Not sure how good these guys are going to be without sharpshooter 2. If you think about it, when shooting at long range they will never kill anything. Most of the time if you are shooting at long range the enemy will have hard cover.

1 hour ago, cookluke5150 said:

Most of the time if you are shooting at long range the enemy will have hard cover.

So take an elevated position! Better chance of getting them out of cover. They at least have sharpshooter 1, so light cover is the best the opponent can hope for.

The way I plan to use them is locking down some long firing lanes. If the enemy moves forward, they can be darn sure they’re getting suppression and reliably losing a mini from Pierce 1 and the inability to spend dodge tokens. They’ll serve as a deterrent and a road block.

Commandos are definitely not a club to hit people over the head with, they are a finesse unit that is strong in other ways

I think the difference between the full unit vs the strike team is yet to be seen for the sniper. One side of it looks like the sniper is a strike team only take. Two soldiers in a nest holding down a lane as previously suggested. However 2 minis are just asking to get popped. On the other side, 5 minis may be more viable over the balance of the game in terms of survivability. The sniper wants an aim token too as far as I see it (that white die is fickle), especially against a unit in light cover or better as it will remove at least one hit (that isn't a crit), so getting suppressed invariably hurts them.

I think that the sniper will have its pros and its cons just like any other unit. What those are and how they will affect the game remains to be seen.

Roll a crit!

Haven't gotten to play them yet, but I plan on using them as flanking units. With Duck n Cover you can safely flank wide in the open and remove your target's cover.

Sniper looks good both in the full unit and with the two man team.

You definitely don’t want to be shooting into heavy cover with the two man team, but you are going to be reliably picking up a model against targets in light cover or in the open. Feels very thematic to me.

With an aim token you have a 95% chance to pick up one model and a 30% chance to pick up two.

The full unit is one of the most point efficient units besides Fleets from a damage perspective, which is saying something.

Snipers are cheap, can give supression from the entire map and drop a trooper or two.

Go flamer at-rt's if you need to wipe a trooper sqaud in One attack

33 minutes ago, jocke01 said:

Snipers are cheap, can give supression from the entire map and drop a trooper or two.

Go flamer at-rt's if you need to wipe a trooper sqaud in One attack

An extra source of suppression can be very useful, particularly right before the concerning unit you need to keep suppressed activates. Or the end of turn to to make sure at least one suppression carries over.

I think range 3 will be their sweet spot. Then you gain the extra black dice from your other trooper. So now you have sharpshooter 1, Pierce 1, and are shooting with 2 black and 1 white. Hopefully one gets through the single cover and then you auto-kill a mini. But if they're in range 3 of anything, these guys can easily be killed. 44 pts is a lot for these guys. I wish they had given the sniper itself sharpshooter 1, so that if you are just shooting with the sniper you have sharp 2. That would make it worth it's points.

Better in the full squad team I think. 2 man teams seem like they're meant for saboteurs.

Honestly i think the sniper, as is, is overcosted for what he does. In only a two man squad your paying 44 pts for average 1 damage per activation. He would be amazing if he had the ability to aim at a specific unit. For instance an ability like.....

SCOPE: If you spend an aim token during this attack pick one model in the unit your targeting and deal all wounds to that model.

I got them at Gen Con. I run two Sniper teams and a sab team. I haven't seen the value for the sab yet. It's a weird mechanic. The team though can rip into speeder bikes fairly well. Snipers however are amazing at controlling the board. BUT there are key factors you must take into account. 1. Terrain, you need tall and near your deployment zone. As you build the table be aware of where your nest will or could be. You will get to do a to speed move when you deploy so line up with your nest so that at deployment you are at the bottom. Turn one use grappling hooks to Clamber to the top of the nest. Turns 2-6 aim fire repeat. They need the aim is important. 2. Environmental Conditions if " LOW Visibility" is on the table eliminate it as quickly as possible. My first game we got stuck with that and my snipers waited forever to shoot. 3. You want them away from enemy troops always. In time I can see dropping one sniper team for wookies. If you time and place it right with Liea on round two you can great an opening salvo across three activations that will really hinder the enemy. Bombardment 3 attacks 2 red die (6 potentail kills 3 suppression) Both snipers (1 black 1 white each 0-4 potential kills and 2 more suppression) you can do all this while still in your opponent is a ways away from you. Snipers are a deterrent unit or for killing that lone trooper leader on an objective from across the board. If you get them high it is **** near impossible to hit them. I absolutely love them. They are not the best unit in the game or most damaging but they are really fun to play.

3 hours ago, Gun4hire said:

Honestly i think the sniper, as is, is overcosted for what he does. In only a two man squad your paying 44 pts for average 1 damage per activation. He would be amazing if he had the ability to aim at a specific unit. For instance an ability like.....

SCOPE: If you spend an aim token during this attack pick one model in the unit your targeting and deal all wounds to that model.

The two man team is actually pretty efficient for what it does, with an aim token. Reliably picking up 1-2 models a turn for only a 44 point investment is very solid.

Right now the only ability that allows you to deal wounds to specific models is Force Choke, which is a range 1 force power currently only equippable by Vader himself.

An unlimited range equivalent of this available to a common unit would be grossly overpowered. I’d pay 100 points or more for something that could just pick up Z-6s and DLTs from across the map.

It's a supper cheap activation. Anything more than that is gravy.

I view them as having a few uses.

Suppression at will due to range and odds are I'll hit something.

Cheap activation.

Mop up duty for troop leaders.

Potshots at leaders for S&G.

You dont bring them to the table to win the table on their own. They're there to give options and play a heavily specialized role that was previously non-existent.

I already have mine on preorder.

take a full unit with sniper and hunter, split fire the sniper first at their wounded commander/operative/guard unit to get a free aim token which you then save for the main unit shots

Full unit with sniper feels like a good hammer unit with sharpshooter and pierce 1. That is how I am going to run them, then 1 small unit with proton charge, will also convert 1 team from spare ion troopers so I can run 2 if I want.

Going to fun and see how people will run these, in what constellation, if there is going to be a default way of using them or if all different ways will be viable.

So I ran them agian last night in a slightly different config. 2-man sab team, 2-man sniper, 4-man with a sniper. This was insanely effective. The 2-man sab was free to move and drop charges. The larger unit had emergency stems and was absolutely leathal at range 3 with an aim. The 2-man sniper was very effective against wounded bikes. If you can use Leia’s bombardment against bikes the snipers should than hit them to kill at least one for each sniper you have. I found this to be highly effective in round one. I have yet to really see the benefit to the sab but that had more to do with poor planing on my part. They did however take 3 activations by my opponent to be killed. So they soaked up a fair amount of damage. My 2-man sniper team was killed when my opponent ran a trooper unit into mellee with them and punched them to death. Snipers really need to be established quickly and out of harms way. They are most effective with an aim at range three so you can use 2 black and 1 white.