Wave 7 Villain Pack – The Grand Inquisitor
The Grand Inquisitor painted and photographed by Matthew of www.oldenhammer.com
Campaign
Keeping in line with making figures costed a bit less, The Grand Inquisitor costs you only 9 Deployment Points. For that, you get 16 Health on a white die. He doesn’t have a way to recover damage, but Defensive gives him a bonus Block if you roll no Block on your white die. This helps him get a bit more sturdy and should keep him alive for a bit. Though, with the crazy amounts of damage flying around in late campaigns, don’t expect him to last long unless you are lucky with your dodges.
His other stats are quite decent. He attacks in melee with his lightsaber rolling red-green-yellow and can back it up with Surge Abilities for +1 Damage, Pierce 3 and most importantly Cleave 3! With his Speed of 5 you should be able to get in range fairly easily. But just on the off chance you can’t, the special action Lightsaber Throw gives him a ranged attack with red and yellow dice, as well as 3 bonus Accuracy. Remember that you can spend surges on this attack too, so you can theoretically hit someone with 3-4 damage and then Cleave 3 on any other target in line of sight and within your rolled range! This can help get around high defenses of Gaarkhan or Biv. And as if that wasn’t enough, he also has Deadly: With the expense of 1 Surge, you can negate a dodge for the defender! And since it is a surge ability, you don’t have to decide until all dice are fully rerolled. That’s amazing against heroes like Diala and also very thematic since he likes to prey on the weak in the Rebels TV show as well.
Looking at the included Agenda Set, it is especially noteworthy that Targeted By The Empire gives you a way to bring him into play without having to win his side mission! This was likely included because investing 3 influence into the chance of later bringing a pretty expensive villain into play is an option most players just haven’t taken. But also When They Least Expect It is worth a look. Deploying a Hunter figure and getting it to move to safety while also getting focused is almost a bargain for 1 Influence.
To recruit The Grand Inquisitor for your campaign, you need to win the side mission Cornered, which is included in this pack. This side mission requires only tiles from the core box! Alternatively, you can also bring him into play via his agenda card Targeted By The Empire.
The pack also comes with a tier 3 weapon to be included in your rebel upgrade deck. The Electrostaff isn’t cheap at 1250 credits, but gives a 3 dice attack, and you can switch it from having Reach or Cleave on the fly. For melee focused heroes that aren’t keen on wielding Lightsabers, this might be a good weapon for the last few missions of a campaign!
The Grand Inquisitor appears in the following campaign missions:
Skirmish
The Grand Inquisitor certainly has many ways in which you can use him. In addition to the options given just above in the Campaign section, he also benefits from the Hunter trait. Especially with Jabba’s Realm right around the corner, this trait might see quite a revival. Of course, he also is especially good against trooper lists with his amazing ability to cleave like crazy. And since he also has the Force User trait, he has access to cards like Deflection, Force Lightning and Lure of the Dark Side. It is still too early to rely on Force User cards to come up though, but when the empire gets more of them, the Inquisitor is only going to even better.
Looking at the other command cards in his pack, there is Deadly Precision. Right now, this card doesn’t do a whole lot, because the Inquisitor himself doesn’t need it that urgently. The only other figure that can use it right now is Darth Vader, but building lists with him can backfire really quick, as you tie up a lot of points into him. Force Rush is a must include into all lists that feature Davith Elso from the Bespin Gambit expansion. But also in lists focusing on Luke, Obi-Wan and maybe Diala (though she is falling from grace right now), this card can work wonders. Finally, there is Hunt them Down. This is the bane of trooper lists. 2 Cleave with a potential 3 Cleave on top of it, and +2 Damage towards a red-yellow ranged attack with Range 3? What’s not to like about it? Even if you are not facing troopers, this can give you 5 cleave onto a target with high defenses, like the soon-to-be released Rancor!
However, the real game-changer in this pack is Advanced Com Systems. For 1 Deployment Point, you can extend the Range of any ability that targets friendly units to 3 spaces. This is a major buff to General Sorin, Kayn Somos and others. The meta certainly needs to adjust to lists where Kayn gives 2 Elite Stormtroopers additional attacks. Both Sorin and Kayn still suffer from a lack of health, but they aren’t completely useless anymore and can actually turn the tide pretty well with this Skirmish Attachment.
The included skirmish map Kashyyyk Station only uses tiles from the core box.
Model
It is … okay. The pose is neat, the double bladed Lightsaber looks good, but there just is something missing. He seems to take a bow more than actually force throwing someone with that stance. And he isn’t as weirdly slender as in the TV show. Numbers wise, this is another kick-ass release. The model, though, just lacks some power.