At this point, everyone pretty much knows that Vader is overcosted. Some say more, other less, but when a competetive Luke is 178, a full 22 points below a naked Vader, the price of a Z6 for crying out loud, you know something is wrong. Naked Vader can't even function, and I feel like Vader is minimum 225, but more probably 235. This means that Vader, who is already more expensive then he should be, needs to pay for more upgrades than Luke, extending the gap even further.

Where am I going with this? I feel this was a perfect opportunity to offer us a true, hard errata fix to Vader, AND include that fix in this exclusive pack for those who really want the cardboard changed. Now, make no mistake, the fix to Vader would be permanent and universal, so you wouldn't need to buy this new Vader, but was a great way to unveil the fix. There are many ideas on how to fix Vader, but here's my simple one:

Add Saber throw onto his card as a ranged weapon, as it always should have been. Done. That reduces his cost by 10, and frees up a Force slot that he was paying for but effectively couldn't use (because he needed Saber throw to function).

To tell you the truth, that's what I assumed they were doing with this special release. Listen FFG, the model for Vader looks cool....too bad he still sucks.

You spelled “alternate Luke/Anakin head” wrong.

Looks like you have to go to the show to get one. I can't say I will be there. Honestly, I thought Vader should have had a free action of invisible throat punch just for being so bad. It can't be blocked and your going to receive one wound.

Instead, for 22 points, you get a guy with his own clout of Bad. That's gotta be worth something.

Except they were intentionally trying not to change Vader. Doing so would give credence to the whiners, and they don't need any more incentive.

For a Vader fix, I'm really expecting to see more Force powers out with the Clone Wars expansions, including some that could be limited to Anakin/Darth Vader that serve to "fix" him.

The biggest problem I see with Vader, and I'm a rebel player so take it with a grain of salt, is that palpatine is effectively the same cost. I was concerned for Vader's future when palp was revealed to be 210 instead of the 240 I thought he was.

Courage (-) is hard to over PRICE. I'd say the PRICING of Vader was pretty well done. He wasn't PRICED too much or too little. Right now at this exact moment in the release schedule a bunch of mathfans have Sudoko'd him out of their lists. He's not the exhaust weapons or the T-47. He's fine.

12 minutes ago, TauntaunScout said:

Courage (-) is hard to over PRICE. I'd say the PRICING of Vader was pretty well done. He wasn't PRICED too much or too little. Right now at this exact moment in the release schedule a bunch of mathfans have Sudoko'd him out of their lists. He's not the exhaust weapons or the T-47. He's fine.

I don't want this to sound bad, but I'm a little surprised to hear you say that about the 47. Normally you focus on how a unit fits in thematically.

24 minutes ago, Alpha17 said:

For a Vader fix, I'm really expecting to see more Force powers out with the Clone Wars expansions, including some that could be limited to Anakin/Darth Vader that serve to "fix" him.

FFg has stated that they will not be releasing any upgrades that require you to purchase a unit that is not for your chosen faction in order to get a copy, unlike X-wing V1. So if they do release new force powers for the Clone Wars Expansions, if FFG follows through on that promise, then they will also be included in some release for the Empire and Rebellion.

Still, I am very interested to see how FFG handels the GAR being fairly force user heavy in canon as far as Commanders/Operatives.

As to adding Saber Throw to Vader's card, why wouldn't doing so also increase his points by 10? Whatever calculations FFG does to price units determined that the attack granted by Saber throw should add 10 points onto a unit and take an Force upgrade slot, therefore adding that functionality onto Vader's card innately should increase his points by at least 10, depending on whether or not they would also remove one of his Force Upgrades.

6 minutes ago, thepopemobile100 said:

I don't want this to sound bad, but I'm a little surprised to hear you say that about the 47. Normally you focus on how a unit fits in thematically.

Here's the thing about that unit. I'll still take it in lists if I ever play rebels again but they do tend to just get shot down and not do much, something's missing with them. But unless I play a learning game I usually get stuck playing my imperials to avoid mirror match-ups.

Exhaust weapons are a whole other thing.

I could normally care less how "good" a unit is. So if even I notice it's got issues, it must be pretty far gone.

At the point in time FFG start doing Xwing 1.0 bandaid fix cards you will begin dropping player base .

It's 2019 people expect points adjustments not here's a -20 point force card for Vader crap.

2 hours ago, Alpha17 said:

Except they were intentionally trying not to change Vader. Doing so would give credence to the whiners, and they don't need any more incentive.

For a Vader fix, I'm really expecting to see more Force powers out with the Clone Wars expansions, including some that could be limited to Anakin/Darth Vader that serve to "fix" him.

unless they are free then they won't fix jack!

I honestly think that Vader is worth his points. The 22 point difference between him and Luke is sort of large but it's not too big of a problem. I cannot count the number of times I have rolled all 6 of Luke's dice and ended up rolling only 2 or three hits/crits. Vader on the other hand always has good rolls. From my memory I have never rolled under 4 hits with him. If he got cheaper then he'd be too good and everyone would be whining about how Luke costs too much. FFG knows what they're doing and unlike with X-wing, this game is staying fairly balanced.

You do know Vader rolls are only marginally better than Luke, 6/8 versus 5/8.

Vader is too slow, can't jump and 2/3 of his command cards come with negatives for them to work.

Base Vader is 40 more than base Luke. Vader needs saber throw for 10, luke can be fine without anything so we have a 50 point whopping difference.

The 22 points diff is a fully competive luke with upgrades versus a NAKED Vader, they are world's apart in usefulness favouring the cheaper Luke who even fixes the wound difference thanks to stims.

I make Vader work quite well, even against meta lists (I mean, so called meta lists) played in my circle, and have 8 win over 10 games with him.

And still 8 activations.

44 minutes ago, RaevenKS said:

I make Vader work quite well, even against meta lists (I mean, so called meta lists) played in my circle, and have 8 win over 10 games with him.

And still 8 activations.

Would you mind sharing your list?

1 hour ago, DarkTrooperZero said:

You do know Vader rolls are only marginally better than Luke, 6/8 versus 5/8.

Vader is too slow, can't jump and 2/3 of his command cards come with negatives for them to work.

Base Vader is 40 more than base Luke. Vader needs saber throw for 10, luke can be fine without anything so we have a 50 point whopping difference.

The 22 points diff is a fully competive luke with upgrades versus a NAKED Vader, they are world's apart in usefulness favouring the cheaper Luke who even fixes the wound difference thanks to stims.

Vader and Luke aren't even in the same army so there's no way to decide to take Luke instead. In theory this gets balanced out by different things the army will and won't have access to.

And he still has courage (-)

Courage '-'

Relentless instead of charge so his ranged threat range (move+move+saber throw) is greater than Luke's, plus throws extra die with +1 impact and pierce

His command cards are arguably better (except for son of Skywalker but Implacable is only marginally worse since you get to recharge a force power and move+attack again). Master of Evil auto suppresses any rebel trooper unit (including named commanders so far) in range 1-2 with the possibility of panicking them if they are already suppressed and/or out of the courage bubble. New ways to motivate them is amazing with Snowtroopers and royal guards.

Master of the force means he is consistently performing 4 actions per turn with force reflexes and/or he is able to use force push repeatedly turn after turn without giving up an action.

I think he's priced fine, even compared to the emperor. His mobility issues make him harder to use than Luke. I win games pretty consistently with him. I agree that his lack of Jump means he can struggle against Luke in complex terrain.

Well at least you didn't miss the opportunity to make a 4th? 5th? thread on the subject?

9 minutes ago, devin.pike.1989 said:

Well at least you didn't miss the opportunity to make a 4th? 5th? thread on the subject?

To be fair, he's not complaining about not getting a chance to buy it. He's pointing out that they could have timed it with a points adjustment or card errata.

yeah, Vader is a lot of points in a low point game (ref some of the 350 or 400 point scenarios), but he is priced right and doesn't need any change.

Interesting that Vader is being conparaed by some people to Luke - who most people contend is the strongest unit in the game. Surely the issue isn’t that Vader is too expensive but Luke too cheap ?

I think Vader is generally fine and pretty balanced - although would love it if sabre throw was in his base stats just so I could get another force power.

He he may not be the “optimal” choice, but he isn’t a bad choice and is fun and really thematic.

10 hours ago, Caimheul1313 said:

FFg has stated that they will not be releasing any upgrades that require you to purchase a unit that is not for your chosen faction in order to get a copy, unlike X-wing V1. So if they do release new force powers for the Clone Wars Expansions, if FFG follows through on that promise, then they will also be included in some release for the Empire and Rebellion.

Still, I am very interested to see how FFG handels the GAR being fairly force user heavy in canon as far as Commanders/Operatives.

As to adding Saber Throw to Vader's card, why wouldn't doing so also increase his points by 10? Whatever calculations FFG does to price units determined that the attack granted by Saber throw should add 10 points onto a unit and take an Force upgrade slot, therefore adding that functionality onto Vader's card innately should increase his points by at least 10, depending on whether or not they would also remove one of his Force Upgrades.

More given that it’d be innate, unless they also removed a force slot, which would be strictly worse than just having the force slot of course.

10 hours ago, Caimheul1313 said:

FFg has stated that they will not be releasing any upgrades that require you to purchase a unit that is not for your chosen faction in order to get a copy, unlike X-wing V1. So if they do release new force powers for the Clone Wars Expansions, if FFG follows through on that promise, then they will also be included in some release for the Empire and Rebellion.

Still, I am very interested to see how FFG handels the GAR being fairly force user heavy in canon as far as Commanders/Operatives.

As to adding Saber Throw to Vader's card, why wouldn't doing so also increase his points by 10? Whatever calculations FFG does to price units determined that the attack granted by Saber throw should add 10 points onto a unit and take an Force upgrade slot, therefore adding that functionality onto Vader's card innately should increase his points by at least 10, depending on whether or not they would also remove one of his Force Upgrades.

The whole point of what he was saying was that he thinks Vader is slightly overpriced (pretty common thinking around here). Making the upgrade mandatory AND charging you for it would make no sense whatsoever.

4 minutes ago, arnoldrew said:

The whole point of what he was saying was that he thinks Vader is slightly overpriced (pretty common thinking around here). Making the upgrade mandatory AND charging you for it would make no sense whatsoever.

Right but that seems to be a bunch of fuzzy logic. Where’s the hard math showing that Vader is poorly costed relative to other similar units?

Vader already has a better hit percentage than Luke on the saber, better use of force powers, more force power slots, ignores difficult terrain on all his moves, can move further than Luke and fire with a better ranged attack, has more health, provides superior support to all other trooper units, and can’t be suppressed (losing an action) or panicked (losing turns) or slowed by anything.

Luke is faster. That’s it. By every other metric, Vader is better, and for a measily 35 points.

1 hour ago, devin.pike.1989 said:

Well at least you didn't miss the opportunity to make a 4th? 5th? thread on the subject?

Did you even read what he posted?