I was going to hold off on doing card reviews for wave 8 until we knew all the cards, but I decided I wanted to cover the cards we know about now, and if feeling change once we know all the upgrades I will cover it once we know everything, but let’s get started, we will start with a card that is basically spoiled but not.
Heavy Fire-Zone
Sorry but, this card is garbage. I would not even call it that I would not even put this card in a dumpster fire, it is completely and utterly useless. Okay maybe that is a little far, but this takes up the turbolaser slot you need to do something nice to get that spot. This card simply changes your blue anti squadron dice to red ones when you are attacking an unengaged squadron. I know a lot of people go crazy for red anti squadron, but in the vast majority of circumstance I hate it. A red anti-squadron die is the only die in Armada that is more likely to produce no damage than to produce damage, meaning it is very inconsistent and in armada consistency is king.
I will say there are some fringe cases where I would rather have a red than a blue, like in the case I was attacking a brace ace I would want a red and a black die, the black die, for a consistent one damage and the red die, because I can break a brace bracket if I roll a double, but I can do this with a reroll on the red with LTT, and that also gives me rerolls against ships, sure I only get to attack one squadron, but still. Maybe this would be an okay second turbolaser to take, but each ship that has two turbolasers does not have blue anti squadron outside of the Assault SSD. I just don’t see a world where this card is taken, I mean even if it’s one point, there are so many better options just spend a few more points. If it’s super cheap it might see play, but really this is a really bad card in my opinion.
Kyrsta Agate officer
she is also a commander, and we will eventually talk about her as well, but I want to get some actual playtime, with her before I pass judgment, but I mean she is going to be good if you care to know like bonkers good. Anyway back to her as an officer she is a red or blue crit effect, you exhaust her card, and ready one defense token, this will also work on salvo attacks, so that is nice. As the card that gives other ships salvo tokens has not been spoiled, I can’t really evaluate this card in its full context, but if the card that gives ships salvo is an officer well it really does not matter in most cases as most ships only have 1 officer slot so could not take this card and that card. I think this card is good especially on an assault frigate, it makes them much more durable, I mean any ship able to get an extra use out of any token is good, I think she will see an okay amount of play, but will be most common on MC-75s, Assault Frigates, and Starhawks, as they seem to be the ships that would benefit from her ability the most, also I think a Mon Mothma list with an assault Frigate is even more viable now with agate with two uses of an evade, we could also do some cute stuff with Mon Mothma on a starhawk with Amity and Agate as well. Agate officer just gives us some interesting options , and makes ships a bit more durable, or just lets them salvo a bit more, she will see play, but I think you will need to have a plan on how you are going to use her she is not just a plug and play type of upgrade.
Wedge Antilles, Officer
I was not quite sure what to think of Wedge when I first saw him, but he is pretty darn good, and also very flexible in what he can do. He has the downside of only working with generic squadorns, that don’t have strategic, because that would be bonkers. It seems FFG is trying to push out/decrees the number of aces that hit the table, as right now when a list take squadrons from tournament data statistically over half of the squadron complement is aces. However what dose wedge do for us? Well the first thing that comes to mind is he can give B-wings a boost in speed give them an extra one push, not bad. Because he happens at the very end of the round he is also extremely good at setting up a yavaris attack. Another thing he can do is I am sure a squadron player has run into this at least once when you want to bomb a ship, but you have to “waste” one of your fighter activations to move your intel fighter into position, wedge lets you have your intel right where you need it at the start of next round, along the same lines he can put escorts right where they need to be as well. You can use him with your E-wings to disengage and snipe past some escorts. You can also use him to reposition a small fighter coverage wing into some very annoying positions. Positioning is key in the squadron game and wedge lets your generic squadrons be in the right position at the right time, he will likely see play in a lot of squadron heavy fleets, because of how good he can be at setting up yavaris, and because he is only good at setting up generics, we might see Reekian die down a bit.
Shriv Suurgav
Okay so when people look at Shriv, they mostly think “he is just an over costed worse Darth Vader" and I say kinda, but not really. There is a lot more behind the cost of the Darth Vader boarding team card than one might think. First Vader makes it so you can not take any other Darth Vader in your fleet not the officer, not the commander, not the tie advanced, a hidden opportunity cost, second think of the cheapest delivery platform for Vader a raider clocks in at 44 add vaider to make it 47, factor in we are giving up ordnance experts to do that, and it’s another opportunity cost, the raider has no way to get rerolls, now let’s look at Shriv the cheapest delivery device is a torpedo hammerhead 36 points with shriv that takes us to 42 points 5 points cheaper than the vaider raider, factor in that Shriv has little to no opportunity cost on the hammerhead, and Shriv is actually pretty cheap compared to vaider, and his ever so slightly more limited ability makes up the difference, sure it’s a bit of a bummer he can’t take out a crew or title, but he is still a very solid pick, and most of the time if I did take Vader it was to take ECM off a ship and this guy can do that on a cheaper delivery package, and because of this I think Shriv will see more play than Vaider will and still be just about as good in almost every situation, if not better, because of the cost associated with him he is going to be a very solid pick.
he is very good, because most rebel ships that can take him there wepon team slot is pretty flexible as they can get rerolls from some other source and they really don’t care about gunnery teams, you can make the argument that the Kuat does not largely care as it can take leading shots for rerolls in all achs, but if you take the equivalent MC-75 Armored cruiser you are still 5 points cheaper than a Kuat Vader, same difference as a hammerhead and a Vader raider, shriv is perfectly costed for the faction that he is exclusive too, and yes the Starhawk would be a more expensive delivery option, but I would argue that it would be far more effective at leveraging the loss of ECMs than any other ships in the game:
Starhawk Battleship Mark I (140) • Shriv Suurgav (6) • Leading Shots (4) • H9 Turbolasers (8) = 158 Points
and then you factor in Raddus and it's just a no brainer Shriv while slightly more limited is easier and cheaper to use, for the rebels than Vader is for the Empire.
The only thing Vader can do that Shriv really can’t that I see with any consistency is take off damage control officer to get crits to go through, but shriv is good and is cost effect for the faction he is in, he is not a worse Vader, and will see far more play than Vader boarding teams probably ever will, and I actually think Vader boarding teams is underrated.
So the rest of upgrades we know about in the starhawk expansion I talked about at length in the starhawk write up. So we are going to move on to the upgrades in the Onager, pack and well if I had to pick a relationship status with the upgrade cards we know about in the Onager pack it would be its complicated, but let's take a look.
Commander Beck
I am just not quite sure how I feel about her, I think she is a card I will need some table time with to work out my feelings. So my main issue with her is the raid tokens, my issue is that if I use her ability get the raid token then use a token later to clear the raid why did I not just plan appropriately and have the token when I needed it? Then if I want to do that command again I will need to ether discard a dial, or a token so I can trigger Beck again a repeat. It just seems like I am running in circles to resolve this command that planning well with comms net flotilla could do just as well, or even hondo. She has the benefit of being able to trigger twice a round, so if you know your ship is never going to resolve a con fire command you get one free die reroll and if you will not resolve an engineering command ether I can take a raid token to move some shields around too, so it’s not terrible I am just sceptical.
It seems she wants to be put on a ship that does not want to resolve a command as a full dial, but would not mind getting a token effect I could see an arquitens really liking an engineering token to move shields around, but again comms net. At the end of the day Beck lets you get that one time token without having to take a comms net flotilla. I think she is best to get one free die re-roll and move some shields around as most ships don’t consistently resolve thoughts commands. Again mixed feelings, and with how competitive the offer slot can be it’s just a hard sell for me, but I do see the potential she has.
Gunnery Chief Varnillian
Okay again another bit of a mixed feeling for me on this one, she is obviously better as second player, as you can set the red die to any face not just a blank face. My gripe with her to start was she does not really fix my dice for me. So I go second and roll and I switch out a blank red for my double red on the card, but now I have a blank red on my card and in order to change that I need to switch it in with something else that acutely has a result. So is more of putting in more damage now and then taking out excess damage when you don’t need it like when you have 6 damage that will be braced to 3 just take out a hit and make it 5 it will still brace to 3 and add the hit when it matters. You can also do some cute things like switch the red out for a black hit crit then later switch the black hit crit in when you are further than close range away to still trigger a black crit. She has some interesting applications, and she is okay just requires a bit of thinking to use effectively like might as well swap in my blank as my single double right not will just get evaded and I can save that for when I am closer, or I have more than enough damage to kill this guy so I will swap it in now. Also when swapping in dice with a blank face it should be done when you have a reroll waiting. Again I really need to see her on the table before making a final judgment, but in most circumstances I think there is a better card to help with consistency than Gunnery Chief Varnillian, like Ordnance experts on any black dice ship leading shots, IF, LTT, etc. She will help the Onager the most as that is what she comes in so that is likely where you will see her. She does have value of taking an accuracy out when it will not matter and save it for when it does, really if she was not a weapon teams slot she would be a no brainer for me but especially for the empire the slot is very competitive.
Reeva Demesne
Lastly we have Reva Demesne officer 4 points, she is kind of like agate officer in that she refreshes your tokens, but does not have to get a crit on an attack it is as long as your targeted hull zone has shields she will be able to provide that refresh if you exhaust her. She is a defensive commander and that puts her against tough competition in Captain Brunson. Captain Brunson comes with a different restriction in that you need to be close to an obstacle, but it’s really not that hard to do. Brunson can cancel dice with crit faces meaning your opponent could lose out on critical effects she also works when you don’t have shields meaning you will take less damage when you are limping away Reva does not offer that. Her limitation of needing a shield to use her makes her in general less useful later in the game, but Brunson can stay relevant the whole game.
With Reva you are going to need to keep one arc exposed as much as possible so they can’t shoot unshielded arcs, you are going to need to move shields around to keep her requirement fulfilled. In the right build I think she might be worth it, and she can save you more damage than Brunson as at most Brunson will save you at least 5 damage, but its really not unheard of to have her save up to 10ish a game, and that is not including damage she could save you by negating critical effects. So it’s a tall order for Reeva to compete with Brunson, but I think with smart shield play it can be done, but you also have to be playing against the right list as well, as let’s be honest the only way she will be able to compete with Brunson is if you get to use a brace twice a turn without discarding it, and the first time you use the brace you use the brace each round you can’t really count that damage Reeva saved you it’s the second time you brace that she starts saving you damage, and without an engineering command of some kind you will likely only get to use her 2, maybe 3 times, and that has to make up a good chunk of damage to be worth taking over Brunson, and that is before you include that your brace could get locked up by an accuracy anyway, meaning you get almost no value from Reeva in that case. With Reeva there are a lot of variables whereas with Brunson she is cut and dry, if you are close to an obstacle you cancel damage. Like I said she can be better than Brunson, but there are a lot of variables outside your control, accuracy generation, if your opponent with have large enough damage dealers to make her worth it, etc.
These are all the cards we currently know about that are coming in Wave 8, I am hoping to hear about the others soon, maybe another article before Christmas from FFG. I don’t really know what to expect with the unknown upgrades other than the salvo token card, hoping for a second type of superweapon for the star hawk, but we will see. What do you think of these upgrade cards, and how will you use them? Until next time have a great week!
コメント