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Definitely the Infantry Support Platform

Can't wait to see Spider Droids, Magna Guard, and Yoda.

Especially Yoda.

 Yodhrin wrote:


The level of resource expenditure necessary to keep up the appearance of an unstoppable empire of unfathomable peerless might and perfect, ordered discipline essentially means that most historical military forces that tried to model themselves as that ended up being paper tigers that could, essentially, be defeated by enemies expending minute fractions of the amount of resources it took to keep up the ideological front.

if the historical inspiration for the empire was (obviously) germany in WW2 and at least one historical inspiration for the rebellion was the vietcong, stormtroopers being basically totally inept makes perfect sense. All these big hyperexpansionist empires basically burn through their real scary elite troops in a matter of a couple years, generally the early part of the military campaign when they garner the reputation for being unstoppable, and then they end up settling for anyone they can conscript to do what amounts to larping as the previous scary elite troopers while the bulk of the resources of said empire goes towards the creation of impressive looking but increasingly impractical propaganda weaponry.

By the New Hope, the empire we're seeing has reached the equivalent point of the V-2 rocket program and the King Tiger tanks in WW2. If anything, the fact that the stormtroopers in the OT all appear to be adult men of standard military age and the fact that the planet destroying laser weapon actually functions accurately is the most unrealistic element - but I suppose it wouldn't have been nearly as exciting to watch Han and Luke fighting old men and 15 year olds or to see the Rebellion slowly cause the empire to run out of resources by flying one single one-man space fighter at the Death Star and making it fire off the horribly inaccurate death laser that costs one quadrillion spacebucks per shot.

While the inspirations behind the GCW factions might have firm roots in WW2 and Vietnam, you can't just map them directly on to that conflict. There's no reason that the Empire should have "depleted" it's Stormtrooper Corps as elite forces in the period prior to the original trilogy, since there was no all-encompassing conflict with an equivalent foe during that period; pre-ANH is not "early war WW2". After the Clone Wars, the Empire "used up" large numbers of the remaining clone troopers as the first generation of Stormtroopers breaking the back of Separatist holdhouts and capturing territory in the outer rim, while also replacing the clones with freshly trained, highly indoctrinated non-clones. Most of the conflicts in the period between the Clone Wars and the GCW were either brushfire conflicts with minimal resource investment(occupation of Ryloth for example), or invasions to conquer new territory from opponents who were usually hopelessly outmatched by the Empire's vast warmachine. In fact, the pre-ANH Empire was the perfect breeding ground for maintaining a corps of elite shock troops, since there was plenty of fighting going on to give them actual practical combat experience, but none of it was ever in danger of depleting Imperial forces faster than they could recruit and train replacements. It was only when the Rebellion coalesced into a single cohesive entity and began organised and coordinated resistance on a galactic scale that the Empire began to endure serious losses, heck Solo even shows us that while they did exist in nuCanon it was the Army Infantry who got thrown into the meatgrinder where that was required, with the STs held in reserve(in a rational world, to be used as the shocktroops they were supposed to be) and acting as enforcers to keep the conscripts in line. I could see the argument for low-quality Stormtroopers in a post-GCW era Imperial Remnant - indeed I'm sure I can recall reading in the EU about one Remnant just issuing all their conscripted Army units with ST armour, both because they had more materiel than they did men, and to make themselves look stronger than they actually were - but not during the GCW era based on the established facts of the setting outside of nuCanon fiat.

But in the end, that's the main point - nuCanon doesn't make any of the arguments you're making, it simply asserts that the Empire chose, willingly and willfully, to phase out the Army Infantry and only have Stormtroopers, and in the context of a space fantasy where the baddies are supposed to be intimidating enemies that your heroes must overcome, having the cool scary looking armoured dudes be bumbling conscripts is just dumb; by robbing the Empire of menace, they take away a lot of the meaning of the Rebellion's victory - huzzah, we effortlessly carved our way through hundreds of poor saps taken from their homes and told if they didn't fight us their families would suffer and they'd be executed, we're such heroes!


As for the slightly mysterious release - my money would be on the ISP as well, it seems like the most likely fit given it's coming opposite the Persuader and it could provide a slightly more interesting "mirror" than usual, since the ISP is fast and maneuverable, while the Persuader's big weakness is that it's easy to flank - seppies get more firepower and less maneuverability, republic something nippier that can exploit that but less punch.

Longstrider wrote:
-space snip-
That seems to have been the case with old canon too, from the original movie onwards - going from the film alone, there's no indication that stormtroopers are anything other than line infantry of the Empire, and they're only "effective" when they shoot up a bunch of farmers.

It's correct to say that in the relevant old canon - all three movies of it - only Stormtroopers appeared on-screen. However, that doesn't contradict the EU-established characterisation of the Imperial military that was most Star Wars fans' default for 20 years or so prior to the Disney acquisition. Firstly, because of the context of their appearances in the films: during an operation led by Vader on Tatooine, on the Death Star a top-secret military installation, during the Battle of Hoth again led by Vader and a major offensive, on Bespin once more led by Vader in pursuit of Rebel leadership and a Jedi, and on Endor as part of a trap to end the Rebellion entirely under the command of the Emperor himself.

Those all sound to me like exactly the kind of important events and locations where you'd deploy your best available forces.

As for their efficacy, I recommend the work of the vaguely-sane alternative to Saxon, ECHenry: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P2TA9coGLzM

But to summarise for people who don't care to watch: they devastate the Rebel defenders - ostensibly a dedicated bodyguard unit - of Leia's ship at a level of accuracy and a casualty ratio that would put any military unit IRL to shame, their behaviour on the Death Star actually demonstrates their competence since by the time the heroes - plot armour and all - come into direct and open conflict with Stormtroopers(as opposed to Naval Security goons and a brief ambush), those troopers would necessarily be operating under Vader & Tarkin's orders to allow the Rebels' escape as part of the plot to track the Falcon back to the real Rebel base; in other words, they had to attack the Rebels with sufficient vigor to be believable while not actually killing them or causing any serious injuries, and without preventing them from reaching the hangar again without giving themselves away. Sounds fairly accurate to me. On Hoth we don't actually see the conflict between Blizzard Force's ground troops and the Rebels, but there's no implication it took them an inordinate amount of time to go from someone radioing that Imperial troops had entered the base, to being in the main hangar bay setting up heavy guns to attack the Falcon. On Endor they initially get dunked on by the Ewoks and Rebels, but for all everyone has a good laugh at the idea of teddybears beating the Empire's best, that fight turns around pretty quickly after the initial "Oh s**t cannibal teddies!" moment and the seemingly basic, regular Trooper who pops Leia didn't seem to have any trouble pulling off an aimed shot. Bespin is the only instance where they don't perform particularly well, and that's a couple of brief corner skirmishes against the Heroes who have to escape for plot reasons, so I'm not inclined to count it against them too much.

"Stormtroopers can't aim" is and always has been a meme, driven initially by people who didn't quite grasp the implications of Vader & Tarkin's little back & forth after the Falcon leaves the Death Star, and for a while now just by self-justification - people think it, so it must be true.

Can you take that to a thread in Geek Media please, it is not Legion related (Storm Troopers have precise after all) and certainly not News nor Rumours.


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New A-A5 info, if anyone can translate the German that would be great! What we can note easily is that the A-A5 has shields and comes with a field commander option;

The A-A5 baffles me. Why are they releasing a transport for a game that absolutely does not need or even have a place for it?

Legion is literally a gunline game and vehicles end up being turrets more than anything else, why a transport vehicle that looks like a minivan?

I am a huge legion fan but as I said this baffles me.

Anyone know that since Atomic Mass is doing the new Legion miniatures if they are still going to cost the same because Crisis protocol is very pricey.

So far nothing has changed on the pricing front.

 ingtaer wrote:
So far nothing has changed on the pricing front.

Thank god, That was the only real concern I had as Crisis Protocol miniatures are top notch. I just didn't want Legion to turn into GW pricing.

It is early days yet so how long this will last is anyone's guess but the announced waves for both Legion and X-Wing all retain the pre AMG pricing structure. It will not be until next year that things start to get branded AMG rather than FFG and who knows if the pricing will change then (bar of course the expected rise due to inflation etc.). Fingers crossed that it will still be reasonable enough.

angel of death 007 wrote:
Anyone know that since Atomic Mass is doing the new Legion miniatures if they are still going to cost the same because Crisis protocol is very pricey.

Not defending their pricing cause it can get bad.
But they are priced because a player will only ever need one.
Star wars will inherently be less like that.

Not knocking it, but it needs a pair of wings for that Spaceballs vibe.

 ingtaer wrote:
New A-A5 info, if anyone can translate the German that would be great! What we can note easily is that the A-A5 has shields and comes with a field commander option;

The special rules explained on the instruction sheet are (not sure about the correct rules terms - I haven't looked at the rules in either language in over a year for the most part):

Embark/disembark
Field commander
Shield token
Closed Transport 1
As well as a resurrection ability I've never seen before that adds a model to a unit that lost a model on the same turn, and the restored model starts with wound tokens equal to its health minus one - so effectively with one wound left.

Box contents (same disclaimer as above):

The model itself
A 175mm x 100mm base
1 dodge token
1 command token
1 ready token
1 commander token
3 vehicle damage tokens
4 shield tokens
3 wound tokens
1 unit card

16 upgrade cards:

1x quad laser
2x Gonk droid
1x targeter thingy
2x Outer Rim pilot
2x unstable R5 Astromech
1x comms
1x heavy laser
1x physician
1x reckless driver
1x Shriv Suurgav
2x ace pilot
1x unconventional tactician

Oh new space box, if the price is sane I may need to get some.

 hotsauceman1 wrote:

angel of death 007 wrote:
Anyone know that since Atomic Mass is doing the new Legion miniatures if they are still going to cost the same because Crisis protocol is very pricey.

Not defending their pricing cause it can get bad.
But they are priced because a player will only ever need one.
Star wars will inherently be less like that.

I suspect Asmodee has far more to say about the pricing of both games than AMG or FFG ever have.

Ok
The Specialists have been deplayed in america until march.
At this point i think its a matter of "it will get here when it gets here"

Super Tactical droid confirmed on the painting stream;


Guess we are going to get the full reveals on the 20th when they have announced a "future of Legion" stream.

Hopefully the A5 Speeder truck is a precursor to the Imp transport. Been waiting for it since Rebels, Mandalorian made it a must (especially the upgunned version).

Apparently both losses are built with one kit and the walking version has a cane too.

Yeah you can see the cane in the second image.

Yup, i didnt see it lol

New Wookie

Yoda looks nice as far as wrinkled green fortune cookies go.

Cool Wookiee, too.

Where the heck are these teases coming from?!

Also: I need that speeder truck. Need.

AMG is doing a Ministravaganza all weekend. tonight big releases are expected to be teased for SWL

Midnight GMT, 1700 PT I think it is,
www.twitch.tv/atomicmassgames

So, something interesting, they are going to be releaeing themed waves.
The first one will be Kashyyk Focus

Shriv gets a card with the Truck!

Also a LAAT Transport (not the big gunship that everyone loves) for Pub and Imp.

Disappointed that they didn't show more and that their streaming is so poor, why they left that to the late night for a huge portion of their customers is a mystery.
Apologies for the terrible photos, could not be bothered chasing down better ones.
Truck rules (only 75pts!);





Was announced on stream that the Wookies would have an upgraded card, melee and ranged units and that they are dual GAR/Reb faction;


Super Tactical is going to come with unit cards for multiple variants;


These will have Guardian but only for characters (maybe Operatives and Commander?)


Other things of note, they are looking at leaning heavily into the thematic stuff and it will dictating both release waves and OP. Events mentioned are Vader Down, Hoth and Endor. They are looking at exploring narrative play more and expect to be releasing new ways to play the game (like their event that ended yesterday).
Will see if I can find the rest of the spoiled card images.


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I'd hoped that the LAAT/LE would be dual faction and it is!

Good to hear about the themed releases. Hoth would be a good spot to introduce some more 'environmental variants' of some stuff. I remember having a cross-sections book as a kid that showed AT-ATs having a garage for speeder bikes in them and Scout Troopers wearing heated environmental suits.

LAAT/le article up.

Also, truck article up too!

The LAAT/le looks like a fun modeling project.