Another year, another round of reveals, and a new roadmap for Atomic Mass Games (AMG) Star Wars games. We gathered round our Legion and Shatterpoint enjoyers to give some thoughts on everything that was shown off, regardless of how little we might know about it yet.

Legion

Jedi Council and Jedi BARC Speeder

Matt: I’m very excited about both of these boxes. One of the draws to GAR for me has always been the amount of Jedi you have access to, and these take that to the next level. Between having two ways to play each character in the Jedi Council box and the generic Jedi in the BARC box, we’re spoiled for choice. The revealed cards look good too; I’m happy to see that each character has their own niche to cover and that I can recommend them over other leaders.

Paul: The inclusion of unit upgrade cards for the Jedi Council members suggests that the Legion team is very happy with their recent change, allowing Cassian Andor, Agent Kallus, and other hero units to act as upgrade cards for Corps units instead of exclusively as Commanders or Operatives. I expect to see even more of this in the future.

Also, the generic BARC-mounted Jedi commander is a wild new choice for a Tours of Duty paragon, unless they specifically disallow it.

Leaders of the Separatist Alliance

Bair: I feel like this is something that I saw a while back and have been very impatiently waiting to get! A new Dooku is cool, nice to have in plastic, and the Grievous is a nice mini since I didn’t get the new Separatist starter set, but I’m really excited for Savage (not pronounced how you think if you haven’t seen the cartoons) and Trench the most. Pretty cool that Savage is available to both Separatists and Maul’s army, it makes sense, and I like that his rules are the same for both, with just a change to who he’s Retinued to. I’m not stoked about having to get this box when the only two new characters are Savage and Trench, but at least the new sculpts look nice for the others, except for Ventress, who’s just the same model that was released separately not long ago.

Matt: I have the same mixed feelings about the new character boxes that Bair does. I’d really like to play Savage, as new Shadow Collective models are always a nice surprise, but I don’t really want to re-buy a bunch of models I already have, just in plastic this time. They look a lot nicer but not THAT much nicer. That said, Trench and Savage are interesting enough that I’ll probably end up with the box anyway.

Mercenary Han/Chewie and Guerrilla Troopers

Paul: The Guerilla Troopers come with red defense dice and a new keyword that requires the unit to equip 2 heavy gunners. The sculpts are my favorite part of this new unit: most of the miniatures are wearing partial suits of Imperial Stormtrooper armor and wielding Stormtrooper heavy weapons. This is a fantastic storytelling detail that creates the impression of Imperial defectors or stolen equipment. I expect it to be a welcome addition to a faction that’s frequently light on defense. On the other hand, Rebels now have ten Special Forces units available to them - twice as many as any other faction. The roadmap presentation also mentioned a coming rebalance. I wonder if it’ll address this somehow (hopefully not by axing any units, like what happened to the Pathfinders).

Han and Chewie as a single mercenary unit is a welcome addition in principle, and it’s nice to have a miniature of Han in his classic vest and bloodstripes, but we know relatively little about the unit itself. Similar to the Bad Batch unit, the Han & Chewie, Notorious Scoundrels card equips separate cards for the two characters, and those cards were not teased.

image credit: Atomic Mass Games

Mud Troopers, Wet Weather Troopers, Army Box

Matt: It’s extremely hypocritical to say this as someone who primarily plays clones, but making a big distinction between “stormtroopers but they fight in mud” and “stormtroopers but they fight in the rain” is getting to be a bit much for me. The models look good, though, and hopefully they’ll be pretty distinct on the battlefield.

Paul: The mud troopers at least have the look of Imperial Army Regulars - the same helmet and goggles as an AT-ST driver, plus some kind of respirator, creating a unique look. The Stormtroopers with rain capes are harder to think of as a different unit. I would also note, with some concern, that the wet troopers, mud troopers, and 224th Army Box are the only teased units for which no unit or upgrade cards were shown. The sculpts are beautiful, though.

Bair: I really like the army boxes; they normally come with a really good discount on the contents, but I’m not a fan of box-locked sculpts of minis. This one has a special-edition officer that looks great, but only comes in this box!

Mandalorians

Paul: The addition of an entire Mandalorian army box, along with a variety of Mandalorian hero units and customizable commander and operative units, which are in some cases only available to the Mandalorian battle force, has the Mercenary forces feeling like an entire fifth faction. They’ve also teased sub-factions within the Mandalorian battle force: some unit cards are marked by the classic mythosaur skull, while others show a Nite Owl, Clan Wren, Death Watch, or hammer and tongs logo. Some of the unit cards show features exclusive to those symbols.

As with previous Mandalorian units, every unit card previewed has red defense dice, most with surge, and a majority of them also have a movement value of 3 with jump 2. This whole box is highly mobile and very hard to kill.

Bair: This rules so hard. I’ll definitely be picking this up. I had played Mauldilorians in the old edition, but didn’t really enjoy the gameplay since I was trying to avoid the basic Corps units; I wasn’t that interested in them. If I can do an army that’s really just Mandalorians, that’s rad as hell. Going to town on these guys, painting them up with unique colours or grouping together by clan, will look really good on the table.

“Air Support Arrives in 2027”

Paul: This was the final thing they teased. 2027 is still a ways off, and we don’t really know how air support will work. We know that the Rebel T-65 X-Wing is the first of the air support products, followed by one for each of the other factions. Anything else would be baseless speculation at this point.

But speaking of baseless speculation, one of the faction symbols getting an air support release is the Mandalorian mythosaur symbol. I’ve already started thinking of Mercenary/Mandalorian as a full fifth faction.

Bair: We know so little at this point that my thoughts are really just two-fold. The base of the model we saw looks ridiculous. I understand that it’s very likely because it doesn’t really have a base in the way other units do, so models can move under it, which is cool and makes sense! Unfortunately, an X-shaped base with a model on top is going to get tipped and knocked over by me so often. The other is that I have never been a fan of the introduction of fliers in Warhammer 40k and any iteration of that game that’s had them, which has been a fair few now! The scale of the Legion battle is similar enough that I have concerns about gameplay balance or use.

That said, it’s really cool to get Legion-scaled fliers, which will make for great terrain pieces if not gameplay pieces.

Matt: I’m worried the rules will be bad because, as Bair said, they’re basically never good, but I can’t pretend like I’m not going to buy and paint every single flier they release. Legion scale X-wings, yes please.

The only images that shows the flight stands and fliers are from their live stream, of which we cannot find a good quality version of to show here.

Shatterpoint

Sequel Sets

Matt: I’m really happy to see that they’re still going forward with finally giving the sequels some representation in either Legion or Shatterpoint. All four of the sets look fantastic, and if they’re all we ever get, they cover enough of the main characters that it’s hard to be disappointed. I’d like to see another bounty-hunter style secondary box that has old Luke, General Hux, maybe Lando, or Admiral Holdo. People who can’t really have an entire box built around them.

Tom: Stoked to have sequel trilogy material in Shatterpoint. As they mentioned, having a nice ‘bookend’ to the releases so far. However, releasing two boxes in 2026 and then announcing four in 2027 is an odd choice. Shatterpoint has been riddled with bizarre choices and decision-making issues throughout its launch, and hopefully, four releases a year will be the new standard.

Also, no more info on ‘The Negotiations Will Be Short’ box with Qui-gon and young Obi.

Character Rebalance

Tom: I am happy for the rebalance, and I hope it keeps the game alive. Keeping the balance is all that will keep communities playing and getting older characters dusted off and onto the battlefield. What I would give for officially printed content, though … tired of the PnP.

Cody: Last year, a rebalance fuelled Shatterpoint for an entire summer of competitive gaming. It did exactly what the game needed without adding anything new. We are definitely in a place where some models need to be adjusted, so I'm hopeful based on previous experiences.

However, adjustments like this help current player bases more than anything and aren't great for attracting new people to the game.

Star Wars is Worthy

Tom: Finally, something I can paint and enter in a contest!

Matt: People do incredible work on the MCP side of the painting contest, so I can’t wait to see what people turn in here.

Bair: I think that the Legion models have certainly gotten better over the years with crisper sculpts that make painting them a much nicer experience and the Shatterpoint minis are really nice to look at with a larger scale giving a painter more real estate to play around with. Not something that I'll be entering myself but excited to see what turns up for it!

Roadmaps Keep Going

Bair: Overall I'm just happy that Legion especially is continuing to get new kits, new rules, and being actively supported. The new edition is a lot of fun and easily sits in my top 3 most played games this year. Whenever a game is tied to an existing IP it feels like it can only really go on for so long until they run out of stuff to make, fortunately Star Wars has had a lot of stuff outside of the films that can still be created in miniature form.

I think I speak for all of our authors that we're pretty excited to keep playing these games and seeing what is coming!

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