With these new operative versions coming, I think we see a glimpse of what to expect for the clone wars. Here we now have the option to have a commander and operative version of many characters.

Now this is obviously down the road a ways, but it makes so much sense for the future. While the obvious example are Jedi, like Ahsoka, who have been in command, and who were just a snippy padawan at times.

Having new options for old heroes is exciting, but it opens up a cross faction pandoras box.. my thoughts are characters like Bossk. I use him as an example because he was active during the clone wars, though never really working for the separatists, but lets hypothesize that he will. If you look at the back if the command cards they all look the same, gameplay wise is obvious. We now now that as long as the name is on the card, that character can play it. So, IF Bossk came out for CIS, it stands to reason that his cards could be used interchangeably - just as those of the new Luke and Vader.

The problem is, if I'm an Empire player, I could be forced to buy a cross faction expansion. While most will just consider it for alternate art and the cards, it could lead to purchasing the wrong version for a specific army.

So, it does open up some crossover options for characters that span the entire saga - Chewbacca, C-3PO, R2-D2, etc. and who can belong to multiple factions. Chewbacca fought separatists, for the rebellion, and the Resistance (if that ever becomes a faction). Hondo is well.. out for himself, and there are likely others.

Is this a good design and direction for the game? Or will it lead to unit bloat? How many versions of the same character will you buy?

Boba can be an imperial operative and a scum/criminal commander.

I can see different boxes of different versions with different cards it would save them money in sculpting maybe but would mean we wint need to buy cross faction

14 hours ago, devin.pike.1989 said:

Boba can be an imperial operative and a scum/criminal commander.

I see this as more of a Hondo role than Boba

15 minutes ago, Zrob314 said:

I see this as more of a Hondo role than Boba

He better be a completely Neutral operative.

So far any Operative or Commander that needs to be purchased cross faction, can be done so by buying just that unit and only that unit. If you want Imperial Bossk, you can purchase him and get a new sculpt (nothing to say the mini is not valid) and new Command cards. You don’t need to buy anything else and you won’t get faction specific upgrade cards (so far). Even Armaments like the Dark Saber or Jyn’s gun only have Sabine’s or Jyn’s names on them (no faction).

The big question is will the Imperial unit card work with the Republic forces or other faction to which the Commander/Operative may belong?

From what we know now, the answer is “no”, but FFG could change that by creating a rule, or maybe that would be odd if Obi-Wan commanded Rebel troops, etc, etc. Even if they don’t create a rule, the only thing so far that can’t be used from a cross faction Commander/Operative is the unit card. So everything else in the expansion pack is usable. To me, that’s not too bad for buying cross faction.

1 hour ago, SpiderMana said:

He better be a completely Neutral operative.

Or even better! A scenario along the lines of the Downed AT-ST where he could double or triple cross the factions playing. That! Would be True to Hondo, rather than a unit that just goes shooty-shooty or stabby-stabby!

The more victory points, you earn, the more likely you can sway Hondo to your side.

I feel like the simplest solution would be to just rerelease the unit with the same cards, but just changed to be the different faction

9 hours ago, SpiderMana said:

He better be a completely Neutral operative.

I mean Scum commander, and operative available for any faction.

8 hours ago, JediPartisan said:

The big question is will the Imperial unit card work with the Republic forces or other faction to which the Commander/Operative may belong?

For official play, that will probably never happen, but do what you will in your own home.

I always thought it was silly that most of the generic scum pilots in x-wing couldn't be flown with rebels, or imperials in some cases.

The biggest impact on the CW I see with these expansions is a delay in getting stuff I actually care about. After that, it's not all that surprising. Lotta talk on here had already concluded that we'd see some Jedi as commanders, and other as operatives, and the idea of a modified version of character has been discussed before as well. I'd rather them release a single, multi-faction expansion than multiple copies of Bossk or Forgettable Bounty Hunter 1138, but they want to make the most money they can for the least amount of effort, so I guess we know what'll happen now.

They could also release a card pack alongside the new faction version, which would avoid the cross faction buying issue. Or they could errata cards to only work with a given version of a cross faction unit.