In this case, it's much more about WOTC and their undercosted double/twin shooters like Dash, right? We haven't really seen too many power Fringe shooters from the v-sets - obviously the new Boba is really good, but he's still not a big damage dealer for the cost.

yeah, its mainly about how WotC ramped things up towards the end of the game.

You said it in your review, he was essentially replaced by gungans.

But better than being slowly digested over a thousand years, right?

Lucien Draay, Jedi Master, from Command of the Galaxy






It always feels hard to fit a high cost piece into an Old Republic squad - by the time you slot in Bastila and Lobot, that's 60 points that are spoken for, so spending 57 points on a single piece after that can be tough. But Lucien Draay is a tank, a 130 point beast with great stats, Shii-Cho style, lightsaber defense with MOTF2; plenty of squads will struggle to drop him their commander effects turned off by BastilaHe's not lacking in offense either; he has triple attack, Dispassionate Killer (much more tantalising wirg Master of the Force 2), Force Push 3, and Lightsaber Riposte. He also has a cannon CE for a Covenant follower, giving them an immediate attack; a Covenant Protector with twin is a good candidate, while he has Speed 8 and hands it out to Covenant followers.

Lucien's weakness is that he isn't able to put out much damage on the move - you can throw in the Revanchist to give him Ambush, but otherwise he has to be stationary to use his Triple. I don't know if Lucien even saw play this Regional season, but I do think there's potential for him to be really good - he packs a lot of power into a 57 point piece, a potent attacker, a cannon CE, and a tough defensive game are a strong package, even at 57 points. 8/10.

Shaper Adept, from Invasion





The Shaper Adept isn't very glamorous, but it fills a hole for the Vong - Yomin Carr and his Spit Poison CE didn't work against non-living characters, which didn't make a lot of canonical sense, since Vong hated droids and would have found a way to hurt them too. The Shaper Adept means that spit poison squads have a way in against droid squads. Really, you're never going to mainline the Shaper Adept into a squad, but it's a great reinforcement choice with Supreme Overlord Quorreal featuring in most Vong squads. Nothing exciting here - it has a bunch of SAs, but with 30 hit points it's going to be sitting out the back in most games - but the Shaper Adept turns a bad matchup into a game, and that's something to commend, 7/10.

PS. - are there any other Vong SAs that don't affect Droids? Spit Poison is the obvious one, but I was wondering if I've forgotten something?

It's a well-designed mini. Thanks for sharing the designers' thought process, Tim.

Whoops, my bad. The only droid with cloaked wasn't in play when we made this piece, lol. OK - so not that last bit, but the rest is true.

It works similar to Ephant Mon's CE in that it works on all targeting (SAs, FPs, and attacks)

It would be a sweet way to take out those pesky BX Spotter Droids. A bunch of Shaper Adept aided razor bugs can take one down from across the board without fear of the energy shield.

Talz Chieftain, from The Dark Times





Such a weird niche commander effect - non-unique fringe followers get +4 attack and +10 damage against non-unique enemies? It's hard enough to get your head around, let alone find a squad where it's useful. There's no way you'd mainline such a niche commander effect, but it does have a way in with Lobot. You'd think, with the advent of Talon Karrde and viable all-Fringe squads, the Talz Chieftain would be playable, but his Commander Effect doesn't stack with Talon's since they're both straight unnamed bonuses. He might be playable if you're playing a swarm of non-unique Fringe attackers in another faction, and you're playing against a squad with plenty of non-uniques, but even then he's up against similarly priced and less niche commanders like Jabba Crime Lord and the Chiss Captain, who do similar things.

Apart from the Commander Effect, the Talz Chieftain piece is a reasonably robust attacker for 16 points, with 60 hit points, advantageous, and double attack, but you're certainly not going to play him just as an attacker, so if you can't use his commander effect he's not going to see play. And while there might be the odd game where his CE comes in handy, I really don't think you even need to bother with one of these in your Lobot reinforcements box, unless you regularly play the kinds of squads that the CE can help, 3/10.

Mandalorian Scout, from Knights of the Old Republic





One of the best non-uniques in the game, the Mandalorian Scout has been a staple of Mandalorian squads from release until the present day, and a couple of Scouts featured in this year's GenCon winning squad:



The Scout is just a very lean, efficient piece - with Cloaked and 50 hit points, they have very good defense for a 19 shooter. On offense, all they do is shoot, but they do it very well, with Greater Mobile, Double, and Opportunist, as well as easy access to Twin (they can get it from a Czerka, a Mandalorian Scientist, or a Mandalorian Captain), they're often making four attacks at +12 for 20 damage against an activated enemy. Even with plenty of new v-set options for the Mandos, it's unusual not to see a Scout in a Mandalorian squad; possibly the only Mando builds to regularly exclude Scouts are the new Neo-Crusader squads, which revolve around pieces that don't have access to Twin. The Mando is a super strong piece for the Mandos, an easily boostable, Mobile, Cloaked Shooter. 10/10.

Darth Sidious, Sith Mastermind, from Bounty Hunters Challenge





From the first pair of Bounty Hunter Challenge pieces, Sidious Sith Mastermind is a tough nut to crack - like a mega-Jarael with Evade and Parry, and more Force Points and Hit Points to go around. On one hand, he raised an entire thread of angst upon release, complaining about his toughness, but on the other hand he really hasn't made a splash in competitive play - I don't think he's ever cracked the Top 4 of a Regional or placed highly in a New Zealand event. As well as his strong defenses, he also has offense with Jedi Hunter and Sith Rage, meaning that he can put significant damage on one piece in a phase, but he doesn't have any area damage, so he's going to struggle against swarms.

As an Imperial piece, the initial reaction is to stick him in a Thrawn swap squad - but when you think about it, you can get similar amounts of damage out of Cad Bane, who's 46 points cheaper, can shoot, and do damage on the move, while you're also paying twice for initiative control. But he's a good piece, with lot of damage avoidance capabilities, and with his Rapport 10 for Darth Vaders, there's probably some scope for having a Vader and Palpatine beatdown squad (maybe Scourge of the Jedi is a good option?) - these ideas have been raised on Sith Holo News Network, but I've never seen them in action.

With Evade, Parry, and high hit points, Palpatine is certainly an intimidating prospect, but a 100 point piece does need to be very strong to justify its high cost. With the release of the new Palpatine Reborn, who's cheaper and has the potential for area damage, I don't know if he's ever going to have the chance to make a splash in the competitive game - although I could see him being nasty at 150 points, where he's less likely to run into bad matchups like swarms. Palpatine Sith Mastermind is an intimidating enough prospect, but his lack of competitive success thus far means that it's hard to justify more than a 7/10.

I still think this guy, and all of the other BHC pieces are some of my favourite. Great super powered versions of the characters we love, and this is truly Palpatine at his finest. Even perhaps more so than the phantom menace