Mastering the Force: Part Two
A beginner’s guide to force-users - Part two of our multi part series
If you haven’t already checked out part one, you can read it here.
In part two of our series on mastering force users in Star Wars Legion, we do a deep dive into three core skills that we think are essential to successfully playing a force users:
Timing
Targeting
Zone Control
Timing
Mastering timing with your force user is key to being successful piloting them. This means controlling the timing of when they activate in a round relative to your opponent’s units, knowing the ideal timing of their command card sequence, and knowing the ideal timing during the game for them to dive into melee or attack range.
The first rule to mastering timing with your force user is the following:
Force users always want an order
When building your list, you need to ensure that your force user has an order at least 5 out of 6 rounds, if not all 6 rounds. Being able to hold your force user’s activation until the end of a round to keep them safe and minimize your opponents’ ability to react to their actions that round is crucial. Additionally, having them activate first on key turns where you need them to do damage or win an objective before an opponent can react is also essential. Force users are considered ‘focus pieces’ so your command cards should center around giving them orders and charging their abilities up. If you need to take a command card that does not give your force user an order, try to bake in a contingency to get them an order such as using ‘Seize the Initiative’ or getting them an order utilizing ‘comms relay’ on another unit.
The next rule of timing is:
Know how to last-first
This is somewhat self explanatory, but is an essential element of successfully engaging a force user. Typically a force user will go as your last activation (ideally, the last activation of the round for both you and your opponent) to run out aggressively to set up their charge. The next round, you will play a one pip command card to let your force user go first to dive in on your target unit. There are a ton of asterisks to doing this successfully (sometimes it’s worth delaying a tad to engage an activated unit versus an unactivated unit, you don’t want your force user to run ahead of your army and dive in unsupported, etc), but the key concept holds.
In coordination with this is the next rule of timing:
Know the timing of your force user’s command cards
Force user command cards can often be split into 3 categories - offensive cards, defensive cards, and support/control cards. Knowing the ideal sequence, which is unique for each force user, is key to success. While the sequence can change as you react to your opponent’s actions, common patterns arise in the big picture. One of your 2-3 pip cards may be defensive and will set you up to go last in a round and tank a shot more safely. Your 1 pip is typically offensive and will let you go first, setting you up for a potent ‘last-first’ play. Every force user has unique combos, so study these before putting your force user on the table.
The final rule of timing with your force user is:
Know when to dive your force user.
This rule is tricky to master, and it takes experience to know when to dive your force user, but there are a few pitfalls to avoid. Namely: don’t feel that you have to dive your force user early, and don’t run them out ahead of your army. It’s perfectly fine to delay diving your force user into melee until turn 4 if you’re using them to zone out your opponent, support your troops, and control an area of the board. Force users can’t survive in your opponent’s line for 5-6 turns typically, so trying to get into melee at the start of turn 2 often results in your force user dying turn 3-4. Force users become even more potent near the end of the game due to a reduced total model count on the board after multiple rounds of attrition, due to how good force push it at objectives near endgame, and due to the fact they’re worth a large amount of kill points to your opponent, so holding them back to keep them alive is usually worth it. While you need to do something with them in the game, waiting until turn 4 to dive in with them is usually perfectly fine. Additionally, you need your force user to dive on your opponent in a synchronous fashion with the rest of your army in order to maximize their value. This is often referred to as ‘threat saturation’ and is covered in a previous article of ours in more depth. Definitely check out that article before putting your force user on the table.
Targeting
There are two rules to learn in regards to targeting. The first is
Know who to target and who to avoid in your opponent’s list
Force users’ greatest strength in combat is typically the quality (not quantity) of their dice, and the fact that their sabers have pierce 2. You typically can push through ~3-5 wounds through enemy saves depending on the unit you’re attacking and your lightsaber’s dice profile. Knowing who to target is key to maximizing the value of your attacks since you will typically only get 3-4 per game. If you swing at a naked b1 squad and kill 4 models, you’ve killed approximately ‘24 points’ worth of models. If you do the same attack on phase 2 clone troopers with a z6 and kill 4 models, you’ve killed approximately ‘73.5 points’ (46.5 for 3 the p2 troopers and 27 for the z6 heavy weapon) of models. This is almost exactly 3 times the value from the same attack. While you won’t always have such a clear choice of the best target, you should prioritize attacking a unit that that is:
Susceptible to pierce
An elite unit with a high points per wound cost
Red save units over white save units
A unit with a heavy weapon
A unit that will lose offensive effectiveness from the attack.
This typically means that your force user’s ideal target is your opponent’s special forces or corp units with heavy weapons. You will quickly diminish their offensive effectiveness with each swing and will reduce the number of ‘thumbs’ they have for objectives. Another ideal target is your opponents commanders or operatives that are not pierce immune, such as rex, cassian, or a super tactical droid. These targets are typically harder to get to, and they have command card tricks that can foil your plans (such as the super tactical droid’s 2 pip giving them ‘impervious’ and somewhat negating the effect of your pierce), but killing them can be devastating to your opponent. Don’t pass up a juicy elite corp or SF unit to make a hail mary swing at your opponent’s commander, but if the opportunity presents itself, you know you’ll be getting value.
There are some of your opponent’s units that you will want to avoid. These units are typically either pierce immune in melee (such as opposing force users or magnaguard) or have high wound pools with poor saves, such as wookiees, which dramatically reduces the value of your elite piercing attacks. If you do 4 wounds per swing to a squad of wookiees, you can spend literally half the game killing one squad, which is not how you want to use your force user typically. With all of these units as well, they can do serious melee damage back to your force user which is not to be underestimated. Those 6-7 wounds on your force user go faster than you’d expect, and one bad defense roll versus a wookiee or magnaguard attack can quickly lose you the game. With this same logic in mind, typically you do not want to ‘duel’ an opposing force user with your force user. There are a few limited exceptions to this, but typically you want your corp and special forces to be gunning down an enemy force user while your force user destroys their other non pierce immune units. Force push can be your best friend in this kind of match up, and typically using your force user to disengage your opponent’s force user and set them up to be shot by your other units is the best counter you can mount.
The exceptions to this are: 1. Killing Blows, 2. Operative Luke, and 3 *Dooku*. If your gunline chips your opponent’s force user down to 1-2 wounds left, using your force user to deliver the killing blow is totally valid and is one of the few times you should engage in a ‘duel’. The other exceptions are if you’re using Operative Luke or *Count Dooku*. Operative Luke is one of the few force users that can throw out a much larger volume of dice in one activation due to his high natural dice pool, access to tenacity, and his Son of Skywalker command card. While most force users are throwing 5-8 dice in one activation, with that combination operative Luke can throw 16 dice in one activation, decimating another force user.
While Count Dooku’s command cards and his ‘makashi mastery’ uniquely equip him to duel other force users more effectively than most, don’t let these fool you into overconfidence. He still has a small dice pool, he has reduced access to dodges compared to most force users, and one bad defense dice roll can quickly lose you the duel. He is best used as a control piece to deny other force users orders (with his two pip command card), and to move them out of position with force push and his three pip command card. He is, however, exceptional at delivering the killing blow to an enemy force user with his ‘cunning’ and ‘makashi mastery’ keywords. With this in mind, you should still try to whittle your opponent’s force user down to 1-2 wounds utilizing your control from Dooku and your gunline/other units before Dooku then dives in on his one pip turn to deliver the finishing blow. If you use Dooku to engage a full health operative Luke, you will lose the battle. Even with cunning and makashi mastery, you will likely strike Luke for 2-3 wounds before he slashes you back with 14-16 dice, which can easily kill you.
The second rule of targeting with your force user is:
Know who to engage in melee in order to stay engaged and not get killed.
This rule is a little simpler but is critical to success. When your force user dives into your opponent’s line, your best defense is typically staying engaged in melee. That way you can focus on fighting one unit at a time while avoiding being shot by your opponent's entire army. Diving on your opponent’s front most unit is often tempting, but can be the wrong choice. In order to stay engaged you need to:
Target a unit that has already activated
Be wary of an opposing units force push moving you out of melee, and
Utilize standby.
If you engage an enemy unit that has activated, they cannot withdraw from that melee until the next round, ensuring your force user is safe from ranged attacks. When possible, wait to dive your force user in until you can engage an activated unit.
With this in mind, you need to be wary of an opposing force user’s ability to draw you out of melee with force push. If you activate your force user before your opponent activates theirs, you should assume your opponent is going to force push you out of melee and into a dangerous position if they are able to. This is where activation count can become crucial, as delaying your force user until after your opponent’s force user goes can give you a huge advantage. Nothing is worse than having your force user activate, thinking they are safe behind a wall or buried in melee, but then having them force pushed out in the open to be shot by your opponent’s entire army. Expect this and you will be able to avoid being devastated by it.
Standby is a potent tool for melee units who want to stay engaged. Sometimes, it is more valuable to move into melee with an opponent’s unactivated unit and take a standby than it is to attack. This allows you to wait until they activate, and if they withdraw, you can just trigger your standby to move into them (or another unit nearby) to stay engaged (and if you have charge, attack them then!). Standby tokens can be stripped by gaining a suppression (which you *typically* are safe from when engaged) and by being force pushed, so watch out for those counters before you make this play. This play is especially potent with Maul since he gains a third action due to his Juyo Mastery, and since he is especially fragile compared to other force users. Move + Move + Standby is one of Maul’s best strengths, and with any force user, a skilled player knows when to take a standby over going for an immediate attack.
Get Value Out of Zone Control
The primary rule here is this:
Force users can win you the game without swinging their saber.
Ultimately, Legion is an objective game, and force users can control an area of the board around an objective better than any other unit. Often, players feel like they are ‘wasting’ their force user every activation that they are not attacking with them, and this is a fallacy that can lead you to being too aggressive with your force user. Influencing your opponent’s positioning and decision making because of the threat your force user poses can be more potent (and sustainable!) than your force user taking models off the table. Often, your opponent wants your force user to jump out of hiding earlier in the game, so that they have more time to focus on dealing with them. Knowing the balance here takes experience, but if you keep it in mind that your force user is still earning you value by controlling space on the board and threatening your opponent, it’ll be easier to be patient with your force user and get more value out of them. Hiding your force user behind a wall or line of sight blocking piece of terrain near an objective is incredibly potent (especially if your force user has ‘jump’) and will cause your opponent to make a number of difficult decisions regarding how to approach that part of the table. Look out for these positions on the table before you select your board edge (if you’re red player) and before you deploy, and try to use them to your advantage.
This concludes part two of our ongoing series on mastering force users in Legion. Make sure to check out our article on ‘threat saturation’ as well, and may the force be with you, always.
Written by: Stephen Cobb (@ASpaceViking)
Edited by: Jeff Van Laethem (@Painting_For_The_Emperor)