Thanks to @TheUnsullied for starting this project, and thanks to him for asking me to tackle a topic for this week!
A topic that I always enjoy is how to approach list building, so I thought I would share my considerations when building a list for the Rebel faction—the best of the three factions.
(“Yeah right,” scoffs the Scum player, whose list half-consists of Rebels J )
So, where to start?
First, let’s examine the embarrassment of riches which are the support options for Rebels:
Support: The Essentials
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Gideon and C3PO
Nothing more needs to be said about these two, except that they’re amazing. The power of focus and the padding out of your activation count with these lower cost figures makes them almost indispensable. I have considered going without C3PO in a list that focused on mobility before, but any list that wants to compete should bring him along. His strength has only increased with the new wave, with Han soon to be featured in a ton of lists, and the obvious pairing of his cunning trait and C3PO’s free evade. And then there’s this:
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Hera
Hera is so versatile and boosts pretty much every list, and she becomes essential to any list that focuses on ranged attacks. She pairs well with Han, Rangers, Drokkatta... pretty much everybody. She allows you to take risky shots and potentially gives you the added damage/surge you needed to finish off a figure when you didn’t quite roll enough damage on your own. And her attack isn’t too shabby, with a decent seven health to boot.
Support: The Extremely Good
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Alliance Smuggler
The Smuggler’s value has decreased now that the current maps feature fewer objectives that require an interact action and fewer doors, but he’s still very useful. He’s good as a terminal sitter and objective grabber, and despite his low health, his -2 accuracy from Slippery is helpful in keeping him alive. At the very least he can be used as a meat shield on Nal Hutta as you advance down the open sight lines of death.
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Rebel High Command
As the command cards become more and more powerful, this Upgrade becomes more and more worth its two points, especially in lists that are searching for Son of Skywalker or those Hunter cards. More and more it’s getting hard to fit these two points in, but they are always worth it if you can.
Support: I Also Really Like Chopper
He isn’t always worth his three points, but man he’s fun. He causes your opponent to rethink how valuable that card draw is from the terminal, which can make a huge difference, and he can help your figures get in and out of position with his Ram ability, sometimes catching your opponent by surprise. His attack is not bad and his health is fine. He’s such a jerk, and it’s awesome.
All told, that’s five to thirteen points of support, and it’s always tempting to take more from this list, as they’re all great additions.
Another option is R2D2, but I don’t typically find he’s worth his points. However, you can’t overestimate the power of card draw these days, and, well, it's Artoo :-).
So where do you go from there?
The Anchors: Squads
The other two factions have common, go-to squads that can populate most any list (the ubiquitous eWeequays for Scum and eJets for Imperial, though both factions have other options). This is the main weakness of the Rebel faction—they lack the two-figure squad in the six to eight point range that can compete along the new power curve set by Jabba’s Realm. Some players have made Echo Base Troopers work, others work with eSabs, but the eRangers are far and away the best squad in Rebels.
A three-figure activation, with access to the powerful Hunter and Trooper cards, rerolls and built-in pierce—what’s not to like? The answer is the cost. At twelve points, the eRangers eat up a lot of your list.
The Anchors: Uniques
However, more than the other two factions, the Rebels are overloaded with powerful, high-costing uniques that can serve as lynchpins to your lists.
The first is as central to Star Wars as you can get:
Jedi Luke’s Heroic ability, allowing for two attacks per turn, in conjunction with the most powerful command card in the game, Son of Skywalker , makes Luke a formidable opponent, and extremely annoying to opponents. His white die (and the luck-faction of when you draw SoS) make him swingier than some people prefer, but he is always a strong anchor.
Before HotE came out, you typically saw two main lists that made use of all of the above figures: the Jedi Luke plus eRangers and the double eRangers lists.
Here was my list, which was pretty standard:
Jedi Luke 12
eRangers 12
Hera 4
Gideon 3
C3PO 2
Chopper 3
rAlliance Smuggler 2
Rebel High Command 2
Due to the high command card draw, along with the potency of Jedi Luke’s potential thrice-in-a-row attacks with Son of Skywalker (or five if you luck out with initiative and go at the end of the round and the beginning of the next) , paired with the efficient Rangers—this list is still competitive.
However, in the wake of HotE, we’ll see a lot of several of the new figures (or new upgrades), namely Han, Drokkatta, and Ahsoka (and maybe a few Chewies).
All of these are fantastic additions to the faction. New Han is one of my new favorite characters. He’s tricky to play, especially against Hunters, because he can drop so quickly, but man is he fun . You have to really weigh when you want to move him out and when you can afford exposing him. But you want to be able to get that extra shot off at the end of the round, so there’s a fine balance to strike. Hopefully if you have his command card in hand and know that you can steal initiative, or if you have Negation or Comm Disruption and know initiative can’t be stolen, you can activate him back to back, at the end of the round and the start of the next one. He can change games with three back-to-back-to-back attacks.
Ahsoka has the amazing special ability, move wherever you want and then kill something . She might not always take out a figure, but she holds up to a few attacks and isn’t easy to ignore. Also, her command card makes it so your opponent has to be wary of attacking her with figures with low health, potentially diverting some attacks from her. Plus, her ability to get involved even round one is particularly powerful for a melee figure. She functions sort of like a Luke-lite, with the bonus of being able to get out of dodge in a hurry when needed.
Drokkatta is the most intriguing of the new figures. Her(?) ability to deal out unmitigated, AoE damage with Demolish and her Shrapnel surge ability helps to finish off characters (or junk droids—and the people said Amen!). She’s got decent range and can attack farther away with more confidence with Hera in tow, and her attack, health pool, and defense are all strong. Mostly, I like Drokkatta because she causes your opponent to rethink his positioning and tactics. And cuz demolition experts are cool.
I like Newbacca (thanks to whomever among you I stole that name from!), but at eleven points he’s hard to include. Starting with his card creates some interesting strategies where you can throw another unit into the fray more to press the issue, but I haven’t tested Newbacca out enough to have a solid opinion.
As to Ko-tun , I’m not quite sold on him yet. The main problem is that I don’t think he pulls enough weight for seven points, and I’m more interested in these other characters. Eventually I’ll play him just to play him, but for now he’ll take a backseat.
List Building
To construct a new list, you can easily follow the mold of the Luke/eRangers list by swapping out a few figures for some added firepower. @brettpkelly suggested his new list (in his awesome review of the Rebel faction , which you should definitely check out), Han’s New Wookiee, along these lines:
Han 10
Drokkatta 9
eRangers 12
Hera 4
Gideon 3
C3PO 2
Not only is this a powerful list, it’s a fun one. Both Han and Drokkatta are exciting to play (Drokkatta especially is a blast , buh doom ching. I’ll see myself out…). They both force the issue and cause your opponent to make tough choices, and so pairing them really strengthens this list.
But really you can just swap out most of these figures in and out and still have a competitive list (though Jedi Luke and Han serve as the strongest anchors right now, in my opinion).
However, I’m feeling, like probably many of us, a bit of Hunter fatigue. I still want to be competitive, but I’d like to try to win without relying on those Rangers, which is hard. The Hunter cards are obviously the best in the game right now, and so abandoning them makes it feel like you’re playing from behind.
So, how can you compete against Hunters?
The first answer comes by focusing on the two second-best traits: Spy and Smuggler. If the Hunters win from their awesome command card advantage, then try to even the playing field with those Spy cards. And On the Lam is up there with the most powerful cards in the game, negating an attack (assuming you can get out of LoS), and with Vader and Ahsoka becoming prevalent, Slippery Target might also help you to evade an attack (as DT showed me in a recent Vassal game).
Here’s my list for Rebels:
Han 10
Ahsoka 8
eSabs with Targeting Computer
Hera 4
Gideon 3
C3PO 2
Alliance Smuggler 2
Rebel High Command 2
Balance of the Force 1
A problem with this list is that it only has two spies (one of which is the underpowered Sabs), and so one solution to that would be to drop the Alliance Smuggler, RHC, and Targeting Computer/Balance of the Force to add Jarrod (who, after I had firmly settled in to dismiss him, has surprised me in games), but I prefer to have that extra command card draw.
Will this still stand up to the Hunter onslaught? Will it be able to handle the force-choking, double-black-rolling freight train that is Vader? I don’t know, but I think it has potential. I’ve played it a few times now and am excited to see how it stacks up.
However, I don’t always play to hone my Regionals or Worlds list. Sometimes, I just want to throw some figures on the table and have at it. And when I’m in that mood, I’m probably going for a Heroic Effort list, which requires all the complexity of throwing units one after another into your list until you hit forty points.
Here’s one:
Han 10
Drokkatta 9
Ahsoka 8
Hera 4
Gideon
Chopper
C3PO
And for when I’m feeling particularly thematic, here’s another:
Jedi Luke 12
Ahsoka 8
Obiwan 7
Diala 7
Davith 6
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Please let me know your thoughts on my approach to list building, as well as whether you think Rebels can compete with those lesser factions or if a Hunter-less list has potential.
Happy gaming!
-ryanjamal
(Special thanks to the Boardwars database—all of the images were stolen from there!)
Edited by ryanjamal
