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Talon Karrde Set: Bounty Hunters #14/60 Date Reviewed: November 02, 2006 Image from Wizards.com Ratings:  Ratings are based on a 1 to 5 scale 1 being the worst. 3 ... average. 5 is the highest rating. 100 pt: 2.16 200 pt: 4.5

 

Sith Dragon	Talon Karrde New Republic Cost:24 HP: 60 DEF: 16 ATK: +8 DAM: 10 Disruptive; Fringe Reserves 20; Recon; Twin attack Today, straight form the WWE, the World Heavyweight Champion - Talon Karrde! Okay, maybe not, although he looks the part. His sculpt is good, but its just not what i pictured in Talon. Anyway, on to the stats. For 24pts you get 60 HP, which is about par, especially for the NR. 16 Def is also about par for a non-Jedi in that range, as is the +8 attack. The 10 DAM is horrid, but that usually means the character is going to have some nice effects. Well, lets see. He has twin attack, which is nice for a fig that you really don't want stuck to the ground because of the other abilities. Recon is a nice plus for the New Republic. They finally get some initiative control. Fringe reserves is one of those things you should never plan for, but man oh man if you roll that 11 its huge, usually for a couple bodyguards. Add that to the fact that you are rolling two die for recon, and your chances just increased for those extra troops. Finally we get disruptive. This is a great new effect from the BH set. It cancels CEs on enemies within 6 of the Disruptive character. It cancels reroll, bonuses, Thrawn's switch, and others. The one catch is that Talon is a bit fragile to stick his neck out. IF you are not careful, with only a 20 DEF in cover and 60 HP, he can be picked off rather quickly. 100pts: Nope. This is the home of the beat sticks. 150pt: Meh. Here the New Republic just is not a strong enough faction here. They need every point they can get to flush out their team. 200pts: Here the New Republic is better but still not a top faction, but Talon works here if you can run him correctly. You need to keep him hidden until your beat sticks (Corran, Luke, your entire faction) are engaged with the enemy. Once they are engaged, then you bring him out for the Recon and up closer for the disruptive if you need it. He doesn't become such an easy choice to target when you are staring down Jacen and Jaina's lightsabers and Han's blaster. You generally have to go after who is going to kill you with 30-40 pt hits. Thus, Talon will live longer and be more beneficial. Depending on the type of squad you are running, he is a very good add for a NR team. For only getting 4 figs over the last two sets, NR has gotten some very good additions. "Dude, the fat guy totally just blew up!" -Pink 5
Ten-Eyed Man	Talon Karrde has singlehandedly made me a New Republic player. Oh, I'd dabbled here and there; I was one of the legion of players who tried unsuccessfully to make Jedi Master Luke work worth a damn; I thought about playing the Solo Family when Champions came out, but I saw the squad in action enough times to not be impressed. When I found out that the New Republic would have only one piece in Bounty Hunters, I figured that was one more set that would go by without my having a real reason to play the faction, and then I (forgive me) got Karrded. You see, back in the olden days, when there were only four factions that counted and dinosaurs ruled the earth, you either had access to Recon or you had access to Reserves. Put another way, you could either get some control over your initiative rolls or you could get special results on specific init results, which made some sense in a "mean ol' game designers!" sort of way. Now they've added Fringe versions of both abilities, so any faction can theoretically put those abilities together, but only Talon Karrde has both abilities on one (fairly inexpensive) piece. I love it already. Since Recon requires line of sight to operate, the pieces that have it get shot a lot, especially by enemy pieces with Accurate Shot (since you're obviously keeping your little recon guy as far as possible from the action). The Rodian Black Sun Vigo could theoretically protect a Recon piece from this terrible fate, except that every Recon piece thus far in the game has been either a Droid or a commander, meaning the Vigo can't help. Every Recon piece but Talon. Furthermore, since the Vigo shares Talon's Fringe Reserves 20, they work well together, making each '11' you roll into two batches of 20 more points added to your army. In a recent 200-point tournament against a Thrawn squad, my opponent found himself up against 320 points by the end of the game. I'm still loving it. There are a number of very powerful squads in circulation right now that depend on Commander Effects to work. Among these are either form of super-stealth, some Exar Kun builds, and the terrors of Grand Admiral Thrawn. Talon is one of two guys in the game with Disruptive, radiating a constant field of "Don't listen to your superior officer." I think he just yells a lot. While Disruptive is very cool and potentially really powerful, remember that putting little Talon within six squares of an enemy piece is fairly dangerous. Have a plan that involves killing that enemy pretty soon. I continue to love this piece. Finally, just to remind us what set he's from, Talon has Twin Attack. I'm less clear on why this is, but I'm not unhappy about it. A piece that needs to maintain line of sight to the enemy to work his best should also be able to attack twice when he moves. Obviously you have a decision to make if you're moving him to keep Recon going and you can only see one guy with 20 hit points or fewer: do I attack and possibly kill him, knowing that I won't get Recon next round? This is a situational decision, and I can't help you with it. Anyway, Talon Karrde is high on my list of favorite pieces in the new set. You must build around him to get the real benefit, but he's just insanely good, in my humble little opinion (which can't be that humble if I broadcast it to all of you, week after week). Overall rating in 100: 2 (you can't really support him here and still have the pieces to fight the top squads) Overall rating in 200: 4.5 (if you need further explanation, reread the above)
wookie lover 11	Talon Karrde BH#14 New Republic Cost=24 HP=60 Defense=16 Attack=+8 Damage=10 Abilities: Disruptive (No CE’s within 6), Fringe Reserves 20, Recon (roll 2 for init, one if you have 2 recons and both have LOS to enemy(I think I got it right)), Twin Attack, Unique A nice package. If you roll 11 for init, he is 4 points, and you can roll it multiple times. Recon is okay, I find it useful, but Thrawn makes it less useful. Twin Attack is good, nuff said. 10 damage sucks, especially with +8 attack, but that’s not why you play him. Disruptive is an awesome ability. Thrawns switch and +3, +3 goes bye as long as Talon is there. General Windu’s abilities goes bye. Exar Kun’s savage’s suck again. The possibilities are limitless. The one thing is that I think that he should be Fringe, but that would make him almost to good. With Windu, Thrawn would be kicked out of play. One thing I want to note is that they don’t take effect within 6 squares, everywhere else, they still work, so with mas, talon makes a safe zone. Still, he is pretty weak, with only 60HP and 16 defense, so a med might be nice. The ratings are… 100=2, ¼ of your squad for a anti commander guy where there are no commanders seen. Maybe with Master Skywalker, but still 200=4.5, I think that most competitive NR squads will have this guy to make up for their small number of minis. Without CE’s the NR is actually very playable. Wookielover 11 going
Chaoz Films	Today we review the piece for one of the most interesting characters in the Star Wars Universe, Talon Karrde. He's a smuggler and roughly the equivalent to Jabba the Hutt. His wealth of knowledge also served the New Republic as an almost equal counter to Grand Admiral Thrawn. He's not a vicious slob like Jabba either. He's got some class. Think of him as a combination of Han Solo, Lando Calrissian, and Grand Admiral Thrawn (smarts-wise). Anyway, on to the review: Talon Karrde Cost: 24 HP: 60 Def: 16 Attk: +8 Dam: 10 Special Abilities Disruptive Fringe Reserves 20 Recon Twin Attack Unique I actually really like this guy for his cost. His stats are mediocre at best. His 16 Def and 60 HP mean he won't last long if he's in the open. And a +8 attack and 10 damage means he won't be killing the big pieces in the game, but it's his special abilities that really make this guy shine. Twin Attack is a pretty awesome ability that basically lets you take a double attack and moving with the only exception being that both attacks have to be against the opponent. Disruptive is also a pretty interesting ability that gets rid of enemy commander effects within six squares. That's a pretty sweet way of getting rid of commander effects like General Windu's extra attack, Bacara's super stealth, and Thrawn's stat boosts and piece switching. The one thing I really like about this guy, though, is his Fringe Reserves 20 combined with Recon. Normally Fringe Reserves 20 has a very small chance of being seen in a game at all, but with recon you get two rolls to choose from, meaning that 11 is that much more likely to come up. That could end up being a game breaking ability. Overall this guy is definitely playable. He helps a faction that is desperate for help and for a fairly low point cost. Like most pieces in the Bounty Hunters set though he's pretty fragile and needs a bit of strategy to keep around for the long run. A bodyguard or two would be pretty useful (wouldn't it be awesome for Wizards to release and Anakin Solo with affiliation with Chewbacca? the new republic would be able to use the best bodyguard and we'd have the whole Solo family). In 100: 2.5/5 (25% of your squad may be to much to invest in a support piece here) In 200: 4.5/5 (If you're playing the New Republic he's pretty close to a must play)
Zeroph Zeal	Talon Karrde 11/02/06 Points: 24 Hitpoints: 60 Defense: 16 Attack: +8 Damage: 10 Fraction: New Republic Abilities: Disruptive, Fringe Reserves 20, Recon, Twin Attack, Unique Talon Karrde... what can I say about him? He's an interesting piece with an interesting array of abilities, but unfortanutly his fraction is quite... bad. First, the stats. For 24 points, 60 hitpoints is about the norm. While 10 more would be infinately more useful, 60 is good. However, this is ruined when we see he has a somewhat-dissapointing 16 defense. While this isn't terrible, a 24 point unit should have a little more than this. Also +8 attack AND 10 damage really leaves something to be desired. However, he does have qutie a few abilities. One of which is Recon, which is simply amazing. Sinse this is the first piece with Recon I reviewed, I'll put my imput on it here... two rolls for iniative is great. All you need is a unit in the same squad as Talon to have Line of Sight, and its yours. With two iniative rolls, you have double the chance of winning iniative, and that's a good thing. Now, this is combined with his Fringe Reserves 20. Normally, this would never it, having only a 5% chance. With Recon, though, this chance is doulbed to 10%. While 10% isn't legendary, at least it is achieveable somewhat. And while 20 points isn't too much, it can certinally give you the advantage over the enemy. He also has Disruptive, but unfortanutly this really doesn't do much for a 60 hitpoint character with a mere 16 defense. The fact of the matter is, you don't want to move him into an uncomfortable position 6 spaces away from an enemy commander. It probally won't last long, and you will lose Recon if it does die. He also has a Twin Attack, making him MAY be able to do 20 damage in a given attack (yay! a waste of twin attack.). While this really isn't a bad piece, the real problem is the fraction. First of all, the New Republic is really horrible, with a grand total of one tournament-worthy squad, if you even consider it to be (The Solo Family Reunion), and this piece really can't fit into that squad. Maybe in the future when we get more New Republic units, but as of now leave this one alone. It really doesn't help further any New Republic cause. 100 points: 1.5/5 Really, ew. Disruptive is useless here (as commanders in general are useless here) and it really can't do any damage. 200 points: 2/5 It's a possibility perhaps, but seriously, he really has no New Repulbic synergy at the momment. At best, he can be used to obtain Recon, but only if you can fit him in. Sculpt: 3.5/5 Its okay... but not great. One of the lesser of the Bounty Hunter sculpts, but that's not really a bad thing.