Top 10 Upgrades for Leia Organa

Hey Reader!

We took a look at Commander Luke a few weeks ago, and today we're looking at Leia Organa, my favorite Rebel Commander and a common sight in the tournament scene, both because her profile is very strong, and because she comes in the Echo Base Defenders battleforce.

We looked at her profile in a previous post, so you can see our discussion of her abilities, command cards, and tactical uses there. But today we will rank the command and tech upgrade options she has to see which are most effective combinations to make the most of our favorite princess.

We'll start with an honorable mention, mostly because it does technically work well with Leia, but it may prove to be a waste of points.

Honorable Mention: Lead by Example

Inspire is a great keyword, especially for armies that rely heavily on Core units with a suppression value of 1. Being able to keep suppression at a manageable level is very useful, especially if you can remove suppression tokens before a unit takes its turn (so there's less chance of them being suppressed when they activate).

And the other nice thing about this keyword is that it's free: it doesn't require an action to use (as you perform it at the end of your Rally step), doesn't require a Recover action to reactivate it, and doesn't require the affected unit(s) to perform a specific action on their turn to make the most of it: they can do whatever they want.

The issue with this upgrade is that it's 8pts to double the effect that Leia already has (as she already has Inspire 2), so the real question is how many units do you plan to have 1) within Range 1-2 of Leia when she activates, 2) that have suppression tokens on them, and 3) that need suppression tokens removed when she activates, without giving up potential cover bonuses before their activation.

So while this is a useful ability, I've found that in most cases Inspire 2 is perfectly serviceable. Inspire 4 is overkill, especially since it's one of the most expensive command upgrade options out there. And speaking of expensive command options...

#10: Aggressive Tactics

For 15pts, you get the ability to hand out up to 4 surge tokens to units with a faceup order token. Now, on the one hand, this is great for Rebels because they tend to hand out quite a few order tokens between access to Coordinate and access to Independent units.

The other nice thing is that this card doesn't have a specified reach: it's a battlefield-wide effect, so if you have units that use an HQ Uplink or Long-Range Comms Link to get a faceup order token far away from your commander, they can still benefit from Aggressive Tactics, which is awesome.

The issue is that it's extremely situational based on the force you take. A high percentage of Rebel units already surge to hit/crit and block, and all of them save the ewoks surge for at least one result. So surge tokens are just not that useful on Rebel armies unless you're really trying to bump up the offensive abilities of your Rebel Troopers, for example (another common Rebel unit thanks to the Starter Set), or the defensive abilities of your AT-RTs (which personally I'd just never take, but maybe that's me).

Furthermore, the units that can receive the surge tokens have to be units with faceup order tokens, and in the case of AT-RTs and Rebel Troopers, they would have to be the units you choose to assign your orders to. So if you were to assign orders to, say, Rebel Veterans (to give them Dodge tokens), Luke (so you can reliably activate him), Han (ditto), Laser Cannon Teams (for reliable firepower on demand), Snowspeeders (ditto), or more, all of those surge tokens would be wasted, as all of those units already surge both ways.

And again, it's 15 points: this one upgrade could cost as much as three upgrades to fully kit out Leia, so it's a hard sell to pay this much for something that might be completely useless on some (possibly most) of the turns in the game. So it comes in at #10.

#9: Targeting Scopes

So this is a pretty niche upgrade for commanders, mostly because commanders are generally less oriented toward damage than operatives are. But at least for Leia she can fully take advantage of it. The upgrade gives her Precise 1, so she is able to reroll a third dice when performing an Aim action.

This is nice for Leia because of her attack pools: she rolls 3 black dice in melee (which have a 5/8 chance of doing a hit or crit, so a decent chance of failure) and 3 black dice with Sharpshooter 2 at range (same chance to hit/crit, same chance of failure). So being able to reroll all of them is really nice.

Unless, of course, you happen to roll anywhere close to average, in which case a normal Aim is enough to do the job. So while this is only a 4pt upgrade, it begs the question how often you'll miss with all of your dice, as that's the only situation where it proves to be useful. So while there's a place for it (crit fishing against armored targets like Dark Troopers, vehicles, etc.), I think it's a pretty niche place, and that's why I'm putting it at #9 on the list.

#8: Improvised Orders

So I am of two minds regarding this upgrade. First, it's a really good upgrade if you need to fix your order pool: it allows you, if you want to draw a second order token from the pool when you draw from it, and use the second one instead if that's your preference. That's actually really good, since it increases your odds that you get what you're looking for when you look in the order pool (one of the most critical random elements of the game, up there with dice rolling and who your draw as your opponent).

And furthermore, while it's a Recover upgrade to refresh its ability, that's 1) possible to do on Leia, as she doesn't always have 2 actions she absolutely has to perform each turn, but also 2) it means you can technically do it twice per round: once before she activates, and then once after she activates and Recovers, which then triggers her reactivating it at the end of the round thanks to using it. So it's a really, really nice upgrade: it doesn't require an action to ready it, but if you choose to, you get more use out of it.

There are some issues, though. First, it's situational: if you are able to fix your order pool through good order token management through issued orders, you may not need this ability. Depending on your army breakdown (if you run, say, 1 Commander, 3 Supports, and 6 Core at 800pts), you might not have a lot of order token diversity in your order pool to begin with, so again, it reduces its effectiveness.

But I think the biggest issue is the opportunity cost: Leia only has so many slots, and her greater access to commander slots than most Rebel options means that she likely has other roles to fill beyond a chance at order pool fixing, and I'm not sold that giving up those things is more important.

#7: Esteemed Leader

This is a very useful upgrade, especially if you intend to lean into Leia's command cards (which are pretty good), because if she is removed from the table, you lose all of those command cards. And that could mean you are calling Standing Orders waaaaay more than you'd like. So toward that end, being able to peel hits off of Leia after you've considered cover and dodge tokens is really nice.

But it's a bit niche: if you could use Dodge tokens to block these, then taking this while surrounded by Rebel Veterans would be great, as you could just send damage to the unit and remove it with a Dodge token. But since (as far as I know) you can't do that, this can be quite dangerous for Rebels since they don't have any red die core trooper units.

But there is a unit that actually works well in this role, and that is the Ewok Skirmishers. Whether you're running this as part of a Bright Tree Battleforce or just a generic Rebel army, these squads come in very large numbers, so losing 1-2 of them over the course of a game to keep Leia safe is 100% worth it. So if you put a few ewoks around the princess, you very well may find that the princess lives to the end of the game. But if you're running other core units, I'm not sure that this is a good decision, as you'll find yourself losing bodies that you probably do need very, very quickly.

#6: Electrobinoculars

This is a weird pivot, but it's does have its uses. Rebels in general struggle with getting access to Aim tokens (unless it's an emplacement trooper), so if there's a way to give your guys an Aim token, that's not a bad shout. And Electrobinoculars allows her to do that: as an action, she can give 1 unit within Range 1 an Aim token. And she can do that every turn of the game without having to Recover, which is really nice.

There are a few issues with this, though, as you can imagine. First, it takes an action, so you're paying 8pts (which is pretty expensive) and a vital action for the turn to give a unit at Range 1 a reroll on up to 2 dice (maybe 3 if they have the Targeting Scopes we mentioned earlier). And while this is a useful ability, it has a surprisingly high number of provisos which limit its effectiveness. First, it has to be a unit within Range 1, meaning that you are either keeping her safe and giving the Aim to a supporting fire unit (who is likely going to lose hits due to cover bonuses on the target unit), or you're right in the mix of it with the enemy, which is a relatively dangerous place for Leia to be.

Second, since she already has Take Cover 2, one of her actions every turn is at least gunning for that action, as it's a nice bonus, if not already spoken for. This ability is also at Range 1, so if she wants to hand out Dodge tokens and an Aim token, she can't move, recover, winnow down enemy units, or even perform both of these actions if she's suppressed.

So is this a useful ability? Yes. Do I think Leia has too many other good things going on to justify taking an 8pt upgrade like this on her? Yes. So it's only #6 on the list.

#5: Portable Scanner

This is actually one of the better tech upgrades you can take for Leia, as it doubles down on what she already does. For 6pts you can bump up her Take Cover 2 to Take Cover 3, handing out Dodge tokens to herself (to trigger Nimble) and 2 more units within Range 1, or 3 other units within Range 1 if she's unlikely to be attacked.

And again, like all tech upgrades, there's no Recover needed to trigger this again: whenever you perform the Take Cover action, you get the benefit.

A lot of people take this upgrade, and I see why: if it saves even 1 life it's paid for itself. And while I think it's a useful upgrade, and I don't blame anyone for taking it, I think it does require you to play a specific way where Leia is basically always performing a Move + Take Cover each turn, and I don't think that's always a good idea. Otherwise you run into a situation where you're out of position to help the people who really need it, or you're too close to the enemy and liable to be removed.

So this is a good choice: if you're on the fence about what to take and you have 6pts lying around, picking this up is a good idea. But I think there's one better tech upgrade choice out there, so I've placed this one at #5 on the list.

#4: Strict Orders

This is a hallmark for a lot of armies, as it's the "Keep my guys from panicking" commander upgrade. Being able to tell your troops to just remove 1 suppression token instead of rolling to remove suppression is a two-edged sword, but mostly in your favor. On the one hand, it's a great way to get those 1 suppression token units to be in the clear at the start of their turn, and that's good.

On the other hand, sometimes unit need to remove lots of suppression tokens, and in those situations Strict Orders can probably keep them from panicking, but probably not from being suppressed. So while useful, it's not a sure-fire answer to heavy suppression lists.

Furthermore, this isn't an ability that has to be on Leia: if you take a cheap Rebel Officer, Han, or any other person with a commander slot, them having it is just as good as Leia. So the question again remains: if Leia is issuing a lot of useful command card order tokens for you, do you need Strict Orders on her, or can you put it on someone else? And I tend to find it's better for me to put it on Han or someone else than to use up one of Leia's slots.

#3: Prepared Supplies

For 5pts, it's hard to beat this upgrade for quality: at any point in the game, whether you've activated or not, you have a Dodge token you can use. And for Leia this is doubly good because with the wording of Prepared Supplies, since "you can spend tokens on this card," the wording of Prepared Supplies triggers Nimble: when you spend a Dodge token in response to an attack, you gain a Dodge token.

Now as far as I know you wouldn't gain the Dodge token on this upgrade card, so you'd need a way to retain that Dodge token to keep it going for future rounds (more on that in a bit), but for at least one round, if you spend the Dodge token from Prepared Supplies, you can trigger Nimble for the rest of the round, which is really good.

And even more so with someone like Leia who is likely to be a target since she is keeping the rest of your team alive, adding good command cards, and doing surprisingly cheeky damage with her attack pool. So spending 5pts to keep her in the field longer is a good investment, and I think the best investment you can do with your tech upgrade slot.

The top two contenders for commander slots are very close in my book, and they tend to be the two I take (if I don't take Strict Orders on her), but I think, upon closer reflection, this is the order I prefer.

#2: Vigilance

Do you remember how I mentioned earlier than Nimble required you to have a way to keep a Dodge token on yourself? You can do that with Vigilance. For 12pts (one of the few upgrade cards that has gone up in cost since printing), you can select 1 trooper unit (or 2 core trooper units) within Range 1-2: they don't lose 1 of their Dodge tokens at the end of the round.

This is useful on Leia for so many reasons. Most obviously, as we've mentioned, it can give her 1 Dodge token against an infinite number of attacks for the entire game, which is great value even if you get shot at only 3 times. That's great, and a good reason to make the top of the list.

But it's also great because it builds on what Rebels do, which is duck for cover. Between Rebel Veterans and Ahsoka having Defend 1, Rebel Troopers and Jyn having Nimble, and several command cards across multiple characters that hand out Dodge tokens, allowing your white defense die army to keep Dodge tokens in the field is crazy good. And being able to do it at Range 1-2 makes it more usable than some of those Range 1 abilities we discussed earlier.

#1: Commanding Presence

And finally, we have an old faithful that a lot of armies use: the 5pt (yay for erratas dropping points on cards) upgrade that extends her order issuing range from 3 to 4 (so 24" instead of 18"). This is critical for Rebels because they tend to spread out, between units holding objectives, to units taking objectives, to cheap firepower giving them cover on Cumbersome or Stationary platforms. So you have a lot of units trying to support each other, and in the middle of it is your commander trying to give orders to people. And this card makes that job dramatically easier.

Now there are ways to mitigate the need for this card: Long Range Comms Links (LRCL), for example, allow you to issue that unit an order regardless of range. But since 1 LRCL upgrade costs the same as this upgrade, I think this one is just overall a better way to solve the problem, as you can probably still fix all of the issues that the LRCL is designed to fix for a fraction of the cost.

Is this a boring upgrade? Yes. Does it make sure that Leia can reach out and give the right units an order token, thereby removing your need for other (and sometimes very costly) upgrades in your army? Yes. And that's what I love about this card: it's a cheap, effective way to fix your order pool and optimize your force.

Conclusion

Honestly, even Leia with no upgrades is great. But there are winners and losers among the upgrade options for her, so thinking through what she can realistically accomplish in a given turn is a good thing to do. And you don't need to take 3 upgrades on her: even if she's just an 80pt Commanding Presence commander, she's actually pretty effective. So play around with different upgrades, but I think if you focus on the top 5 in this list, I think you'll find her very useful to your team and quite enjoyable to play.

Watching the stars,

Centaur

"I watch the stars, for it is mine to watch, as it is yours, Badger, to remember." ~ Glenstorm, Prince Caspian