Well, my players finished the core campaign, this past Wednesday, and sweet zombie jesus it was epic. Seeing Darth Vader on the board, then realizing how much health he had...My players faces went a whiter shade of pale. Now, their heroes were pretty well geared out, and they had some very useful skills, but it was still a nail-biter right up to the end. Despite the players effectively going nuclear on Darth Vader, three of them were wounded, with only the wookiee being the last man standing, as it were. The wookiee made a charge attack that dealt one point of damage via Rampage, and that finally brought Vader down.

But there were several questions that popped up during play. Most of them we just kind of fudged ("We'll do it this way for now, but I'll look it up. It may change."), and some were genuinely confusing. First off...Dancing Weapon and Cleave. The Jedi managed to score her story-reward lightsaber, and upon getting Dancing Weapon, turned into a god toy. Is there some kind of ruling or clarification on how Dancing Weapon and Cleave interact? The Jedi was practically clearing entire rooms of elites by herself, towards the end of the game.
Secondly, how often can the Jedi use the 'Foresight' ability? The Jedi player was attempting to use it more than once per roll...and with Shu Yen's Lightsaber dealing damage with each use of Foresight. The player was effectively trying to 'buy' rerolls until the result he wanted showed.
Third, are there any limitations on the movement points used for Gaar's Charge ability? For example, upon activating Charge while adjacent to a target, can the player back up one or two spaces, then move forward to the same target and resolve the charge attack? Can the player 'charge' around one target to attack another, or does the player charge the nearest legal target?
And Fourth, a question for our next campaign. Can different sources of Blast stack? The wookiee demolitionist from Heart of the Empire can acquire Shrapnel Rounds (which gives Blast 1), and Repeater Cannon (One surge: Blast 1). If the wookiee is outfitted with both, can the two separate sources of blast stack, and effectively give Blast 2?

1. This old Inquisitor article explains ranged-cleave pretty well (Ctrl+F search for "cleave"). It looks like Diala played correctly judging by what you said here - yes ranged cleave is terrifying

2. All dice may only be rerolled ONCE . Once it's been rerolled it's "locked" and cannot be further modified by any abilities (unless in skirmish you heighten reflex it or something like that)

3. Note the exact wording on Gaarkhan's charge: it's move X spaces not gain X movement point. It matters because

• Move X spaces ignores terrain/hostile figure penalty
• No, you cannot "split" it but the wording is "up to X spaces" so you don't have to move that many if Gaarkhan doesn't want to

4. Yes, Shrapnel gives automatic Blast 1 for free and Repeater Cannon have ~: Blast 1, so you may "stack" them since they come from difference sources (nitpicking rules you might say you didn't really "stack" them, they're resolved separately but for this discussion I think it's safe to say yes you can combo them into a Blast 2)

2. During attacks each die can be only rerolled once. (A rerolled die cannot be rerolled. It may be affected by other abilities that are not rerolls though.) But more importantly, each ability can be only used once per trigger, thus Foresight can be only used once per attack.

3. Also, nothing requires that all of the spaces are moved in the same direction.

4. Technically each separate Blast is resolved separately, just like each Cleave is resolved separately. But practically their effects combine.

So in the secondary effect of shrapnel rounds, it could add the two "blast 1" effects into a "blast 2" and then using the effect of shrapnel for 2 dmg? Or you have to use it on only one of the "blast 1"?

Blast are probably intended to combine for (at least) Shrapnel Rounds. It's in the list of topics for the next faq.

I was wondering, due to Shrapnel Rounds' ability to reduce blast by X to, so on and so on. But the only thing I have ever seen is blast 1. Now, I will admit that I don't have every expansion, and I don't have all my cards in front of me, but if blast 1 is the only 'level' of blast available, that makes the secondary ability of Shrapnel Rounds dubious, at best.

The flip side to the coin is, what is the maximum 'level' of blast that a Hero or mob or villain could attain? Can they layer on blast damage until they are flinging blast 22, for example?

And Ricope, just so we're singing from the same songbook, when Gaar charges he:
A. Cannot 'reverse' then charge a target that he is adjacent to. But thats okay because...
B. Gaar can stay right where he is and charge a target he is adjacent to and stay in the space he started in....?

1 hour ago, LugWrench said:

I was wondering, due to Shrapnel Rounds' ability to reduce blast by X to, so on and so on. But the only thing I have ever seen is blast 1. Now, I will admit that I don't have every expansion, and I don't have all my cards in front of me, but if blast 1 is the only 'level' of blast available, that makes the secondary ability of Shrapnel Rounds dubious, at best.

The flip side to the coin is, what is the maximum 'level' of blast that a Hero or mob or villain could attain? Can they layer on blast damage until they are flinging blast 22, for example?

And Ricope, just so we're singing from the same songbook, when Gaar charges he:
A. Cannot 'reverse' then charge a target that he is adjacent to. But thats okay because...
B. Gaar can stay right where he is and charge a target he is adjacent to and stay in the space he started in....?

You can have up to Blast 3 if you got Fenn's 4xp Rebel Elite (turns his normal Blast 1 into Blast 2) + underbarrel (attachment with ~: Blast 1). I think that's the highest possible right now and is largely why Gideon +Fenn combo is so OP: if you got Fenn + Gideon you can theoretically have Blast 6 x2: Fenn attack x2 (Blast 6) + attack x2 again from Gideon with Masterstroke (Blast 6)

Not sure what you mean by "reverse". There's no "direction" in IA as long as you're moving. Gaarkhan's charge basically says "move X spaces". X can be 0 if that's your question. If you're referring to Rampage then yes it's legal: I'll charge to...nowhere! all of you take damage!

Rebel Elite gives Fenn's Havoc Shot Blast 2. As far as I know, that is the highest Blast ability currently in the campaign. Blast 1 from Underbarrel is a separate ability.

Technically Blast abilities are not combined, they are resolved separately like each separate Cleave. Only Pierce values are specified to be combined by the rules.

Charge says "Move a number of spaces up to your Speed. Then, you may perform an attack with a melee weapon.". Gaarkhan can move 0 spaces. He can also move 2 spaces one way, and 2 spaces back to where he started. But he cannot split the move X spaces to be performed before and after the attack. You can't store movement by spaces like movement points. Also, "Then," in the ability indicates sequence. The Move X spaces must be performed before the optional attack.

The attack is optional. Move X spaces ignores extra movement point cost from terrain and hostile figures, so sometimes a focused Gaarkhan may want to use it to get around and still save focused for later.

Okay, now Charge is making more sense. As we were new to the game, I wasn't entirely sure that we were using it correctly.

Now, what can be done about the Jedi and her cleaving, dancing weapon? Besides burning the cards and forbidding the players to speak her name, ever again? Heh.

Dancing Weapon is a special action, so it can only be used once per activation. Thus, if the weapon has cleave, Diala only gets one ranged cleave per activation. It's not that bad.

Diala is very good at support anyway - Force Adept, Force Throw, and Battle Meditation is a great combo that makes the rebel attacks much more consistent.

On 11/12/2017 at 7:52 AM, LugWrench said:

Okay, now Charge is making more sense. As we were new to the game, I wasn't entirely sure that we were using it correctly.

Now, what can be done about the Jedi and her cleaving, dancing weapon? Besides burning the cards and forbidding the players to speak her name, ever again? Heh.

Dancing weapon is good but not that OP, going back to what you said initially, remember that (like Albert said above):

You can only perform Dancing weapon once per activation

Each surge ability can only be triggered once. So Diala can't do Cleave 2 + Cleave 2 on the lightsaber even if she got 2 surges. How is she

On 11/9/2017 at 10:57 PM, LugWrench said:

practically clearing entire rooms of elites by herself, towards the end of the game.

Diala clearing out rooms came down to how the mobs were grouped either during set up, or as the game progressed, with synergy from other abilities. For example...A squad of elite 'troopers. To really get the most out of them, they need to be close for their Squad Training reroll. Diala would select one trooper (usually in the center of the 'pack), use her ability to remove its defense dice, then use Dancing Weapon. Between dice rolls, skills, and a few bits of gear, if she didn't drop the entire group of 'troopers then and there, the group would be in pretty sorry shape.
About the only counter I had was to either swarm Diala (which made her Dancing Weapon even more effective...big groups = lotsa cleave), or attack her with a single 'impressive' mob such as a Royal Guard Champion.
I'm not trying to neuter the Hero, here. But as I said, when one Hero can practically clear an entire room by themselves, in one or two turns...

32 minutes ago, LugWrench said:

Diala clearing out rooms came down to how the mobs were grouped either during set up, or as the game progressed, with synergy from other abilities. For example...A squad of elite 'troopers. To really get the most out of them, they need to be close for their Squad Training reroll. Diala would select one trooper (usually in the center of the 'pack), use her ability to remove its defense dice, then use Dancing Weapon. Between dice rolls, skills, and a few bits of gear, if she didn't drop the entire group of 'troopers then and there, the group would be in pretty sorry shape.
About the only counter I had was to either swarm Diala (which made her Dancing Weapon even more effective...big groups = lotsa cleave), or attack her with a single 'impressive' mob such as a Royal Guard Champion.
I'm not trying to neuter the Hero, here. But as I said, when one Hero can practically clear an entire room by themselves, in one or two turns...

Ah I see, in that case I wouldn't try to bunch up eStorms, and would only bunch them up for rerolls while they're active

So I'd try something like this as Imperial:

Trooper 1: move 4, shoot

Trooper 2: move 2, shoot (+ reroll from trooper 1), retreat 2

Trooper 3: move 2, shoot (+ reroll from trooper 1), retreat 2

So the end board state would look something like this to deny cleave:

1_ _2_ _

_ _ _ _ _

_ _ _ _ _

_ _ 3 _ _

Rather than this:

12_ _

_3_ _ _

Now yes Trooper #1 might die from Diala but overall I'm limiting my casualty

If you're looking for strategy tips, feel free to make another thread in the campaign section and post what class are you using + what have you bought (xp cards) + what have the 4 heroes bought (xp cards)

I might actually do that. At some point, I'm going to run Heart of the Empire, and I have little doubt that Diala will make an appearance.