I am so pumped to get her on my raiders! I have loved those little buggers but they have always popped so quickly on me. This is the upgrade I have been waiting for. It makes me hopeful for the rest of the upgrades in the new campaign to breath new life into our ships. I personally wanted this type of release more than anything else. New plastic is great, but new ways to work other ships is just as good. I may have to print this card out and start using it right away. Oh Iden, I may have a crush......

She’s going to be absolutely fantastic against squadrons... Double evade is even better than a redirect in that matchup.

Demo, man, Demo. Raiders don't live long enough to justify her cost, and Demo LIVES at short range.

I mean, yeah, not even an exhaust to use means that she could potentially see use in 4 attacks against a Raider vs only 2 in a Demo, but still...

(I guess it comes down to the list. Odds feel low you'll be running a Demolisher *and* an Instigator in the same list - but for sure, whichever you run, she'll be on it.)

I cannot put into words how excited I am to have her on a Raider...Not auto-dying to 5 bombers sounds amazing.

@xanderf that heavily depends on where you get the Raider. If it's taking a medium or close range shot from the primary arc of most large ships, no it won't, but on a flank when it's taking at most 5 dice from most ships, it's a huge advantage that could very well save it. I use Brunson on one of my Raiders and she regularly saves me from death by dropping a double-damage or even a single-crit die off of an attack, often even allowing me to brace and take just shield damage even from 4-5 dice arcs. Versio just increases that.

6 minutes ago, xanderf said:

Demo, man, Demo. Raiders don't live long enough to justify her cost, and Demo LIVES at short range. 

Didn't you hear? Raiders don't die anymore. At least, not to fighters when Iden is on board.

Every Evade token spent is a damage die killed. And you have two of them every round, or four for emergencies.

Not saying she's no good on the Raider. Obviously she is.

I'm just looking at overall utility of the ships, and considering where I usually see Raiders/Demos used successfully, and where they fail, and their overall utility to a list. A Demo dying is a lot of points lost , and Demos suffer in the defense token department at the shorter ranges that they really want to be at . Iden helps with the latter, and doesn't add much burden to the former (you're already 5 pts in for either Brunson or Monty, and she's only 6). While a Raider is still going to be a OHK against most capital ships, and it's only real value is in going really cheap so that the enemy doesn't feel it worth shooting at vs higher priority (/value) targets. And here, she does little - her value is in reusability, which a OHK isn't going to matter for, and she costs too much for the relatively low-value Raider.

She is good enough for a Raider that you are otherwise running super cheap, keeping away from ships, and intending to throw into a pile of squadrons. I just don't feel that is as useful a use of points as finding the few dozen more needed to get a Demo into the list.

Brunson is better on Demo. That single evade can still get locked out, where Brunson cannot. Raiders, though, get a ton of use out of their double evades.

The other thing to remember is the reduced point format, taking a cheaper Raider vs. a Gladiator could give you the space you need to stretch for that Victory SD instead of double Gladiators or a Quasar.

1 hour ago, xanderf said:

She is good enough for a Raider that you are otherwise running super cheap, keeping away from ships, and intending to throw into a pile of squadrons. I just don't feel that is as useful a use of points as finding the few dozen more needed to get a Demo into the list.

I've run a list with double-Raiders, one Monti and one Brunson, since Store Champs competitively. The 5pts spent to reinforce their defenses has kept them alive and functioning nigh constantly in that list. Brunson is generally more effective for this and Iden is just a better Brunson for where Raiders want to fight at. ( though Brunson at long range is delightful).

I just noticed that the main picture of the spread out has a new victory title behind Iden. I don't know what it says but I am hoping for a navigation keyword.

Iden is an investment- going from 51 points to 57 is a big difference, but the amount of damage she can soak up- more than adding the admo title- combined with that nice edge case utility really lets her raider stay in the fight. I'm not sure if it is better to run a lean and mean ord experts + external racks, or how much sprucing up she wants. All I know is that she is going to be a part of my raider lists from now on.

Iden + counter on a Raider (plus whatever the Corvus titlw does). Yes please! Let's add Needa and Kallus to an SSD and suddenly you won't have any squadron issues

5 hours ago, Norell said:

Iden + counter on a Raider (plus whatever the Corvus titlw does). Yes please! Let's add Needa and Kallus to an SSD and suddenly you won't have any squadron issues

And then you face a squadronless Raddus list...

I think I need to buy a third and maybe a fourth raider. I know she is unique and only works on one but to run raiders in the 200 point format just might be sweet.