Hello, everyone!

I'm a big Star Wars fan and got my copy of Imperial Assault a couple of years ago. I mostly game by myself for now, however, and was wondering if the app provides a decent experience for just one player. Money's tight, and I would love to pick up an immersive campaign experience for just five bucks. What do you guys think? Would you recommend the Legends app for one player only, and is a copy of Jabba's Realm worth picking up at some point too?

Thanks in advance!

12 minutes ago, Mindless Philosopher said:

Would you recommend the Legends app for one player only, and is a copy of Jabba's Realm worth picking up at some point too?

If you are going to be getting Jabba's Realm at some point, then yes. With just core, it depends... I don't think the first (Flight of the Freedom Fighter) campaign is as replayable as Jabba's Realm. I have played FoFF twice solo, once with my group, and Jabba's Realm 4 times, waiting to play with my group at some point.

I think you'll have an even more immersive experience playing solo, because you can spend exactly as long as you want reading the flavor text and making decisions as you like. I don't usually pay much attention to flavor, but especially Jabba's Realm got me reading everything very closely.

51 minutes ago, Mindless Philosopher said:

Hello, everyone!

I'm a big Star Wars fan and got my copy of Imperial Assault a couple of years ago. I mostly game by myself for now, however, and was wondering if the app provides a decent experience for just one player. Money's tight, and I would love to pick up an immersive campaign experience for just five bucks. What do you guys think? Would you recommend the Legends app for one player only, and is a copy of Jabba's Realm worth picking up at some point too?

Thanks in advance!

I just played through the Jabba's Realm campaign on the app solo and I loved it. I did 4 characters, but some people do two in order not to have so much to keep track of, but I am all in for a 4 man team.

I'd echo a1bert and Rikalonius' sentiments here.

Flight of the Freedom Fighter was a nice bonus for those of us who already own IA and have played most (if not all) of the campaigns multiple times.

But Jabba's Realm is where its at. More replayability. More interesting missions. (plus the box comes with some pretty good figures)

Additionally, while it might seem like more to keep track of (it is), 4 heroes is much more fun than 2 in my opinion.

It's like having more tools for the job, and the puzzle of which tool to use at what time is a large part of the fun.

I always play with 4 heroes too. And which hero to activate first/next is what takes a lot of thought - and that's part of the experience for me. (When playing solo in the Hard mode. With the group we play in Normal and in a more casual way, the others are not as experienced as me.)

One other thing I forgot to say: playing Flight of the Freedom Fighter first with just the core set, then again with Jabba's Realm enabled will make it a different experience because you'll get different imperial/mercenary groups. The more boxed expansions you have the more varied the enemies will be.

Do the other expansions react with the app in any way? If I'm going to be playing mostly solo, is it worth picking any of them up? The sapper Wookiee looks like a lot of fun...xD

1. You can play with any hero from the core or boxed expansions.
2. The app uses non-unique groups and villains from the core and expansions you have.
3. You get ally encounters randomly offered from the core and expansions you have.

(I have everything, so the enemies vary, and fortunately they vary. Stormtroopers with the reinforce bonus and Last Stand are very annoying, and Snowtroopers at 4 health are annoying as heck for them allowing other figures to recover damage and having that annoying 4th Health which makes a big difference early on. Most two-figure groups are not that scary, although they pack a punch. Gamorrean Guards are very scary though if you can't defeat one in two attacks. And so on, and so on... And the activation bonuses of figures vary also, so they do not do the same things round after round. There's a lot to explore.)

29 minutes ago, a1bert said:

1. You can play with any hero from the core or boxed expansions.
2. The app uses non-unique groups and villains from the core and expansions you have.
3. You get ally encounters randomly offered from the core and expansions you have.

(I have everything, so the enemies vary, and fortunately they vary. Stormtroopers with the reinforce bonus and Last Stand are very annoying, and Snowtroopers at 4 health are annoying as heck for them allowing other figures to recover damage and having that annoying 4th Health which makes a big difference early on. Most two-figure groups are not that scary, although they pack a punch. Gamorrean Guards are very scary though if you can't defeat one in two attacks. And so on, and so on... And the activation bonuses of figures vary also, so they do not do the same things round after round. There's a lot to explore.)

How about Jet Troopers who are immediately warped to their target and get that free extra blue dice. They are very survivable, but rather annoying, especially if their bonus is 'jet blast'

This is a bit of a tangent, but I am looking to expand my collection of games this holiday season. As I expect to play a good deal of solo games until I can find a local group, I was wondering what you guys think of a few thematic titles I've looked at. I want something fun, but not too braindead. These looked good:

Swords & Sorcery

Island Spirits

Gloomhaven (durr, but I might have to save up for a few months)

Scythe

Mage Knight

Heroes of Terrinoth (I think this is the Warhammer Quest game reskinned...?)

One-Deck Dungeon

Any advice or recs for other games would be appreciated. Thanks!

Anyway, back on topic: are the base rules still the same for the app as they are for the physical game? I understand there's a tutorial mission or two anyway, so it probably doesn't matter, but still.

31 minutes ago, Mindless Philosopher said:

Anyway, back on topic: are the base rules still the same for the app as they are for the physical game? I understand there's a tutorial mission or two anyway, so it probably doesn't matter, but still.

Most of the rules are the same. The biggest differences are:
- When recovering strain, heroes no longer recover damage for each strain not recovered. This means you need to spend a medpac when resting to recover damage (5dmg), or abilities that specifically recover damage (Emegency Medpac, Bacta Infusion, some item cards, MHD-19).
- Blast does not affect friendly figures and massive figures can enter interior spaces (to make imperial life easier).
- Supply cards that deal with credits (and some others) are removed.

In addition the imperial class decks or agenda cards are not used, they are replaced by the instruction list of groups and activation-specific bonuses. Optional ("may", "choose") and some specific abilities of imperial groups have been removed (can be seen from the group icon's Info section). Imperial figures spend the appropriate power tokens as soon as they can and can spend more than 1 at a time.

These are listed on page 21 of the LotA rulebook. https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/products/star-wars-imperial-assault/

Edit: almost forgot the best differences (which make the app play slightly but sufficiently different to normal campaign to warrant its own perspective on which heroes and class cards are best with the app - there are more things to try and explore even for a very experienced campaign player):
1. Purchased items can be sold at full price
2. Class cards are unlocked one XP level at a time, so you get one class card after each mission (can choose 1 from each XP level, or get one from any previous level instead).

49 minutes ago, Mindless Philosopher said:

This is a bit of a tangent, but I am looking to expand my collection of games this holiday season. As I expect to play a good deal of solo games until I can find a local group, I was wondering what you guys think of a few thematic titles I've looked at. I want something fun, but not too braindead. These looked good:

Swords & Sorcery

Island Spirits

Gloomhaven (durr, but I might have to save up for a few months)

Scythe

Mage Knight

Heroes of Terrinoth (I think this is the Warhammer Quest game reskinned...?)

One-Deck Dungeon

Any advice or recs for other games would be appreciated. Thanks!

I also do 99% of my gaming solo, and I'll echo everyone here that the app, particularly the Jabba campaign, is super fun for solo play. If you've already got the core then it's definitely worthwhile!

Regarding other solo games, even if you have to save a bit and put it off I would 100% recommend Gloomhaven. It's a spectacular game, and there's just so. much. stuff. I played nothing else for a long time after I bought it, and I'm still going through the same campaign and unlocking new characters (probably 40-50 missions in or so all told - I've finally unlocked what I'm pretty sure is the "final boss" scenario, but I don't want to play it until I've gone through all of my open side missions). Plus the designer has been releasing free additional campaigns where players vote on story decisions as they go through. I haven't done any of the voting, but it's crazy to think that there are still 20 extra missions with different stories available without needing to buy any additional expansions (which, I might add, are also coming, just in case you need even more ). So long story short, it's an expensive purchase but the value for your money is insane. If I divide the cost by the total number of hours I've spent enjoying it, it would probably be one of my cheaper games at this point!

As for the rest of your list, I've played and enjoyed Scythe but I've never tried solo and I'm not convinced it would have a lot of longevity playing against the automaton (but I haven't tried it, so who knows!). I also have Mage Knight, but for whatever reason that one kind of fell flat for me. The core puzzle was nice, but there are just so many little rules and exceptions that I felt like I was spending more time checking things in the rule book than playing, even on my third game. Take this "review" with a big grain of salt though, since everyone else seems to love this one, but it just didn't click for me in the same way some other games have. I keep telling myself I should go back and try it again sometime, but in the event that I've got that kind of spare time I always find I'd rather just set up Imperial Assault or Gloomhaven instead

Finally, I was really pleasantly surprised by the new Arkham Horror LCG. I put it off for a long time because I didn't want to get into another FFG game with so many expansions, but with IA releases slowing down I finally bit the bullet and bought the core set, then later the Carcosa cycle once I found that I loved it. They really do a fantastic job telling an immersive story in that game with just a few lines of text and some really novel mission mechanics, and it's lead to some of the most fun solo gaming sessions that I've had. Be warned, though, that like all expandable FFG stuff it doesn't come cheap once you start collecting. As much as I love it I'm still not sure if I want to buy any more, since I'm trying to avoid falling down that financial rabbit hole for as long as I can.

3 hours ago, Mindless Philosopher said:

This is a bit of a tangent, but I am looking to expand my collection of games this holiday season. As I expect to play a good deal of solo games until I can find a local group, I was wondering what you guys think of a few thematic titles I've looked at. I want something fun, but not too braindead. These looked good:

Swords & Sorcery

Island Spirits

Gloomhaven (durr, but I might have to save up for a few months)

Scythe

Mage Knight

Heroes of Terrinoth (I think this is the Warhammer Quest game reskinned...?)

One-Deck Dungeon

Any advice or recs for other games would be appreciated. Thanks!

Anyway, back on topic: are the base rules still the same for the app as they are for the physical game? I understand there's a tutorial mission or two anyway, so it probably doesn't matter, but still.

I too play mostly solo and found One-Deck Dungeon interesting. I decided to purchase it on Steam and found it to be just an OK little card/dice game to pass the time. It's a bit of a grind and every dungeon feels pretty much the same. I usually always lose the boss fights until I build up enough abilities and potions. It's a bit repetitive but if you like rolling dice and leveling up it's cheap enough to give it a try.

This is all super-helpful! Thanks so much, everyone.

Oooh, couple more questions I forgot to ask!

Is it easier to use on a phone, or a tablet? I have both.

Also, is it now free? I thought it was five bucks...what's going on here?

Like I said, I appreciate all the help!

1 hour ago, Mindless Philosopher said:

Oooh, couple more questions I forgot to ask!

Is it easier to use on a phone, or a tablet? I have both.

Also, is it now free? I thought it was five bucks...what's going on here?

Like I said, I appreciate all the help!

I personally would use it on a tablet. A phone is too small, in my opinion. Either if you plugged it into a monitor though.

3 hours ago, Mindless Philosopher said:

Oooh, couple more questions I forgot to ask!

Is it easier to use on a phone, or a tablet? I have both.

Also, is it now free? I thought it was five bucks...what's going on here?

Like I said, I appreciate all the help!

Personally, I prefer to use my laptop, but a tablet would be fine. I’m just like having easy access to the data files in case there’s an issue.

Regarding the cost: It’s actually always been free.

I've been playing using my laptop; my tablet died and I think the phone is too small.

My experience is showing that:

a.), The app is quite fun solo- I have a four hero group running through right now, and its going well and I'm enjoying it quite a bit. (CT-1701, Ko-Tun, Drokatta, and Jyn).

b.) The more content you have available for it to play with, the better. I'm currently re-playing Freedom Fighter (waiting for a copy of Jabba's Realm from the post office...), and compared to earlier efforts, my expanded collection is making it more interesting already. And more thematic. I theorize that the app's deployments are based on an available pool of "threat" to spend, so when it was at a low threat deployment, it almost invariably would start sending waves of Imperial officers and probe droids, until I added Lothal to the collection. Death Troopers make for a much more fitting deployment group, and my last mission came down to running for a shuttle, protecting prisoners, while being headed off by one eDeath Trooper, 2 regulars, plus an Imperial Officer (in ISB dress) and a single probe droid. That looked a lot more like Star Wars than three officers and three probe droids...

As an example of the app's success, as I was playing, I was finding myself invested enough in the game beyond simple mechanics that I was starting to see the dynamics of the squad- CT-1701 is emerging in the back of my head as the squad leader, though Ko-Tun is enough of a tactician and leader in her own right that she occasionally takes the lead in the heat of battle. That still left the voice and personality of a clone trooper in my head helping to dictate the responses I'd use during encounters. One of my "tests" of a game system like this is to look at how much the game immerses me in the narrative side of the game, rather than just paying attention to the mechanics. Playing solo, the app has passed that test. The mechanics are simple enough that they don't detract from the experience, so you can focus on the evolving story on your tabletop (and in your device, which is serving as the "Imperial Player").

On 11/27/2018 at 5:45 AM, Mindless Philosopher said:

This is a bit of a tangent, but I am looking to expand my collection of games this holiday season. As I expect to play a good deal of solo games until I can find a local group, I was wondering what you guys think of a few thematic titles I've looked at. I want something fun, but not too braindead. These looked good:

Swords & Sorcery

Island Spirits

Gloomhaven (durr, but I might have to save up for a few months)

Scythe

Mage Knight

Heroes of Terrinoth (I think this is the Warhammer Quest game reskinned...?)

One-Deck Dungeon

Any advice or recs for other games would be appreciated. Thanks!

Anyway, back on topic: are the base rules still the same for the app as they are for the physical game? I understand there's a tutorial mission or two anyway, so it probably doesn't matter, but still.

Also want to add another game by Fantasy Flight that is incredible solo and multiplayer is Lord of the Rings Living Card game, hands down the greatest solo game I have ever played and my wife enjoys coop as much as our four person gamer group enjoys the multiplayer coop. Definitely check it out.

On 11/26/2018 at 1:29 PM, a1bert said:

If you are going to be getting Jabba's Realm at some point, then yes. With just core, it depends... I don't think the first (Flight of the Freedom Fighter) campaign is as replayable as Jabba's Realm. I have played FoFF twice solo, once with my group, and Jabba's Realm 4 times, waiting to play with my group at some point.

I think you'll have an even more immersive experience playing solo, because you can spend exactly as long as you want reading the flavor text and making decisions as you like. I don't usually pay much attention to flavor, but especially Jabba's Realm got me reading everything very closely.

This. I've enjoyed playing solo just as much if not more than with a group for the app.

LOTR LCG is amazing, love it. Especially if you are a fan of the books, as the lore takes from there not the movies. However since LOTR is later in its life cycle, it is very difficult to find physical product. I basically just collect what I can find as it comes out in re print, then once I have a full cycle or a new Saga expansion, I play that through. But I've been at it or a few years now, it's tough going. So don't expect to just hop into that one and be able to advance at a rapid rate through content.

My secret dream is that one day they release a Star Wars LCG with the same format as LOTR.. oh man would that be amazing.

4 hours ago, FrogTrigger said:

This. I've enjoyed playing solo just as much if not more than with a group for the app.

LOTR LCG is amazing, love it. Especially if you are a fan of the books, as the lore takes from there not the movies. However since LOTR is later in its life cycle, it is very difficult to find physical product. I basically just collect what I can find as it comes out in re print, then once I have a full cycle or a new Saga expansion, I play that through. But I've been at it or a few years now, it's tough going. So don't expect to just hop into that one and be able to advance at a rapid rate through content.

My secret dream is that one day they release a Star Wars LCG with the same format as LOTR.. oh man would that be amazing.

Yes! I wish that's what Star Wars LCG would have been. Would be amazing! Also the trouble of finding physical LOTR product is a never-ending one. Mountain of Fire in particular.