“Gungans no dyin’withouta fight. Wesa warriors. Wesa got a grand army. That’s why you no likin’ us, mesa thinks.” – Jar Jar Binks
Though Legacies may have introduced us to our favorite Gungan, Jar Jar Binks, Way of the Force is going to help us fill out the ranks of the Gungan’s “grand army” with the introduction of Boss Nass – Bombastic Ruler and a new non-unique character, Gungan Warrior. Both of these new characters are Red and feature the Gungan character type. While character types have not previously been referenced on cards before, we’ve long expected that they would be in the future after they started appearing on cards, and it looks like we get our first taste of their use with Boss Nass.
Boss Nass is a Red unique character with 9 health and a cost of 9/12. He brings with him an interesting ability that reads, “After you activate a Gungan, you may deal indirect damage to an opponent equal to the number of its character dice that just rolled a blank.” This ability is particularly good for Boss Nass since his dice sport two blanks each. But where the ability is likely going to shine is when Boss Nass is paired with other Gungans. The ability is not a once per round effect, so each time you activate a Gungan and it rolls a blank, you’re dealing indirect damage. His non-blank sides include 2 indirect, 1 focus, 1 disrupt and 1 resource. Unfortunately, these sides aren’t great for damage output early so you’re likely going to have to rely on pairing him with a heavier hitter or getting out some upgrades pretty quickly. With a 9/12 point cost, there are lots of options for pairings with Boss Nass, but if you want to really take advantage of his ability, then you’re going to need to put some more Gungans with him. Certainly, you can include Jar Jar Binks – Clumsy Outcast both for his Gungan character type and to splash Yellow. But how else do you fill out the remaining points? With more Gungans of course!
Gungan Warrior is a relatively nondescript non-unique. At 6 points, it sports 6 health and a die with 1 melee, 2 indirect damage, 1 shield, 1 resource and 2 blanks. It’s not a great die, but it does feed Boss Nass’s ability nicely and that may be something to not ignore since it essentially turns each blank into a free indirect damage side that doesn’t have to be resolved. But are blanks really going to win games? Can you assemble a team that takes advantage of Boss Nass’s ability without being forced to take exclusively terrible character dice? Let’s take a look.
If you’re willing to run mono Red, then you can pair elite Boss Nass with three Gungan Warriors. That actually gives your opponent quite a bit of health to chew through and a lot of potential free indirect damage coming their way early in the game. And to be fair, there are a lot of great hero Red upgrades and supports that will synergize nicely with the indirect damage sides on these dice (like Lookout Post, Mortar Team, and Ground Battalion). But more likely, if you want to run four Gungans, you’ll be pairing regular Boss Nass with elite Jar Jar Binks and two Gungan Warriors. This will offer you slightly more health while also giving you access to Yellow. But Jar Jar actually brings a bit more to this pairing than that. While the other Gungans each sport two blank sides, Jar Jar only has one and that’s pretty significant since it increases the likelihood of his Activation giving you free rerolls on any your other dice that rolled blanks (potentially at the expense of rerolling some dice with more favorable sides as well). Additionally, a Yellow character like Jar Jar Binks will be the only way that you can also include Dumb Luck in your deck.
Dumb Luck is a 1 cost Yellow Event that reads “Spot a Yellow Character or Gungan to reroll up to 5 of your dice. Then deal indirect damage to an opponent equal to the number of dice that just rolled a blank.” I’m not sure how I feel about this card yet. It’s basically a Discard to Reroll that costs a resource (which is never good) but might also give you free indirect damage (although, that’s a bit of a blessing and a curse since that means you might be stuck rerolling those blanks again). Still, if we’ve learned anything in Destiny, it’s that unmitigatable, free damage is always good so I’ll be looking to include this card in Yellow (and especially Gungan) decks that feature cards with multiple blanks such as Runaway Boomas.
So what do you think? Does an all Gungan team stand a chance at being one of our best thematic pairings to date? Or will Boss Nass go the way of other Prequel favorite, Nute Gunray, competitively? Only time will tell, but personally? Meesa excited to runa da Gungans! Meesa roll alllllllll the blanks! Meesa thinkin’… meesa gonna lika dis pairing! (I’m so sorry…I’m so very sorry for that…)
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