not really cutting the mustard. Their damage is still a little low as well.

Red villains kinda break the mold. They have almost no healing and their economy is yet to be proven effective, but they get around this using massive character and action economy, with cards like Endless Ranks. They also just have some of the cheapest, most bang for buck characters like Death Troopers, Stormtroopers, and TIE Pilots. There's a little bit of mill and lots of damage amplification here. Honestly, this is a struggling faction, but they do have some interesting and unique tactics.

Blue villains? Ok, they're just crazy. Palpatine, Vader, Force Lightning, etc. make them astoundingly powerful. I have to say, this makes them a very thematic faction. In the Star Wars movies, dark side Force users are extremely rare, only a couple in the whole universe, and they're by far the most powerful characters. Blue villains have it all - mill, damage amplification, dice mitigation, a bit of economy, and even healing now with Rise Again.

Last but certainly not least, yellow villains. They have the best mill in the game. Hands down. They also have decent damage amplification and good economy, but where they really shine is dice mitigation (yes, I'm talking about He Doesn't Like You!) Healing is their only weakness, and they kind of make up for that with Personal Shield.

So, what this (extremely long, sorry!) post boils down to is that each faction (except one) had something that they really stand out for:

red hero - damage

blue hero - economy

yellow hero - healing/surviving

red villain - nothing...

blue villain - everything!

yellow villain - mill/dice mitigation

So, before you think this was all a self-aggrandizing rant (well, maybe it is anyway!), what I wanted to ask was, do you think these archetypes will stay this way? Do you like the way these things are shaping up? Do you even agree that these ARE the faction archetypes? Eventually, will this game get to the point where factions all have pretty equal access to all the types of cards? Are there types of cards I missed?

I'd love to hear what you all think!

Red hero plays more of an indirect / support role, whereas red villain is the single most synergistic color. This is the color you play if you want to focus on ranged damage.

Blue hero is all over the place, with a good half of the characters not having any home at all and the rest of the color stretched in too many directions at once - shields, healing, and mill. Blue villain has some really aggressive die faces, making it one of the flashier slices of the color pie, though not necessarily the most effective. Both factions have a monopoly on the best melee options.

Yellow villain is split 50/50 between equally aggressive die faces / abilities and pure Johnny potential, with little overlap between the two. Padme is kind of an outlier for heroes, being the best / only mill option, with the rest of the color focused on die manipulation or action economy.

The best way to frame them as a cohesive whole is to consider what you'd get out of a mono-color deck from either faction.

Edited May 10, 2017 by WonderWAAAGH