IP Class Deck Review: Power of the Dark Side

When the Nemeses class deck was released with the Jabba’s Realm expansion, we thought we were getting the Sith deck we always wanted. Then, with Heart of the Empire (and the release of Emperor Palpatine and Maul), we were told that we had received the actual Sith deck we always wanted with Power of the Dark Side. When I first saw it, my thoughts went something like this. . . .

THIS. DECK. SUCKS!

So, it’s taken me some time to look at the deck and determine what I think of it. My thoughts over the last six months shall be shown below. Rest assured, my views have gotten better, but given the choice, I think (for the record) I’d still choose Nemeses (you can read my thoughts on that deck here).

Power of the Dark Side: Give A Little To Get A Little

Every now and again, you’ll find a class deck that focuses on something new that was released in that expansion. This is seen most obviously in two Imperial class decks to date: Power of the Dark Side (with Damage Power tokens) and Imperial Black Ops (with the Hidden condition). When you’re playing with these kinds of decks, you’ll be given many opportunities to use whatever new mechanic is introduced – and often times if you focus full-bore into it, you’ll do alright. Power of the Dark Side does have a variety of ways to get Damage Power tokens (DPTs hereafter), but I’m going to submit that focusing fully on it isn’t that necessary. While we will discuss how you can use this “damage in your pocket” to the max, we’ll be looking also at the non-Damage-Power-Token routes that you can take.

What makes the Power of the Dark Side Imperial Class deck unique from the other decks is not only its use of a new game mechanic, but also the penalties it requires in order to gain benefits. While other decks might provide static offensive or defensive benefits for being near a certain unit, Power of the Dark Side rarely requires proximity to something but instead provides either a one-time boost to someone, a temporary boost to someone, or it requires taking damage in order to become stronger. This allows your units to act more autonomously, but requires that you take healthier units (or field cheap units that you can regrow as you require).

Perhaps the best thing about this deck is that unlike all other decks we’ve seen thus far, it doesn’t rely on an Imperial Player using a particular kind of unit (only one upgrade has any kind of exclusion at all). While other decks might require you to have Troopers, Guardians, or Leaders in your deck, this one helps everyone equally. With that said, let’s get into it. . . .

End-Game Build #1 – That Thing Yoda Says: Manifest Aggression, Embrace Fear, Embrace Anger, Embrace Hate, Embrace Suffering

Okay, I’ll be honest: when I first saw the deck, I said “Huh, it follows that quote Yoda says in Episode I: I wonder if that’s worth doing.” After some debate, I think it MIGHT be worth doing, but I couldn’t hesitate in the end from presenting it. J

The automatic upgrade available to the IP is Manifest Aggression – this is a great way to give 2 Imperial figures each a DPT. This is the most reliable way to get DPTs spread across your army (and the good thing is that it doesn’t require you to do anything bad to the guy receiving the token). The cost paid is this: you either a) get 2 tokens but tell the heroes where they’re going to be, or b) you get 1 token and the heroes can’t preemptively strike whoever gets it. I highly recommend that you NOT give out Damage tokens at the start of the first round and instead assign DPTs at the end of the first round AND the start of the second round – this gives you 4 DPTs to use during the second round (and you could have 2 DPTs on 2 figures if they can attack multiple times). The only cost of doing this is not being able to up your damage during the first round (which you’ll be hard-pressed to see that realized into anything meaningful because most of your units will likely be out of position to attack properly).

Supporting this upgrade are two upgrades that deal Strain to Rebel heroes: Embrace Fear and Embrace Hate. Embrace Fear can only be relied on to give 1 movement point to an Imperial figure when he activates (which isn’t that great, but is on-par for what we expect from a 1 XP upgrade). The value in this upgrade is that it dictates which Rebel figure goes first – the Rebels can appear to be defeating this upgrade by activating someone with a good Insight check pool (but this might not be figure who is in the most danger). If the chosen first figure fails the check, they’ll suffer 1 Strain (which turns into Damage if the hero is already fully strained OR makes it less likely that they’ll be able to use their special abilities). While only a niggling hurt, every Strain suffered pushes the Rebel hero closer and closer to having to spend an action resting (which is often good for the IP, since many missions require the heroes getting somewhere or killing things).

Embrace Hate allows you to choose a Rebel figure in the status phase to suffer 1 Strain. This not only happens right before Embrace Fear (which means a Rebel hero with only 2 Strain left could go from able-to-strain to not-able-to-strain-without-resting), but it’s not dependent on having line of sight to the figure. If you do have line of sight to the figure, your figure suffers 1 Damage and gains a DPT. Pairing these two upgrades together is powerful not only because you can slap 2 Strain on someone if they don’t have a good Insight pool and they NEED to go first (like if they’re about to be wounded). This, added to the DPTs that are handed out, makes it very likely that you can wound that character so long as you have units healthy enough to endure the first Rebel activation.

The other two upgrades we have are different: one is offensive, the other tactical. Embrace Anger is perhaps one of the best upgrades available in this class deck (if you have healthy characters): an Imperial figure can exhaust the card when he declares an attack to suffer 1 Damage and add 1 Damage to his attack results. Since this card readies at the start of each Imperial activation, you can use healthy units to rail against a single hero, driving him to rest (see the Hate-Fear combo we just talked about for how to finish this guy). Embrace Suffering is far more situational: you can either choose to exhaust the upgrade without paying Threat to push someone (useful if they’re trying to get somewhere or be next to something/someone) OR you can pay Threat to take control of a Rebel figure and perform an attack (like using that amazing Polearm with Vibrogenerator and whack another Rebel figure with it). It’s painful AND it happens at the end of the round, so you can rack up a little extra damage on someone before the first activation of the round is decided.

This build is eclectic, but it works. Your emphasis is on doing as much damage as you can during the round and then as one round turns into another, you add a little Strain, do some unexpected damage, gain a few DPTs – BAM! You’re all set up for another round of punishment.

Best IP Units:

·         Royal Guard (Core) – If you’re going to be taking damage in order to gain bonuses, you might as well get a static Block 1 each time you defend yourself. While Royal Guards don’t give themselves static Block results, they do give friendly figures this bonus. They themselves not only have a great attack profile (Red-Yellow with Reach), but they also have a great health-for-cost ratio (great for keeping them alive).

·         Elite Gamorrean Guard (Jabba’s Realm) – While these guys can’t benefit from the free Block provided by the Royal Guards mentioned above, they do receive a static Block 1 against blaster attacks. With the same cost and health as Royal Guards (plus a punchier attack pool and a reroll whenever they attack), these guys are less team-oriented and more self-oriented – the perfect candidates for the two DPTs provided by Manifest Aggression.

·         Riot Trooper (Heart of the Empire) – With an equally good health-to-cost ratio as Royal Guards and Gamorrean Guards, Riot Troopers are very inexpensive and their free Block Power Token allows them to supplement their defense results quite nicely. As Guardian units, they also can’t benefit from the static Block 1 of the Royal Guards, but they’re still great to have (and can be easily fielded in the first half of any campaign. On offense, they lack the Reach of the previous two candidates, but they can turn any surge they get into Damage, which is pretty nice (and can convert Damage into Strain if required).

·         Heavy Stormtrooper (Twin Shadows) – Like the previous three candidates, Heavy Stormtroopers also have a great health-for-cost ratio and are the first non-Guardian units we’ve considered (so they can benefit from the static Block 1 bonus from the Royal Guards). They can add to this an additional static Block 1 against attacks from 4+ spaces away – perfect for not being sniped (though in practice, the Rebels tend to just run up closer, so it’s not a big thing). As one of a handful of Imperial units who can surge for Blast, getting a DPT is critical to getting the damage you need to breach an opponent’s defenses and blast into his friends.

·         Elite Probe Droid (Core) – While getting free defense is a way to offset taking damage, healing is far more reliable. Elite Probes not only have a good health stat, Probe Droids have always been an inexpensive three-dice-attack-pool unit – and the ability to Recover Damage is huge.

End-Game Build #2 – Maximizing DPTs: Manifest Aggression, Embrace Hate, Unnatural Abilities, The Power of Passion

Four of the nine upgrades in this Class deck allow the Imperial Player to hand out one or more DPTs. While we’ve already talked about Manifest Aggression (use back-to-back at the end of a round and the start of the next every other round) and Embrace Hate (which comes at the cost of a damage to whoever gets the DPT), there are two other upgrades that provide DPTs: Unnatural Abilities and The Power of Passion.

Unnatural Abilities rewards you for having single-figure, non-Creature deployment cards in your list. With a static Block 1 + Evade 1, your single-figure deployment card is MUCH harder to kill (though multi-model deployment cards still get the static Evade 1), and at the end of the deployment group’s activation, one figure in the group receives a DPT to use during his next activation (regardless of how many figures are in the group). The Power of Passion makes anyone who uses a DPT more powerful by adding a static Surge 1 to the Damage 1 of the DPT. This static benefit is supplemented by the ability to exhaust the upgrade in order to reroll any number of attack dice. This is similar to upgrades in other Imperial Class decks (Precision Training, Nemeses) while other decks allow a reroll of a single die (Inspiring Leadership, Precision Training, Hutt Mercenaries). While the ability to reroll attack dice is nice, the real benefit comes from the static offensive benefits – don’t get too caught up in which unit gets the reroll.

Best IP Units:

·         AT-DP (Heart of the Empire) – If equipped with Unnatural Abilities, this guy gets a static Block 2 + Evade 1 (in addition to whatever he gets on the Black die – likely an additional Block 2). The Evade 1 is the real boon, since you want to keep those nasty Pierce 3 guys from getting through all that armor – and because you lose the ability to perform multiple attacks each turn if you fall below half health. With very few surge abilities (and a Yellow die already in your attack pool), it’s not that necessary to use DPTs with this guy (unless you’re just trying to maximize damage).

·         Elite Clawdite Shapeshifter with Streetrat Form (Heart of the Empire) – I love this build – the surge abilities on the Streetrat are phenomenal (free Red die worth of damage against an adjacent figure, Damage 1, or DPT) and with the Elite, you have a good chance of getting 2 surge (which you should use to deal the Red die worth of damage and regain your DPT). As a single figure deployment card, you also get the full benefits of Unnatural Abilities (which can give you a DPT at the end of the round if you didn’t surge to get a DPT during your attack).

·         Elite Probe Droid (Core) – If you’re going to get a free surge result from your DPT, you might as well have some great surge abilities to use – with choices of Damage 2 / Pierce 2 / Recover 2, it’s hard to go wrong with this guy. He also will get the full weight of Unnatural Abilities to assist him in defense, including a free DPT each turn, allowing you to use Manifest Aggression on other figures.

·         Clawdite Shapeshifter with Senator Form (Heart of the Empire) – Thanks to the Conspire skill on the Senator Form (and the ability to surge for a Wild Power Token), you can make sure all of your teammates get DPTs. This is a cheaper, less-powerful version of the Elite Clawdite Shapeshifter we discussed previously, but if you’re planning on playing the support role and passing out tokens, I recommend taking the cheaper version.

·         Wing Guard (Bespin Gambit) – These guys don’t benefit from the static Block 1 from Unnatural Abilities, but they do benefit greatly from the static Surge from DPTs (as a Green-Blue doesn’t reliably surge and they can Recover Damage whenever they surge). The DPT gained from Embrace Hate can be an excellent counter to the Damage 1 suffered in order to gain the DPT (since you can then surge to Recover 1). Be watchful of the damage these guys are taking though – they’re not hard to reinforce, but redeploying a new batch costs 6 points (which is very hard to come by in most missions).

End-Game Build #3 – Defensive Stance: Manifest Aggression, Dark Resurgence, Supernatural Vigor, Unnatural Abilities

It was a little surprising to me that a Sith-oriented deck could play defense – none of the Sith characters have any kind of defensive abilities. Some of these upgrades, however, are quite good. We’ve already seen the defensive (and offensive) benefits of Unnatural Abilities, but there are two other upgrades we’ll look at: Dark Resurgence and Supernatural Vigor.

Dark Resurgence is simple: pick someone who was just defeated to recover 3 Damage instead. While this is an obvious boon to an Imperial figure who needs to be defeated in order for the mission to end, it’s not as powerful as the Failsafe upgrade in Technological Superiority. That said, it’s a 1 XP upgrade – how much can you really complain (and unlike Failsafe, it doesn’t cost Threat)? Supernatural Vigor is a tricky upgrade to use: whoever receives it has a slight health boost (or a dramatic health boost if it’s a low-health figure), but that figure needs to be able to recover any damage that spills over onto the upgrade in order for it to move to someone else (assuming it follows the general understanding of the Adrenaline Command card – see discussions here and here). In my opinion, it’s best put on a low-health figure who will begin at the front of the fighting, keeping him alive for an additional attack action – though it obviously has benefits on a villain that you’re trying to keep alive for mission objective reasons.

Perhaps the best thing about this build, is that it only costs you 6 XP in order to field – giving you plenty of opportunities to get other upgrades to supplement your offensive needs (I like Embrace Anger, though borrowing a Rebel figure to perform an attack with Embrace Suffering is also great).

Best IP Units:

·         Stormtrooper (Core) – When it comes to thinking about a defensive build for an IP team, cheap units are one way to do it. If you can keep one of your guys alive (let’s say with Supernatural Vigor), then redeploying your men comes easily. When I mentioned above that you want to give Supernatural Vigor to someone who might get one-action-KO’d by your opponent, I had Stormtroopers in mind.

·         Elite E-Web Engineer (Core) – E-Webs are great at using both Unnatural Abilities and Supernatural Vigor: not only can they Recover up to 4 Damage in a single turn (if they shoot twice and surge to Recover 2 Damage each time), but they will have a static Block 2 + Evade 1. Since E-Webs play defense (our mantra on this site), I kinda felt like I needed to put them in the list.

·         Elite Probe Droid (Core) – what can I say – we’re looking for units who can Recover Damage? These guys are just going to naturally benefit from upgrades like Unnatural Abilities and Supernatural Vigor (with the healing bringing them under the +3 bonus health they receive), but don’t underestimate the benefits they get from free damage provided by Manifest Aggression or Embrace Anger.

·         Clawdite Shapeshifter with Senator Form (Heart of the Empire) – The Senator Form allows a Clawdite Shapeshifter to Recover Damage and since Clawdites have low Health as it is, this makes them difficult targets to remove if they have Supernatural Vigor and Unnatural Abilities. I’ll note that you can run a Elite Clawdite Shapeshifter as well, passing the Senator Form along with the Supernatural Vigor upgrades between them – boosting the health of whichever one needs to recover the most.

·         Wing Guard (Bespin Gambit) – As the final unit that can recover damage, it shouldn’t be a surprise that these guys made it here: like their Stormtrooper counterparts, they don’t benefit particularly well from getting Unnatural Abilities, but Supernatural Vigor can keep one of them from dying.

In our next post, we’ll be looking at the Imperial Black Ops Class deck – another deck that focuses on maximizing a new game mechanic introduced in its expansion. Until next time, happy gaming!