Hey, you! Yes, you! Do you like spoilers? I got some good spoilers over here if you wanna take a look. These are legit, straight from AMG. The first one is free! Come into this sketchy, poorly lit alley as we recap the Shatterpoint road map from Ministravaganza 2024.
During the road map we got the standard approach – more info for units coming sooner then gradually less info about releases further out. They also included a timeline at the the to give an idea of when everything is anticipated to release. If you want to watch a VOD of the stream you can currently do so on AMG’s Twitch channel.
Pew pew, baby! Crosshair v2 is a primary, as we knew from the Adepticon panel. Coming in at 8sp but only 2 force is a bit different, but he can refresh two force when wounding a primary or secondary. Move to Position is a useful active, though it is similar to what many primaries get as a tactical ability. As such, you’ll trade off force cost for timing flexibility. My favourite ability, theme wise at least, is Reflector Discs. It’s very on-brand for Crosshair and a fun, new, unique mechanic for Shatterpoint. While you can set up some seriously long shots with it, I’m not sure how useful it will actually be in practice. As written, it seems like he still has to not be engaged with an unwounded enemy since he’s performing the attack, but his ally could be engaged. That makes sense thematically too for my brain, he still has to line up the shot and can shoot through a scrum. His Bad Play stance returns and looks pretty close to the secondary version while Target Eliminated brings a lot of killing power as well.
I’m not sure what to think of Crosshair. He can shoot well, but Empire already has a very good shooty primary with Iden. I don’t think I’d double down and run them both, but perhaps he can displace her. If he’s running his tree then you’ll be feeling great, of course, but I worry about “only” getting four successes and struggling to one-shot 8hp supports/secondaries. Against Bounty Hunters, for example, Crosshair is only hitting 5+ successes in Target Eliminated 19% of the time according to my dice simulator. Luckily, he has ways of adding dice and/or successes. I personally struggle to get consistent value out of effects that want my target to be engaged with unwounded allies, so maybe Crosshair just isn’t a style fit for me. I’ll definitely try him out as a proxy soon though! His era limits squad choices quite a bit for the moment, but a Bad Batch pairing is probably what I’ll try first.
I was excited to see Flamey-Boi because they were talking up his cool flamethrower mechanics at Adepticon, and I’m not disappointed! His Can’t Stand the Heat ability is very cool (or quite the opposite I suppose) and will definitely be something you want to play around as an opponent. If you’re going to engage him, do it with moves from maybe tactics, active abilities, or combat trees rather than move actions. Prescribed Fire also feels like a nod to a flamethrower effect in the form of AoE. It’s similar to Endor Leia’s ability except it does allow the enemy to dash away, which is a crucial difference.
All in all, both Crosshair and ES-04 bring some very unique mechanics which I’m a big fan of thematically. I’m certainly excited to pick this pack up!
Paz is a beast! He is big, slow, and goes down fighting. Once again we have a big theme-win! I’ll focus on his two reactive abilities mainly. Like Zeb, he can bounce back after being wounded to instead gain two injured tokens. Unlike Zeb, Paz only triggers it when he is wounded by an attack, but he also gets a revenge attack of his own. Additionally, he can attack back whenever an ally within range 2 is targeted by a ranged attack. It doesn’t say “another” so he can target himself. As I read it, he can use both reactives if he’s shot and wounded since one triggers off the attack and the other off the wound. For reference, Vader1 has some similar triggers which have been clarified on the rules forum.
While he can mass move mando supports, Paz is limited in ways to move himself in-activation. Essentially all you are going to get is a move action, which isn’t a lot for a character who wants to be in the mix and threaten clap backs. Luckily, he can remove a condition from himself with his tactic ability so he won’t be decimated by a pin. Bo or Gar in the other squad could help a lot to move Paz into position. While throwing 8 dice in melee and getting Steadfast is cool, I think it’s cooler to threaten reactive attacks with three strikes on one expertise. I’ll be staying in Heavy Firepower almost exclusively, I think.
We’ll have to see what the stance is, but Covert Mandalorians appear to be a nice blend of Clan Kryze and Super Commandos. I won’t say no to that! The flexibility to choose Impact or Sharpshooter will be quite handy. However, it is an active ability so it’ll increase in cost when wounded. Not only do Mandos already struggle a bit with force efficiency when wounded, but Covert Mandos and Paz Vizsla seem even worse in those circumstances. We can see as well that The Armorer will be 9pc and thus probably won’t bring more than two force (though refreshes are possible). Mandos might come out of the gate swinging but taper off quite a bit in the late game, which could be an issue.
I have (what I think is) good news: Boba is not another Jango! His purpose is clear: harass primaries. He should be pretty mobile, and Whipcord Launcher can certainly neuter an enemy’s next activation. His Dead or Alive reactive is similar to Hunter’s Enhanced Tracker ability. I find savvy opponents can sometimes avoid taking move actions with primaries to prevent Hunter from triggering, but Boba’s effect can’t be avoided. I feel like his stance will be important to see how effective he can be when it comes to targeting primaries (who are often the more durable defenders).
I ain’t gonna lie, I like the look of Dengar. They mentioned on stream that he is a melee monster, so we’ll see just how much when we get his stance. I really like unconditional Steadfast and pin immunity. He’ll be a solid piece in the objective game as someone hard to knock off objectives and easy-ish to get back on them (Scoundrels traditionally don’t have tons of ways to move out-of-activation, but more on that later). He can be very force efficient with a tactic move and allowing friendly bounty hunters to reserve for free. Move twice, punch someone, then be a nuisance to knock away – all for free unless you want an extra tag!
If you’ve ever wondered what a Super Tactical Droid would look like if they were promoted to a primary, Veers is probably the answer. He essentially gets Tactical Network but for stormtrooper supports, plus a few other support effects and a splash of AT-AT bombardment to finish it off. I am excited to see what sort of shenanigans Prepare for a Surface Attack opens up. Starting with a stormtrooper of your choice (that got a free dash during setup) in reserve seems quite strong. I’m generally a bit weary of abilities that give agency to your opponent, so the dashes opened up by We Are the Storm may dampen its effect, but three damage is a big chunk of health for many units so you may get some enemies willingly vacating objectives to avoid being slapped. It should be noted that only enemies get to dash away so you can’t use this ability as a way to move a bunch of friendly units off a previously active objective, for example.
The Snowtrooper Lieutenant has some neat stuff as well. His tactic is nothing crazy, but very solid. Dogged Assault is a new twist on the Coordinated Fire formula by allowing the attacking unit to do a Take Cover action after their combat action. I’m not sure how useful the hunkers will be in Empire but it doesn’t hurt to have them! Commanding Presence is very nice for keeping pesky conditions at bay.
“Hello, is this my stock broker? I need you to immediately sell all my Dogecoin investments and buy as much Lobot stock as possible. Take out a reverse mortgage on the home I don’t have and use that as well!”
Jokes aside, I am very excited for Lobot, mechanically speaking (sort-of pun intend, because he’s sort-of a machine, get it?). He has multiple was to move friendly Scoundrels, who usually don’t get that kind of love. There are tons of great Scoundrel secondaries out there for him to target with Security Network, and the Scoundrel supports aren’t too shabby either. Battlefield Calculations is a handy ability as well. At first it seems very similar to Mandalorians Are Stronger Together, but notice that the other unit doesn’t have to be performing a move action. Bounty Hunters could potentially trigger this off their On the Trail tactic dash, then spend force for Tools of the Trade, then attack then move, for example. Another strong synergy is Death Star Leia, who can advance, focus, dash, attack. She also has ways to move Scoundrels (well, anyone really) so I love the synergy there. I already have a list of Leia/Lobot combos I want to try when we know his points and combat tree. I haven’t really mentioned Lockdown yet, but what is there to say? He can prevent an opponent flipping your objective even when he’s outnumbered and that’s absolutely fantastic.
We did get a little ahead of ourselves here; Lando is also part of this pack. As is the common refrain today, I think he’s a big win for theme. His tactic leans into his double-crossing nature as he can dump all his conditions on another Scoundrel. If they are an ally then they at least get to dash first. Hedged Bets can also dish out or remove conditions if you have extra force before refreshing your pool. The gambler aspect of Lando comes out in Sabaac Shift where he can toss his order card back to refresh force but then you must activate the next unit drawn. It’s kind of like when you don’t want to use the Shatterpoint, except Lando’s order card gets shuffled back before you draw so there’s a chance he draws himself again. Sometimes that could suck (sometimes you gamble and lose, kids), but if he’s the last unit in your deck you essentially get two force for free before he activates. Finally, his identity allows him to choose the Rebel or Empire tag and to give a tag he has to a friendly Scoundrel whenever an order card is revealed. The list building implications of this are vast. My first thought is using Lando with Hask and ISF (points allowing) to pair with the Bad Batch. The Bad Batch are all Scoundrels (assuming you take Wrecker & Omega) so now they can be Empire when they activate, possibly getting the benefits of both Hask and Hunter to improve offense. I’m not sure that concept is good, but there’s all sorts of other interesting things one can do with this ability.
We now get into the portion of the road map where we don’t get any more cards, but that’s OK! The last time we saw Kit Fisto it was just a grey render, so this is a step up. We also find out that his squad comes with Fil and some clones. More options in the box can’t be a bad thing, unless you ask my wallet.
Similar to Kit’s squad, we only saw renders of Ki-Adi and crew at Adepticon. We also see now that Shaak Ti is his secondary. The spicy info they dropped on stream was that Shaak Ti is the first secondary to add force to your pool. I’m happy to see that mechanic finally used, though I am interested to see the balance implications.
Whatever your excited/celebrating GIF of choice may be, imagine that and it probably isn’t far off from my reaction when I saw these guys. Rogue One is my favourite Star Wars movie and I’m hyped to see these guys in the game. I will admit the Cassian face looks a bit odd, but that may be due to the paint job.
Are we blind? These guys look great! The one Death Trooper is a little close pose-wise to the Death Trooper Escort for my liking, but other than that I have no notes. There is a Death Trooper secondary then two support options between Shoretroopers or more Death Troopers.
It sounds like this is coming out a bit after the other Rogue One stuff, which is a bit sad. It just means a little more time before I can rock a full Rogue One rebel list. They did say on stream that Bodhi’s cable backpack optional so you can build him without it if you prefer.
I saw a lot of people painting up their regular clone commandos like Delta Squad, so if that’s you I have good news and bad news: the actual Delta Squad should arrive in Shatterpoint sometime next year! I never played the video game, but I’m nonetheless excited to pair this box up with the Bad Batch for some all-clone fun. Hopefully it’s good too!
Last, but not least (OK, maybe least too) we have SHARK MAN! Riff Tamson looks to be the first Separatist release since July 2023. Admittedly this one was a bit out of left field, but hopefully it scratches the itch a bit for a faction that hasn’t received much support since launch. The aqua droids look absolutely huge and I’m here for it! Riff is shown bursting out of water, which could be an issue with Shatterpoint’s standard bases except it looks like the basing piece has a little grate worked in too which should help it make more sense visually.
Looking at the anticipated release timeline my main thought is “gotta save up that hobby budget for November.” If we actually get everything shown by Q2 2025 I might be a bit surprised, but we’ll see. That would mean everything shown would come out in less than 12 months, which seems a bit aggressive considering all the recent delays, but I’ll trust the timeline until it’s proven wrong.
The stream team did drop major hints that there may be something else coming that’s not shown, similar to how we got the Death Star rescue box revealed after the Adepticon panel. My best guess (more of a hope really) is that any additional items are spoiled at GenCon at the start of August and release late September or maybe October alongside the Crosshair box.
That’s it for now! Overall I’m happy with the reveals and think that they really hit the spot thematically. Time will tell how balanced everything is, but first impressions is that nothing is too crazy.
We also got some big news during the Key Operations panel on Friday, so check back in later for a recap article on that. The best course of action is to sit with this website open pressing F5 until my article arrives.
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