The separatist faction is spoiled for support options. In this article we are going to have a deeper insight in the first option of this slot: The DSD1 Dwarf Spider Droid.
Pros
- High mobility
- Highly customiseable for dealing with any kind of threat
- Sturdy and annoying, if supported
- A Self Destruct that can do a LOT of damage (but is hard to pull off)
Cons
- Needs support from Super Tactical Droids
- Goes down fairly fast to large dice pools
- Gets quickly expensive
Overview
Let’s start with the overall stats on the card for the DSD1 Dwarf Spider Droid (from here on DSD or spider Droid), which is one of the four possible support options for CIS. The DSD is a ground vehicle with 6 HP and a resiliency value of 4. It displays a mandatory programming slot, a hardpoint slot and a comms slot (see Upgrades). The base cost for this unit is 50 pts. However, due to the programming requirement the cheapest iteration will be 53 pts…and, of course, it almost always benefits from using a hardpoint that makes it more expensive as well. As a ground vehicle it blocks LOS. Don’t expect the same hiding abilities as an aqua droid unit, however. It can hide a single model such as Dooku, Maul or Ventress on their way to the engagement zone though.
For defense, the DSD exhibits white surging defense dice, which gives this unit 9 effective wounds further protected by Armour 3. This is quite durable: small dice pools without critical and/or impact will have a hard time bypassing this. This means that more dedicated lethal units have to target the DSD with one or more actions to remove it from the battlefield, a situation is favorable for the CIS-Player as they are generally trading a cheaper unit (depending on the configuration) for a more expensive unit. Additionally, this circumstance can be further enhanced by using the appropriate programming upgrade as well as through Exemplar dodge support.
On the offensive side, the DSD offers two close-range attack possibilities of which one is conditional. Under normal conditions, it uses melee a single rainbow of attack dice in its “Wicked Kick”. If the wound threshold of 4 (resiliency bracket) has been reached, the Separatist player has a choice to use the free action to self-destruct this unit and throw 3 red dice with blast and impact 1 against the opponent. As this is a free action and not an attack action, it is possible to aim, attack, and finally self-destruct for a total of 4R1B1W against the target. Legion 2.6 is all about POIs, however, so this option should be weighed against the value of the unit possibly living until the end of the round.
Let’s examine the following theoretical situation: The DSD and the opponent’s unit contest a POI which would be leading to a situation that neither player would score. As a secondary might be either “marked target” or “sweep and clear” in play. Therefore, the above-mentioned sequence might be used giving the CIS-Player the opportunity to break this deadlock and snatch a VP away, if the spider droids itself is not marked for Marked Target.
Next, I would like to focus on mobility. The DSD exhibits respectable mobility due to the large 70 mm notched base in conjunction with a maximum speed of 2. In addition, it has climbing vehicle and expert climber keywords. The first one gives you the ability to treat this vehicle as a trooper unit for the purpose of climbing, the second allows it to climb to height 2. It should be highlighted that crossing area terrain and climbing obstacle terrain (as long as you and your opponent agreed it would be “difficult”) still reduces its speed by one. This gives the separatist player either a tool to react quickly on any new developments on the battlefield or to rapidly push it into enemy lines.
Upgrades
Programming
Protocols behave like a double-edged sword. They usually gain a permanent buff at the cost of a disadvantage, if one doesn’t satisfy a condition. In this case, it is the AI-Keyword, which dictates your first action if you don’t have a face-up order and if not being within range 3 of a commander unit simultaneously. The second requirement makes the AI-condition a lot easier to achieve and therefore is AI a less prevalent phenomenon than in legacy Legion. Nevertheless, it should not be disregarded, as a potential impactful drawback in situations where one might want to have free-reign over his actions.
The first option is the attack protocol, which costs 8 pts. It provides AI: Aim as well as Precise 2. The latter is a neat keyword granting the possibility to reroll up to 4 attack dice if you spend an aim-token, which will increase the damage output of the DSD. The next protocol displaying the identical cost of 8 pts is the defense protocol. It gives the separatist player the keywords nimble as well as outmaneuver at the cost of AI: Dodge. Both advantage keywords on this card are drastically improving the life expectancy of the DSD. Canceling critical hits as well as regaining a dodge token when spending is quite strong. In combination with Armour 3, this is potentially four less white defense dice to be thrown assuming one spends one dodge token. The last and cheapest option for 3 pts is the engagement protocol, which provides just the AI-Keywords Attack and Move. These drawbacks aren’t actually severe as the controlling player has a choice and most of the time, a move will be chosen, which will not hamper him because he can still move his DSD in a more advantageous position such as for scoring on a POI.
Comms
In this slot the only really considerable possibilities are linked targeting array, comms jammer, and hacked comms upgrades. LTA can be nice if you have a reliable way to get the Spider an order such as a Super Tac. Both of the others are really only worth considering on a Flame Spider since that’s the only one that will routinely be getting close… Hacked Comms is an interesting choice in particular because it will give you a face-up that you can incorporate with a high-priority command to ensure you get a chance to Self-Destruct before you die.
Hardpoint
The first option we will talk about is the laser cannon upgrade which costs 15 pts and displays the keywords fixed front and critical 1. It offers the CIS-General 1R3B1W at range 1 – 3. In the following table are shown expected wounds for this upgrade.
The second option available for DSD is the ion blaster. This upgrade is quite expensive with 30 pts but provides 3B3W with Ion 1, Critical 1 and fixed front at range 2 – 4. Ion is a situational keyword as it just kicks in on any inorganics such as vehicles1 and droids, but if it does it possibly reduces the available actions by one which can be crucial, as legion is also very much about actions and action economy. In the table below are the excepted wounds displayed.
The third available option is the flamethrower with 1R1W at range melee to 1, Blast and Spray for 15 pts. Spray and blast are a very useful keyword combination one can use the depicted dice per model and LOS with no cover allowed. Below are the corresponding expected wounds for this weapon.
Now let’s dive into the interpretation of these numbers. I would like to start with the flamethrower (see table 3), as that’s an obvious choice. This weapon is your close/melee support unit or simply put: an infantry clearing device. The displayed values show the expected wounds per model, meaning a standard rebel squad with a heavy weapon and without any other defensive modifications such as dodge token and any sort of cover are statistically losing 4.175 wounds. That’s almost the entire squad minus the leader. In the case of B1 with a heavy weapon that value is 7.301, which essentially means that one flamer attack obliterates this unit on average. Even red-save infantry with the same configuration would expect to suffer 3.115 wounds. Clearly, this weapon is unsuitable to be used against any kind of armour.
With these customisation options the Separatist player can build three types of a close/melee support unit: budget, offensive and defensive. The budget option adds the engagement protocols resulting in 68 pts. The offensive option would instead exhibit attack protocols, while a defensive-oriented version would have defense protocols. Each option amounts in 73 pts. Being in such proximity to enemy units one can consider taking either a comms jammer or a hacked comms unit. As these flamethrowers DSDs tend to operate in a pack those options can either affect a considerable portion of the enemy army and therefore disrupt order control of the opponent (comms jammer) or simply guarantee order control on your side. Both upgrades would push the aforementioned points up to 78. The best option would be the defensive close/melee support modification due to the enhanced survivability, particularly with exemplar dodge support as it ensures one can enjoy the barbecue much longer.
In the next comparison we have to analyse the laser cannon (see table 1) and the ion blaster (see table 2) in conjunction as they are both seen as long-range option (at the moment of writing this article the standard operating range is now range two). In the department of non-armoured units, the laser canon tends to be marginally better but is clearly inefficient against anything with armour. The ion blaster seems to be here more of a generalist option as it can handle both Infantry and armour but is more expensive. If points are an issue one can think about a budget option, namely the laser cannon and engagement protocols for 68 pts, but why not take Dekas (60 pts) instead?
Therefore, the ion blaster is the superior choice and should always be considered as the long-range support option, though costlier. In the same manner, like with the flamethrower DSD, the ion spider droid can be equipped identically, offensively and defensively costing 88 pts each. The only real comm-upgrade consideration is linked targeting array if orders can be provided on the ion spider droids. This boosts the points cost to 93. In my opinion, the most suitable option for a long-range ion spider is the configuration with attack protocols and linked targeting array. In conjunction with Kalani, who feeds those spiders relentlessly with aim tokens, you can make sure that these lovely droids can push through the highest possible amount of damage to the designated target. Last but not least, let’s not forget Ion here as it can be horrific for other droids and armour-heavy lists.
List Building
The first example of a successful use of DSD spider droids is the list of Ben de Ridder who made 2nd place losing only in the final game against the overall winner Mitch Kazimierczak (who I came personally to know in Adepticon 2024) at the GTCancon in Canberra, Australia. This list is a scary melee list with Dooku (full load out with push, improvised orders instead aggressive tactics),
Asajj and Maul as the centrepieces. Ben used two budget flamer droids to support his immense close-quarter abilities. To further enhance his raw melee potential, he added 3 naked magna guards. The B1s sole purpose here is just to fill out the corps requirements. Special attention should be put on the choice of the secondary mission “Destroy Enemy Bunker”. If the opponent is not careful enough with the placement of that objective, Maul (Infiltrate, Burst of Speed) can easily reach that spot in round one causing a possible loss of 4 VPs in round one. Pulling off that stunt will definitely leave a mark on your opponent, who won’t forget this again in their coming games facing maul.
Drew Buchholz piloted this list successfully on the LVO 2025 with 116 players reaching place 18. This list displays a lot of mobility and close-quarter abilities with 6 Geo Squads. To support his harassing unit, he added two fully equipped long-range ion blaster spider droids, with attack protocols and a linked targeting array. These get further supported by Kalani with aims to fully exploit the precise keyword and push as much damage as possible through.
Summary
In summary, the DSD1 Spider Droid is a very mobile weapon platform which offers a solution for any kind of problem on the battlefield. The costs are ranging from 58 to 93 pts depending on the load out. The high amount of customisation options can be very confusing but when you have the requisite knowledge it can also open many doors. Additionally, it needs the support of an exemplar unit such as the generic Super Tactical Droid or Kalani to really shine adding hidden costs to that unit. Nevertheless, a solid option for Separatist player in the Support slot.
I hope this guide is encouraging people to have a closer look on the DSD1-Spider Droids and its abilities as it’s a unit with a lot of potential. It’s a fine unit that has to deal with a lot of competition in the support slot
- Editor’s note: Given that Szymon holds a doctorate in organic chemistry I can’t help but protest the concept that Fluttercraft, which are partially made of wood and DEFINITELY get affected by ion, are “inorganic.” You are on thin ice sir. ↩︎
