It may very well be that I am completely missing something and if so, please be kind in pointing me to the right solution.

So here my concern:

1. Scouts have Scout 1, Commandos have Scout 2 (rest identical)
2. Scouts have defensive surges, Commandos also have offensive and defensive surges
3. Scouts have 2 dice on range 2, Commandos have 1 die at range 3

I could see #3 as balanced, maybe the offensive surge (#2) is even necessary to balance #3 out.

Still that would leave us #1 as unbalancing factor. Commandos can, with the help of Scout 2 move further, and, because of their range 3, shoot farther than imperial scouts by far. The scouts, on the other hand can shoot more often. which is neat but hardly an equivalent.

Have I missed something?

Scouts have defensive surge, but shoot twice, while commandos have offensive surge and defensive surge, but shoot once. Commandos are meant to stay further away while scouts are light aggressive units.

We also do not know how good the special weapons will be for both squads, maybe the scouts have some more powerful mines/special weapons.

IMO, the scouts will be relatively bad because of their range anyway, range 2 is really short honestly, I'm still to play my proxied fleet troopers with any efficiency.

4 hours ago, Mr.Vitriol said:

It may very well be that I am completely missing something and if so, please be kind in pointing me to the right solution.

So here my concern:

1. Scouts have Scout 1, Commandos have Scout 2 (rest identical)
2. Scouts have defensive surges, Commandos also have offensive and defensive surges
3. Scouts have 2 dice on range 2, Commandos have 1 die at range 3

I could see #3 as balanced, maybe the offensive surge (#2) is even necessary to balance #3 out.

Still that would leave us #1 as unbalancing factor. Commandos can, with the help of Scout 2 move further, and, because of their range 3, shoot farther than imperial scouts by far. The scouts, on the other hand can shoot more often. which is neat but hardly an equivalent.

Have I missed something?

The only other thing that warrants consideration are points costs. It looks like they're both either 60 or 68 points, but I think it looks more like 60. It's tough to see on the pictures in the announcement articles. Also, we don't yet know what a team costs instead of a squad.

I'm sure they will both have their pros and cons but I think it will largely depend on how you play/intend to play with them. These things have a way of fleshing themselves out over time and plays.

I often think that Rebels Troopers are a bit useless when it comes to defending, but then that's usually a result of not taking advantage of Dodge and Nimble and focusing more on offence. On the other side of things I tend to think the same of Stormtroopers and shooting, unless you Aim and take advantage of Precise and worry too much about them not dying (although I usually run them with a DLT-19 to help offset shite white dice).

Or maybe they'll be just like the T-47 and everyone will hate them. ? Only time will tell.

I myself am already toying with the idea of the Scout Only force. Squads, Teams and Bikes. Squads for the objectives and close range, Teams for sniping from afar and Bikes for impact and speed. Pit that against Han and/or Leia and the Endor Unit and it could make for some fun/silly thematics.

1 hour ago, Crawfskeezen said:

I myself am already toying with the idea of the Scout Only force. Squads, Teams and Bikes. Squads for the objectives and close range, Teams for sniping from afar and Bikes for impact and speed. Pit that against Han and/or Leia and the Endor Unit and it could make for some fun/silly thematics.

Would still have to have Storm or Snow troopers for your Corps choice. Scout "Squads" are a Special Forces unit.

2 minutes ago, NeonWolf said:

Would still have to have Storm or Snow troopers for your Corps choice. Scout "Squads" are a Special Forces unit.

Yea, that's one consideration as well as what Commander I would use. There were Stormtroopers on Endor though, so no worries there. I could use Vader even though he wasn't there for the actual battle, just to catch Luke. But there's plenty of time to worry about these things.

The question is have I missed something? Why are we saying things like scouts shoot more often or scouts shoot twice?

1 hour ago, NukeMaster said:

The question is have I missed something? Why are we saying things like scouts shoot more often or scouts shoot twice?

They just mean that scouts have 2 dice per mini on the blaster, commandos only have 1.

8 hours ago, Derrault said:

They just mean that scouts have 2 dice per mini on the blaster, commandos only have 1.

Yeah, I mean you are getting 60% more hits with the scouts vs. the commandos. It’s 6” shorter range, to be sure, but it’s hard to ignore that kind of damage difference.

Scouts could be good with rapid reinforcements... anyone know if the Scout keyword would trigger off of this condition?

Units don't have to be mirrors of each other, and they shouldn't be. Units don't have to be balanced against a certain unit. The only thing that FFG should be concerned balance wise would be the army as a whole. If one particular unit in that army makes it so much stronger than the other army, or if it makes it a must take, then they have issues.

9 minutes ago, Jacen007 said:

Scouts could be good with rapid reinforcements... anyone know if the Scout keyword would trigger off of this condition?

It seems that Scout does trigger, given this bullet point under "Deployment" on page 24:

Quote

If the “Rapid Reinforcements” condition card was selected during setup, each player will have set aside up to two units to deploy later during the game.

Pending the full "Scout" rules of course.