Wave 1 Ally Pack – Han Solo
Han Solo, painted and photographed by Matthew of www.oldenhammer.com
Campaign
Han is one of the Wave 1 figures being featured directly in a campaign story mission. The mission to earn him as an ally “Sorry about the Mess” is included in the core set of Imperial Assault. The new card you get with this pack is a reward card called Quickdraw Holster. The mission you have to win to earn it is called Imperial Entanglements. Even though the card must be depleted and is thus only usable once per mission, it does scale very good with the weapon upgrades the rebels are going to buy throughout the campaign. It essentially is an additional attack for 1 Strain. And because it stays viable the whole campaign, the pack is very well worth it for the campaign.
To recruit Han as an Ally for your campaign, you need to win the Side Mission, Sorry About the Mess. Since this mission is included in the core box, you don’t need any additional expansions.
Han Solo appears in the following campaign missions:
- Core Box Story Mission: Fly Solo
- Core Box Side Mission: Sorry About the Mess
- Wave 1 Pack Han Solo Side Mission: Imperial Entanglements
- Twin Shadows Side Mission: Hunted Down
Skirmish
He is not bad in Skirmish, he is just overpriced. A quick look at his Deployment Card shows that his highlights are:
- A blue-green-green attack with good surge abilities.
- Distracting, which gives evades to adjacent defending friendly figures.
- Return Fire, which allows him an additional attack if the attacker didn’t deal any damage.
The problem is that you pay 12 Deployment Points for all of this, while he only has 12 Health and a white defense die. Also, you want to pair him with other models that have a high base range to benefit from Distracting without having to shuffle around a lot. This does make him hard to play, even if his abilities seem to be worth his cost.
However, there is a good reason to buy this pack for the Command Cards. The one standing out of course is Inspiring Speech usable by any figure with the Leader trait. It can be of use in lists playing with either Gideon on the rebel side or Imperial Officers on the imperial side. And if you do decide to use Han in your army, his signature card I Make My Own Luck basically works like a better version of Take Initiative in that you don’t need to exhaust a figure, but only need to play with Han first.
With the recent resurgence of the Spy trait on both deployment and command cards, you should also take a look at Slippery Target and Disable. Both are not stellar, but might fit in your deck depending on what exactly your plan is.
Update: The box expansion Heart of the Empire adds something very interesting. Rogue Smuggler is an attachment that can only be played on Han. It fixes a few gripes players had with Han. Lowering his Deployment Cost from 12 to 10 is a start. 10 is right where unique figures seem to settle nowadays. However, they also need to carry their weight. Han can do this now by getting Return Fire, even if he suffered damage. It also enables Han to make yet an additional attack at the end of the round. Positioning is key here, as you can’t shoot what you can’t see. But overall, the attachment made Han more than playable in Skirmish. For right now, he seems to be one of the most played figures in Rebel lists. Go get Heart of the Empire!
The included skirmish map Correlian Underground uses only tiles from the core box.
Model
Han strikes his signature pose and his leather vest swings dynamically. He is one of the cooler models both to look at and to paint. So if you want something to show off, he certainly is good for that.