It’s a bit trickier to find characters for the Empire during the time of the Original Trilogy, trickier than any other era. Sure, there are lots of standard troopers, but not named characters. Imagine my surprise when ‘Today the Rebellion Dies Squad Pack’ was announced. This is a big turning point for the skirmish game. This is a squad not based on the movies, not the television shows, but the computer games. Oh, how my heart leaps with joy. Now don’t get me wrong, I love the releases we’ve had, there has been a vast variety from across the galaxy. But, from computer games? It opens up a whole other library of characters available for Atomic Mass to use. I’ve already mentioned how it would be really really great to see a Dark Forces pack with Kyle Katarn (cough, cough Atomic Mass).
If you don’t know, this squad pack is Inferno Squad, who originally featured in the newer Battlefront 2 game and also had a very well written book about them by Christie Golden. It was a book that linked very well with The Clone Wars and really helped cement the name of the squad in Star Wars canon. They have since been mentioned or featured in various books and comics along the way. This squad pack shows just how well regarded they are. Even better, it’s a five pack, giving players a few options of how best to run the squad.
It’s also a good boost for Empire players, a few named characters as well as some ‘standard’ Imperial Special Forces characters (if they can even be called standard!). I’m excited to see how the combinations of characters can create some interesting and varied Empire squads. On the back of the box, it does say that there are three alternate helmet options, presumably for the characters. While this is great, I wish Atomic Mass would have an image of what they look like in this configuration. I can see from the front of the box what they look unhelmeted, now show me unhelmeted!
In the box, there is everything that you would expect; the leaflet, the cards, eight bases (I guess you can never have enough) and all the models contained on a single sprue. Let’s get the instructions loaded up and see what these characters are like to build. I’ll start off with the alternate builds for Iden Versio, Del Meeko and Gideon Hask. It is just a helmet switch, like with the clones. I love that you can have them with their helmets on and it definitely makes the most sense in battle that they’d be wearing them. Yet I think this is one time where I’m going to go against that reasoning for one important reason. Unlike the clone commanders/captains that visually you can see are different from their troops, I think it would be difficult at a quick glance to see who, is who, if everyone is wearing helmets. Yes, Iden has a droid, that makes things much easier, and Del has a blaster rifle, but Hask would look very similar to the other troopers and I think Del – at a cursory glance – would too. In terms of game play, I don’t want to be confusing units. It could make me make mistakes in my strategy and I certainly don’t want that. So, it’s definitely helmets off for all three.
The first build is Iden Versio. She is nice and simple to put together. The body and legs click into place and will need a bit more force than is customary to do with the figures. I also found the droid at the back wasn’t quite level when I glued into place. While the glue was still drying, I was able to move it slightly to get it looking straighter. In terms of a finished model, well, what can you say? The detail is amazing, the facial sculpt is incredible and the addition of the droid at the back is the chef’s kiss to top it all off.
We then move onto Gideon Hask. He is again simple to put together. The left arm glued in before the right will make things a bit easier and allow you to line up the hands better. The main body is the same as Iden; it’s full of detail. His sidestep to the left looks amazing and you can really feel his body moving to comb the area. Even at this stage I’m very happy to have gone with the faces rather than the helmets, it gives them a more personal touch.
After this we go straight to the Imperial Special Forces, starting with A, the one with his blaster pointing down. Easy to do, left arm first and you’ll find it comes together very, very quickly with no needing to decide on alternate heads! Model B – the one aiming his blaster – is exactly the same. The steps are the same and you’ll want to put the left arm on first. Both, while unnamed, are great to look at, and I love the poses. I just want to take a moment to appreciate the layout of the sprue. There are five models on here, that’s a lot of parts in a small space. Atomic Mass has done a great job of laying these out in a very logical way, so once you find the first part to a model, the rest are seamlessly obvious, there’s no hunting around trying to figure out where a small part is.
Finally, it’s Del Meeko. He is just as simple as the others, and it really is just a joy to put – not only him together – but the whole squad. There isn’t much at all that should cause players many issues.
Now that the squad is together, they look superb. I’m really happy I decided to go with the non-helmet versions for the three named characters, as on the tabletop they will be so much more easily recognised. But looking pretty is one thing, how do their cards look for the battlefield?
Iden is a three force, eight spending points primary. Her two stance sides are ‘Burst Fire’ and ‘Full Auto’, both focusing more on ranged. ‘Burst Fire’ can do nine damage on the track as well as lots of pinned. If you get far enough you can also reposition and heal two. The flip side is seven damage but a lot of turning defensive rolls to failures and a lot of movement with shoves. I should also mention the special forces armour that allows lots of blocks, healing and repositioning. I have a feeling opponents are going to get very frustrated by it. In terms of abilities, Iden’s tactic is that every Galactic Empire Scout within four who isn’t engaged can dash as can Iden. Very useful for the squad as a whole but very specific keywords, Galactic Empire and Scout. That limits it somewhat, at least with the current selection of squads available. Of course, this could and probably will change in the future. Iden then has two abilities that each cost a force. The first – ‘Covert Operations’ – allows Iden to dash and then if she ends within four of an enemy, she immediately focuses and gains sharpshooter one. Extremely useful and handy for taking an enemy unit out. Her other force cost ability is the seeker droid, which allows you to choose an enemy within three. You remove all the hunker tokens unless they didn’t have one, then they gain exposed. If you can combine these two abilities, Iden is going to make short work of some units. Her identity ability is when an Empire unit wounds an enemy, the unit may choose another enemy unit with four. The enemy gains either strained or disarmed and the friendly unit can heal and dash. I think this could be extremely useful, particularly as it doesn’t rely on two keywords, only one.
The secondary for Inferno Squad is Gideon Hask, who costs four points. Causing a maximum of seven damage on the track, typically adding another one to that, as well as shoves or conditions, he doesn’t seem bad at all. Combine him with the special forces armour and I like the look of him. Like Iden, he is focused more on ranged attacks, as I imagine the whole squad will be. They are about shooting and moving the enemy away, rather than becoming embroiled in melee. Two of Hask’s abilities cost a force. The first is the same as Iden’s, ‘Covert Operations’ so I won’t go over it again. The other, ‘Long Live the Empire’, allows a Galactic Empire supporting unit to reposition towards an objective, take two damage and, if it wounds the unit, remove all damage, the wound, and a condition to replace it with an injured token. This could be the difference in winning a round, but it depends how much you want to sacrifice your supporting unit. The two other abilities that Hask has are ‘May We Live Up to Our Name’ and ‘Defiance Will Be the Death Of You’. The first allows you to make a dash and five dice attack at an enemy that just wounded you (I like that you can get a bit of revenge!). The second is when an Empire unit makes an attack within five of a Galactic Empire Scut unit, add a hit. It is a nice little bonus if you have your scouts spaced around a bit.
We then move onto the supporting units and there is a choice of two, both costing four points. I always like when there’s options in the box, whether it’s so the squad can be a bit more flexible, or to give you a unit with the keywords you need to add to a different squad. Let’s look at Del Meeko first. Del can do six damage and is all about showing the opponent. He can also add a fair few conditions onto your enemy too. His tactic when he activates is ‘Trick Shot’. If Meeko isn’t engaged, he can choose an enemy in line of sight, no range restriction. The unit suffers a damage and removes all hunker tokens. That seems very powerful and will force your opponent to consider terrain even more. He has one ability that costs a force, like everyone else on the squad, it’s ‘Covert Operations’. Del also has sharpshooter two (as standard!) and ignores cover. That is all fantastic but then his last ability allows him to make a combat action twice in his turn. Get him in the right place and he is going to be a thorn in your enemy’s side. He is a very good supporting unit.
Which brings us to the other option you can take, the Imperial Special Forces. They can do more damage than Del, with a maximum of eight damage on their track, but with no shoves. Their tactic at the start of their activation is to remove a damage and a condition from itself. Now that means they are only really helping themselves, which is in one way quite limiting to your game play. However, it also allows this unit to be quite self-sufficient. The rest of the squad looks like it all needs to be fairly close together to work effectively, these look far more independent. It also would suggest these would be a good unit to add to a different squad. They also have ‘Covert Operations’ for a force and they have infiltration, allowing them to deploy three away from their primary unit.
I like the look of this squad. There are a few options that will be fun to try out, but they seem like a solid choice for the Empire. Let’s see if they match their renown on the battlefield. Iden’s tactic is extremely powerful at the start of the game. With everyone so close together, I was able to move everyone around and get them into position. I decided to leave the special forces behind in favour of Del, because well he looked so much fun. In fact, let’s go straight onto Del who is quite simply terrifying. Having Iden able to position him first, I sat him on an objective and let the enemy come to me. I did have to move to get the enemy into my sights, something I was hesitant about but then impatience got the best of me. Shooting twice, I was able to wound a unit in a single turn, but I was also close to Iden. Because of her identity ability, I was able to move Del back out of the way. It was a happy accident but one I will definitely remember.
Covert Operations is exceptional, I didn’t realise just how good it is until I used it with every one of the characters. You do have to keep your eye on your force use, but my enemy wasn’t happy about it. The other thing that really let these characters shine was the armour. My opponent was trying to do some serious damage, particularly to Hask who ended up having to face off against Luke Skywalker. I was pretty sure I would be dead, until his armour save soaked up a lot of the damage. I’m not going to lie; it seriously impressed me.
This squad is incredible. Let’s get that right out of the way. Keeping them close, although not too close, to one another, and they support each other brilliantly. You have to know when to push forward, when to hold back, but their abilities will help with this. And if you do make a mistake, their armour is a life saver (quite literally) and they will be able to oppose most things your opponent can throw at you. If you’re a Galactic Empire player, you will be wanting this squad. I’m already planning on using every unit in this box with other squads so I can go to town with them. And Del? Well opponents to the Empire, you’ve been warned – run!
