Snoke/Watto/FOST is public enemy #1 and many feel the deck is a bit too consistent. Regardless of whether you think its too good or beatable its inarguable to that you have to plan on when facing it when heading to an event. Thankfully attacking metagames is one of my strengths and doing a thorough search of all cards that could destroy a top deck is something I enjoy. Finding the right characters or card that will work towards a cohesive plan is paramount and you have to keep in mind that you have to have deck that is doing something powerful and consistent on top of being a metagame deck. Today I wanted to talk about particular cards that I think are in a good place to attack the big boogeyman. There’s a good chance that Snoke and friends will get nerfed but I don’t have the luxury of waiting. These cards are on the forefront of my mind when making decks in this format and I hope these will spark some creativity on your part. I want to categorize these cards into certain categories, there are a few general ways to combat this high resource support deck. They are:

Resource Disruption Discard Supports from Hand Discard Supports from Play Focus Denial, Die Removal or Manipulation Punishing 3 Wide Strategies with AOE.

These all have strength and weaknesses and I’ll be grouping them in the above categories.

Resource Disruption

This method will slow down the playing of big supports or if you are lucky completely lock your opponent out of playing them. Its strength is that disrupts are pretty impactful in the first two rounds and in the first couple of turns of the round. By round three this method won’t be impactful unless you have previously been successful in chocking their resources. Doing this takes effort and your damage will usually suffer as a result. Here are a few of the cards that I have highlighted that are part of this strategy.

Unfortunately there aren’t a ton of great ways to disrupt your opponent’s resources. Generally having all of your resources get destroyed is a Negative Play Experience and design has only provided us a few tools to do so but these cards either disrupt for 2 or destroy a resource while giving is a benefit. In Nute’s case he would probably be better served in a mill shell but since that doesn’t directly effect your opponents ability to play big resource cards I have placed him here. Tobias lets us play his rifle and when packaged with Profitable Connections that can be a powerful first turn play. His special like Val’s can take resources and give us an additional benefit. Val is probably a bit over costed but she is on plan to take resources and deal damage.

Discard Supports from Hand

Generally speaking I am not the biggest fan of this method. A savy opponent will keep multiple threats in hand making discard a poor choice. Still, your opponent does need to have multiple threats in round 1 and in round 2 they are at the mercy of their deck and the previous round’s draw. I find this strategy to be best in a mill strategy.

There are other options for cards that discard cards but these are the ones I like best. Scruffy is targeted discard and if your deck can afford to spend a resource in round one you might be able to get ’em- it could also be wiser to wait until round 2 if they kept a hand full of cards. Both Leia and Wullf have two discard sides which makes blowouts more likely. In the later round Wullf’s ability can nab more supports. Wullf and Leia are at their best in a mill deck while Tarkin plays best in an aggressive deck. Tarkin requires a bit more reasoning when deciding on when to use the discard since it can backfire and then the damage plan suffers.

Discard Supports from Play

Discarding supports from play can be incredibly backbreaking if you have paid a lower rate for destruction compared to your opponents investment. Entourage is probably the worst card to destroy because all of the rates for its destruction are either even or poor. Once we get to Megablaster Trooper and Vader’s Fist that’s when things get profitable. The downside to destroying supports is that it’s time sensitive in order to be successful. If your opponent already used the support once you’re not getting as much value as you wanted. In addition to the time sensative nature of destroying supports the ability to destroy big supports comes at a high cost.

Sebulba doesn’t directly destroy supports but he is the character that makes Sebulba Always Wins playable. Sebulba’s rate isn’t awful and with the metagame in the place that it is there could be a place for our podracing villain. Vandalize is a classic option and I see it being great for decks that start with 5 dice or are packing megablaster troopers and leaders. Convergence is for those brave enough to play Gungans as its the only viable deck that can run 4 characters of the same subtype – this still doesn’t deal with Vader’s fist but dealing with 2/3rds of the support trinity is something to at least note. Dismantle is an even trade of resources for support and I’m personally not a fan although it could be fine in the mirror match if you manage to get ahead.

Focus Denial, Die Removal or Manipulation

Die Removal would usually be a great way to handle Snoke’s Power Action but Watto’s ability protects his dice(thanks Lukas). His ability only protects his dice from events so there are some options although they are limited.

In many situations Watto or FOST will not naturally roll resources but will rely on Snoke’s focus to get there – in these situations these are two cards in particular that handle focus. They also can be impactful later in the game when Snoke wants to focus its supports to their best sides. Strategic Planning is playable if you are playing supports yourself but it can be used on your opponents which makes it a weird die removal option – this is obviously backbreaking against Megablaster Trooper while being on curve vs Entourage and Vader’s Fist.

Suppressive Fire is a great choice for early game die removal that can actually hit Watto’s die. It is a real cost in round 1 but can be worth it if it stifles the rest of their development. The best defense does not work on Watto but it can be a great tempo play if timed after a double focus. Few opponents will walk right into it but it can create a strong enough tempo play that can swing a game in your favor. Grappling Boa and Enfy’s Electrpripper can remove character dice while still being reasonable offensive cards. Asajj has the same upside of being able to remove dice but you have to play enough downgrades to make her ability worth it.

These cards can manipulate dice without removing them. They are more soft removal that excel when your opponents roll average to below average. Many of these effects can be undone by your opponents reroll option but these can then be followed up with a random discard which can be back breaking. These kind of effects punish focus but there timing can be awkward at times. The most intriguing of these options are Sly Moore and Force Focus. Sly Moore is a card most have overlooked but her price could be good enough as a support character. Her special is both a soft removal and a random discard – one of those ways could lead to the ramp denial plan. Force Focus has been quite good in Palpatine decks as it automatically can lead to a Force Storm or Force Wave special – it might be worth a look in other blue decks.

Punishing 3 Wide Strategies with Area of Effect

Area of Effect is a term that refers to all characters but here I’ll be using it to refer only your opponents characters. There are a variety of cards that are above curve if your opponent is playing 3 or more characters. This a good way to keep up with the support damage although it doesn’t direct effect their ability to out damage you. This is a good tool when forming your strategy but you’ll need to add additional elements that are disruptive.

Where have all the Vader’s gone? I suspect with the nerf to Theed and the rotation of certain cards like Force Illusion and Price of Failure he has taken a hit. Fear and Dead Men remain and along with cards like Force Wave Vader could see a resurgence. People have been trying to make Boush work but without the Salvage Stand and Back-Up Muscle her ability is a bigger commitment. Force Wave and Sonic Detonator are both cards that Yoda can proudly wear and I wouldn’t be surprised if we saw more of that with perhaps old man Luke, Boush or Mace? Detonator also has a 2 disrupt and a 2 discard side which can be relavent in the ramp match up. Defoliator is a card that seems crazy to consider since its a 4 cost support not named Megablaster Troopers but if its spam-able it might be worth looking at some weird line-up with Grievous, Armored Reinforcements and a bunch of droids.

Oddball Cards

Jar Jar kind of falls into the messing with opponents dice without removing them classification but your opponent can always make you activate as your first action. It is however a Gungan which lets you consider Convergence. He can also come with both dice for the low price of 9 which makes Vandalize a little more desirable. He has both disrupts and discard that can be impactful in round 1. Is this this perhaps the era of Jar Jar domination? Probably not but wouldn’t that be something? Mind Extraction shuts off Snoke’s Power Action but they can exhaust Snoke to remove it. This is pretty good if your opponent rolled badly in the first round and they had to roll in Snoke before using the power action. This scenario would cancel his power action in that round AND force a Snoke exhaust in the following round or forgo the Power Action – this is the best case scenario. It also has unreal blowout potential vs Palpatine in certain spots. The scenarios where its truly backbreaking rely on your opponent rolling badly so its not my favorite option but it could be part of a plan that forces your opponent to roll in Snoke before they can PA.

I hope you enjoyed this exploration of cards to consider in the metagame. Please let me know if you think I’ve missed anything. I went pretty deep and if I missed some something there is probably a good chance that I didn’t think it was good enough. When things feel the most bleak its important to dig deep and see if you can prove everyone else wrong. if you fail at least you can say you pushed it to the limit.

Take care and as always…

-NJCuenca

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