Happy Monday! It wasn’t the biggest week of reveals, but it was to be expected with the American Holiday of Thanksgiving this past week.

FFG posted the third spoiler of the Cunning Month social media poll on Facebook/Twitter/Instagram

Justin – Outside of an aggro go face deck, I don’t think this will really ever see constructed play. Making up the tempo lost on playing an upgrade by then cheating in the attack is nice, but Sabine aggro is the only deck I’ve really found desiring to run any of the 1 cost 1/1 upgrades.

Tyler – I have trouble finding a place for 1-cost upgrades in my decks. The value for the draw just isn’t there usually. Snapshot reflex does a couple useful things, but all at a low level, so not sure where I’d play it. When there’s units that get a buff for being upgraded, I’ll take another look. For now- binder.

Jayson – I briefly read this wrong and thought it was ridiculous, but instead, it’s more like a weird Shoot First. Shoot First is pretty good. I wasn’t asking it to get weird, I don’t think. The use case for this is (probably) aggressive decks that want quick value out of their upgrade investment and intend to avoid trades. This does kind of outvalue Shoot First the minute the unit swings again. But losing that Quick Strike effect is a big loss. I think even in an aggressive deck I might choose to play it safe and dance with the girl that brought me.

The next 2 cards were revealed by the Golden Dice Podcast in an exclusive interview with senior designer Jeremy Zwirn! Check out that awesome video here.

Justin – With several exhaust effects existing in Asteroid Sanctuary, No Good to me dead, and Cunning, I don’t see much reason to run this unless you’d rather pay a card from hand over 2 resources. That could be helpful in a pinch, but the more interesting line would be if you needed an extra exhaust option in a Villain deck and could run this without fear of the aspect penalty (free is free).

Tyler – The exhaust effect is solid, but the removal of upgrades is where the true value could come in- anything worth 2+ would be a bonanza. Don’t forget that experience and shields are upgrades! There’s also some combo potential with Black One to give you back your discarded card. Overall, this is a super flexible card that deserves consideration. I’ve tried this in my Han/Red deck and been very happy.

Jayson – I have no idea how to evaluate this. On one hand, this can be a free exhaust effect. On the other hand, cards are important and discarding one is a significant cost. Then there is a third hand that wants to cover up this Han art so I don’t have to see it anymore. As you can imagine, this is too many hands.

Justin – Realistically, if you ever hit this on 3 units you’re likely in a win more state. Thus if we hit this on 1-2 units are we happy to pay a card for it? Only testing will tell! Swarm decks like Leia aggression seem like a good candidate for it though.

Tyler – There’s a Rebel go-wide deck taking shape and I’m excited about it. This complements Dodonna and Jyn by making small unit swarms real threats. What I think this card needs to shine is more Rebel units with Ambush. Right now, all we have is Snowspeeder, which just isn’t enough ways to focus your attack into a single payoff turn.

Jayson – All I really have to say about Medal Ceremony is that it is pure jank but I love it so much and nobody will be able to stop me from trying to make it work.

The next 2 cards were shown at a Asmodee event in France and on marrie.grd.jeux’s instagram!

The text translates to
“Attach to a non-VEHICLE unit
If unit attach is FORCE unit, it gets: On attack give -2/-2 to defender for this phase”

Justin – People were initially over the moon when Fallen lightsaber was revealed. My first thought was “I can’t wait to see the hero version!” I may be in love… Generally, when you throw an upgrade on a unit, you’re wanting to give it staying power and allowing it to swing into things taking 2 less damage each time (or no damage if the -2 health defeats the unit) is fantastic. The obvious dream is to throw this on Mace Windu and clear the opponent’s board with a healthy Mace Windu still standing at the end! By far my favorite card reveal of the week. Hopefully we’ll get the English version soon so we can throw some proxies in our IRL decks!

Tyler – I like this version better than the Villain saber. It’s got better trade potential and snowballs with Jyn’s ability to create a board-clearing machine. Hero also has more Force users which will make getting the ability to proc easier. Definitely excited to try it!

Jayson – This is the card that gets you out of the gulag. An outstanding upgrade for any unit that really needs to stick around and trade at the same time, and I think Vigilance ought to have plenty of those. All the same downsides as other big upgrades, of course, so really you have to grade these cards by their ceilings. And this one? This one’s high.

Justin – While I see this as more playable than the Chimaera, I’m still not thrilled to run it. With the opponent choosing what unit it defeats, unless they are running a heavy, thin board, this card isn’t swinging you back into the game. I want my bombs to be able to bring me back and push me ahead in games, not only keep me ahead.

Tyler – I don’t know that I’d run this over other available 8 or 9 cost cards. It’s certainly not as versatile as Palpatine. There will eventually be a Villain Blue/Green deck that wants to ramp like crazy and play these capital ships, but we haven’t seen the enabling control cards out of Blue to make that happen. This is one we’ll have to wait and see if the card pool enables it.

Jayson – As with most big stuff, I’m unimpressed. I am particularly down on this one because of the opponent getting to choose. It’s probably not going to be tremendously difficult for them to have some cheap stuff around to sacrifice to this, and in the meantime, with no Overwhelm, Sentinel, or defensive tech, they can probably stall this out long enough to win. I could be wrong across the board about these big Star Destroyers, and I know that. But for the timebeing, I’m putting this one slightly above unplayable and calling it a day. I just don’t see how it wins you the game.

The last card below was spoiled on FFG social media!

Justin – It’s funny to think how much lower I would be on Jyn if she was released 2 weeks ago when we were still in love with Han Solo. Since we’re no longer in “why would I ever run a different Hero cunning leader?” mode, we can look at Jyn with an open mind. With an ability that is always online (no resource cost), I find myself interested. Where she will really gain value is turning 1 for 1 trades into 0 for 1 trades that keep her units alive with 1 health, which will also force the opponent into potentially bad trades to finish off the leftovers. You’re a little sad comparing her 4/7 6 resource body to Boba Fett at 4/7 5 resources, but her ability could prove worthy of the extra cost. I’m definitely ready to see her in action!

Tyler – This is such a player’s card, I’m surprised both her and Han aren’t rares. In addition to her great go-wide ability, the Rebel trait opens her up to some valuable bonuses like Medal Ceremony and General Dodonna. My only complaint is that she comes out at 6 resources. Having a leader that drops after 5 makes me feel like she needs to be played with Green to get the ramp. But I want to play her with Blue to take advantage of healing effects that stand damaged units back up. We’ll see what niche she ends up in.

Jayson – First of all, the art is unreal. Amelie Hutt consistently delivers. As for Jyn herself, I’m very high on her. In a lot of instances, the end result here (a unit lives for one more attack than it was supposed to) is going to be functionally the same as a Luke shield, except Jyn does it for free. It’s not going to be like that all of the time, but it’ll be more frequent than you think. I also love that her unit side gives a global effect that doesn’t care about NGTMD. I think she’s likely going to be super good.

~~~~~

That’s it for last week’s spoilers! What cards are you most excited about? Are there any specific archetypes you’ve been enjoying in the cards revealed?

Advertisements

2 responses to “Last Week in Review (11/27/2023)”

  1. […] posted in last weeks article when the French version was […]

    Like

  2. […] We already shared our first thoughts on the Avenger when it leaked a little early from a French(?) Influencer event a couple of weeks ago. Check that out here. […]

    Like

Leave a comment

Trending