Leebo list // Corran list // VASSAL file

Today’s puzzle is pretty straightforward and comes from my game night last Thursday where I was trying out Leebo-Luke. My opponent on the other hand had a cool Daredevil Corran/ARC Norra/Wedge list and a moment came up in the game which I thought would make a good ‘easy puzzle’ since it doesn’t involve many elements. Everything is about to explode here (except Leebo who was very tanky this match). The puzzle begins in the ACTIVATION PHASE. The Corran player has initiative. Leebo turned in to block the Tallon Roll and punish a 4-K. Norra heads forward and barrels in hoping to hopefully get arc on Luke. Corran comes in hoping to get a shot on Luke. Luke activates but can’t use Supernatural Reflexes since he is stressed. Luke must now decide on his action! Wedge has yet to activate. The puzzle for today asks: How should Luke spend his action? His S-foils are open and he has 1 force charge! For the benefit of discussion I will simply say: Yes, Corran has arc on Luke, Luke has arc on Corran, and Norra has arc on Luke!

Best replies on Reddit, the Forums, and the Blog will be posted below.

Solution to last puzzle: Force Fam

Solution

FFG Forum user nexttwelveexits hit the nail on the head with his solution:

If you stay put you are guaranteed to take two shots and chances of surviving that are near zero. You either lock Corran and attempt to take him with you, or roll in front of him and hope you take him out.

Corran looks to be unmodded, while Luke will have a pair of Focus tokens [editorial note: Force tokens] to spend on attack and defense. Luke has reasonable odds of surviving the shot, though whether he’ll kill Corran with the 4v3 return shot is also questionable.

Personally, given the state of the game, I’d lock Corran.

My reasoning: Leebo is tanky, Wedge and Corran are both vulnerable, and Norra is wounded. Norra and Corran are both tokenless, and a hypothetical Wedge shot at Luke would also be unmodded, while Leebo and Luke both have mods to work with. The board state favors being aggressive.

If Luke survives Corran’s shot with his two Force charges, he basically forces Norra to also shoot at him, preventing a shot at Leebo. Luke is unlikely to survive a second attack, but with (presumably) at least one if not two Force tokens to spend on the attack, along with a target lock, on four red dice vs three unmodified greens, his chances of killing Corran (or leaving him with only 1 hull) are excellent. Further, if he can manage to survive Corran’s shot, he will force Norra to use her shot to kill him, although her unmodified rear shot into Threepio + Calculate Leebo is probably not expecting much damage anyway.

So by locking, Luke has an excellent chance at eliminating Corran, while Leebo has an excellent chance of killing Wedge, even if the attack is only at Range 1. Assuming Wedge, Corran, and Luke are all destroyed, with Wedge’s unmodified 4v1 shot doing anywhere from 0 to 3 damage, you’re talking about Leebo vs Norra 1v1, with Leebo in a much better position for that fight than Norra is.

Of course, dice variance could change all that. But I think basically the choice is between locking or barrel rolling, and barrel rolling does not guarantee Luke’s survival.

Lastly, and this really sealed the decision for me: Corran has bullseye on Leebo. Leebo probably isn’t worried too much about 3 naked red dice, but he’s already definitely taking punishment from Wedge plus a possible pot shot from Norra, so removing Corran from the board before he gets another pot shot off on Leebo puts us in a strong position for the end game.

At this point, I looked up the numbers:

Corran’s (or Norra’s) 4 naked reds vs Luke’s 2 green with 2 force tokens: 0.926 expected hits. So the odds of Luke surviving two shots are low, BUT the only way to avoid a second shot is to barrel roll in front of Corran AND kill him with your shot.

Luke’s 4 reds with 1 force token at Corran’s 3 naked greens: 1.613 expected hits. He is more likely to kill Corran than to not kill Corran, but it isn’t by much. Choosing this (the barrel roll) path means relying a bit on the RNG gods, as Luke’s chances of surviving are not improved unless Corran is eliminated, which is far from guaranteed.

Luke’s 4 reds with 1 force token AND lock at Corran’s 3 naked greens: 2.345 expected hits. (1.908 if Luke is without Force tokens, although this also means that he survived all incoming fire and you’ve pretty much already won the game.) This is a significant increase in the odds of killing Corran and, I think, the likeliest path to victory.