Skirmish Upgrades: Spectre Cell

Good morning gamers,

Today we're going to talk about a very niche skirmish upgrade: Spectre Cell. This upgrade was one of the driving reasons for me to get the Tyrants of Lothal expansion and the primary driver for getting Chopper and Hera. It heavily restricts the units you can run, but boy is it powerful (even after its errata). Let's see what it does!

Spectre Cell: Running the Star Wars Rebels Team

When my son and I first opened the Tyrants of Lothal box last year (we didn't get our hands on it fast enough when it came out), we looked at the Spectre Cell upgrade and said, "Well, that looks busted." The skirmish upgrade is simple: to use it, the only characters you can run are the six members of Phoenix squadron (Hera, Chopper, Kanan, Ezra, Zeb, and Sabine), all friendly figures get +1 damage and +1 block, and you can exhaust the upgrade during a friendly figure's activation to either perform an attack or give two movement points to another friendly figure. Easy right?

Yes, very easy - and FAR too powerful. A free damage with everyone and a free block with everyone was oppressive, especially in two-player games. We basically said, "Yeah, you can't use this card outside of a four-player team game." Then I looked up the erratas for Imperial Assault and found that they too thought that it was busted - at least the free damage/block part. Instead of getting a free damage/block, at the start of the round, you get to hand out 1 damage power token (DPT) and 1 block power token (BPT). That's . . . far more reasonable.

The upgrade is certainly worth getting if you're okay with a six-character team - which most non-Trooper Rebel lists are. The ability to get an extra attack with Ezra for some pinch healing or get a cheeky Blast in with Sabine is excellent and if it just provided that, I think it would be good. Since two of your punchiest heroes (Sabine and Ezra) both roll white defense dice, it's nice that you can throw out a block token each round to give them a slightly better chance of surviving (and an extra damage token on basically anyone is going to be awesome). Of course, the best thing about power tokens is that if you don't use them, they stick around (though you have a max of two tokens). 

There are trades, though - if you take this upgrade, you're not taking other characters that might fulfill roles similar to those of the Spectre Cell units better - R2-D2 is arguably better at guarding terminals than Chopper, I generally jump for Ahsoka before I grab Kanan, and one could easily make the argument that the augments you can get from Gideon are better than the augments you get from Hera. I'm not going to make the argument against Ezra, Sabine, or Zeb - they're excellent in a scrap - but are these 7-8pt characters better than their 3-model trooper equivalents? In some match-ups sure, but having a 6-model team limits your options in some scenarios in ways that a 10-12 model team just doesn't have.

Since we know that we're getting all 6 characters (37 points) and the Spectre Cell upgrade costs 2 points, we have 1 point left to spend . . . and since we can't pick up any characters, we have a few options for additional upgrades:

• Extra Armor - this upgrade was released in the Zeb and Sabine pack (and will actually be our topic next time), but it's really simple: throw out four block tokens on your guys at the start of the game. This is a great way to make sure that Ezra, Sabine, and Kanan have a slight defensive boost when you get started (and when paired with a fifth block token and a damage token on the first turn, you're ready to roll from the beginning).
• Channel the Force - this was released in the Obi-Wan Kenobi pack and it allows you to draw one fewer command cards at the end of the round and fish out a Force User card instead (suffering Strain equal to its pips). There are a ton of good 0-1 pip command cards that Force Users can use, and if you lean into this, it's not hard for Kanan to get a few Force User cards in your discard pile early so that his unique command card is more powerful.
• On a Diplomatic Mission - if you don't plan to attack with Hera, you can get a free VP each turn by having this upgrade on her. She's likely to play it safe in the midfield if you do this, but it's definitely an option (and pairs nicely with Sabine's Rebel Graffiti for free VPs). 
• Smuggler's Run - speaking of free VPs, if you don't mind running Ezra into the enemy's deployment zone, you can get some sweet VPs from him with Smuggler's Run. I generally wouldn't do this, but turning 1 command point into 5 VPs is almost always worth it. This also comes in the Rebel Smuggler pack, which I think is one of the best Rebel-focused upgrade packs when it comes to command cards.
• Motivation - released in the Luke Skywalker pack (which is just good to have - the command cards are pretty generic, cheap, and useful), this card has to be placed on Kanan or Zeb, but can be used to heal anyone else and give out a movement point. When you're handing out block tokens and have heavy-hitters in the mix, a little healing and a little extra movement can go a LONG way.

Okay, let's look at a sample list . . .

Spectre Cell: Sample List

Here's a list that shows off what you can do with the Spectre Cell upgrade:

• Deployment Cards:
• Hera Syndulla with On a Diplomatic Mission 
• C1-10P
• Kanan Jarrus
• Sabine Wren 
• Zeb Orrelius
• Ezra Bridger
• Spectre Cell 
• Heroic Effort 
• Command Cards:
• Balancing Force (2)
• Evacuate (2)
• Force Jump (1)
• Force Push (1)
• Force Rush
• Force Surge (2)
• Heart of Freedom (2)
• Hour of Need
• I Can Feel It 
• Learn by Example (1)
• Protect the Old Ways (1)
• Pummel (1)
• Pummel (1)
• Rebel Graffiti 
• Telekinetic Throw (1)

I added Heroic Effort to the list because it's free and all of our characters are unique. Because we don't draw cards as easily as some Rebel decks (something we could fix easily by replacing Chopper and Spectre Cell with R2-D2 and Rebel High Command), having the ability to send a command card that we can't play anymore (because that character just died) to the bottom of our deck to draw a new one is excellent.

I also opted for On a Diplomatic Mission, paired with some command cards that either give us VPs (I Can Feel It, Rebel Graffiti) or deny our opponent VPs (Evacuate). Hera won't be shooting unless by doing so she can finish off a model (which will score more than one VP). I could have also taken Channel the Force with this build - it would allow us to draw Force Rush or I Can Feel It without suffering any damage or draw Force Jump, Force Push, or Telekinetic Throw for 1 damage (probably best to do this on Kanan unless you're going to be healing it up with Ezra).

The heavy emphasis on Force User cards is not only because Kanan and Ezra are some of our workhorse heroes, but also because both of their command cards depend on Force User cards being played. Ezra can copy cards like I Can Feel It to gain an extra VP or Force Surge to gain some extra movement and deal some extra damage (which is killer after an activation in which he uses Pummel). Kanan can provide extra block results to himself or a nearby friend based on the Force User cards in your discard pile - and we have 6 of those. Realistically, you'll probably get 2-4 extra block when you play it, but cancelling the results of 1-2 dice or the Pierce 3 of a lightsaber is super useful.

Conclusion 

On the whole, I really like this deck and this upgrade. The errata makes it a lot more playable and I think it's a great addition to the game. Next time, we're looking at the Extra Armor upgrade, which has some really interesting applications to the various factions in the game. Until then, happy gaming!