Star Wars Rebellion

[Tai-Pan]

This game is awesome!! Just got it this week and have already played two games.

Anyone else have it or is interested in it?

[Ranior]

Nice. I've heard a lot of great things about it and am interested in getting to play it.

Fortunately I have a boyfriend who wanted it as a Christmas present and it may or may not be under our tree currently....


Looking forward to getting in some games during Christmas time and in the coming weeks and months. Hoping him and I enjoy it. We'll find out.

[Yodaking]

Yeah, I picked it up as soon as it came out and have not regretted it at all. Very fun game with lots of replay ability. For us, initially it seemed like the Empire had the advantage but then we started to gain a better understanding of what the Rebels can do and now the Rebels have been on a winning streak. Even though both sides play very differently, both have a great chance to win. Just need to pursue the right missions and then roll the dice needed to succeed.

[Tai-Pan]

I love how it tells a huge story and becomes MORE exciting and nerve-wracking the closer you come to losing. Even though I played the Imperials by myself I almost started shouting that we need to work more effectively and provide results and not just empty leads! And playing the Rebels I had a very Lord of the Rings type feeling trying to use my army to draw Sauron's, I mean Palpatine's attention away from the Rebel Base just one system away from the Star Destroyer.

In the game I played today the Rebellion started an aggressive Naval campaign to strand Imperial ground forces. Despite attempts to sabotage Imperial production, the Imperials consistently repaired their factories and kept the war machine churning. Both Imperials and Rebels solidly and consistently won systems to their side, with the Empire not needed to rely on subjugating planets. The widespread support the Empire enjoyed made it difficult for the Rebellion to rally support. The Empire was able to pump out Star Destroyers and surround the Rebel fleet in the inner systems, but the Rebels attacked Sullust, won the ground battle with a single Rebel Trooper remaining to disrupt production and had to pull the fleet back to save their Mon Calamari Cruisers. The Empire produced a Super Star Destroyer, but gave up pursuit of the fleeing fleet in order to devote more effort to the search for the Rebel base. The Death Star randomly moved to Toydaria and blew the planet apart, frightening the inhabitants of Nal Hutta to become loyal and betray the Rebel base on that system. The Rebels initiated a daring maneuver to plant the Rebel flag on Coruscant and managed to take the system, but not hold it long enough to rally support. Han Solo was captured by Boba Fett, but careless Stormtroopers left him alone to attack another planet and he escaped. In the last round, the Rebels had so little resources and such a bad hand of missions that they just threw heroes at different opportunities. Luke commanded a single unit of Snowspeeders to take out 3 units of Stormtroopers and a AT-ST to defend a planet on the Outer Rim, Solo and another hero went on a secret mission and turned up the Death Star Plans at the last possible instance and Wedge Antilles led an apparent suicide mission to attack the Death Star, making use of the plans and blowing up the battle station, giving the Rebels the last two Support points to win the game.

[Yodaking]

Yeah the cool stories that play out are a lot of fun. I've blow up the Death Star, watched Obi-Wan get turned to the Dark Side, cornered the Rebels just to watch them evacuate, rescued Leia, and many other fantastic events. It has been a while since I last played, but I seem to recall that whenever I'm the Rebels I focus on building starships over ground troops. I try to put together a few strike forces and just hit the Imperial Navy while sabotaging their own ability to build new Capital Ships. It has worked out really well for me a few times as the Empire soon finds it has more ground troops than ships able to transport them. You also need the starships to take on the Death Star, where as ground troops really don't help you with that.

[MementoMori]

My copy is under the Christmas Tree... oh, I don't know if life is unfair or totally the opposite.

[Tai-Pan]

I played two more games this week to get me in the mood for Rogue One.

I'm not sure if it's just my opponent, but I somehow found the game "too easy" to win, no matter which side I played.

Imperials should spread as fast as they can in order to find the base. I haven't had much difficulty in subjegating systems and defeating Rebel forces. Once the base is found, it's not too hard to take it out. With outposts of a few soldiers blocking as many systems as possible, possibly even playing to systematically move from one side to the other to make sure they have the larger armies on the right side of the board. It feels really easy to keep the Rebels from producing by blocking their planets and churning out a lot of units. My opponent managed to nearly exhaust his available units by filling the galaxy with dark gray figures.

Still, despite this, I felt while playing the Rebels that it was also very easy to win. The Empire is faced with logistical difficulties making them slow moving. I hid the base somewhere, armed it with enough troops to fend off the force that would probably accidentally discover it, once it was found I moved it to the complete other side and the Imperials couldn't get to it in time with a force big enough to take it (I evacuated the old base with the Rapid Mobilization to populate the new base), even if they had known where it was. If you save the better mission cards until you get the corresponding goal cards to earn support, it doesn't seem to hard to destroy the death star, take Coruscant or deal 3 damage to land or space units and accelerate the end.

Somehow, no matter what side I play, it feels like my opponent can do his best, but he can't beat my side. I realize that I make a ton of mistakes, but still end up winning the game. In one game I barely had any Rebel Units outside of my base the whole time and the Empire had all his units on the board and he still lost. Seeing as I don't feel one side is easier than the other, I guess it's balanced, but it's still a strange feeling realizing your opponent has no chance to win and still having to play 4 rounds.

What have been your experiences?

[CrazyTankster]

So... If you were to play yourself, who would win?

[Yodaking]

As I mentioned earlier, it currently feels like the Rebels have the easier road to victory once you understand what you need to be doing to advance the Rebel's goals while also how to slow the Empire down. I haven't had a chance to play the Empire much lately but I think I have a few new tactics to try out the next time I do. I've come to understand that if the Empire is really aggressive with their troops, constantly initiating the fights and wiping out each and every small pockets of Rebels they can, then the Rebels have a much harder time achieving their mission goals. At least the mission goals I usually go after. Destroy a Star Destroyer in a battle you initiate, destroy 3 health worth of ground troops in a battle you initiate, have at least 1 Rebel unit in 5 systems loyal to the Rebellion. By aggressively sweeping the Rebel Forces off the map they can't score those easy points, but doing so means you have to use your heroes to move an attack rather than complete mission cards. Not sure how much the loss of completed mission cards will impact you though. So if those work out it could shift the momentum back their way for a while until I come up with new Rebel tactics. Which makes for a great game IMO.

[TREX]

Originally Posted by CrazyTankster

So... If you were to play yourself, who would win?

You always win. (Is there a pun in there.) ( Is it intended.)

[Tai-Pan]

Maybe my opponent sees some resemblence with a wookiee and plays the 3PO strategy - let the Wookiee win.

I think if I played myself and the Imperials could get the Ground Assault card, they would win most of the time. Spread out, find the base, then use the assault to land a force and wipe them out.

I have only played one game where the Imperials have used the probe droid information effectively. If you avoid planets you have already drawn and use almost all your leaders to search the galaxy, I think you can lock it down quickly. My Imperial opponent the last two games repaired every sabotage attempt, which caused me to quit sabotaging things. I also wonder about the effectiveness of projects. We have only blown up a planet once in 4 games, the SuperSD has been built several times but never seen combat action, the second death star was started once but blown up by Rebels (who didn't gain support because they didnt have the cards and the Imperial player didnt really mind losing it either).

The Rebels really need to do two things, imo. They must focus on getting a MonCalCruiser, because they need a fleet to destroy Imperial transport capabilities to slow their spread. Then, they really have to play Missions for their Goal Cards. If they use up the good missions but aren't gaining support for them, the missions are often not effectively used.

What was the most support points you guys have seen as Rebels? Our top was 4, I believe. 2 for holding Coruscant, 2 for units on different planets.

[Yodaking]

Pretty sure I've hit 5 a few times. Blown up the Death Star before and that is two points right there. Never done the get Rebels on Coruscant one though, it is one I like to bury if I can as is the 3 Sabotage markers mission. I've found one key for the Rebels is to use their Infiltration cards to look at the two mission cards and move the harder to complete mission (changes base on the current game situation) to the bottom of the deck. Some of the level II & level III missions are pretty easy to achieve so if you can move level I missions to the bottom of the deck and get to those sooner you are doing good. The Empire should be contesting every Infiltration attempt.