Sudden Conflict - Tactics Guide: Galactic Throne

Greetings friends!

We've talked about Sudden Conflict before. It's a cool 3v3 skirmish game that is being released on Gamefound in less than a month from now. Goonhammer has been lucky enough to receive review copies of each of the release boxes and after some tinkering and experimentation (and that was before we even opened the boxes and played the game, wink wink) we've come up with some guides for how to build teams and play with the various characters in each set.

The first set we're providing a Tactics Guide for is the Galactic Throne, set in an ancient and empty universe. The Empress Melar, galactic monarch, has swept through fading embers of this cosmos, collecting any refugees and civilisations that remain either by choice or by conquest. For she holds the Infinity Matrix, and uses it like some sort of universe-scale woodchipper. Feeding other realities and parallel universes into it in order to keep the lights on at home. Which is pretty grim but she gets results and isn't that enough?

Apparently not for the Caladorian Plutocracy. Enter our heroine, Space Ranger Heather Sing and her motley crew of: Baron Holloway (Man-machine Hybrid who is half-man, half-machine, and half-universe-scale-woodchipper. Yes, the maths does work when you're dealing with the Infinity Matrix) and Ula, the Imprisoned Empath that, in my head-canon, can bust out the high notes and chicken-wings like Plavalaguna*, the diva from the Fifth Element.

Without further ado, let's explore each of the characters from Galactic Throne and see what their strengths and weaknesses are. We've also included a Ratings system, mostly because nothing generates controversy and internet arguments like a Tier List. Generally, the game is quite nicely balanced and you're not going to lose a match because you picked a team consisting entirely of characters we've rated as B and C tier while your opponent was mucking around in the S and A tiers. However, you're welcome to blame us if admitting that it was actually a skill issue is a big ask (and that's OK, we can take it.).

A game of Sudden Conflict playing out

The Empire of Melar

Empress Melar

Sudden Conflict - Empress Melar

Strengths

Meteoric Blow is a straight up game-ender if you pull it off correctly. 3-dice Spirit on melee is fine, basically par for the course. However, it’s followed by a 2-damage Push. If Melar lines up an opponent to get Pushed into an ally, you’re clocking 4+ damage on the enemy team regardless of their Defence roll. Where teams will usually have between 15 and 18 HP total, having a single hit do potentially 25% of a team’s HP without being able to roll Defence is just wild.

Oh, you need to do a little positional play to set up Meteoric Blow? Be a right shame is Melar had the ability to ignore Barriers while moving (and while not Defeated but, details details…). Say no more, Fam. Unstoppable Force has got you covered.

Unstoppable Force means that Meteoric Blow is never off the table. Even if she’s been downed and is crawling around the map, leaking royal guts everywhere, there’s always a chance something goes terribly wrong and Melar just jumps up and style="font-weight: 400;">Falcon Punches your team into the next universe.

Disintegration Beam is weird. It’s a 2-dice ranged Body shot but the kicker is that if you roll all successes then you get a free undefended damage through. So, obviously the best way to trigger that is to never roll Momentum on this attack. However, that only happens 25% of the time you roll the dice, so it’s a bit of a gamble for when you absolutely must deal 1 damage to someone. I think the expected outcome for a multi-momentum attack here causes more damage but Disintegration Beam is a cheap way to nickel and dime someone if you want to save your resources for something else.

Weaknesses

Melar doesn’t have any inbuilt access to status clearing, so if your opponent Hexes your key abilities Melar is pretty sad until she spends an Action to clear it (and that has its own opportunity cost).

Good Partners

If you’ve put Empress Melar, Galactic Tyrant (Golden Gigachad Queen-bae) into your line up you’re chasing that sweet, sweet endorphin hit of Meteoric Blow’ing your opponent off the table (and you are right and just in doing so). So, keeping Melar safe, topped up on Momentum and not having her premiere skill blocked by a Hex is pretty important. Baron Holloway can roll dice to either gain Momentum or remove status tokens, Kotai from the Ukyo setting has an ability that moves Allies (great for setting you up for your big hit) that also farms momentum, and Belle Thrushwood (from the Valrona set) is a buff beast: Farms momentum, removes status tokens and can even grant Bless tokens.

Rating: A Empress Melar is a team-defining character, as it should be for someone whose resume includes the phrase ‘Deconstructed multiple universes down to a quantum slurry to feed the ever-hungry void’. She’s good but also has a target painted on her head, so you need to support her.

Contessa Bly

Sudden Conflict - Contessa Bly

Strengths

Contessa Bly is a position/movement-focused character. Of her 5 abilities, 3 of them involve movement, ranging from shifting your opponent’s pieces around as well as ignoring Barriers and Characters. If you put her in your team you need to be playing the table/terrain as much as you’re playing your opponent.

I quite like Bly’s ranged attack, Psychogenic Infraction. It’s only 2 dice but it recycles any failed Momentum dice, which makes it an incredibly efficient outlet for your banked Momentum pool. My read on the game is that you need to have a plan for gathering/banking Momentum dice and a plan for using it to deliver the big hits that get past your opponent’s defensive pools. Psychogenic Infraction, as a Ranged Momentum Recycler, is the perfect tool for this purpose, it’s easy to line up a shot with Bly’s movement shenanigans (Spatial Rift) and you’re assured that your Momentum dice spent on an attack won’t be wasted.

Glimpse Beyond the Veil is an interesting skill, it’s only 2-dice Soul but if you can get even one success in you’re stacking both Anguish and Hex tokens onto your target.

Weaknesses

Bly only has one inherent Momentum-gathering mechanic, which relies on you having Defeated allies. I don’t love planning around taking hits. This is also a problem, as if Bly is a Momentum spender, you need someone else in the team to gather the momentum for her. About the best/most reliable Momentum farmer I’m aware of is Belle Thrushwood (from the Valrona set).

Good Teammates

As noted above, Bly wants Momentum, so I think you need to be running someone with her that can bring the juice that she wants to drink, see Belle Thrushwood above.

Rating: B Contessa Bly is a very good support character but in a game based on 3v3 brawls, having one of your team members being a little bit on the lower-end of offensive output is a risk you’ll have to take. This means you’ll have to maximize the other capabilities she brings to the table.

Arlax Jorl

Sudden Conflict - Arlax Jorl

Arlax is a bit of a bruiser, a melee tank with a huge swing on him: That axe is thirsty. A lot of his abilities are focused on either taking damage or supporting his allies. Arlax’s ability to share HP with his team is amazing.

Strengths

Arlax swings hard. Reluctant Strike appears to be the single highest attack you can make in the game thus far without buffs or Momentum Dice. At 5 dice swinging against Soul, you’re going to make an opponent with a Soul Defence value of 2 or less incredibly nervous. Toss in a buff or some momentum dice and one-shotting enemies is a very real possibility. The downside is that after using his melee attack, you’ve got to apply a Hex to yourself. Thankfully, Arlax has a few abilities you can jam up before you lock yourself out of using Reluctant Strike again. I’d suggest locking out his 2-dice Ranged Attack (Voltaic Discharge) first, as if you’re already close enough to have swung with Reluctant Strike, you’re probably close enough to walk and swing with it again next round.

Voltaic Discharge is a weird ability. On first glance, it’s a two-dice ranged attack, which doesn’t look amazing but because it has a Push effect attached to it, you’ve got the potential to double-dip on damage. Smack ‘em with the damage roll, then push them into a wall for another 1 undefended damage. Enslaved Spirit is his passive ability, redirecting damage from your allies onto Arlax. This ability to control where the incoming damage lands on your team is going to be a really strong ability. You’ve only got 3 characters on the field, even one of them dropping into the Defeated state represents a significant loss of capability, particularly if they get clocked before their turn comes up in the activation order. Arlax can straight up ignore this (for a little while, at least), that’s wild. He’s even got his own self-heal baked in with Purifying Aura, just further stretching out your team’s endurance.

Weaknesses

2-dice abilities have a 75% chance to trigger, which is pretty solid but, man, when Arlax uses either Voltaic Discharge or Purifying Aura you really want them to get at least one success. With Reluctant Strike gated behind the risk that you get Hex’ed between activations, you need a reliable way to clear status effects before he swings. Getting locked out of Reluctant Strike can reduce Arlax’s contribution to your team, so keeping that skill online is a priority. While he can do it himself with Purifying Aura you might want a character who can reliably help him out in a pinch.

Good Teammates

I think Una (also from Galactic Throne) is Arlax Jorl’s best friend. She gives you an advantage in Initiative (always a strong play), she can heal herself as well as Allies, helping you stretch Arlax’s HP-sharing even further. Additionally, if you’re playing in a closed set (i.e. there’s only one Una to go around, grab her before your opponent does because her 4-dice Soul attack will make Arlax very unhappy if they ever meet.

Rating: S

I think the HP-sharing, access to the single biggest dice attack in the game and his balance of other abilities makes Arlax Jorl an S-tier pick in Sudden Conflict. 11 out of 10, they’re all good mind-slaves, Brent.

The Galactic Resistance

Sudden Conflict - Heather Sing, Space Ranger (Photo courtesy of Musterkrux)

Heather Sing

Sudden Conflict - Heather Sing

Strengths

I feel like Heather’s strength lies in making insanely good Underdog plays.

There’s a wild wombo-combo you can pull off with her: Activate, trigger Promise the Stars on any damaged allies (but not yourself, sadly), then use Fusion Thruster to move a smooth 5 spaces, trigger that sweet free Momentum and toss out a Coup de Grace. Blow some momentum and Glory and if you can turn that hit into a KO and then immediately throw out a free Hypersonic Railgun. Alas, you can only take each Action once a round (unless specifically noted otherwise), so you can’t pull off a cheeky Jump-Stab-Jump with Coup de Grace.

It’s also worth noting that Heather is always in the game. Even when defeated you’ve got a 75% chance at minimum of triggering Galaxy’s Last Hope, gaining at least one momentum and then having the option of just straight up cooking the field with an Area attack Hypersonic Raygun. If you get lucky on the Raygun, you’re tossing around Hex tokens like crazy.

Weaknesses

Heather has a weird tension between wanting to act ahead of her allies, to give them Glory tokens but by the same measure, having her activate early while you have injured allies on the field exposes you to the risk that they get ganked immediately after Heather’s activation. Unfortunately, Glory doesn’t affect Defence rolls, so you can’t use this mechanic to buff your team up when they need to survive an incoming attack. With 5 HP and her highest attack value being 3, Heather is very much a finesse character. You can’t throw her into a HP trading fight without a plan.

Good Partners

Heather wants Momentum farming buddies who have their own actions that you want to boost with her passive. Ginger from the Valrona set is a good combo, she's got a solid Ranged attack that also has a 'Free Action' reward, letting you use her and Heather to lean into an action economy game. Yugo, the Badger from the Ukyo set has a good Ranged Attack that recycles Momentum, he's a good friend, as well.

Rating: B

Heather is fine, a lot of her kit is built around making underdog plays that require finesse, which isn’t necessarily something you should be planning for when building a team. That said, there’s nothing better than pulling off that wild Wombo-Combo Hail Mary and stealing the game at the last minute.

Baron Holloway

Sudden Conflict - Baron Holloway

Strengths

Holloway just doesn’t care about your opponent’s tricks. If someone gets cheeky and tries to lock down his cooler abilities, he just straight up shrugs it off with Photonic Acceleration. If one of your allies has been debuffed, just Reshape Matter. It’s free real estate. Holloway farms momentum like nobody’s business with Prime the Matrix. It’s not impossible to scurry up 4 momentum in a single roll if you set it up right. Just remember, even if you fail to roll any successes, that still triggers a pity momentum. ">Everything's coming up Milhouse!

Shifting Realities. You might need to read this one a second time to understand how insane this ability is. It affects everyone, so you can move your allies through barriers, getting them to safety while also Pushing your opponent for automatic damage as well as getting them away from your team.

Weaknesses

For a guy that reads like a support piece, Baron Holloway still has 6 HP, multiple 3-dice attack options and a super solid Push for punching through defence.

Does Baron Holloway have a weakness?

I don’t even know at this stage.

Good Partners

Who is Holloway’s best partner? That is the wrong question, friend. Instead, you must ask who is Holloway a good partner to? Everyone. Baron Holloway is everyone’s best friend.

Rating: A+

Holloway is amazing. He might not be Arlax-tier but he’s damned good.

Ula, the Imprisoned Empath

Strengths

Ula has a unique advantage of giving you re-rolls on initiative due to Prophetic Visions. Without breaking down the probabilities of conditional re-rolls here, this gives you a relatively good chance of winning initiative when you want it. It’s worth noting that you can use this to deliberately tank an initiative roll, useful if you want your opponent to commit first or you want that sweet, sweet pity Momentum.

Ula is a great healer in a game that places a huge premium on your very limited HP pool.

She can heal herself with Siphon Essence (Also a 4-dice melee attack, no less!) or reliably heal her allies with Vestige of Hope.

Weaknesses

Ula’s biggest weakness is that aside from healing and initiative she doesn’t have much going except the fact that she has a 4-dice melee attack (love the dice, hate the requirement to put her into close range with people who want her dead to use it). The closest thing Ula has to Momentum farming is deliberately throwing your Initiative roll, which is cute but not something you want to do every round.

Good Partners

Ula wants to hang out with people who can take a hit and keep standing, so she has a mild preference for characters with 6HP as well as any sort of defensive tech.

As noted above, Arlax Jorl is Super Best Friends with Ula, because they synergise with each other really well. I wonder what she perceives when trying to read his mind?

Rating: B

Ula has a few incredibly strong and unique abilities (healing and initiative manipulation) but her offensive output is limited to a single move that can be Hexed with no baked-in status effect removal and limited Momentum farming opportunities. She’s a great support piece, can hold her own in a scrap, but you don’t build a team around her.

Wrap Up

And that's it for this week, folks. Next week we'll look at the characters from the Ukyo setting, including Ophella (two-headed turtle. Neither Teenage nor Ninja. Possibly Mutated, though.) and Temu Bear (that's his name, not a value judgement).

*That's her name. Plavalaguna. I looked it up. There, we both learned something today.

Sudden Conflict - Baron Holloway (Photo courtesy of Musterkrux)

Sudden Conflict will be available on Gamefound in early 2026, with three core sets (Ukyo, Valrona, and the Galactic Throne) as well as two Character Expansion packs (Solaris and the Exiled).

Have any questions or feedback? Drop us a note in the comments below or email us at contact@goonhammer.com. Want articles like this linked in your inbox every Monday morning? Sign up for our newsletter. And don’t forget that you can support us on Patreon for backer rewards like early video content, Administratum access, an ad-free experience on our website, and subscriber-only content covering competitive Warhammer 40K!

Tags: sudden conflict | galactic throne