This card is completely broken. Without spending an action you get 2 stuns and weakens. I can't deploy my stuff because I already know my best 2 activations will be basically off for the round, if I'm lucky I will get an attack on a suboptimal target leaving my best stuff exposed.

Any idea?

Not to mention that the attack doesn't even have to hit. As long as you have line of sight to a unit, you can "pin down" 2 down other units that you don't need line of sight to.

There should be a couple more limits on this card. It should read as such:
"Exhaust this card after you attack with a [ranged] weapon. If the target suffered damage choose up to 2 hostile figures with a cost of 5 or less, within 2 spaces of the target space and in your line of sight. You may choose to stun or weaken those figures"

That seems much more appropriate for 2xp, albeit a little wordy.

"Put your head up and I'll take it off" should read "Exist with a 5 square radius of another unit and get wrecked".

3 hours ago, thestag said:

Not to mention that the attack doesn't even have to hit. As long as you have line of sight to a unit, you can "pin down" 2 down other units that you don't need line of sight to.

There should be a couple more limits on this card. It should read as such:
"Exhaust this card after you attack with a [ranged] weapon. If the target suffered damage choose up to 2 hostile figures with a cost of 5 or less, within 2 spaces of the target space and in your line of sight. You may choose to stun or weaken those figures"

That seems much more appropriate for 2xp, albeit a little wordy.

"Put your head up and I'll take it off" should read "Exist with a 5 square radius of another unit and get wrecked".

I agree but is there any way to partially counter that?

I am playing a Lothal campaign this weekend and we intend to use the two new heroes as well as two older ones in the campaign. Myself and one of my buddies are the Rebels, with another playing as the Imperials. I don’t like when things feel unbalanced and Wildfire’s Pin Them Down card seems really broken to me.

Without seeing him in action yet, I imagine that the only way to get around Pin Them Down is to focus on making sure Wildfire is removed from the battle. That was the only way I could deal with Shyla when she was cleaving for 5 during each attack.

Our game group has a little “ban list” of heroes going that we have mutually agreed upon that includes Shyla and Gideon, with Mak and Murne being close to on the list. I imagine Wildfire may be placed onto the list as well.

I faced off against a Rebel team that included CT-1701 (referred to as "CT" and then colloquially as "Cheese Taco") in two consecutive campaigns. Pin Them Down is a nightmare. It's the Rebel equivalent to Subversive Tactics i.e. not fun for the player on the receiving end. The only partial counter I had to this was saving up threat and then deploying strong units to multiple deployment points. He would have to choose which to Pin Down and which to get hit by.

I would agree that the card should probably be at 3xp level, or only stun or weaken, or require a hit on the target.

Rebel team also had Gideon so CT was getting multiple attacks and Pin Them Down without even having his activation yet and then doing it all over again. Just brutal.

9 hours ago, Trevize84 said:

I agree but is there any way to partially counter that?

Sure.

If the attack requires damage to be done, then there are ways to deal with that. Several Imperial Class cards give options to boost defense in one way or another. Assault Armor (Military Might), Reactive Armor (Armored Onslaught) and Shielded (Reactive defenses) just to name a few. None of these are sure fire ways to avoid being 'pinned down', but it wouldn't be fun for the rebels if you could %100 counter it. There are also some Agenda cards that offer options to mitigate damage and reduce the chance of triggering "Pin them Down".

If you need the targets to be in line of sight, just hide them away (often easier said than done).

If the targets need to be below a certain deployment cost, then choose expensive options for open groups (easier in the latter parts of the campaign). But there is something to be said for building up threat and only deploying every other option, regardless of the situation.

So there are options, more than there are with the RAW it seems.

2 hours ago, Funky_4LOM said:

Without seeing him in action yet, I imagine that the only way to get around Pin Them Down is to focus on making sure Wildfire is removed from the battle. That was the only way I could deal with Shyla when she was cleaving for 5 during each attack.

It's already hard to get some actual damage and deal with objectives, I can't think of defeating CT twice. It's 24 damage with 1 black die. It's like wasting around 30 damages on him. Also in the meantime Onar with hand cannon and don't make me hurt you kill everyone else.

1 minute ago, thestag said:

Sure.

If the attack requires damage to be done, then there are ways to deal with that. Several Imperial Class cards give options to boost defense in one way or another. Assault Armor (Military Might), Reactive Armor (Armored Onslaught) and Shielded (Reactive defenses) just to name a few. None of these are sure fire ways to avoid being 'pinned down', but it wouldn't be fun for the rebels if you could %100 counter it. There are also some Agenda cards that offer options to mitigate damage and reduce the chance of triggering "Pin them Down".

If you need the targets to be in line of sight, just hide them away (often easier said than done).

If the targets need to be below a certain deployment cost, then choose expensive options for open groups (easier in the latter parts of the campaign). But there is something to be said for building up threat and only deploying every other option, regardless of the situation.

So there are options, more than there are with the RAW it seems.

I was also going to mention, the card requires the two figures to be within 2 squares of the target, so keeping units spread apart should help to mitigate the usefulness, much as keeping them apart would help against Blast or Cleave.

A question: can you use the Stun/Weakened on the original target? The card says to “choose up to 2 hostile figures within 2 spaces of the target space”. The card does not say to pick “up to 2 other hostile figures”, so I imagine you can use it on the original target.

1 minute ago, Funky_4LOM said:

I was also going to mention, the card requires the two figures to be within 2 squares of the target, so keeping units spread apart should help to mitigate the usefulness, much as keeping them apart would help against Blast or Cleave.

A question: can you use the Stun/Weakened on the original target? The card says to “choose up to 2 hostile figures within 2 spaces of the target space”. The card does not say to pick “up to 2 other hostile figures”, so I imagine you can use it on the original target.

Yes you can use it on the target, and no you can't spread enough in case of strict map constraints or right after deployments.

1 hour ago, MFL said:

The only partial counter I had to this was saving up threat and then deploying strong units to multiple deployment points. He would have to choose which to Pin Down and which to get hit by.

I kind of do this but having the threat for that is rare. Also you can't always leave the board empty to save threat, often you need to deal with objectives.

14 minutes ago, Trevize84 said:

Yes you can use it on the target, and no you can't spread enough in case of strict map constraints or right after deployments.

What class deck are you using?

1 hour ago, MFL said:

Rebel team also had Gideon so CT was getting multiple attacks and Pin Them Down without even having his activation yet and then doing it all over again.

With 4 heroes, only up to two uses of Pin Them Down on the first round, then once per round. (Cards of heroes do not ready during the ready step of the status phase, only at the start of their activation.)

(No, I haven't played against Pin Them Down yet, and I won't bother getting it in the app - usually defeating figures is more important than stunning / weakening them - so spending the XP for something else. Instead of high-cost figures I would probably try the other way: swarm figures - if CT stuns them instead of defeating, swell.)

42 minutes ago, Funky_4LOM said:

I  was   also going to mention, the card requires the two figures to be within 2 sq  uares of the target, so keeping units spread apart should help to mitigate the usefulness, much as keeping the  m apart would help against Blast or Cleave.    

The problem with that is the size of the area. You’re talking about a 5x5 grid centered on the target of the attack. Moving figures out of an area that big is often really limiting when it comes time for their next activation.

Yeah this card is fundamentally broken in its current state. I mentioned in the CT-1701 XP build thread that I think it's the best XP card in the game, even if it was 4 XP it's still ridiculous. I'm surprised it made its way through playtesting.

I wonder if “house-ruling” the card to be for 1 target rather than 2 would make the card a little less-broken. Even then, it still seems very powerful.

I’ll see how my Lothal campaign goes this weekend and bring it up with the guys once this comes up because I know it will.

2 hours ago, Funky_4LOM said:

What class deck are you using?

Overwhelming oppression. We are using full content from latest expansion and wave 11 integrating missing parts with previous expansions.

2 hours ago, Funky_4LOM said:

I wonder if “house-ruling” the card to be for 1 target rather than 2 would make the card a little less-broken. Even then, it still seems very powerful.

I’ll see how my Lothal campaign goes this weekend and bring it up with the guys once this comes up because I know it will.

Look I believe this should require at least one damage and cost 1 action and 2 strains minimum. This way it would still be a must have card. Because you traded 1 action for 2 imperial actions and 1 strain for 1 weaken.

I wonder, could it be argued that you have to inflict dmg on the original target for the effect to occur? You have to cause dmg to inflict conditions on targets, right? (Or is that only true for conditions that require spending surge?). If you have to inflict dmg on the original target, you'll technically make it a little bit harder to pull off the card and you eliminate the option of targeting empty spaces to Weaken & Stun nearby badies. Thoughts?

Update: No, wait! You cannot target an empty space so that is not an issue. You can, though, often attack doors and terminals etc., so it's an easy card to pull off.

(Frankly, one of the strongest sides to CT is that he's not only awesome but he's very easy to use; he ALWAYS have good options to pull off his powers. Oh man, one of my players are soooo going to love playing this guy! )

13 minutes ago, angelman2 said:

I wonder, could it be argued that you have to inflict dmg on the original target for the effect to occur? You have to cause dmg to inflict conditions on targets, right? (Or is that only true for conditions that require spending surge?). If you have to inflict dmg on the original target, you'll technically make it a little bit harder to pull off the card and you eliminate the option of targeting empty spaces to Weaken & Stun nearby badies. Thoughts?

Update: No, wait! You cannot target an empty space so that is not an issue. You can, though, often attack doors and terminals etc., so it's an easy card to pull off.

(Frankly, one of the strongest sides to CT is that he's not only awesome but he's very easy to use; he ALWAYS have good options to pull off his powers. Oh man, one of my players are soooo going to love playing this guy! )

Your Update really made me like the card even less lol

43 minutes ago, angelman2 said:

Or  is that only true for conditions that require spending surg  e  ?     

The damage requirement only applies to Blast, Cleave, and condition keywords . Stun, Bleed, and Weaken are the negative condition keywords so they require damage; Stunned, Bleeding, and Weakened are the negative conditions so they do not.

And, of course, the same applies to Focus versus Focused and Hide versus Hidden.

22 hours ago, a1bert said:

With 4 heroes, only up to two uses of Pin Them Down on the first round, then once per round. (Cards of heroes do not ready during the ready step of the status phase, only at the start of their activation.)

(No, I haven't played against Pin Them Down yet, and I won't bother getting it in the app - usually defeating figures is more important than stunning / weakening them - so spending the XP for something else. Instead of high-cost figures I would probably try the other way: swarm figures - if CT stuns them instead of defeating, swell.)

Did follow that rule but that first round is completely devastating.

I'm starting to think that Embrace Suffering is the only good counter to this ability. If the heroes take CT then the IP would need to take Power of the Dark Side. Just save threat while the heroes clear the board; then when you have enough drop a lot on them CT stuns and weakens two teammates.

Pin them down is definitely a powerful card. My group took it out after 1 mission at the request of the IP. I think it should also have the stipulation that the figures to be stunned/weakened should also be in CT's LOS. It doesn't make any sense that someone can be pinned down if they can't be shot at and would give the IP more room to play around it while keeping it as a good upgrade.

We haven't played the campaign (or CT) yet but would you rate CT-1701 above all the other heroes because of Pin them Down?

2 hours ago, Findariel said:

We haven't played the campaign (or CT) yet but would you rate CT-1701 above all the other heroes because of Pin them Down?

Hands down. Only Gideon is better than him.