Star Wars Legion Unit Review: Obi-Wan Kenobi

Good morning gamers,

In early 2023, I got the Republic half of a Star Wars Legion starter box, and after playing a bunch of games, I was hooked (though disenchanted by some of the features of the game - see a previous article I wrote on this). The starter box for for the Clone Wars era gives you Obi-Wan Kenobi, two squads of Phase I Clone Troopers (which we'll cover later this year), and a BARC speeder (which we'll cover eventually). In all my research on how to run the Republic, basically everyone says that Jedi are good . . . but Obi-Wan is not. So, since all of the experts are saying to avoid this guy, I've naturally been playing with him exclusively since the start of the year and I have some thoughts on him. TL;DR is that he isn't junk, just misunderstood.

NOTE: When I wrote this article, everyone was down on Obi-Wan - and then someone won the LVO tournament with him, so now he's being talked about everywhere (and I'm moving this article up in the schedule to be relevant - and so you don't think I'm just tooting someone else's horn, since all of these thoughts were written up BEFORE Obi-Wan's success at LVO). If you'd like to see the LVO winning list, you can view it here. You can also listen to a discussion about Obi-Wan (and the Republic - and a lot of other things) here. 

Obi-Wan Kenobi: The Profile

My Go-To Build for Obi-Wan Kenobi: 205 points
Photo Credit: Legion HQ

General Kenobi has a fairly standard Jedi profile - lots of attack dice (2 red/black/white) with Impact 2/Pierce 2 (and Critical 2, since he doesn't surge for crit/hit innately), Immune: Pierce, Master of the Force 1 (for resetting one of those really useful Force upgrades), and a very healthy 6 Wounds/3 Courage and a red defense die. Obi-Wan can also perform Jump 1 for one action (most Force users can), he has Charge (which isn't the same as Relentless, but a free attack action is still a free attack action), and he's got 2 Force upgrade slots. By all rights, this guy should compare pretty well to his Jedi counterparts, specifically Yoda and Anakin.

But here we depart into the differences - both Yoda and Anakin have rules or command cards that allow them to lean hard into the token-sharing mechanic that makes the Republic really good - and most of the upgrades that Obi-Wan can take can also be taken by these guys (Yoda can't take Training upgrades and Anakin can't take Command upgrades). If you compare the expected damage from Anakin (one attack with 6 Blacks and surge for crit) or Yoda (two attacks with 4 Reds), Obi-Wan is lacking in the damage department a bit. But Obi-Wan has two other rules that make him distinct and different from these guys - and paired with his unique access to Force, Command, AND Training upgrades, I think these rules set him above the other two (wait, did I just say that?): Guardian 3 and Soresu Mastery.

Guardian 3 allows Obi-Wan to absorb up to 3 hit results from a friendly unit within range 1 and within line of sight - he then gets to roll his red defense die to try to block them. This pairs nicely with Soresu Mastery, which not only allows Obi-Wan to cancel one of these hits with a dodge token if he wants to (he's the only Guardian who can use dodge tokens to cancel Guardian hits), but also gives him surge for block on defense, increasing his effectiveness. While Yoda can generate a lot of dodge tokens that can be borrowed on a turn in which he plays Luminous Beings Are We (and can REALLY generate dodge tokens if Padme is also in the list with Guidance) and while Anakin can generate lots of dodge/surge tokens that can be borrowed with Exemplar and Reliable 2, Obi-Wan has the ability to continually absorb damage away from your critical units in a way that neither of the other Jedi options for the Republic can. Let's see how we can capitalize on this with his upgrade suite . . .

IP Class Deck Review: Hutt Mercenaries

Good morning all, 

After a long hiatus (read five years) from covering Imperial class decks (and anything related to Imperial Assault in general), we’re back! We've been busy over on our other blog (which mostly tackles topics for the Middle-Earth Strategy Battle Game), but this year, I'm coming back and working through the other articles I intended to write for Imperial Assault (and covering the Tyrants of Lothal expansion, which has been released since I stopped writing). Today we tackle the second IP deck from Jabba’s Realm: Hutt Mercenaries. While I personally think this is the weaker brother to the Nemeses deck, you can get some nice free bonuses from many of the cards (and you can get a TON more damage than you can in the Nemeses deck). Like our other posts, you’ll see units that work well in the deck – so get ready for LOTS of Mercenary cards (though you’ll see Imperials as well). 

Hutt Mercenaries: A Wretched Hive of Scum and Villainy 

The Hutt Mercenary deck relies on a new token mechanic: bounties. At the start of the game, each Rebel Hero is assigned a “Bounty token” and they hold this bounty token until they’re defeated for the first time (aka wounded). These Bounty tokens do different things based on the upgrades you choose, but the simplest bonus you get is that once per turn you can add +1 Damage or +1 Surge to the attack results. Other bonuses to Bounty tokens can be offensive (rerolling attack dice, adding extra dice/ignoring figures in the way, adding even more damage) or defensive (die rerolls). While not all Hutt Mercenary cards rely on the Bounty Token mechanism, the Bounties can provide niche benefits in a particular fight – I recommend stacking up all of the bonuses in the same fight. Like I said in my post on Power of the Dark Side, you can get some absolutely deadly combinations by pairing multiple class deck cards together in a single fight. Without further ado, let’s look at some lists.