Enjoy Your Retreat! - Squad Reactions

They have now spoiled all of Asajj, Kalani, and the B1 Droids. I will talk about how I think they'll all work together and individually. You can still consider this article speculation since everything can be way different on paper than on the table. Eventually, I will be writing Unit Guides on most/all of the units in the game, but that will have to wait until I can get some playtime in with them.

Primary - Asajj Ventress, Sith Assassin

8 SP - Seems to be pretty standard. It's a good number and will probably prove to be pretty flexible.
3 FP - Solid, not as high as Ani, but that's to be expected.
9 Stamina - This is the same as Ahsoka and Rex. It's a good amount, but be careful. 2 Solid hits from almost anything and you're already wounded.
3 Durability - This is the same as Ahsoka, they're both sitting at 27 HP. I think that is a pretty comfortable spot to be in, but we will know for sure once we get to the tables.

Dathomirian Dexterity - This is an Active Ability with a cost of 1 FP. Each character in this unit may Jump. This Unit may use this ability two times during its activation instead of the normal one. This is really cool, I cannot wait to see her and Ahsoka just jumping around the table like maniacs.

Force Push - This is an Active Ability with a cost of 2 FP. Choose a character in this unit and an enemy character within range 3 of that character. Push the chosen character 3 away from the chosen allied character. This is a cool ability, I am surprised that it's not on every force user as a general kind of thing, but maybe there's a reason for that. Unlike in Legion, this ability only allows you to push your target away, not pull them closer.

Riposte - This is a Reactive Abilty with no cost. After a Melee attack targeting a character in this unit is resolved, this unit may use this ability. If the attack roll contained one or more Failure results the attacking Unit suffers 2 damage. This is cool, there is no reason not to use this ability pretty much ever. Donn't forget that if she's injured it will cost 1 more Force Points. Especially once we look at her Identity Ability.

Slip Away - This is a Reactive Ability with no cost. When another Dathomirian or Separatist Alliance character targets an enemy character that is engaged with a character from this unit with an attack, this unit may use this ability. One character in this unit that is engaged with the target character may immediately reposition. If it does, this unit gains one Hunker. This is a pretty neat ability. It seems like it will be quite easy to proc and will certainly add to her maneuverability and defense.

Sith Assasin - This an Identity Ability with no cost. When a character in this unit wounds an enemy unit, after the effect is resolved, that character may Heal three times. If it wounded a Primary Unit or Secondary Unit, it may also Advance or Jump. If it wounded a Primary unit, refresh 2 Force Tokens. Absolutely Wizard! The fact that this ability procs of wounding any unit is incredible! She is just going to be healing non-stop. The second clause is also quite good, free movement in any capacity will always be good. The third clause is perfection. Force point refreshment is going to be absolutely huge in this game. Your Force points have to last upwards of 14 turns before you get to refresh them normally, so the fact that she can refresh even 2 is amazing! I think she is able to refresh up to 4 if she can proc off of a regular attack and her Riposte ability.

Funky Combat Trees, Asajj! What's interesting is I don't think there is a clear Offensive/Defensive stance like most of the other units. It seems more like Abilities/Combat or something like that.

Form II Makashi

This stance seems to me like Asajj's more ability-based stance. The Combat tree here is less damage-oriented and more ability oriented. She still does a decent amount of damage (up to 6) but by the time she's made it to 3 successes she has potentially healed, jumped, dashed, and repositioned. She's going to be moving around the field in all sorts of ways, especially considering once she has had 4 successes on the middle branch she can use one of the Active Abilities she hasn't used yet, or Dathomirian Dexterity since it can be used twice. The expertise on this stance is good, but not great. She still generated a few crits and blocks, but not much else special. I think this stance will prove to be pretty popular with the amount of movement it grants her.

Jar'Kai

This stance seems like it's her more combat-oriented one. It should spike higher in damage and blocks. The combat tree itself gives here only one opportunity to move and it's if you choose to use Datho Dex on the ability icon. By the time she has had 3 successes, she's either doing 6 damage or 3 damage and 3 different conditions. Her expertise here is better. The attack expertise is still not the best we've seen, but it is okay. Her defensive expertise is pretty good with lots of block gen and crit changing. Hell, her 4+ sections seem like it essentially just deletes an attack die, and then she can Riposte on them and do more damage back.

I think Asajj is going to prove herself as an excellent piece to play in a lot of strike teams. It does seem like she prefers to be paired with other Seppies, but I think there is potential elsewhere. We will see soon enough.

Secondary - Kalani, Super Tactical Droid

5PC - Our first 5! This makes sense if you consider that he's paired with B1s who needed to be really cheap, and he's supposed to be an insane tactician.
0 FP - Secondary Droid, sounds about right.
10 Stamina - This is the highest Stamina we've seen for a Secondary unit so far, but it makes sense when you consider his defensive capabilities. I still expect him to be murdered fairly easily.
2 Durability - I think 2 Durability can be considered the baseline stat. I think it is unlikely we will ever see a unit with 1 Durability.

Roger, Roger - This is a Tactic Ability with no cost. At the start of this unit's activation, each allied Battle Droid Supporting character within 4 of a character in this unit may Dash. This is really neat and kinda adds to the thematic bit about all droids being connected to each other. This ability is probably going to prove very good since anything that provides free movement is almost always helpful. This is going to make the Droids feel even more like a horde. Having up to 4 Droid supports getting free movement is pretty nice.

Tactical Network - This is an Active Ability with a cost of 1 FP. Choose another allied Battle Droid character within 4. The chosen character may Dash, then may gain one Hunker, remove one condition token from itself, or make a 5 dice attack. This will also probably prove to be really handy. It's super flexible and should be able to give you just what you need on your Droids.

Target, Concentrate All Firepower - This is an Innate Ability with no cost. When an allied Battle Droid character makes an attack, if the targeted character is within 4 of one or more other allied Battle Droid characters, the attacking character adds 1 die to its attack roll. Once again, this ability is just going to add to the hive mind, horde-like behavior of Battle droids and I love it. Adding dice for free is awesome and there should be a ton of opportunities to use this ability.

Complete Analysis - This is an Innate Ability with no cost. When you spend Force Points to place this unit's card in reserve, spend one less FP. No real explanation is needed here, this is just plain good. Conservation of FP is going to be pretty huge I suspect.

Cold Logic

Kalani is definitely not a combat character and it shows a little bit in his stance. 7 Dice at range 5 isn't necessarily bad, but his ranged expertise is not great and his Combat Tree only gets really good toward the 4-5 successes mark. He's only rolling 4 defense dice at range and 3 dice in melee which means he will be going down like a sack of potatoes as soon as a saber hits him. He can only take full advantage of his defensive expertise if he has any cover, Hunker, or both. The icons on his Combat tree are not terrible though. His 3rd slot is very good for handing out more actions to other Battle Droids.

I think Kalani himself is going to be pretty good, but He is an absolutely fantastic Support piece. He's going to be handing actions and abilities out to all sorts of Droids buddies and I am super excited to see it.

Support - B1 Battle Droids

3PC - Good. Rogers being cheap is what I was hoping for.
0 FP - No surprise here.
9 Stamina - Very interesting. 501st CTs are 7 Stamina. I guess this sorta makes sense since there are 3 B1s per base.
2 Durability - This is also the same as 501st Troopers. I think this is really just the baseline, I feel like it isn't possible or likely to have a durability of 1.

Combat A.I. Protocols - This is an innate ability with no cost. After an allied Battle Droid unit makes a combat action, choose one of the targeted characters this is within 4 of all characters in this unit, if able. The chosen character gains 1 Strain or 1 Exposed. This is good, there is no real reason not to use since since it has no cost. I figure you'll probably be keeping the B1s together most of the time anyway, so the target being at range 4 of all characters in this unit shouldn't be too difficult to pull off.

Well, I guess I'm in Charge Now - This is an innate ability with no cost. When this Unit's order card would be placed in reserve, its controlling player may place it on the bottom of their order deck instead. This is good, keep that reserved spot open for more timing-sensitive pieces like Primaries.

I Hate This Job - This is an innate ability with no cost. When a character in this unit is contesting one or more active objectives, it has Protection. This is quite good. All units will be trying to contest the objectives since it's the main way to win the game. Canceling one damage for free just because you're playing the game is good, especially for such flimsy units.

Countless

This is a hilarious name for their stance, but I suppose it is thematic. They're throwing 7 Attack dice at range 5 and 5 Attack dice in melee. That is pretty good for some generally dumb droids. Their combat tree is good, they max out at 5 successes and can do a total of 8 damage. Their attack expertise is kinda trash though. They only ever generate strikes off of expertise. Their defense is also pretty pitiful, but that is to be expected. They're rolling 4 defensive dice at range and 3 in melee. Like Kalani, they are going to be melting in melee if a saber gets a hold of them so be careful. Their defensive expertise is also terrible, If you roll only 1 expertise result you get nothing.

Overall, I think they did a really good job of showing how cheap and expandable B1s can be while still balancing them in such a way as not to make them completely useless.

I'm pretty excited about this squad, Kalani in particular. I think he is going to prove to be exceptional when it comes to all sorts of Battle Droids like Magnas and B2s. I am really glad we're getting at least 1 5PC Secondary and 2 3PC Supports in the first wave since it should open up some list-building choices. Asajj should prove to be quite the unit as well, I am pretty hyped to run her side-by-side with Ahsoka.

As always thank you for reading and let me know what you think in the comments!