Imperial Assault - Story Mission #1: Aftermath

Imperial Assault is a strategy board game of tactical combat and missions for two to five players, offering two distinct games of battle and adventure in the Star Wars™ universe!

Imperial Assault puts you in the midst of the Galactic Civil War between the Rebel Alliance and the Galactic Empire after the destruction of the Death Star over Yavin 4. Imperial Assault offers two separate game experiences. The campaign game pits the limitless troops and resources of the Galactic Empire against a crack team of elite Rebel operatives as they strive to break the Empire’s hold on the galaxy, while the skirmish game invites you and a friend to muster strike teams and battle head-to-head over conflicting objectives.

Last night we played the first mission in the campaign: Aftermath! Jim took on the role of the Rebels while I was in charge of the Empire. The heroes selected were

     · Diala Passil - Haunted Exile
     · Gideon Argus - Valiant Commander
     · Jyn Odan - The Smuggler
     · Gaarkhan - Fierce Warrior (Wookie)

The game mechanics are an evolution of the Descent system, which were based on the Doom board game. In Imperial Assault, players take turns activating a hero (Rebels) or deployment card (Empire). This back-and-forth keeps you engaged with the game even when it's not your turn. Combat uses a variety of colorful dice. To attacking you simply roll the dice based on the ranged or melee weapon to determine the results. The defender rolls a defense die to see if they're able to dodge or reduce the amount of damage taken.

Each character has special abilities which can be triggered using either "surges" from the dice or by spending endurance points. Stormtroopers, for example, are allowed to re-roll an attack die if they are adjacent to another trooper, while the Imperial Officer is able to order nearby friendly models to move out of turn.

The Rebels ended up destroying all four Imperial transmission terminals and won the game. This gave them additional credits to spend on items/upgrades before the next mission.