Rapid Reactions: Aqua Droids

Well, we finally know what these things do, let’s “dive” in.

Today Atomic Mass Games posted their “Scene to Stats” article on Aqua Droids. This unit is releasing in just over a month so the timing couldn’t be much better! We’ll naturally release a unit guide once we’ve had a few reps but for now we can at least share our thoughts on what we now know are the complete “depths” of the expansion.

The opening quote of the article is one about Assajj ordering for them to go build something, presumably because AMG didn’t have much else to draw from in the canon and extra-presumably because the article’s writer was blocked from using this quote which is quite a bit more famous (we would have allowed this on The Fifth Trooper for the record). After that, we’re reminded (with some sadness on my part) that AMG has done away with the usually-silly number/letter designations for their product boxes and unit cards (the AQ-Series Aqua Droid in this case, from the Department of Redundancy Department) and then of course we “wade” into the good stuff.

Here AMG continues the trend it started when it released Dark Troopers as a trooper in the Heavy Slot, then continued with a couple of non-notched base Support uses (Clone Commandos and Range Troopers. This unit is the first:

• Vehicle with a heavy slot
• Vehicle with more than 2 minis in it

Those first one is just a mark of the game’s growth and age, they should try new things as long as they don’t break the game. The second one isn’t going to break the game either, but it may end up bending it: more on this toward the end, you’ll just have to “hold your breath” for now.

Offensively, the un-upgraded Aqua Droid is a bit “brackish.” While it’s true that it surges on attack, the average hits one could expect with a Range 3 shot is very close to the output of a B1 Battle Droid unit with an E-5C heavy weapon. Obviously that B1 unit is a lot less beefy on defense, but the part that matters here is that a naked Aqua isn’t going to be one-shotting much out there. You can, of course, shift the math by including the one upgrade that this unit comes with:

The heavy blaster adds 3 more dice that are significantly higher quality and add Impact 2 as well. Given that I doubt their comms slot will be used for much (maybe an emergency transponder when there is room in the list) that will bring the typical “expensive” version of the unit to 93 points for an offensive pool that’s very comparable to a full unit of “Pyke” (aka…Fish) Foot Soldiers than includes both the impact gun and the Capo. That’s a much more respectable pool, and more reliable than an Attack Protocol Ion Spider Droid with Linked Targeting array and an aim token for the shot, which happens to also be 93 points with half the health and only one more Armor. To add insult to injury, the Aqua’s Crushing Punch is about twice as reliable as the Spider’s Wicked Kick, and adds Impact 3 to (Das) boot. Between this and the recent points hike on Protocols Spider Droids seem to be “taking on water” lately.

From a defensive perspective, these things are considerably tanky given their surprisingly low base cost of 65 points. Compared to a Rebel AT-RT with a Rotary Gun (which has the same defensive dice and keywords along with a roughly similar offensive profile for 5 points less) Aqua Droids have 1.5X as much health (9 versus 6). While it’s true that the Aqua Droids will begin “leaking” attack dice after just 3 wounds with the loss of their first mini, an AT-RT will become damaged after 4 wounds which severely limits its utility while the droids will not be at risk of such an enfeeblement; they will always be able to take two actions while they exist on the board.

One of those actions will very often need to be a move if these things are to perform as intended because they’re pretty slow. I’ve made a few demonstrations on Table Top Simulator, simulating the Aqua Droid by making a Droideka 1.4x taller which is likely close to reality if not completely exact (also, tall Dekas be kinda freaky, you’ll see what I mean in a bit.) For now let’s just remind folks about the fact that while notched bases are always faster than trooper bases, the small notched base ain’t much faster and is definitely still slower than a standard trooper making a move that is one speed higher:

So yeah, these things are a lot more “churn” than they are burn. Given that trooper LOS shielding will be one of their primary duties, this will make planning ahead crucial when it comes to getting complete utility from them. Naturally, Infiltrate will provide some much-needed wiggle room when it comes to that blocking role, which is probably the real raison d’être of this unit.

“I can’t see a thing behind those legs!” – Everyone in the game, apparently

Droidekas could already perform this role…sort of. The change to vehicle movement rules, which removed displacement and allowed anybody to just stroll right past them as well, has made sight-blocking a more viable tactic than it was in the past, but mostly only for single-mini units and even then there were weaknesses.

As demonstrated here (with standard Deka silhouettes) Commander Cody can’t see the Count on the left but either of the positions show on the right, a lateral movement or a jump to height 1, makes him visible again, meaning the Sight-Blocking is annoying but only-sometimes truly limiting. Now let’s look at a similar scenario with Aqua Droid sized silhouettes:

To be clear: Cody can’t see Dooku from any of the above locations, and yes he’s at Height 2 now. The mere presence of one more base and a bit of extra height makes an enormous difference when it comes to the ability to shield a single mini. I promise he’s there, tucked right in behind the leader with the other two shielding his sides. That dude ain’t gonna get shot from anything shorter than a T-47 or a flutter at somewhat-close range, it’s a hell of a “bulwark.”

Though it’s harder to hide a multi-mini unit (a tactic that was much-talked up but functionally inert before this release in my opinion) it’s definitely quite possible, the Cody’s in the below picture can just barely see the B2 unit with a repair droid:

Obviously, you could make that zone bigger if you had a heavy mini or another unit of Aquas. The key here is that the unit takes up a lot of surface area but unlike say, an AAT (which you could fit FIVE Aqua droids onto), it is a surface area that is flexible. Just like…uh…water, the unit can shape itself into what you want it to do, whether that’s blocking as many lines of attack as possible against a friendly unit or, perhaps, blocking entry onto a POI.

Thankfully in my opinion, this is a much tougher thing to accomplish than LOS-blocking. The Saber tank above would be blocked from contesting the POI with a single move but would be able to with two. Additional minis on the Aqua’s side could finish the job of course, but if their opponent had standard trooper bases moving in to contest it would become open again. Long story short, these will make POI body-blocking easier but it won’t always be “smooth sailing” to do so.

One last interesting question to ponder is to what extent Droid players will consider the pelagic 1-2 punch of Aqua Droids and Crab Droids. There is a certain point at which you start to get diminishing returns from including too many units that perform roles other than reliably wiping out your opponent’s units, but when their offense is fully upgraded neither unit is a slouch either. The idea, of course, would be to forward deploy the Aquas and give a Scout 1 move to the unit they’re shielding, allowing that unit to catch up to the infiltrating Aquas. On any deployment where the Territory stretches out to Range 1.5, the following scenario is possible if both units do nothing but move:

Yep, Dooku is almost halfway across the board. This would be a move that would be scary enough if he had done it with the last act of the Round, but as such (I realize the Aquas could be a little closer to the board to shield him more, I just wanted to show how far THEY can get too) Dooku can instead WAIT for your opponent to get a couple activations in before he makes his move, which is what a force user always wants to do anyway. This is a neat tactic, I just HOPE that it won’t become a problematic one, but we will have to see. I’m seeing double Crab double Aqua as a potential “thing,” something like this maybe?

In all the Aqua Droid seems like an insanely good buy. I just pre-ordered two of them, and if you’re a CIS player you may want to do the same before these enter the “Clone Commando” zone of a recent release that was so good that it sold out. I personally have a suspicion that their points will end up going up in the future because their value feels like a standard deviation or more above the rest but we shall see. In any case, this expansion is sure to disrupt the meta. Some would even say that it will…”rock the boat.”