Jabba the Hutt

"Oh, dear. His High Exaltedness, the great Jabba the Hutt, has decreed that you are to be terminated immediately."
     –C-3PO

In our earlier previews of the C-ROC Cruiser Expansion Pack, we explored how the Scum faction goes Epic with its huge new ship and how the expansion adds new versatility to the faction's M3-A "Scyk" Interceptors. However, if there's any one part of the expansion that's most likely to impact both Epic and Standard X-Wing™ play, it's the new crew upgrade— Jabba the Hutt .

Today, we take a closer look at what Jabba brings to X-Wing.

Criminal Enterprises

In X-Wing, Jabba the Hutt is a double-slotted crew upgrade that ensures Scum players a chance to enjoy the bounties of his vast criminal network.

But first you have to get him aboard a ship—which, by the way, is no easy task. Currently, only two Scum ships feature two crew slots—the huge-base C-ROC Cruiser and the large-base YV-666 . And only the YV-666 is legal for Standard Play.

Once you get Jabba on board one of your ships, however, he adds immediate value, placing one illicit token to each of your illicit ( ) upgrades. These tokens then give you more uses of the illicit upgrades they modify; whenever you are instructed to discard an illicit upgrade, you can instead discard its illicit token, if it has one.

In short, Jabba the Hutt is Extra Munitions for every illicit upgrade in your squad.

This means Jabba—like Extra Munitions—serves largely to boost the economic value of your upgrades. But it's important to note that his influence goes a step or two further.

• First of all, it reinforces the Scum faction's reliance upon its illicit upgrades. These feature all manner of dirty tricks that highlight the faction's criminal and self-serving tendencies, and by doubling the value of each piece of illicit technology, Jabba pushes the whole Scum faction one big, slug-like step further in that thematic direction.
• Second, it's worth noting that Jabba increases the value of your list's illicit upgrades not by reducing their cost, but by doubling the number of times you get to use them. And this may very well transform the way you think of upgrades like Glitterstim and "Hot-Shot" Blaster . A Binayre Pirate with a "Hot-Shot" Blaster in a squad with Jabba the Hutt is almost more like a three-attack turret than a two-attack fighter with a single use shot out of arc. Even your Cloaking Device takes on a different character when it has the safety valve provided by Jabba's illicit token.

A squadron with Jabba the Hutt and four Binayre Pirates loaded with "Hot-Shot" Blasters can direct a surprising amount of firepower in any direction.

The result is that in both Standard and Epic Play Jabba makes your Scum lists even "Scummier," but his impact is certainly larger in the Epic format. There, you can equip more illicit upgrades. Also in Epic, you can, ironically, have Azmorigan dump Jabba from your C-ROC Cruiser in order to make room for Dengar , Boba Fett , a Hotshot Co-pilot , or some other crew member.

A New Scum Standard

While the huge-base C-ROC Cruiser is, itself, too large for Standard Play, the C-ROC Cruiser Expansion Pack is bound to make a major impact upon X-Wing Standard Play with its new M3-A Interceptor, ship cards, and upgrades. And none of these upgrades are likely to carry more weight than the mighty Jabba the Hutt.

Will we see more of 4-LOM cloaking himself aboard the Mist Hunter ? Will we see Prince Xizor dodge more effectively about the battlefield by making more use of the Inertial Dampeners onboard his Virago ? How will your battles change when Ketsu Onyo can jettison a pair of Rigged Cargo Chutes while Pushing the Limit to rotate her mobile firing arc and catch her foes while they're distracted by the debris?

You'll soon have your chance to experiment with all the Scum faction's newest tricks when the C-ROC Cruiser Expansion Pack arrives at retailers. In the meantime, you can head to our community forums to discuss the ways you'd use Jabba the Hutt to empower your illicit upgrades. Then stay tuned for more on the C-ROC Cruiser Expansion Pack and other X-Wing news!