So, judging by the box office, at least two or three of you have seen Solo by now (seriously, it's a great film- get off your butts, people!).

Just wondering what we think Solo might be able to bring to Imperial Assault.

Personally, and surprisingly, I don't think it's a lot, especially when compared to Rebels and Rogue One. In fact, I think we could see a single, blister wave pretty much cover it (maybe a slightly larger wave than normal still).

18 minutes ago, subtrendy2 said:

So, judging by the box office, at least two or three of you have seen Solo by now (seriously, it's a great film- get off your butts, people!).

Just wondering what we think Solo might be able to bring to Imperial Assault.

Personally, and surprisingly, I don't think it's a lot, especially when compared to Rebels and Rogue One. In fact, I think we could see a single, blister wave pretty much cover it (maybe a slightly larger wave than normal still).

Rebels-

Enfys Nest (personally, I'd love for this to happen)

(Maybe Cloud Riders too, but... not necessary)

Empire-

Imperial Army trooper (based on Mud Trooper Design)

(I really don't think we need Range Troopers)

Scum-

Surprisingly, I don't know if we have a lot to add here. Val and Rio don't seem necessary, and we already have Maul/Han/Lando/Chewbacca.

If anything, that leaves Beckett, L3, Qi'ra, and Dryden. So, here's a thought:

Qi'ra/Dryden dual pack (with at least one ability representing Teras Kasi).

And/or

Pyke Overseer generics

Any thoughts? Am I wrong to say we don't need Beckett and L3, or is there someone I forgot?

1 minute ago, Indy_com said:

Rebels could get Enfy's Nest and the Cloudriders.

Imperials could get Patrol Troopers, Range Troopers, Mudtroopers and the AT-DT.

Scum could get Dryden Vos, Dryden's Guards, Tobias Beckett, Qi'ra, L3, Kessel Guards/Workers.

What do you think the design of Dryden's guards would be? Any specific species? Any stills you'd imagine them based on?

5 minutes ago, subtrendy2 said:

What do you think the design of Dryden's guards would be? Any specific species? Any stills you'd imagine them based on?

Funko has a POP Vynl of the Guard.

In addition to what's already been said, these would be very cool:

37 minutes ago, Indy_com said:

Funko has a POP Vynl of the Guard.

Huh, nice! I actually really like that design. Is that... lasat?

I like the design a lot, but I think I'd want the name to be more like Crimson Dawn enforcer, rather than specifically mentioning Vos.

19 minutes ago, angelman2 said:

In addition to what's already been said, these would be very cool:

A new wave of droids, with a droid rebellion mission to go with it, might be cool

I would love to see the Lady Proxima character/species in IA; a very interesting concept, I though. And we could even go for a Corellia box with appropriate sewer/underground tiles with dockside/industrial tiles on the reverse side. Street urchins perhaps, although... kids in a combat-focused murder hobo game isn't that alright. (Any they could always be represented by Neutral Mission Tokens in a mission).

Corellian Hounds could be AWESOME new "Creature" figures.

The Kessel guards could perhaps work, although the weren't particularly unique and would be hard to make interesting, rules wise.

Several of the Sabbac-game creatures could perhaps appear as allies, although that is perhaps a bit of a stretch.

I like all of those- particularly the Corellian hounds!

2 minutes ago, IanSolo_FFG said:

Skirmish players might not like it, but I'd rather have a new campaign (app campaign or booklet campaign) that focus on the Crimson Dawn organization rather than new minis. But because we all love new miniatures, Qi'ra, Beckett and Vos might make sense (Unless the campaign is set AFTER the events of Solo, in which case, on ly Qi'ra would feel thematic). Obviously the campaign would use Maul as a villain and we would get to see the likes of Han, Chewie and Lando as allies. However, we have yet to see a campaign requiring anything else than the Core and whatever expansion the campaign comes from. The above, would require a few expansions (at least blisters) and maybe tiles from other existing expansions.

Why not both?

20 minutes ago, subtrendy2 said:

Why not both?

Absolutely! I just wanted to emphasis that I'd rather have a new campaign than just blister packs that will serve mainly for skirmish (I presume). But I'm in for both!

54 minutes ago, IanSolo_FFG said:

Absolutely! I just wanted to emphasis that I'd rather have a new campaign than just blister packs that will serve mainly for skirmish (I presume). But I'm in for both!

Cool!

Just as an idea... I really like your idea to include Maul as the main villain in the campaign. That might be tough though, since waves usually don't cross like that.

What could be cool, though, is if the Imperial player gets to secretly pick any Merc villain (including Maul) to be the main leader in the campaign, and apply some base stats to them to balance all villains accordingly. Then, it's up to the Rebels to discover who is truly at the Syndicate's head.

37 minutes ago, subtrendy2 said:

What could be cool, though, is if the Imperial player gets to secretly pick any Merc villain (including Maul) to be the main leader in the campaign, and apply some base stats to them to balance all villains accordingly. Then, it's up to the Rebels to discover who is truly at the Syndicate's head.

Love that! It adds an element of replayability as an imperial player could select a different villain and with some imagination, adjust the narrative for a (to some extent) different campaign.

Your base stats mechanic sounds intriguing. Have you given some thoughts to it? In an ideal world, threat should be the ultimate unit measure. For example, if Maul is the main villain of a campaign (worth 7 threat) then swapping Maul for Agent Blaise (worth 6 threat) should involves a penalty/adjustment of 1 threat and then you're good to go (for example, if the mission is at threat level 4, at the end of round 1 you increase the threat counter by 3 only). But I doubt the threat mechanic is so well balanced (hello skirmish upgrade, although campaign mode can be different than skirmish mode when it comes to balancing issues .. ok then hello players not wanting to run ally mission because they think it's not worth it, when by design it's just that. You want to bring farm boy Luke? Ok, then give that 10 threats to the imperial player in exchange).

Take the core set for example. Weiss is worth 16 threats. Each time a story mission calls for Weiss, could I instead substitute Kayn Somos (10 threat) and Agent Blaise (6 threat) without affecting balance too much? If the threat mechanic was a perfect system I suppose it could work. I suddenly find that I'm "hyping" myself as I write this I wanted to revisit the core campaign in a near future and I might actually try that to give some villains more game time.

Lots of great ideas above! Personally, I hope we get to see stuff from Rogue One before anything else, though.

1 hour ago, IanSolo_FFG said:

Your base stats mechanic sounds intriguing. Have you given some thoughts to it? In an ideal world, threat should be the ultimate unit measure. For example, if Maul is the main villain of a campaign (worth 7 threat) then swapping Maul for Agent Blaise (worth 6 threat) should involves a penalty/adjustment of 1 threat and then you're good to go (for example, if the mission is at threat level 4, at the end of round 1 you increase the threat counter by 3 only). But I doubt the threat mechanic is so well balanced (hello skirmish upgrade, although campaign mode can be different than skirmish mode when it comes to balancing issues .. ok then hello players not wanting to run ally mission because they think it's not worth it, when by design it's just that. You want to bring farm boy Luke? Ok, then give that 10 threats to the imperial player in exchange).

Take the core set for example. Weiss is worth 16 threats. Each time a story mission calls for Weiss, could I instead substitute Kayn Somos (10 threat) and Agent Blaise (6 threat) without affecting balance too much? If the threat mechanic was a perfect system I suppose it could work. I suddenly find that I'm "hyping" myself as I write this I wanted to revisit the core campaign in a near future and I might actually try that to give some villains more game time.

Lots of interesting thoughts there!

First, I think that it's generally accepted that threat isn't the only method used when determining balance in a campaign. That's why some people home rule it that a card like Vader's fix can be used for an open group, but not when Vader is written into the mission- the inherent Vader was balanced with his original attributes in mind, while the 13 pt. Vader is arguably just as good as any 13 pts of threat. So I wouldn't think that it's fair to substitute units based wholly off of their threat cost.

For the base stats, I honestly haven't thought much about it. It could be as simplistic as creating an entire set of stats for the "boss" unit and simply choosing which mini to represent it, or in creating "caps" on stuff- for instance, maybe the rules state that the boss keeps their stats, except his health is 20 and speed is 3 regardless of what's on the card.

I do like the idea of players earning allies outside of side mission rewards. I've often heard the "not worth it" argument, and here's where I disagree with it: It often is worth it for rebels to bring allies, as the activation advantage alone is often a good bonus. The problem is that to get an ally, they have to attempt a mission that could've been otherwise spent on a different reward. Since the allies require a threat cost anyway, I totally agree that earning them in a different way would be ideal.

It'd help get more variety of allies on the board, too. The app does a pretty good job of this.

19 minutes ago, subtrendy2 said:

Lots of interesting thoughts there!

First, I think that it's generally accepted that threat isn't the only method used when determining balance in a campaign. That's why some people home rule it that a card like Vader's fix can be used for an open group, but not when Vader is written into the mission- the inherent Vader was balanced with his original attributes in mind, while the 13 pt. Vader is arguably just as good as any 13 pts of threat. So I wouldn't think that it's fair to substitute units based wholly off of their threat cost.

For the base stats, I honestly haven't thought much about it. It could be as simplistic as creating an entire set of stats for the "boss" unit and simply choosing which mini to represent it, or in creating "caps" on stuff- for instance, maybe the rules state that the boss keeps their stats, except his health is 20 and speed is 3 regardless of what's on the card.

I do like the idea of players earning allies outside of side mission rewards. I've often heard the "not worth it" argument, and here's where I disagree with it: It often is worth it for rebels to bring allies, as the activation advantage alone is often a good bonus. The problem is that to get an ally, they have to attempt a mission that could've been otherwise spent on a different reward. Since the allies require a threat cost anyway, I totally agree that earning them in a different way would be ideal.

It'd help get more variety of allies on the board, too. The app does a pretty good job of this.

Ok let's say it differently. In the best of both worlds, Threat would have been the easiest way to pick a boss. Obviously like you point out, it's more than that. But still threat points must mean something (some base foundation). Can you substitue Blaise for Jabba in Blaise's agenda mission without affecting balance? Probably not because of their own personal abilities. Like you say there is more than just threat. It's even more true for skirmish as a character's ability can be messed up or enhanced by command cards. For campaign you often see health boosts or extra/modified abilities to compensate.

I wouldn't want generic stats for bosses just to allow switching the minis. If Vader is on the board I want the mini to play like Vader. So even though an interesting idea on paper (a pick-any-villain campaign) I think a considerable amount of work would be needed to make it work.

I guess the closest FFG has come up with so far is the Nemesis class deck, but you still have to pay the threat cost to bring in a villain that is not embedded in the mission.

I once played the Celebration mission about imperials trying to imprison wookies. Rebel players starts the mission with Chewie. Even though the rebel players did not have earned them it just felt right to grant them the wookie warriors for this mission in exchange for the 8 threat. In fact, the twin shadows hero missions were great in that sense. At some point in the mission the rebels got access to R2 or 3PO as an ally already embedded in the mission. They should have done that more frequently in later expansions (not in every mission obviously).

I also agree that a new mechanic to earn allies outside of missions would be great, especially since generally only a single mission grants access to an ally. Maybe threat cost is enough with some rules to prevent the rebels from bringing Jedi Luke in an early 2-threat-level mission. Maybe something like this : At the proper stage of the setup of a mission, the rebels can bring an unearned ally that costs no more than 3 times the threat level of the mission. Then if the rebels bring an ally, the imperial player could be granted the choice to make one card change to his opened group hand if he desire. The Alliance smuggler could be seen in early missions while Han or Chewie could show up in later-campaign missions.

The app encounter is another cool way of earning an ally. It's a neat mechanic even though one could argue that it's much more dice dependent (read random), but still I personally like it a lot!

it was not very good.

design wise though , it was good. so i suppose some varying troopers could make their way into IA

18 hours ago, IanSolo_FFG said:

I once played the Celebration mission about imperials trying to imprison wookies. Rebel players starts the mission with Chewie. Even though the rebel players did not have earned them it just felt right to grant them the wookie warriors for this mission in exchange for the 8 threat. In fact, the twin shadows hero missions were great in that sense. At some point in the mission the rebels got access to R2 or 3PO as an ally already embedded in the mission. They should have done that more frequently in later expansions (not in every mission obviously).

I also agree that a new mechanic to earn allies outside of missions would be great, especially since generally only a single mission grants access to an ally. Maybe threat cost is enough with some rules to prevent the rebels from bringing Jedi Luke in an early 2-threat-level mission. Maybe something like this : At the proper stage of the setup of a mission, the rebels can bring an unearned ally that costs no more than 3 times the threat level of the mission. Then if the rebels bring an ally, the imperial player could be granted the choice to make one card change to his opened group hand if he desire. The Alliance smuggler could be seen in early missions while Han or Chewie could show up in later-campaign missions.

The app encounter is another cool way of earning an ally. It's a neat mechanic even though one could argue that it's much more dice dependent (read random), but still I personally like it a lot!

Somewhat related (spoilers for Jabba's Realm)

Although I liked the movie, I dont really care if we get any Solo characters in IA. I would however love to see some Rogue One figures make it our way.

6 hours ago, jconway2002 said:

Although I liked the movie, I dont really care if we get any Solo characters in IA. I would however love to see some Rogue One figures make it our way.

For sure. Now that Rebels is seemingly done with Tyrants of Lothal, I'd imagine the next logical step would be some Rogue One characters. I think there's a lot more in that movie to choose from.

Anyway, had another thought-

Maybe we could get a swampy campaign sometime? Mimban, Dagobah, etc.

Imperial Army troopers (maybe weak 5 figure groups).

I loved the WWI atmosphere of Mimban in the film, and would really like to see it come to IA

Part of the issue with Solo is the timeline — while we do now have some characters in IA who died/disappeared before A New Hope, the state of the galaxy at that point was still largely set for Rebels vs. Empire. I think the Solo timeline is simply too early: there isn't enough of an institutional Rebellion at that point for the characters to make sense in Imperial Assault. While Greedo can be stretched to make an appearance in an ambiguously timed campaign mission, or even as a goofy alternate history; I'm not sure Dryden Vos would ever really make sense within the narrative confines of IA.

i think blurring Solo releases with Rogue One could make some sense. A blister wave with Director Krennic for the Empire, Saw Gerrera for the Rebels, and perhaps Enfys Nest for the Mercenaries could make sense. I could see a campaign that built on the locations from both films: the beaches of Scarif and Savareen could share tiles, or the spice mines of Kessel could double as the Kyber crystal mines under Jedha.

I'm ultimately skeptical though, since as far as we know the only characters from Solo who survive to see the Rebellion are the ones already represented in IA. I did enjoy Enfys Nest as a character, and she's the one I'd be most interested in seeing make an apperance.

@sionnach19 I just saw Solo last night, and I've gotta agree with everything you've said in your post. If we get anything from the movie, I think it would be most likely that we see some of the new alien species released as generic characters. Maybe something specific like the Clawdites, but more likely something along the lines of the Saboteurs where the species is ancillary to the flavour of the unit.

Like you said, Enfys Nest is the only one that it really makes sense to me to bring in as a named character. I could also see the Imperial Infantry, but I'm not sure how they would mechanically be different from Stormtroopers.

On ‎5‎/‎29‎/‎2018 at 9:16 AM, subtrendy2 said:

Just as an idea... I really like your idea to include Maul as the main villain in the campaign. That might be tough though, since waves usually don't cross like that.

Since Maul was just a token and deployment cards in HotE, why not include the same token and cards in a Solo-based expansion?

21 minutes ago, bill_andel said:

Since Maul was just a token and deployment cards in HotE, why not include the same token and cards in a Solo-based expansion?

Uh...

That's actually kind of a brilliant idea.

It would be really easy to implement, and could allow for villains to enter other campaigns with "official" appearances.

For example, we could get a campaign with all of the ESB bounty hunters when we finally get 4-LOM and Zuck, if we do it this way, and the component cost would basically be negligible.

I like the way you think, friendo.

What SOLO could bring to IA? Well, I guess bland, dark, colourless and boring tiles would fit...

Actually, at this point i wish they would release expansions like they did for Armada's Correllian Conflict. A lot of us have multiples of previous sets. You could release a 1 sheet of new tiles, some skirmish/campaign fixes or rereleases that enhance previously releases material (make the tusken raider or stormtroopers more viable for example) and a small booklet to lead a new campaign perhaps mixing tiles from multiple sets/ gasp\

They'll never do it because of the app

But here's to wishing

They just announced some Solo content for X-Wing with Lando's Millennium Falcon.

Not that tells us anything about the potential for Imperial Assault figures, though, considering that we still have nothing from Rogue 1

1 hour ago, ManateeX said:

They just announced some Solo content for X-Wing with Lando's Millennium Falcon.

Not that tells us anything about the potential for Imperial Assault figures, though, considering that we still have nothing from Rogue 1

Does make me wonder what's next, though.

With us getting all the obvious Rebels stuff, I think we can assume we're probably due for something new if the game continues after this next wave.

Would there be interest for Rogue One stuff in what we can assume would be nearly 2 years since the film's release? Do the original characters of Solo have the staying power to justify their inclusion? Could 0-0-0 and BT-1 imply that we could be getting more comics/print media stuff? Or could we go back to the original trilogy and mop up some stuff there?