Mapping the Future: Some Thoughts on Squad Development

In The Empire Strikes Back, a young Luke Skywalker is famously chastised by Yoda for always looking to the future and hardly ever having his mind focused on the present. Yoda roll over, but, in SWGoH, the wisest course of action you can take is to strike a balance between the two. In this post, I'll discuss how to negotiate between approaches to gameplay, and I'd like to do so because I recently realized that there are a number of members in the same Lvl 70ish bracket as my alt, Qel Whatevs. So, I'll share my approach to not only constructing a viable pre-lvl 85 Arena Squad, but also how to develop other squads you might choose to need for a variety of purposes in the future. It's never really too early to unlock, level, star, gear, and mod these characters.

I. Arena Squad

The first thing you should consider about constructing an Arena Squad is that you'll use it on both Offense and Defense. With the former, you play the battles. With the latter, other players challenge you and the AI takes over. Ideally, you'd like to find a middle ground between Offensive and Defensive capabilities, gathering characters who not only work well together on Offense, but who won't also get decimated and drop 200 rank positions overnight because the AI plays them horribly.

With this in mind, the first step is to pick your Leader. Many characters have Leader Abilities that grant bonuses to the entire squad. Sometimes, these bonuses are faction specific. So, if you'd like to run Darth Vader in the Leader position, it's wise to ask yourself what benefits he gives to the squad as a whole. If he's leading a squad of LS Rebels and Jedi, for instance, his Leader Ability does absolutely nothing.

At this point in the game, you may want to use a character who has a neutral Leader Ability, by which I mean they grant bonuses and benefits to everyone, no matter their faction or alignment. Obi-Wan Kenobi (Old Ben) grants all allies 15% Evasion and 30% Turn Meter whenever they Evade an attack, for instance. On the other hand, Count Dooku grants all allies 15% Evasion and Offense Up for 1 turn whenever they Evade an attack. Look for these kinds of leaders.

As far as leaders go, in fact, there are some old, fairly easy to obtain, and very useful characters you may want to consider. Here are my top three:

1. Luminara: She's the Swiss Army Knife of characters and great to use as a lead, especially if you have other Jedi in your squad.
2. Wedge: Use him as a lead when paired with Biggs (commonly called Wiggs) and you'll get a dynamic 1-2-3 punch whenever Biggs calls for an Assist and there's another Rebel in your squad.
3. Admiral Ackbar: He's downright extra as the leader of a Rebel Squad. In general, he cleanses debuffs, which is very handy.

Now you'll need to pick the rest of your squad. If you haven't already begun to see a pattern emerging, let me clarify. In most cases, Leader abilities are mostly faction specific and work most potently that way. For Wedge to really be effective as a leader, for example, you'll need at least two other Rebels in your squad, which includes Biggs. On the DS of things, Darth Nihilus' Leader Ability helps Sith allies only, which means he's most useful in a squad comprised entirely of Sith.

Which is as much to say that the Leader Ability is potentially synergistic, granting bonuses and benefits to specific kinds of allies. Take advantage of this potential and build your Arena Squad around it. And, again, remember Offense and Defense! When building your squad, try not to group 5 attackers together, for example. On Offense they might be great, but, Defensively, not so much.

And this leads me to the second part of this post:

II. Building Faction Squads

In the beginning of the game, we're introduced to different aspects of it with tutorials. I recall being told that, for Cantina Battles, there are no rules! You can mix and match whatever characters you'd like, in other words. And that's true. But, this kind of "Cantina mindset" can harm a player more than help them in the long run. This is because down the line, later in the game, Faction specific squads are necessary for different purposes. Sometimes, it's to earn Mods at the Mod Challenges table. At other times, though, it's to earn a character who isn't available anywhere in the game except for special events, such as the R2-D2 event currently running. This is one of the reasons why I highly suggest that, if you're under level 85, focus your efforts on Faction squads. Let's outline the Big 3.

1. Rebel (Phoenix)

My alt has been developing a Phoenix squad since day one. They're easy to farm for the beginning player and they work great in the Squad Arena together. My advice is to farm them all, but run the following group: Hera (Leader), Kanan, Ezra, Zeb, and Chopper. Now, I advise this for a number of reasons, but mainly because this squad works great in the Arena and great in Galactic War.

Most importantly, though, this single squad will help you obtain two powerful characters. The Artist of War Event requires a Phoenix squad to obtain Grand Admiral Thrawn, the final tier of which is nearly impossible to beat without using the lineup that I outline above. You'll also need a geared up Rebel squad in the Emperor's Demise Event to obtain Emperor Palpatine. Both these characters carry Empire faction tags, and you'll want them both for your Empire squad.

2. Empire

You'll use your Empire squad for a lot. They aren't a one a trick pony. As we've seen, though, the key to building a great Empire squad is to first build a great Rebel squad. Phoenix characters work excellently together for this purpose. If you include Thrawn and Palpatine (who works great as an Empire Leader, by the way) in your Empire squad, you'll then have three squad positions left to fill. The obvious first choice is Darth Vader. And, I agree. That leaves two positions left to fill. Now the obvious next choice is GM Tarkin. And, I disagree.

While Tarkin is not only great in many aspects of the game, but also necessary in some circumstances, you'll eventually use your Empire squad to obtain R2-D2 in the Daring Droid Event. In the final 7* Tier, your Rebel opponents are immune to Turn Meter reduction effects, which is Tarkin's specialty. Basically, Tarkin's just an ineffectively squishy target on the final tier. I speak from experience! So, I suggest you focus on other useful Empire characters who are relatively easy to obtain, such as Tie Fighter Pilot. You will also do well to include a Tank, such as either Stormtrooper, or Royal Guard to fill out the final two squad positions. It's good to know these details in advance!

3. Rebel (A New Hope)

This squad is basically used for one purpose only, which is to obtain Commander Luke Skywalker. He's easily one of the most powerful characters in the game, if not the most. And yes, you guessed it, to obtain CLS, you'll need an entire 7* squad of Rebels, which includes R2-D2. The other required characters include: Princess Leia, Stormtrooper Han Solo, Obi-Wan Kenobi (Old Ben), and Luke Skywalker (Farmboy). At this point, you'll have two great squads, one LS and one DS. You'll want to level, star, gear, and mod this Rebel squad as quickly and efficiently as you can. The Hero's Journey: Luke Skywalker Event is very rare.

I hope you see the pattern. You need a squad to obtain individual characters who, in turn, help form another squad to obtain a character who, in turn, helps form another squad to obtain a character. Whew! That's a lot of squad development! What's more, this is only the Big 3. There's also First Order and Resistance to consider. For example, you need a full 7* FO squad to obtain BB-8 who, in turn, helps comprise a full 7* Resistance squad to obtain the new Rey (Jedi Training).

Which is as much to say that, if you don't care about obtaining R2 and CLS, both of whom are used regularly in the top tier Squad Arena teams, then you only need to focus your efforts on developing a First Order squad and most of a Resistance squad. Once you have BB-8, you can plug him into your Resistance squad and go earn Rey (Jedi Training). That means, though, that you'll miss out on not only R2 and CLS, but also Thrawn and Palpatine. Or, at least, it will take you much longer to obtain these characters. And they are four very powerful characters. At the end of the day, though, the choice is yours. Your future is your own to map. I hope some of this has helped you do so. And, as always, if you have any questions, feel free to ask!

Pit Raids: Some Notes

Hello everyone. First, I'd like to take this opportunity to point out that, just above this post, you'll find a link to an article on the Zero Damage Rule that we put into effect some time ago. If you're not already familiar with this rule, take note. Repeat offenders will, unfortunately, find themselves removed from the guild. While I don't like doing so, it's pretty imperative that we all follow some very simple rules here and there to improve guild quality of life.

Next, I'd like to post on my main Pit Raid squad with the hope that it will give you some ideas about developing your own. My main Arena squad consists of Leia (Leader), R2, Chirrut, Fulcrum, and Biggs. When I finally get CLS, I'll drop Biggs and insert him into the Leader position. Balanced on offense and defense, this Arena squad does pretty well at the moment. And, even though they put up sizable numbers in Pit Raids, they are not my main Pit Raid squad. For that, I developed a squad built around Turn Meter Reduction (TMR). Let me explain.

A number of characters have attacks that will reduce enemy Turn Meters. In Pit Raids, this is particularly important because, using TMR attacks, you can significantly slow down the Rancor and, in turn, do much more damage. By building a TMR squad to run in the Pit, you're basically building a squad that will delay the inevitable Enrage trigger for as long as possible. What's more, you're also delaying or evading altogether the Rancor's speciality, which is to simply devour one of your characters.

So, my main Pit Raid squad consists of Vader (Leader), Nihilus, Death Trooper, Thrawn, and Tarkin. I've taken screen shots so you can see their level of development. You'll note that Tarkin carries a Favorite Flag, since I've been working on him daily! Also keep in mind that, again, I don't run these characters in the Arena. My Rebels have the Arena Mods! Anyway, here are the five:

1. Darth Vader (Leader)

In the Lead Position, Vader can do some serious damage with his Zeta Leader Ability "Inspiring Through Fear." First, the entire squad gains 30% Offense, but that's not what really is at stake. Note that the squad also, importantly, receives a 50% chance to remove 20% TM when they do damage. What's more, this TMR can't be resisted.

What makes this Zeta ability so deadly, however, is that his DoTs not only stack, but reappear in full after you've attacked with Culling Blade. You know how much damage Vader can do with Culling Blade when an enemy has, say, 3 DoTs on them? Well, try stacking 50+! The longer the encounter, more the more opportunities Vader has to stack DoTs, and this squad is built to make a single encounter as long as possible.

2. Darth Nihilus

Nihilus is in this squad for basically one reason and one reason only. His Special Ability, "Annihilate," does MASSIVE amounts of damage to a Boss. You'll note, though, that the Cooldown is an astronomically high 8 turns. That's why Nihilus works so well with Vader's stacked DoTs and, as we'll see, Tarkin's "Intimidation Tactics," which stacks even more debuffs on the Rancor. Why are debuffs important to Nihilus, you ask? Well, in a nutshell, he has a 100% chance to reduce the cooldown of "Annihilate" against debuffed enemies. In this debuff-heavy squad, Nihilus is a beast.

3. Death Trooper

Speaking of debuffs, Death Trooper's Special Ability, "Terminate," helps soften up the Rancor boss. Debuffs grant this attack a guaranteed Critical Hit and, more to the point, it inflicts Deathmark on the Rancor for 2 turns after you've taken out the gate in Phase 2 and 3. Normally, the Deathmark debuff will cause an enemy target to lose 50% of their Max Heath when hit. With bosses, it's unfortunately reduced to .03%, which seems measly, but it sticks for 2 full turns of attacks. (You can find a fairly comprehensive compendium of buffs and debuffs here.) In the future, I may chose to replace Death Trooper with a character who has a TMR ability--such as Bistan--but for now he's my go-to.

4. Grand Admiral Thrawn

Speaking of TMR, we now have 1/2 characters who significantly slow down the Rancor. Thrawn's Special, "Fracture," not only does decent damage, but it removes 50% Turn Meter. Against the Rancor, this is significant, especially when the entire squad also has a 50% chance for a 20% TMR on any attack when Vader's the Leader. What's useful, too, is how Thrawn can not only grant himself and Tarkin extra protection with his "Grand Admiral's Command" ability, but he can also give Tarkin 100% Turn Meter. That reduces the number of cooldown turns for all of Tarkin's Specials, but it's especially important for "Ultimate Firepower."

5. Grand Moff Tarkin

Yep, that's another 50% TMR guaranteed. The Rancor can't resist it. If you find the right attack cadence between Thrawn and Tarkin, you'll be reducing the Rancor's TM more times than you will care to count! You'll also note that this attack gains Offense equal to double Tarkin's % Potency, which is why the Omega on his Basic Attack is crucial, since it grants +50% Potency (stacking) until the next time Firepower is used. So, not only does Firepower grant TMR, but it also puts a healthy dent in the Rancor's health. At the end of the proverbial day, here's what this DS squad did in the T5 Pit recently:

Not too shabby. And, if I recall correctly, Tarkin's numbers are low because he unfortunately got devoured just before this squad finished Phase 3 and moved on to Phase 4. Had the RNG been a bit different and I lost, say, Deathtrooper (whose Deathmark doesn't work in Phase 4) instead of Tarkin, this whole squad would have done much, much more damage. 

So, there you have it! I hope that sharing the deets on this Pit Raid squad will give you ideas for your own. In fact, now that I've written all this out, I'm seriously considering the replacement of Death Trooper with another TMR character. Old Ben comes to mind. And, as I mentioned, Bistan too. Good hunting, everyone! 

Foresight: CLS, Rey, and What's Next

Hi all! This most recent Rey (Jedi Training) installment of the Hero's Journey event has had me thinking quite a bit about what the next Hero's Journey might entail. My thinking on this subject is various and, frankly, all speculation, no matter how deductive I might make it sound! However, something someone said in the forums about the new Rey event struck a chord with me. Namely, they said that they'd been prepping for the event since before the dynamic duo of Smuggler Han and Chewie was released. That's some serious foresight. So, I thought to share a few thoughts. As you'll see, we'll need to pull together as a guild to pull off the next Hero's Journey event, if indeed my speculations are even remotely accurate.

First things first. Most of us know that Commander Luke Skywalker (CLS) is arguably the most powerful character in the game, even after the new Nightsister releases. Practically every top tier Arena Squad uses him, for example, and he's perfectly capable of dominating in both Pit Raids and AATs. What's fantastic about CLS, though, is that he's obtainable by the average player. That is, if they've got the required event characters leveled up: Farmboy Luke, Old Ben, Princess Leia, ST Han, and R2D2. Obviously, R2 requires having a nasty Empire squad to acquire, but the other characters are easily farmable and have been around since the beginning of the game.

Now, it's my speculation that the next Hero's Journey is going to require CLS. In fact, I think it's going to be the next installment of Luke's cinematic journey. Keep in mind, I could be very wrong, but it makes a lot of sense that the next Hero's Journey character will be Jedi Knight Luke from Return of the Jedi. Here are the two major reasons why I think this is probably the case.


1. A Commitment to Powering Up Factions

Of the recent RJT release, the devs said that they designed her with a Resistance squad in mind, specifically that she would replace Zeta Finn in the Leader slot. In other words, while you can plug-n-play RJT with your current Arena Squad, she's really most effective in her faction specific squad. It's the synergies that devs love, to which the Phoenix characters attest, for instance, and I'm guesstimating that the next faction that will receive a new OP character with serious offensive skills is the one that needs it the most: Jedi. Rather than breaking the Arena, JKL would promote the diversification of its current homogeneity, just as, I believe, RJT is designed to do. She isn't another CLS. And, more importantly, players have repeatedly screamed into the void for a Jedi rework, myself included. A JKL lead would stand to make Jedi not only relevantly potent in the Arena, but also in AATs and, especially, Pit Raids. I mean, it stands to reason that a Zeta JKL would be able to solo an entire Pit Raid by himself, right!?

2. Franchise Faces

So, the future is in squad synergies. Phoenix fell short in this regard, but at least the devs later added Zeta abilities to sorta kinda make up for their shortcomings. Be that as it may, the second reason I think JKL will ultimately appear is that Luke and Rey are ultimately our protagonists. They're the main heroes. They're the leading faces of the Star Wars franchise and, while the idea of a Dark Side Villain's Journey is interesting, the logic of following through with already established character arcs makes much more sense. First, Farmboy Luke becomes CLS. Then, Scavenger Rey becomes Rey in Jedi Training. Then, CLS becomes Jedi Knight Luke. Then, another Rey event. And so forth, until their respective journeys are complete.

Okay, so, there's obviously more to my rationale, but the above cuts to the core of it. Now for the bad news.

If I'm right, then it stands to reason that, for a JKL Hero's Journey event, characters from The Empire Strikes Back will be required. One of the other, minor reasons I think JKL will eventually happen is because the devs very slyly released three new characters from The Empire Strikes Back with the relatively new Territory Battles: Hermit Yoda, Rebel Officer Leia Organa, and Commander Han Solo. Before these three were released, LS Empire Strikes Back toons were few and far between. Lando and Lobot are the most obvious. Oh, and that damned Ugnaught. I just recently rewatched Empire and, while Lando and Lobot are key to the narrative, Lando has only one line of dialogue with Luke at the very end of the film. Considering that this Hero's Journey event would center upon Luke, then my guess is that, in addition to CLS and R2D2, HYoda, ROLO, and CHS would be required. Yikes!

With requirements like this, JKL should prove to be the most potent character released into the SWGoH universe. It will also keep JKL out of the reach of everyday players. Unless, of course, we have a little foresight and start putting together our squads now. To recap, I speculate that we'll need CLS, R2, HYoda, ROLO, and CHS all 7*. As I mentioned earlier, if you've got a 7* R2, then CLS is potentially obtainable with easily farmable characters. That's 2/5.

As for CHS, he is fairly easy to farm for more experienced players on Neutral Node 7-D, Boss Lvl 80. So that's 3/5. HYoda is only available in the Guild Events Store, which requires massive amounts of Guild Event Tokens. He unlocks at 145, so 4/5 is a grind. But, ROLO presents the real problem.

Her shards are only available in the Phase 3 Special Mission of the LS TB, which requires 5* CHS and Hoth Rebel Soldier to participate. And here's the real rub: When you finish the Final Tier of this Special Mission, you earn a whopping 1 ROLO shard for everyone in the guild. 1. Yep, I'll say that again. 1. The loneliest goddamned number. So, if indeed these characters will be required for a JKL event, we'll need to help one another earn ROLO shards. There's no other way to do it. And if we don't start working on this soon, together, we stand to miss out on a character that will potentially outshine both CLS and the new Rey, while, at the same time, making all those Jedi characters collecting dust in your inventory suddenly killer.

So, after consulting with Admiral Fishy McFishface, who is an expert on TRAPS, I've developed the following plan of attack:

I. Upper Level Members

1. Collect HYoda shards.
2. Farm both CHS and HRS to 5*. Earn ROLO shards in LS TBs like a boss.
3. If you don't already have CLS, like me, then prep your required squad asap, too. The next event is right around the corner!



II. Lower Level Members

1. Develop your Empire squad to earn R2 at 7*, who you'll need to earn CLS.
2. Grind away to eventually unlock, level up, and use both CHS and HRS to earn ROLO shards.
3. Once you have R2, switch your focus away from Empire (they're already awesome) and continue to develop the required Rebel squad to earn CLS.
4. Balance collecting HYoda shards with spending on necessary gear.

The more of us who do all of this, the better off we all are, even if JKL turns out to be just a mirage of logic and never actually happens. But I think it will. And I want all of us to be prepped and ready to kick some ass. That's always better than panic farming in the eleventh hour, right?

I'd like to hear from you. What do you think about all of this? I'd especially like to hear from the less experienced members of our guild. Do you need advice on building your Empire squad to earn R2, on the specific requirements of the CLS event, or how best grind your way to earning CHS shards? Let me know, I'm your Guild Leader. I'm here to help. Send an email, drop me a line in the comments section, or join LINE and we can talk.

Until then, good hunting.

Rey's Hero's Journey

Well, the official Rey event date is 12/15 (surprise surprise) and the devs have kindly posted the requirements on the forums here. If you haven't been panic farming smuggler Solo and Chewbacca since their release, as well as buying their packs, then you're not going to unlock the new Rey. You'll not only need Scavenger Rey and these two rare smugglers for the event, but also BB8. His "Pieces and Plans" event runs from 12/8 to 12/16, thankfully. As far as I know, a kit for the new Rey has yet to be released, but I'm guessing she's a meta killer.


Update 12/7: The Rey (Jedi Training) Kit has been released! You can check it out here. She's a Tank, just like that other new toon, what's his name? Oh yeah, Kylo Ren (Unmasked). Unlike the new Kylo, though, Rey brings to the game the only unpreventable and undispellable Healing Immunity debuff, which looks like her greatest strength. And, in case you're wondering, she doesn't carry a Jedi faction tag, so she's of no real use to Jedi squads. Btw, isn't there a word for somebody who is training to be a Jedi? Padawan, isn't it?

Pit Raid Update

Hello all! As you know, we've run T6 Pit Raids for quite some time now, and I'm sure the rewards have been terrific. We plan, however, to try something different. Starting Monday 12/4 at noon, we will run T5 Pit Raids for two full weeks! That means some of the lower level members should get their 5*+ squads together!

It also means that we need to step up our production of Raid Tickets so that we can run a lot more Pit Raids! If you're unfamiliar with how to produce Raid Tickets, we've two blog posts, one of which was written by our TB Platoon Leader, Ryer. You can read Part 1 here, and Part 2 here. Part 2, by the way, shows you how to hit 600/600 in roughly 5 minutes!

Running T5 Pit Raids also means that the Zero Damage Rule (ZDR) is going to be very important, given that a number of the more seasoned guild members can fundamentally beat the Raid by themselves. So, if you're not familiar with the ZDR, I've posted about it here. Please read this post! I can't stress how important it is to follow this rule. You can also find links in the sidebar to a handy video that tells the how and why guilds use the ZDR.

Good hunting!