And so it begins.

https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2017/12/1/orders-from-high-command/

Nothing too new there other than some command card reveals.

Vader, as usual, wiping out some of his own dudes.

I assume this is just the first article we will get today.

Just now, ninclouse2000 said:

I assume this is just the first article we will get today.

Likely. I think they drop them in batches.

Might even get Armada too.

I was hoping for the article that says "Surprise! This comes out next week!"

14 minutes ago, Undeadguy said:

Likely. I think they drop them in batches.

Might even get Armada too.

I would love an armada article but I sadly don’t expect one but I do like how you think.

Nice article.

I think next to deployment this will be critical phase to game play.

Out thinking or guessing your opponent will be a biggie!

I like how activation is different than Armada. No more last/first shenanigans

I do like the command card idea.

I will say that the Order tokens might be a flaw in working to get people to take diversity in the force.

Observe if you have A vader player who brings 6 squads of Stormtroopers, and a Luke player that brings 2 ATRT, and a snow speeder, and a Heavy weapons team.

They both use ambush and move one squad. Then the Vader player has the advantage. The Luke player might get a Speeder token, when he needs a Heavy weapon team token. The Vader player is going to get a Stormtrooper token, and can use it to activate any squad he has.

Its not huge, but its a thing.

1 minute ago, Hawktel said:

I do like the command card idea.

I will say that the Order tokens might be a flaw in working to get people to take diversity in the force.

Observe if you have A vader player who brings 6 squads of Stormtroopers, and a Luke player that brings 2 ATRT, and a snow speeder, and a Heavy weapons team.

They both use ambush and move one squad. Then the Vader player has the advantage. The Luke player might get a Speeder token, when he needs a Heavy weapon team token. The Vader player is going to get a Stormtrooper token, and can use it to activate any squad he has.

Its not huge, but its a thing.

But he's bringing a larger number of possibly less effective units. He's trading combat flexibility for potency, which could still lead to a fair scenario.

17 minutes ago, Hawktel said:

I do like the command card idea.

I will say that the Order tokens might be a flaw in working to get people to take diversity in the force.

Observe if you have A vader player who brings 6 squads of Stormtroopers, and a Luke player that brings 2 ATRT, and a snow speeder, and a Heavy weapons team.

They both use ambush and move one squad. Then the Vader player has the advantage. The Luke player might get a Speeder token, when he needs a Heavy weapon team token. The Vader player is going to get a Stormtrooper token, and can use it to activate any squad he has.

Its not huge, but its a thing.

Something you have to plan for. But you are required to bring 3 Corps in every army to a max of 6.

I was along the same lines however. If you have your 4 mandatory units, you could take 2 Heavy, like 2 AT-ST fully loaded, and now you have 7 activations compared to the guy who brings 12. You will have much more control over your army because you can activate 2-3, which leaves 4-5 left over. If you were to play bunched up, you could have most your units in range to attack your opponent without having an "dead" activations - not being able to do anything useful when you pull a random activation - compared to the guy who can activate 3 reliably but hopes to pull something good from his stack.

For example. Vader leads 3 squads of Storm Troopers who are supported by 2 AT-STs. You are engaging Luke, 2 Rebel squads and an AT-RT, with the rest of the army at/beyond long range. Your AT-STs can attack those fringe units, but they can't fire back. Every activation you take will have weight, even if random. Your opponent is stuck hoping they can activate all 4 units engaged with you before activating the rest of their army.

Effectively, taking a smaller force can give you more control over your army. I have no idea the impact it would have on objectives, which is how you win.

24 minutes ago, OccasionallyCorrect said:

But he's bringing a larger number of possibly less effective units. He's trading combat flexibility for potency, which could still lead to a fair scenario.

Exactly, it's a trade off. A large homogenous force will be easy to command, but will lack the ability to do specific tasks or adapt as well as one with a mix of units. Seems ok to me.

Overall nothing much new here, but good to start seeing articles and having things confirmed a little more!

The downside to a smaller force (just saw the post above) is that faced in all alternating activation games....namely that activation advantage can be HUGE.

A bigger force can activate chaff first, then hit the enemy with all its important units unopposed once the enemy runs out of units to activates.

Or they can hit the objective with 3-4 or more activations all at once after the enemy runs out of activations, which might well simply win the game.

If years of Malifaux and similar games taught me anything, it's that a smaller force has to play well to survive against a well played force with activation control.

35 minutes ago, OccasionallyCorrect said:

But he's bringing a larger number of possibly less effective units. He's trading combat flexibility for potency, which could still lead to a fair scenario.

I've Bolded, Italicized, and Underlined the operative part.

Are you suggesting that Stormtroopers aren't going to be worth their points?

59 minutes ago, Hawktel said:

I've Bolded, Italicized, and Underlined the operative part.

Are you suggesting that Stormtroopers aren't going to be worth their points?

Not at all! In the above example someone said they may bring a wider variety of specialty troops and vehicles, all of which are probably more potent, and costly, than a single group of storm troopers.

3 hours ago, Crabbok said:

I was hoping for the article that says "Surprise! This comes out next week!"

No, we are suppose to buy X Wing week. The gunboat people will enrage if their thunder is stolen.

3 hours ago, Undeadguy said:

I like how activation is different than Armada. No more last/first shenanigans

Wat?

That kind of stuff is exactly what can and will happen, via commands....... it just requires some thoughtful list building and cohesion/upgrades to your commander (oh and there is also the penalty of not being able to commander activate as many units that round with an initiative order).

That said, it's nice initiative order isn't set in stone, and swaps round to round based on command choices. Gaming command cards and unit makeup is going to become as important as rolling dice methinks.

It is most definitely going to have last/first Alpha strikes if people play their cards right (literally).

The difference is that to guarantee them you'll have to trade off having less control that turn (since you'll need a low priority card with low orders), and you'll need to have more units than the enemy. It can and will happen and it'll hurt though.

And god help the enemy if they took something mad like dual AT-STs and you outnumber them by like 4-5 units. You might get a half dozen units activating before they get another shot. Better make those walker attacks count....

3 hours ago, Hawktel said:

I do like the command card idea.

I will say that the Order tokens might be a flaw in working to get people to take diversity in the force.

Observe if you have A vader player who brings 6 squads of Stormtroopers, and a Luke player that brings 2 ATRT, and a snow speeder, and a Heavy weapons team.

They both use ambush and move one squad. Then the Vader player has the advantage. The Luke player might get a Speeder token, when he needs a Heavy weapon team token. The Vader player is going to get a Stormtrooper token, and can use it to activate any squad he has.

Its not huge, but its a thing.

I get what you are getting at here. Since randomly drawing a troop icon means you can activate any of your troops, there is an advantage to just not taking some of the non-troop type units. But I think you are going to want to. Non-troop units have this activation cost to them as well as the fact that you are limited in the number you can take. I think we are going to want to take them. In some games, expensive point costs are the main deterrent from taking the really great units, but Legion has made that more complicated. I actually see this all as a good thing. It means that if AT-RTs or Speeder Bikes or something else that isn't a basic troop are just really really good in the meta, the game won't turn into something that doesn't look very much like a battlefield battle.

That being said, I am totally going to try to do an all Storm Trooper + Vader list when I get the game. I am just not convinced that it is going to be that good.

Armada's weighty first/last activations are tied into the game's core structure.

You have to move forwards, and move after your opportunity to shoot. That's part of what makes it such a satisfying game of prediction and strategy, but it's also why activation order is so important.

In Legion you can move/shoot in any order and any which direction, so even beyond the Command / priority system, activations would've played a lot differently.

Example:

You know the opposing Vader wants to mulch your Stormtroopers. Your opponent will have the last activation this round, and you've already played your highest priority Command so they might also have first next round.

So, you activate your Stormtroopers... and they turn around and walk away.

Or, if he's almost dead, you walk into range and shoot him a bunch.

Against Demolisher, that's not an option, ergo the order of activations carries more weight.

7 minutes ago, Extropia said:

It is most definitely going to have last/first Alpha strikes if people play their cards right (literally).

The difference is that to guarantee them you'll have to trade off having less control that turn (since you'll need a low priority card with low orders), and you'll need to have more units than the enemy. It can and will happen and it'll hurt though.

And god help the enemy if they took something mad like dual AT-STs and you outnumber them by like 4-5 units. You might get a half dozen units activating before they get another shot. Better make those walker attacks count....

That head game goes deeper though. If you can force your opponents initiative cards early (by punishing poor deployment/choices) it means you can then guarantee iniative for the late stages of the game.....

It seems any hope of getting generic 'unnamed' commanders is lost, as most of the command cards are based on the character you use as a commander, and these are more powerful than the 'generic' commands.

5 hours ago, ninclouse2000 said:

I assume this is just the first article we will get today.

I wouldn't hold my breath on another one.

Prior to release they like to put out an article a week or so. They want to make sure they space them out enough to keep the fire stoked until the game is released.

4 hours ago, Hawktel said:

I do like the command card idea.

I will say that the Order tokens might be a flaw in working to get people to take diversity in the force.

Observe if you have A vader player who brings 6 squads of Stormtroopers, and a Luke player that brings 2 ATRT, and a snow speeder, and a Heavy weapons team.

They both use ambush and move one squad. Then the Vader player has the advantage. The Luke player might get a Speeder token, when he needs a Heavy weapon team token. The Vader player is going to get a Stormtrooper token, and can use it to activate any squad he has.

Its not huge, but its a thing.

Hmmm. That's interesting. I wonder what they have to remedy this, or how this will ultimately play out.

I want to know how priority works. What if both sides have a Priority 1 card. Who goes first?

I don't think that is necessarily a problem, since taking only trooper squads is giving away a lot of tactical options, and basic troops are usually less powerful than elite/armored units even when you consider their lower cost, hence why those are restricted by the limited numbers you can take.

Casualties may also give a bit of that "Mario Cart" boost to the player being left behind as casualties tend to make your command cards more effective as you have less units to activate. Although I expect losing units won't be that big a help.