Star Wars Legion Meta-Hipster Guide

This article is a guide to off-meta armies and a reflection on some of the exciting new lists that found success at Adepticon.

Are you tired of the hyper competitive players at your local game store, who scour the internet to put together the “best” hyper competitive list? Are you someone who despises the meta and has the extremely original opinion that 10 activation CIS is the bane of all fun? Are you not like other girls? If you identified with any of these points this is the listicle for you! In this article, we will first talk about some new archetypes that found success at Adepticon then dive into some hipster armies that have yet to make a splash.

Adepticon Ruined My Article

I often start writing these articles a few weeks before they are posted so I have time to draft my thoughts. Between starting my draft and posting it, Adepticon happened… and some of the armies I included in this article did extremely well. Adepticon was the most viewed Legion event of all time, which means that these armies are more than likely going to start showing up all over the place. With this in mind, instead of scrapping these armies from the article, I decided to address them first as an example of how you can find great success even with unpopular units when you build them in the correct army.

Iden 333

When it comes to Legion, I would consider myself a hipster. I played Empire pre 2021 RRG, back when people said the faction was unplayable. Now, Empire is extremely good, so I had to try and find the most hipster, yet still competitive Empire army. Everyone was talking about Vader so I decided to give Iden a shot. Turns out I am way less of a hipster than I thought. In both Adepticon and Invader league season 8, Iden was the most popular non-generic commander for Imperial players. Before Adepticon we had not seen many Iden players at competitive events but she now seems to be a mainstay of the faction. Luke Cook was one of these players that brought Iden to Adepticon. He played a unique list that features Iden, 3 Imperial Special Forces (ISF), and 3 Speeder Bikes. Speeder Bikes have not been considered competitive since the release of Strike Teams back in 2018. Luke Cook went 8/1 with this army, only losing in the final, proving it to be a very strong army.

So how did Luke make an “unplayable” unit like Speeder Bikes fit in a top tier competitive list? Iden plus 3 ISF is a very strong combo resulting in a devastating alpha strike on turn 1. This army goes all in with Tactical Strike then follows up with 3 Speeder Bikes on turn 1. You have great order control on the Tactical Strike turn. Four orders are given out to Iden and the 3 ISF, one of which is Inferno Squad. Inferno Squad then coordinates to a Shoretrooper, which coordinates to a Mortar. This gives you 6 face up order tokens leaving only 2 core and 3 bikes in the bag. Besides the alpha strike, the army has some other very powerful tools. This army has brutal Battle Cards and loves being blue player since so many of the Objectives and Deployments are difficult to deal with; it is also very board edge neutral, with three speeders and four infiltrating units. Inferno Squad also contains Del Meeko who has Repair 2, which can be used to repair the Speeder Bikes with. All this together makes this army quite deadly and competitive. If you want more information about Iden Versio and my favorite version of Iden 333 (I use 3 Dewbacks instead of Bikes) you can check out my Iden Versio Unit Guide. To see this army in action, you can watch the recording of our live Adepticon coverage linked below!

Adepticon Round 1: Luke Cook (Iden 333 Bikes) vs. Kyle Dornbos (Anankin Padme Cloneline)

Adepticon Semi Final: Luke Cook (Iden 333 Bikes) vs. Matt Bronson (Luke SA Gunline)

Adepticon Final: Luke Cook (Iden 333 Bikes) vs. Goreshde (CIS Good Stuff + Cad Bane)

Vader LAAT

When making a hipster army you should go straight to the units that people think are utter garbage like the LAAT. I have been calling the LAAT a flying trashcan since it was released and Mr. Evan (The Racoon) Bulriss had to go and place top 4 at Adepticon with a LAAT running my Legion street cred. Turns out the LAAT is actually good. The LAAT is too expensive to be a pure transport and is also too weak to be a pure gunship, but when you do both at once and drop off a dark lord of the Sith, the LAAT can hold its own. This army slams the LAAT in your opponent’s face and drops off Vader in front of the entire enemy army. Krennic gives Cunning to Vader and compel for your core units, creating a solid gunline to back up the Vader LAAT bomb. Evan did amazing with this list, placing 4^th only losing one game in the quarter final against CIS Good Stuff. His loss was a result of being double Ion’ed by two Spider Droids on turn 1, pinning his LAAT in place. To combat this, I shuffled some upgrades around and added Del Meeko to the shore trooper unit along with another T-21 on the Stormtroopers. Del Meeko gives you access to repair to strip off the Ion tokens and since you are saving points by taking Del Meeko you can fit another T-21 making your gunline more powerful. If you want to view Evan’s original army he ran at Adepticon you can find it in our Adepticon Top 8 article, and you can also catch the army in action in our Adepticon coverage.

Adepticon Round 3: Evan Bulriss (Vader LAAT) vs. Ben Lear (Palpatine Bossk)

Adepticon Round 8: Evan Bulriss (Vader LAAT) vs. Koray Satili (Super Tac AAT)

Deep Dish

So I would be lying if I said I had this army in my article pre-Adepticon. Out of nowhere Brian Baer brings an army with two Landspeeders, three Fleet Troopers, and three Laser Cannon Teams and finishes 9^th place at Adepticon! Literally if you took a poll from the Legion community about the most garbage units in the Rebel Faction, Landspeeders, Fleet Troopers, and the Laser Cannon Team would be top of the list. Turns out nobody has any idea what they are talking about since this army finished with an impressive 6/1 record at Adepticon. Deep Dish is here to stay! This army uses the Laser Cannon Teams to create a strong defensive line, then it rushes forward with the Landspeeders, Luke, and R2-D2 to play objectives and score for the win. R2-D2 also has an amazing synergy with Shriv Suurgav. R2-D2 rides in the land speeder, Shriv gives him a suppression and dodge. Because of Inconspicuous, you can no longer shoot R2-D2, and he can repair the Landspeeder while riding in it. This army is a great example of how you can make a unique army that is also deadly and competitive. You can watch this wacky army beat a meta CIS army at Adepticon, link below! For more information about the Landspeeder you can check out our X-34 Landspeeder Unit Guide.

Adepticon Round 7: Brian Baer (Deep Dish) vs. Michael Smith (CIS Good Stuff)

The New Hipsters

Now that Adepticon has shaken up the meta, I bet you are wondering, “what are the new spicy under rated armies I can wow my local store with?” Well, I have graciously decided to offer you some armies that I think are underrated and have some solid play when piloted correctly. Give one of the following a try if you want to be a hipster in a post Adepticon world.

Double the Maul

Double the Maul puts all your eggs in the Sith Lord basket. This army is made to take advantage of the power wielded by both Count Dooku and Darth Maul. The army has perfect order control because of the 6 B1 Battle Droids, which helps you to get full value out of the two Sith. Both Sith can fight at Range 2 with Saber Throw and Dooku’s Lightning, then close the gap into Melee. Dooku and Maul can single handedly destroy a gunline if they both engage in melee. One unique feature is the two Force Push upgrades that fit in the army making it so you can rag-doll around enemy units. You also can bid deep to 12 points to force the favorable objectives found within the Battle Cards. While your primary focus is on the Sith Lords, the army still has 5 B1’s with E-5s, which is a solid gunline. This army takes skill to play, but can be deadly in the right hands.

Krennic Double Bounty

Some of you may know that I am a double bounty fanboy. I played double bounty in the past two Invader league seasons and really enjoyed the army. This is an updated version of double bounty. Because of the 2021 RRG, you can now fit Krennic and Death Troopers in the army. With Comms Relay and Entourage: Imperial Death Troopers you have perfect order control on the bounty hunters. Cunning pairs nicely with Bounty as well making it so you can last-first a bounty target with no chance of them out bidding you for priority. You can make some tricky plays with this army to catch your opponent off guard. This army has range supremacy at range 4+ between Bossk the Death Troopers, and the 3 Strike Teams. The new Mercenary rules update will be giving all the bounty hunters updates so stay tuned for that news! If you want to learn more about double bounty you can check out my article Double Bounty: Revisited.

Lizard Wizard

Attacking twice each turn with Bossk is pretty wizard. Bossk is vulnerable to getting one shot? No problem you have Imperial Royal Guards (IRG) to keep him safe with Guardian 2. This army is strong at every range. At range 4, double tap Bossk and shoot with the 2 Snipers, then use Emperor Palpatine and the Imperial Royal Guards if the fight goes to melee. Typically, Palpatine struggles against armor, but this army solves that problem with Bossk and his surge to critical Relby-v10 Mortar Rifle, and the 3 T-21 Stormtrooper units. Palpatine also adds to the ranged supremacy with Force Barrier which is one of the few ways to block High Velocity snipers. While Palpatine is difficult to play he is extremely competitive when played properly.

Any GAR List

If you want to be the ultimate hipster in the current meta you play GAR. Now you might be thinking “An entire faction can’t be hipster surely there are popular armies” and yes you would be correct that Yoda Saber Tank is good, but no one is playing it. Turns out every GAR player is a hipster ignoring the few competitive GAR armies opting for something more flavorful. If you want to be a hipster amongst hipsters here are two GAR armies that are 100% janky hipster nonsense.

If you saw the Vader LAAT army and thought “pffffffft JuSt OnE LAAT ThAt’S NoT VeRy HiPsTeR” I raise you two LAATs. This army was run by JJs Juggernaut who placed 2nd in TTS ladder. The army has one strategy, air drop two Jedi in the middle of your opponent. Only 7 activations? No problem Yoda and Anakin will kill 1-2 units each turn closing that gap. The LAAT’s job in this army is to just fly strait and drop of the two Jedi, if they survive and get some attacks in that is just a bonus.

But Lucas I said I wanted a “ReAl HiPsTeR LiSt” pure jank, pure insanity, and total lack of all reason. Well, you asked for it I present you with the GAR air force! How is this supposed to work? I don’t know! Deep Dish (3 FD Cannons, 3 Fleet Troopers, and 2 Land Speeder) is apparently a thing so where there is a will there is a way!

Conclusions

In all seriousness, Legion is currently in an amazing place. Balance has never been better, resulting in great army variety and a resurgence of previously un-played units. Adepticon is a good example that just because the Legion community thinks a unit is garbage (Landspeeder, LAAT, FD Cannon, Speeder Bikes ect.) does not mean that you can’t win with it. If you put in the practice you can come up with new and exciting ways to play with existing units and make them competitively viable. I hope you found a new army that excites you in this article or at the very least you are inspired to try out some new units and create your own new army!