I actually played Sidious at pre-release for Homeworlds. He wasn’t one of the leaders that I was most excited about playing, but in sealed you get what you get and you don’t throw a fit. His stats make him a bit squishy for a leader, but the chance for damage pings without any additional resource cost seemed reasonable with the pool I had, and it certainly played out even better than I expected, so that got me interested in trying this out in Premier constructed.
For those who haven’t had the pleasure, Darth Sidious, There is No Mercy is a 4/5 Aggression/Villainy leader with a pretty simple trigger. Whenever you deal 4 or more damage to a unit or base, you may exhaust him in order to deal 1 damage to a different unit or base. Once he deploys at 6 resources, the exhaust goes away and he pings every time it happens. Sure, one damage doesn’t sound like much. As it turns out, one free damage on every big hit adds up in a hurry.
Props to fellow SWU-Tang Clan member, Sam, who was also intrigued and has been helping refine and test this deck. His build is a smidgeon different, but the themes and goals are the same. Plus, I’ve got to give him props on the name.
The Game Plan
This plays as a bit of an aggro/control deck. You basically always want to be attacking. Most often, this means going to base and then using Sidious’ ping damage to mop up various opposing units on the board or create less favorable trades for your opponent when they want to attack in to your units to stop your assault, but sometimes it does also mean eliminating a threat of theirs and making sure you can still ping in some damage to the base with Sidious to keep the pressure on.
The tricky thing is sequencing, particularly with multiple damage sources available to you. It’s important to determine where your damage will do the most good, how you’ll need to stack multiple triggers to eliminate one of your opponent’s cards, and even to have a good insight into your opponent’s mindset to try to figure out what they might do next so that you can bait them into an attack that leaves a unit vulnerable and the like.
To that end, the whole deck revolves around one number. Four. A healthy number of units in the 50 hit that threshold on their own: Grand Inquisitor (3 power plus Raid 1), 0-0-0, Droid Missile Platform, The First Legion, and pretty much everything at the top of the curve. The rest generally need a little help, which is where the upgrades and pump effects come in.
Turn One
Poacher’s Starfighter is my favorite turn 1 play, especially if your opponent is going first. If they are, you can use its ability to make sure that you have a unit in whichever arena they didn’t go to. That said, space is superior, so I try to leave it there if I can. And frankly, if I think I have the cards to back it up, I want to be going first with it in space as well.
What are the cards to back it up? First off is Vader pilot. Dropping him turn 2 often gives you enough of an HP boost to survive a possible attack in to the Starfighter and then also gives you a unit big enough to start triggering Sidious on attack. 6 damage to base with a Vader ping and a Sidious ping (8 total damage unless you really get lucky and get Vader’s extra for 9 total) is a very quick start and can often remove something on their side of the board. If they don’t have immediate removal, a couple attacks like this can set you far, far ahead. That said, the other possible card is Villainous Ambition, which isn’t quite as good, but does a reasonable impression and allows you to even possibly remove a slightly larger turn 1 play on your opponent’s side of the board.
The other 2 drop, turn 1 plays (Adamant Ewoks, Syril Karn, and Benthic “Two Tubes”) all also put early pressure on with damage that can be combined with Sidious triggers to mop things up. Sure, they don’t start triggering Sidious themselves unless you happen to get Villainous Ambition on Syril (which is another strong start, I admit) but the setup for later is still worth it.
Strikeship rounds out the 2-drops as well. It’s a sly little 0/3 that swings for 3 thanks to Raid, with Overwhelm on top, so it survives most early pings. Put Villainous Ambition on it and you have a 5-power attacker on turn 2.
Nightfall
Nightfall is also perfect for the deck. As a baseline, it can make a unit big enough to trigger Sidious that normally wouldn’t, making it essentially 4 damage for 2 cost, which is a pretty good rate (+2 attack, 1 ping, 1 Sidious ping) and can really help finish off other units. Or, as we all know, sometimes the attack and boost events can end games right there.
The attack half of Nightfall only works if you control an Endor base, which is the main reason we’re on Bright Tree Village in the first place. Conveniently, Adamant Ewoks key off the Endor base too, so they get their ping even when they’re the only Ewok on the board.
Haymaker and Craving Power
It’s also worth noting that Haymaker and Craving Power combo very, very well with Sidious. They give you removal by dealing damage, and removal is always great, but the real clincher here is that they deal damage after providing a boost to the unit you play them on. This makes them almost certainly big enough to trigger Sidious since you dealt damage, which means they can help keep extra pressure on base while you remove threats or even help mop up other units on the board. Plus, the boosts stick around as upgrades, which means that unit continues to be large enough to trigger Sidious (or just plain deal more damage to base) on future attacks.
That’s why Craving Power stays at the full three copies in spite of the 5 cost, with two Haymakers backing it up.
Damage on Defense
Another item worth noting is that Sidious only cares about you dealing the damage, not that it has to be an attack. This is great as it means that Haymaker and Craving Power can trigger him, but it also means that if your opponent attacks into one of your units that deals enough damage on defense — you can still trigger Sidious! So not only can sentinels like Stormtrooper Patrol or Cruel Commandos be roadblocks to buy you needed time, but they can also keep the pressure up while on defense!
Stormtrooper Patrol in particular gets +2/+0 while you control another unit that costs 3 or more, which puts it at exactly 4 power on most turns. Cruel Commandos ended up in the sideboard for the final 50, of course, but this is exactly why they come in against the more aggressive matchups.
The Rest of the Deck
The 3-drops are the workhorses. 0-0-0 is a solid 4/4 that triggers Sidious on its own and can tack on a ping to the enemy base by recycling an Aggression card from your discard pile. Grand Inquisitor swings for 4 with Raid 1 and gives Hidden to your other Inquisitors. Droid Missile Platform hits for 4 as well, and when it goes down it leaves 3 indirect damage behind. The First Legion comes down a turn later as a beefy 5/5 that does much the same job.
Battle-Scarred Destroyer looks like it comes with a drawback, since it deals 4 damage to one of your own units when played. That said, Sidious doesn’t care whose unit took the damage. Point it at a Droid Missile Platform and you get the Sidious ping and the Platform’s 3 indirect damage on top. Not a bad way to say goodbye to a 3-drop, is it? Because the Platform was always going to die eventually.
Cinta Kaz and Sudden Ferocity both carry Plot, which means the turn Sidious deploys at 6 resources, you can play them right out of your resources. Cinta bring an attack on the way in, which is a chance to hit for 4 or more with Sidious himself and hopefull get multiple triggers with other attacks that turn. Sudden Ferocity helps boost units for pressure and Sidious triggers. Vader, of course, can also show up as a full 7/7 when you don’t need him in the cockpit, and Ninth Sister tops the curve as an 8/7 with Overwhelm (and an Inquisitor, so Grand Inquisitor keeps her Hidden).
Collateral Damage rounds things out as flexible removal. It doesn’t trigger Sidious by itself. Splitting 2 and 2, however, is the kind of setup damage that lets the next attack and ping finish the job.
The Sideboard
The sideboard leans on removal and a couple of bodies.
- Cruel Commandos (2) come in against aggressive decks, as covered above.
- Eager Escort Fighter (2) does shore things up against space, and it also triggers Sidious when it attacks with Ambush, so it continues to play in to the theme.
- Charged with Treason (2) and No Disintegrations (2) are the answers for big threats that the pings can’t handle on their own. And yes, the deck’s namesake ended up in the sideboard.
- Topple the Summit (2) is a sweeper that deals 3 damage to each damaged unit, which in a deck that pings everything is a lot of units. Granted, it hits your own damaged units as well, so it rewards a little care with sequencing.
Where It Stands
Let’s be real here, Sam and I are still testing, and I’m not about to claim we’ve cracked anything. This is one leader I wasn’t excited about, built by a guy who’s never quite closed out a title. Sidious will always be a little squishy, and a deck that lives on 4-damage hits will have bad days against a board full of big sentinels. That said, the sealed games gave me a wiggle of indication, and the constructed games so far have backed it up. Only time will tell, but I feel confident that Sidious has more to offer than his stat line suggests.
There you have it, folks!
