I think this is where we post this sorta stuff: house rules and such.

Background: our group has been playing a house rule where you can earn unused heroes as allies.
- basically, you just play their hero-specific side mission (with them as a forced guest star) and you earn the hero as an ally rather than their hero specific reward card
- We've ran this in a couple campaigns already. While there's some minor further adjustments to be made in set-up, on the whole it works fantastic. (I'm just skipping those specifics since it's a boring read)

Being said, after playing with newer characters we're seeing the same pricing/value gap everyone else is. So this is our attempt to rework them.
- we tried to keep this easy to remember
- I'm also providing our frame of reference and logic so you can at least see where we were heading (even if we missed the mark)

Diala Passil
(unfortunately leading out with the most complex update)

• Same Price and stats
• Shattering Blow gets replaced with Way of the Sarlacc (attack all adjacent figures)
  • note: counter-balanced by her low skirmish health
• Gains Lightsaber throw (same as Grand Inquisitor: ranged attack, red/yellow, +3 accuracy)
  • note they're both attacks, so it's one or the other
• gains action: lesser force throw (target figure within 2 spaces gets pushed 2 spaces ... no damage
  • ... should this be a regular force throw? within 3 spaces, pushed 3, 1 damage?
• Foresight remains
• reference point: Grand Inquisitor
  • logic: she costs 2 less and has roughly half the health. This makes her a risk/reward glass cannon. A pack of storm troopers could potentially take her out in a single round

Fenn Signis

• Reduce price from 9 to 6, other stats remain
• Assault remains
• Trooper Assault remains in skirmish
  • In campaign this gets replaced with Joint Assault: once per round, after an ally resolves an attack, Fenn may attack the same target but removes 1 attack die from pool
    • This change was made since Trooper Assault effectively provides an additional attack. Since that's not an issue when commanding heroes, having Fenn deliver the attack himself gets the job done effectively.
• Reference Point: most other trooper figures
  • logic: he's a solid character, adjusting the price was really all we needed to do. POSSIBLY change price to 7 instead of to 6

Gaarkhan

• Same price, change health to 14 (same as hero card), remove auto-block.
• Enraged stays
• Charge gains "this attack gains surge: rampage " with similar rules as his XP upgrade (1 damage to all adjacent hostile figures)
• POSSIBLY surge recover 1 damage?
• Reference Point: Gamorean Guards, Royal Guards
  • logic: Gaarkhan's fun to play, but his survivability really suffers for an 8-point character (like, sending skirmish gaark against 2 royal guard is a terrible idea). So the increased health should help balance it.

Gideon Argus

• No changes to price, stats, or abilities for skirmish
• Tactical Manuever, in campaign, should be replaced with Order (target figure can move instead of just 2 movement points)
• SPECIAL EXCEPTION: if the player unlocks and deploys gideon, they may ALSO simultaneously deploy regular Rebel Troopers (or as Gideon calls them, Saber Team). Same deployment rules apply
• Reference Point: Imperial Officer + Storm Trooper combo
  • logic: Point value, Gideon's pretty effective, so we didn't feel the need to change his skirmish card (outside of a functional issue of Tactical Manuever). But a 3 point Ally by his onesies is pretty underwhelming. That's why they come as as a batch.

Jyn Odan

• The only change is increasing her health from 6 to 9.
• Reference Point: Vinto
  • logic: Jyn and Vinto have really comparable card abilities and similar pricing. So the HP boost is more to put Jyn on par with Vinto

Luke Skywalker
(may's well mention)

• Reduce price from 10 to 7
  • logic: thematically it doesn't make sense to adjust what he does. We're pretty sure the price is all you'd really need in order to balance it

Mak Eshka'rey
(sorry, this one's a little complicated as well)

• POSSIBLY +2 cost (to 5 total), +1 HP (to 5 total) (see below in the logic section)
• Priority Target remains
• Critical Hit: in campaign this gets updated to "This attack gains Pierce 2. if this attack defeats a hostile figure, recover 2 HP"
• gains "Covert: figures 4 or more spaces away from Mak do not have line of sight"
• for campaign gains "Special Action - Rebel Supply Lines: Once per mission, draw a card from the item deck"
• for skirmish gains "Special Action - Rebel Intelligence: Once per mission, draw a card from the command deck"
  • logic: We found covert to be THE defining trait of regular Mak in campaign, frequently forcing troopers to get uncomfortably close just to get a shot in. It feels necessary to include it. While most of his other XP upgrades were covered in the rest of his card, his Rebel Supply Lines upgrade felt like the most one-of-a-kind thing he had. So, it made sense to include it. However, Rebel Supply Lines is a powerful ability, so increasing the cost and HP felt necessary.

anyhoo, there's all that nonsense.

Let me know what you think of these reworks. Did we hit the mark? Do you see points where we could simplify it or make it closer to their hero-play experience?

And if you want to know the extended rules/balancing for doing the whole "unlock unused heroes as allies" bit, also let me know.

I think you can use the app in this post to create fixed cards:

1 hour ago, Golan Trevize said:

I think you can use the app in this post to create fixed cards:

duuuuude. serious thanks on that find for me. ^^

2 hours ago, Golan Trevize said:

I think you can use the app in this post to create fixed cards:

seriously again, thanks for the heads up. ^__^

10 hours ago, thinkbomb said:

I think this is where we post this sorta stuff: house rules and such.

Background: our group has been playing a house rule where you can earn unused heroes as allies.
- basically, you just play their hero-specific side mission (with them as a forced guest star) and you earn the hero as an ally rather than their hero specific reward card
- We've ran this in a couple campaigns already. While there's some minor further adjustments to be made in set-up, on the whole it works fantastic. (I'm just skipping those specifics since it's a boring read)

Being said, after playing with newer characters we're seeing the same pricing/value gap everyone else is. So this is our attempt to rework them.
- we tried to keep this easy to remember
- I'm also providing our frame of reference and logic so you can at least see where we were heading (even if we missed the mark)

Diala Passil
(unfortunately leading out with the most complex update)

• Same Price and stats
• Shattering Blow gets replaced with Way of the Sarlacc (attack all adjacent figures)
  • note: counter-balanced by her low skirmish health
• Gains Lightsaber throw (same as Grand Inquisitor: ranged attack, red/yellow, +3 accuracy)
  • note they're both attacks, so it's one or the other
• gains action: lesser force throw (target figure within 2 spaces gets pushed 2 spaces ... no damage
  • ... should this be a regular force throw? within 3 spaces, pushed 3, 1 damage?
• Foresight remains
• reference point: Grand Inquisitor
  • logic: she costs 2 less and has roughly half the health. This makes her a risk/reward glass cannon. A pack of storm troopers could potentially take her out in a single round

Fenn Signis

• Reduce price from 9 to 6, other stats remain
• Assault remains
• Trooper Assault remains in skirmish
  • In campaign this gets replaced with Joint Assault: once per round, after an ally resolves an attack, Fenn may attack the same target but removes 1 attack die from pool
    • This change was made since Trooper Assault effectively provides an additional attack. Since that's not an issue when commanding heroes, having Fenn deliver the attack himself gets the job done effectively.
• Reference Point: most other trooper figures
  • logic: he's a solid character, adjusting the price was really all we needed to do. POSSIBLY change price to 7 instead of to 6

Gaarkhan

• Same price, change health to 14 (same as hero card), remove auto-block.
• Enraged stays
• Charge gains "this attack gains surge: rampage " with similar rules as his XP upgrade (1 damage to all adjacent hostile figures)
• POSSIBLY surge recover 1 damage?
• Reference Point: Gamorean Guards, Royal Guards
  • logic: Gaarkhan's fun to play, but his survivability really suffers for an 8-point character (like, sending skirmish gaark against 2 royal guard is a terrible idea). So the increased health should help balance it.

Gideon Argus

• No changes to price, stats, or abilities for skirmish
• Tactical Manuever, in campaign, should be replaced with Order (target figure can move instead of just 2 movement points)
• SPECIAL EXCEPTION: if the player unlocks and deploys gideon, they may ALSO simultaneously deploy regular Rebel Troopers (or as Gideon calls them, Saber Team). Same deployment rules apply
• Reference Point: Imperial Officer + Storm Trooper combo
  • logic: Point value, Gideon's pretty effective, so we didn't feel the need to change his skirmish card (outside of a functional issue of Tactical Manuever). But a 3 point Ally by his onesies is pretty underwhelming. That's why they come as as a batch.

Jyn Odan

• The only change is increasing her health from 6 to 9.
• Reference Point: Vinto
  • logic: Jyn and Vinto have really comparable card abilities and similar pricing. So the HP boost is more to put Jyn on par with Vinto

Luke Skywalker
(may's well mention)

• Reduce price from 10 to 7
  • logic: thematically it doesn't make sense to adjust what he does. We're pretty sure the price is all you'd really need in order to balance it

Mak Eshka'rey
(sorry, this one's a little complicated as well)

• POSSIBLY +2 cost (to 5 total), +1 HP (to 5 total) (see below in the logic section)
• Priority Target remains
• Critical Hit: in campaign this gets updated to "This attack gains Pierce 2. if this attack defeats a hostile figure, recover 2 HP"
• gains "Covert: figures 4 or more spaces away from Mak do not have line of sight"
• for campaign gains "Special Action - Rebel Supply Lines: Once per mission, draw a card from the item deck"
• for skirmish gains "Special Action - Rebel Intelligence: Once per mission, draw a card from the command deck"
  • logic: We found covert to be THE defining trait of regular Mak in campaign, frequently forcing troopers to get uncomfortably close just to get a shot in. It feels necessary to include it. While most of his other XP upgrades were covered in the rest of his card, his Rebel Supply Lines upgrade felt like the most one-of-a-kind thing he had. So, it made sense to include it. However, Rebel Supply Lines is a powerful ability, so increasing the cost and HP felt necessary.

anyhoo, there's all that nonsense.

Let me know what you think of these reworks. Did we hit the mark? Do you see points where we could simplify it or make it closer to their hero-play experience?

And if you want to know the extended rules/balancing for doing the whole "unlock unused heroes as allies" bit, also let me know.

there's 100s of posts like this in the skirmish side. I think you're off on the point cost or abilities quite a bit but that's skewed from a skirmish viewpoint. Campaign mileage may vary.