Darth Vader by Dominik Mayer

Darth Vader: Dark Lord of the Sith – Unit Guide (Legion 2.6)

Picture of Lucas (Teknofobia) Ustick

Lucas (Teknofobia) Ustick

Competitive legion player, writer at the Fifth Trooper blog, streamer, and board game enthusiast.

Darth Vader: Dark Lord of the Sith comes in the original core set for Legion and was one of two commanders available at the release of Star Wars Legion. Since then, he has undergone many changes, gaining new command cards and a rework to his unit card. Commander Vader is the tankiest force user in the game and can single-handedly destroy just about as many units as he has wounds over the course of a game. This article is being updated for Legion 2.6 by Evan Paul from the original written by Lucas Ustick, new text will appear in blue.

We’ve typically been trying to stick to units with updated unit cards for the Legion 2.6 guides so that we don’t have to circle back should the card get changed again with the next set of updates. I ended up deciding to update this one in particular though since Commander Vader is such a central piece for Empire players (and obviously for the game in general because he’s the main character of Star Wars in a way) so I figured it would be best if we at least made sure this one was updated for now.

Cover artwork by: Dominik Mayer

Strengths

  • Hard to kill (8 health with red saves)
  • Infinite courage
  • Compel: Corps Trooper
  • Six Command Cards
  • Playable in Blizzard Force

Weaknesses

  • Speed 1 (usually)
  • Expensive

Overview

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Points

Darth Vader: Dark Lord of the Sith, Emperor Palpatine, and Darth Vader: the College Years (Anakin) are tied for the most expensive unit in the Empire the game at 190 170 points. While this is a high cost, he justifies it by being difficult to kill, deadly in combat, and great at leading troopers. Because of his high price, Vader is often the focus piece when placed in an army. He cannot just be slotted into any army but with proper list building and technique, he can hit far above his cost.

Offense

Darth Vader has one melee weapon profile: Vader’s Lightsaber. This weapon is usable only in melee and has 6 red dice, Impact 3, and Pierce 3. An attack with this lightsaber averages 4.5 hits without surges and averages 5.25 hits with surges. Vader’s Lightsaber can cut through just about any unit type because of its high average hits and Pierce 3. An unaimed attack with two surges from Darkness Descends averages 5 wounds into a unit with red saves. This means he can consistently one-shot many trooper units regardless of the type of defense dice they have. He can also use force abilities like Force Choke and Saber Throw to increase his damage.

NameRangeAvg HitsKeywords
Vader’s LightsaberMelee4.5-5.25Impact 3, and Pierce 3
Vader’s Lightsaber (Saber Throw)1-22.25-2.63Impact 3, and Pierce 3

Defense

Darth Vader: Dark Lord of the Sith has 8 health with red saves and Immune: Pierce. This already formidable health pool is further augmented by Deflect and surges from Darkness Descends. All this together gives him the highest effective wound count out of all non-heavy units in the game with 16-24 effective wounds. Vader is also a great target for medics. Each wound healed gives him another 2-3 effective wounds. It is worth mentioning playing Implacable reduces his effective wounds by 2-3 due to the wound he takes for a second activation.

Utility/Support

Vader has built in support abilities like Compel: Corps Trooper and infinite courage. On top of this he has command card specific abilities like New Ways to Motivate Them. Compel and his infinite courage combine quite nicely. Compel gives suppressed units a move action at the cost of an additional suppression, which is essentially ignored since Vader prevents units from ever panicking with his infinite courage. I love the flavor of Vader’s infinite courage; the Imperial Troopers are more scared of his wrath than the enemy forces making it so they will never panic in combat. New Ways to Motivate Them gives units with face up orders the option to suffer one wound and gain a free action. This card is amazing when combined with multi-wound units like Dewbacks and Imperial Royal Guard. It activates Tenacity and gives them a free move to charge the enemy army.

Vader’s infinite courage is also important when it comes to eliminating a key strategy players use to prevent scoring in Legion 2.6: intentionally panicking units, especially those that have already acted since that suppression will remain until the end of the round unless removed by Inspire. Vader is the only character who can achieve this from the beginning of the game: Chewbacca can do it when he gets enraged and there are a few others (Dark Troopers, Delta Squad, and an enraged Bossk weirdly enough) who can get there via promotion when your original commander is dead. Thus, Vader is essentially alone in possessing this ability. Additionally, a Vader in the middle of your ranks will make it very hard and possibly impossible for your opponent to score the “Panic” checkmark for Bring them to Heel while you will be free to panic your opponent as much as you want (assuming they aren’t also running Vader of course!)

Mobility

The main drawback to Commander Vader is his slow speed 1. He does have Relentless which gives him a free attack at the end of a movement, making it so he can double move most turns. The force upgrade Burst of Speed can help overcome this issue by giving him speed 3 for one turn. He also has two command cards which can help Vader with his mobility issues. Darkness Descends gives Vader Infiltrate which makes it so he can deploy closer to the enemy army. Implacable also gives Vader the ability to move 3 times in one turn. Implacable combines nicely with Burst of Speed letting him move ~24 inches (range 4) in a single turn.

Battle Forces

One major advantage Commander Vader has over his Operative counterpart is his inclusion in Blizzard Force. Blizzard Force is an excellent battle force competitively and provides powerful command cards like Overwhelming Barrage.

Upgrades

Vader is one of the few characters I always fully equip with upgrade cards. I have yet to find a situation where I do not fill every slot during list building.

Command:

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Improvised Orders

Improvised Orders gives you extra order control which is useful considering four of Vader’s command cards only give an order to himself. Improvised Orders is a way to get some more order control without having to issue orders with command cards.

Esteemed Leader

Esteemed Leader is a cheap way to get Guardian 1 on all your corps units. The main drawback to this card is it only is usable when Vader is getting shot which should be avoided in general. I tend to hide him until I am trying to engage. When engaging you rarely have corps troopers in close range unless you are playing snow troopers alongside Vader.

Inspiring Presence

Infinite courage at range 1-3 is good, so infinite courage at range 1-4 is better!

Aggressive Tactics

Commander Vader has no training upgrade slot so Aggressive Tactics is the only upgrade that can passively get him surge tokens. Aggressive Tactics is expensive at 15 points but is worth it if you plan on playing aggressively with Darkness Descends to Infiltrate.

Now that deflect is automatically on against ranged attacks this upgrade has less utility generally since Vader tends to be a little stingy with his orders and thus won’t help his fellow Imperials in your army with their own tokens much. This would be a different story if Empire had access to “Direct” but since it does not, it’s more of a tough sell given that the extra surge will only be helpful against high velocity and melee attacks.

Force:

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Vader has 3 force upgrade slots. I always start with Burst of Speed and Force Push on Commander Vader, but the 3rd force upgrade is more variable post Force Choke nerf. I think there are a few options you can consider for the 3rd force upgrade.

Force Push

We realize that Force Push is 40 points, but it’s hard to argue against it on this character: it’s that good, and it just may save Vader’s life.

Saber Throw

Saber Throw is a possible option for Vader since he has Relentless. Now that cover has changed and is much less reliable against small dice pools, it has much less downside than before.

Burst of Speed

Burst of Speed is essentially a must take on Commander Darth Vader. It helps overcome one of his biggest issues: his speed. Gaining an immobilize token at the end of the round is also not as bad as it seems. For example, if you can engage a unit with Burst of Speed that has already activated you are set up to stay protected the following turn. If the unit withdraws the following turn just force push it back and/or use Vader’s Might to grab a unit and place it in base contact with you. Taking a standby can also help you deal with the immobilize from Burst of Speed since the token is removed at the end of the activation. This makes it so Vader can move with his standby. Note that a unit that is speed 0 cannot be force-pushed, so taking the immobilized token from Burst of Speed functionally makes Vader immune to Force Push for a turn.

Force Choke

Though it ain’t what it used to be, Force Choke is still a viable option for Vader since he can get extra value with double activations from Implacable. The card is not as good for objective play as it once was but still increases his overall damage output. You can choose not to use Pierce when attacking to leave a single living model behind and keep Vader safe in melee. In this situation, Force Choke is still a great way to apply the final wound on that unit the following turn so you can move freely.

Force Barrier

Force Barrier is an excellent upgrade for protecting your units against ranged attacks. It is a potential option for the third force upgrade slot but has one short coming: Force Barrier must be used at range 1 of your own troops but Vader is most effective when he is buried deep in enemy lines. Despite this you can still use the card on early turns as Vader is approaching to help reduce the incoming firepower from your opponent.

Force Reflexes

Force Reflexes gives you a free dodge token during your activation. The main issue with Force Reflexes is the timing. You almost always want to go last with force users which does not work with the timing of this card. Vigilance fixes this timing problem letting you hold onto any dodges generated at the end of the turn.

Commands

Implacable

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Implacable is one of the best command cards in the game. The card gives Vader a free dodge token upon activation and gives him the option to take a wound and shuffle his token back into the stack, providing him with a second activation that turn. During the second activation you are limited to one action. This card is amazing for both engagement and dealing massive damage once engaged. For engagement you can triple move and when combined with Burst of Speed gives you ~24 inches of movement which is roughly a charge attack from range 4. You can combine Burst, Implacable, and Force Push which makes it possible to engage from roughly range ~4.67. Engaging at these ranges does sacrifice one or both attacks from Implacable.

Alternatively, you can use Implacable once engaged to attack twice and use force powers twice in one turn. This is especially good on objective scoring turns since you can manipulate two different enemy units with Force Push and attack twice potentially killing two more units. The main drawback to Implacable is the fact you must take a wound for the second activation, and you shuffle the token back into the stack. Vader has 8 wounds making a single wound sacrifice not the biggest deal, and the dodge tokens help make up for the lost health. You can also activate back-to-back if you activate him last since he will be the only token in your token stack. In some situations, you may want to use Implacable the turn AFTER you burst because doing so will allow you to drop the immobilize token after your first activation. An example of when you would do this is if your infiltrate with Darkness Descends landed you close enough to the enemy to get in there with a two-move Burst on Round 1.

Vader’s Might

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Vader’s Might lets you pick up a friendly or enemy unit at range 1 and move it to range 1 from its current position. If the unit is an enemy, you roll a white dice for each model and it suffers a wound for any non-blank results. This ability, like Force Push, is amazing for objective play: you’ll always be able to toss a unit way off a POI, and sometimes that can change the direction of the game when you combine it with force push and plain old killing. This card can help overcome Immobilize tokens from Burst of Speed by letting you grab an enemy unit at range 1 and place it in base contact with Vader. There are also some tricks you can pull by grabbing one of your own units, such as placing a friendly but vulnerable-to-shooting character directly into engagement. The ability averages 1/3 of a wound per model in the targeted unit.

New Ways to Motivate Them

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New Ways to Motivate Them is more situational than the previous two command cards but can be powerful when paired with specific units. This card is a two pip which issues orders to two troopers and gives units with a face up order token the ability to suffer a wound for a free action. This card is best paired with multi wound units like Dewbacks who are also melee focused. New Ways to Motivate Them lets Dewbacks move three times in a turn and turns on Tenacity to make them hit harder once engaged. A new use for this command in Legion 2.6 is for super-squads: for the price of only one snowtrooper for instance you can get an extra move out of a super squad with a flamethrower in order to make that final push to make that big boy attack.

Fear and Dead Men

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This is the first of two Vader commands that were changed specifically for the Legion 2.6 rules. It used to hand out a bunch of dodges for enemies activating close-by and changed the nature of deflect to wound on blanks-only but now it’s thankfully (from a new player perspective anyway) much simpler: if ya hurt Vader ya hurt yourself. This does also combine with Deflect meaning that shooting at Vader can come with quite a few consequences for the shooter. You would typically use this command when Vader is truly going to be in trouble, because while it may not make your opponent hesitate to try to kill him, it does force a certain amount of parity if they’re going to do so. Vader’s other commands will typically be used first if he’s not in a position where he’s at particular risk of taking a bunch of wounds that round, such as already being engaged when the round begins.

Master of Evil

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Master of Evil is a three pip which gives an order to Darth Vader and two other units. The card gives Vader a free dodge, and when he activates all enemy trooper units at range 1-2 gain 3 suppression tokens. This card has a high floor and an even higher ceiling. At a minimum you get a free dodge and good order control. If Vader is deep inside enemy lines Master of Evil can become a game winning command card. You can panic and suppress multiple units with ease. Even if you cannot panic enemy units on the turn this is played it is almost guaranteed to suppress corps troopers which removes actions. Naturally, it also is a huge bomb to make it difficult to score POI’s, since it usually only takes a shot or two from the rest of your army to put enemy units into the panic zone after you play this.

Darkness Descends

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Darkness Descends has two different modes; it either gives Vader Permanent: Reliable 2 or Infiltrate and Scout 1 when divulged. While it is less flashy, I almost always select the Reliable 2 mode of this card. Darth Vader does not surge on defense or offense so the two surge tokens every turn significantly increase both his defense and offense. I play Darkness Descends on the first turn 99% of the time. Having Reliable 2 is especially important since Deflect cannot be used in melee. Having surge to block makes him much harder to kill once engaged in melee.

Hey Lucas sorry to cross out your whole section here but uh…things have changed along with this card in Legion 2.6. Remember: in the old days infiltrate meant that you had to deploy outside of Range 3 of any enemy units already on the field…but that’s no longer the case. It’s true that you can’t deploy ANYWHERE aside from that limitation, but you sure can wait to see how brave the enemy army is in moving up Round 1 then drop yourself right at the edge of your territory in order to start moving in, possibly also using Burst that turn followed by Implacable or Vader’s Might the turn after depending on the situation.

I do think that taking Infiltrate in the old rules was sometimes the right thing to do, but this time around it’s not only flipped but has become more extreme: taking the Reliable 2, and slogging Vader out there at speed 1 from his own deployment zone, is almost never the right thing to do now. This is a 5 Round game at most, you simply do not have the time to be hoofing it from the board edge at Speed 1, as any current Yoda or Palp player can attest to with tears in their eyes. Luckily, Vader needs surges a lot less now that Deflect is automatic…it does hurt on attack and in melee, but just being there Round 2 and beyond is worth 20 surge tokens, I promise.

List Building for Legion 2.6

There’s a lot of ways to run the Dark Lord, here are a few examples from high-performing tournament lists

Vader Soup

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Steven S took this to a #3 finish at the biggest tournament in Legion 2.6 so far (Las Vegas Open GT) and this summarizes pretty well who Vader’s best friends are: Krennic, Dewbacks, and a medic.

Vader Immortal

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This list, piloted by Dave Grant who may be the top Vader player in the world at the time of this post, is the latest version of “Vader Immortal” which made a big splash close to the beginning of Legion 2.6, so big that AMG ended up making medics more expensive thus making the act of spamming them more challenging. This list has dropped Krennic from the original form but has gained a Black Sun unit to add a true Range 2 threat that Empire typically lacks. The HQ’s on every Dewback means that he can play New Ways on Vader and someone else (whatever corps that needs to move more that round) along with all 3 Dews with the Uplink to move really fast that turn while laying down a whole lot of dice, while the medics can negate the wound cost those units take by the end of the round.

Blizzard Force

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While Blizzard Force isn’t the absolute monster it once was, it can still put out a pretty big wave of dice on Round 1. This list piloted by Romainswl won the GT in Bourges, France.

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This is my own list that focuses on E-webs rather than speeders, it can lay down a LOT of suppression and has a very solid gunline but also a couple of close-in threats with the flamer snows and, of course, the man himself.

Conclusions

Darth Vader: Dark Lord of the Sith is truly a menace once engaged. If you are wanting to recreate the Rogue One hallway scene, he is the commander for you. It is great to have such an iconic character be so fun and flavorful to play. I hope this article introduced you to some new strategies and I hope it helps motivate you to put Darth Vader on the table!

3 Responses

  1. This is a great article but I do have one question isn’t yoda currently the most expensive unit.

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