Shatterpoint Preview: General Kenobi, You Are A Bold One!

The Hello There Squad Pack is one of the two boxes that will be released alongside the core set and this one will really round out the Galactic Republic strategies of the first wave. This box comes with a Primary Obi-Wan Kenobi, Secondary Commander Cody, and Supporting 212th Clone Troopers.

Theme

This expansion really rounds out the hunker synergies that the 501st units already established in the core box and takes them to the next level. Similar to the 501st, both Commander Cody and the 212th have abilities to help them get hunker tokens without using the take cover action. From there both Commander Cody and Obi-wan have abilities to augment your units that have hunker tokens and make them more effective. This really feels like what the 501st was missing in the core set as Anakin primarily does his own thing (but does it oh so well).

General Obi-Wan Kenobi

Obi-Wan starts out fairly typical with 8 SP and 3 force points (I was hoping he would be on par with Dooku and Anakin but oh well). He also has 10 stamina and 3 durability putting him slightly above the average on wounds. Obi-Wan’s unit card has a lot of familiar abilities but he gives them all a bit of a Jedi Master spin. Hello There! is a typical force jump ability but with some high ground power, it still starts at 1 force point and allows Obi-Wan to perform a jump but then additionally grants you another 3 dice on your next attack that turn. These 3 extra dice should net you an average of roughly 2 more crits or successes depending on the expertise results. So Uncivilized… takes deflect and puts some of that Soresu secret sauce on it. It costs 1 more force point than deflect from other units but before the attack you gain a hunker token and when there is a fail in the opponent’s attack roll you send 3 damage back instead of 2. I don’t know about you but the potential for 3 damage would give me a long pause before trying to shoot Obi-Wan. Patience​​ is a really interesting ability that allows you to pull off some order card shenanigans. When you draw Obi-Wan’s card, if you already have a card in reserve you can swap that card with Obi-Wan and then put the previous card on the top or bottom of your deck. So not only do you reserve Obi-Wan, but then you can choose to activate the previously reserved card, or push that to the bottom and draw a new card. But that’s not all, when you put Obi-Wan in reserve he also gets to recover 3 and jump which is great, moving multiple units on your turn is always a big plus. Now for Obi-Wan’s Identity ability, Knowledge and Defense, which really rounds out the defensive capability of your other Republic units. First your units get to keep their hunker tokens while engaged which prevents your opponent from reducing your ranged defense and disabling some of your character abilities simply by walking into you. The rest of the effect only applies to Galactic Republic units. For your Galactic Republic units that have hunker tokens they get to add 1 defense die against melee attacks (remember hunker normally only provides cover from ranged attacks), additionally when a Galactic Republic unit is attacked they may choose to remove all of their hunker tokens to recover once per token plus an additional recover or dash. This can be a great tool for being able to stick to an objective when your opponent tries to shove you off.

Obi-Wan is a true master of the Soresu stance and his Form III Soresu stance card provides him with a lot of useful options. This side offers 5 attack dice and 6 defense dice in melee but only 5 defense at ranged. While these may seem low you need to remember Deflect is a huge ranged deterrent and Hello There! Will bring that attack up to 8 dice. On top of all of this both expertise charts are great, offering a lot of Crits and even granting him a jump on defense. Finally the combat tree starts with a recover and 2 damage which is a great starting node and leads to great conditions, a ton of recovers, and finishes off with good mobility. All together this will make Obi-Wan really tough to get wounds onto.

On the flip side Obi-Wan dusts off his Form IV Ataru from his days as a padawan under Qui-Gon. This form takes a more aggressive approach with 7 attack dice which can go all the way up to 10 with Hello There! Even though this is a more aggressive form it doesn’t slouch on defense either with 6 defense dice in ranged and melee. The Expertise charts get a little weaker but are still solid. Whereas Soresu turns Obi-Wan into an immovable object, Ataru turns him into an unstoppable force. This combat tree starts with a shove and 2 damage and provides branching paths to either shove your opponent several times, disarm and expose them, or get both.

CC-2224 Clone Commander Cody

Commander Cody is a stock standard Secondary unit coming at 4PC, 0 force points, 9 stamina, 2 Durability, and a Tactics ability. Thematically Commander Cody is a sniper through and through. The one ability that doesn’t really fit that theme is Defensive Maneuver but this seems to be a common clone trooper ability and will generate those hunker tokens for you to work with the Galactic Republic theme. Now for the sniper abilities. At the start of his turn, We’ve Got A Big Problem…. allows Commander Cody to expose an enemy at range 5 that is contesting an active objective, the import thing here is that this happens at the start of Cody’s turn meaning they won’t have the chance to recover the exposed condition before cody blasts them! When you do go to line up that shot, Say Goodnight, Clanker! will grant you sharpshooter[2] and prevent your target from gaining cover. Cody also acts as a spotter for your other clone troopers. Bring It Down! will allow supporting clone troopers within range 4 reroll up to 2 failed results so long as he has a hunker token.

Commander Cody comes with Concentrated Firepower which could prove to be a real annoyance for your opponent as you can easily place a pinned condition on them at range 5. Beyond that your combat tree offers a potential for 9 damage, a few shoves, and a potential for a free use of Defensive Maneuver (it’s not a free force push but hey, it might get cody to an objective). At range 5 Cody is throwing 6 attack dice and 4 defense dice but between all the hunker tokens and his native sharpshooter this will feel more like 9 attack dice and 5 or 6 defense dice. His ranged expertise chart isn’t anything too special but getting unblockable damage is always something. At melee his profile is still 6 attack dice and 4 defense dice but his expertise chart loses the free damage for just normal successes.

221th Clone Troopers

The 221th Clone Troopers are there to support Commander Cody and are very similar to the 501st Clone Troopers, so similar in fact that I am left scratching my head as to why they cost 4PC while the 501st only cost 3PC. The 212th clones offer 0 force points and have the same (below average) 7 stamina and 2 durability. Even their abilities are nearly identical with the only change being that the 212th Coordinated Fire will pin an opponent while the 501st will strain them. That being said I do think that a pinned condition is harder for your opponent to ignore than a strained token (This game focuses far more on the objective than killing) but I’m not sure that adds up to a whole squad building point. Defensive Maneuver is still there for them to get their hunker token support and Brothers In Arms is there to make it hard to shove off of objectives. Brothers In Arms pairs especially well with Obi-Wan’s identity ability as even melee attacks will struggle to shove them off.

The 212th Clone Troopers stance card is a little boring on the surface, but might offer more consistency than many other supporting characters. At range 5 they get to roll 6 attack dice and 4 defense dice whereas in melee these drop to 4 attack dice and 3 defense dice. The expertise charts are nothing too special but do offer guaranteed damage on the ranged attack. Finally we have their combat tree, this is the only combat tree we have seen so far where there are 0 choices for the player to make. But what it lacks in choices it somewhat makes up for in consistency. This unit only needs to get 2 successes and 1 expertise to be able to push through 3 damage, a pin, and a shove. With this card we also only need to get through 4 nodes to complete the tree where we can deal a total 6 damage plus whatever we get from expertise. This might not sound super consistent as the damage is mostly in that last node but if you take Commander Cody for rerolls or the 501st for easy exposed tokens it makes it a lot easier to get to 4 successes.

Strike Team Building

With the limited units we have available it’s hard to go too crazy with list building yet but let’s try to get creative.

Standard:

This is the standard Galactic Republic strike team available at launch and provides the most overlap in Galactic Republic and Clone Trooper Tags. As I mentioned earlier, Obi-Wan’s identity ability really rounds out the hunker token strategy the clone troopers are going for by allowing you to keep and use them in melee and exchange them for more value. Commander Cody also gets a big boost in value here as he has 3 more characters for his reroll aura to apply to. One other thing that is worth mentioning is that the supporting clone troopers actually do decently well when spread out as opposed to separatist and mandalorian units that we have seen so far. They still want to try to stay within range 4 of Commander Cody for the rerolls but as long as they are within range 5 of another supporting clone trooper they will always be able to use their Coordinated Fire which will put a ton of pressure on your opponent with all the expose and pinned tokens.

Duel Of The Fates

This list is a little odd but provides a few strange synergies. Lord Maul functions best when you can keep him at high damage but this always leaves you close to being wounded. Obi-wan offers so many recovers that you can let Maul get low so you can get that high damage and then try to heal him back to safety with Obi-Wan, mix in some MagnaGuards and Lord Maul will be a truly scary threat. Kalani will help get your MagnaGuard where they need to go and grant them hunker tokens which, thanks to Obi-Wan, can’t be stripped when engaged (but wont do anything against melee attacks). Lastly, if we are lucky enough to draw Kalani before Obi-Wan, we can put Kalani in reserve for free so we have something there to trigger Obi-Wan’s “Patience.”

Conclusion

Obi-Wan looks like an incredible unit that really rounds out the Galactic Republic hunker token strategy and has a lot of thematic flair to boot. Clone Commander Cody also shows up with some awesome tools to bring your clone troopers to life. As for the 212th I think they are fine…..I am still really confused as to why they are 4 points instead of 3 like the 501st (aside from needing to match Anakin’s and Obi-Wan’s points). That being said, clones as a whole sound really interesting and I can’t wait to see what other units Obi-Wan will pair well with in the future.

Also, don’t forget to check out our store, where Obi-Wan is still (as of this writing anyway) available for Pre-Order at a discount from retail!

Cover art by The Techthromancer