Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes will soon celebrate its 10th anniversary. For the huge occasion, an update based on Disney smash Andor is on the way. It will add a new version of Cassian Andor, and villains Major Partagaz and Dedra Meero.
Andor focuses not on the Force battles between the Jedi and the Sith, but on the everyday people like Cassian Andor who make the Rebellion possible. It was their undercover work that allowed the Rebels to find the plans that allowed the destruction of the Death Star.
"I am a huge fan of how well [‘Andor’ shows] the danger and the realness of the people inside of Star Wars that aren’t Obi-Wan Kenobi and aren’t the lead characters,” Capital Games Lead Producer Caley Roberts said. “These guys felt down-to-earth. There was so much tension. There was so much strife in there as they tried to build this rebellion against the Empire, that we wanted to make sure that was felt in any event that we do. And I think that that’s one of the cool things with our holotable is that because we are a holotable game, we can build events that feel really authentic to the episodes and movies, because they are a small, bite-sized piece.”
"We've got players who are, on average, playing two hours a day with us every day of the year," Capital Games General Manager Erik Larsen told Variety.
And they've got quite a few players, 150 million of them since 2015. Galaxy has enough meat to appeal to longtime fans but can also serve as an entry point to new ones as well.
From Capital Games, here are the objectives from the Era of Andor:
1. Reducing Early-Era Pressure
One of the loudest pieces of feedback was the "Crystal Crunch" at the start of an Era. To address this, we are making the following changes:
Lowered Requirements: For the first three Marquees of the Andor Era, the EL requirement for the final tier has been reduced from EL 70 to EL 55. Requirements for the final three Marquees will remain at EL 70, as players will have had more time to naturally accumulate materials by that stage.
Smart Store Management: We are temporarily removing Tier 8 Era Material bundles (EL 80-95) from the store until they are actually applicable. We want to ensure players don't accidentally overspend on materials they are currently gated from using due to Zerek Ability Module constraints.
2. Coliseum & Strategic Variety
We want the Coliseum to feel like a place where your roster growth is always a benefit.
Power Scaling: Summoned units will now scale based on your highest-level Era unit, rather than the lowest. This ensures that when you unlock a new Marquee at a low EL, your overall Coliseum power doesn't "dip."
Leader-Based Summons: To add a layer of strategy, the units you summon will now change based on your Leader. A Rebel leader will bring different reinforcements than an ISB (Imperial Security Bureau) leader, allowing for more tailored theory-crafting.
Summoned Unit Adjustments: Summoned units will be available on later tiers than we had on the 10th anniversary.
The changes for Coliseum:
If the leader is Rebel Fighter, summon the following units (in the associated Coliseum tiers):
Pao (all)
Saw (all)
Cinta (1,2)
Vel (1)
If the leader is ISB, summon the following units (in the associated Coliseum tiers):
IPD (all)
Krennic (all)
KX (1,2,3,4,5)
Partagaz (1,2,3,4)
Summoned units will be at the player's highest Era Level brought into battle rather than the lowest.Tiers 5-8 will now summon units (previously only tiers 1-4 did)
Hero Abilities
These are currently being targeted for release during the middle of the Era. More information to come as details are finalized.
3. Era Challenges: More Ways to Play (Will be introduced during the Second Era Challenge)
We will be introducing a new 4-Feat System for Era Challenges
Each challenge tier will now feature four distinct feats with escalating EL requirements.
Kleya's Era Challenge will have only the 1 Feat per tier, but the other five will have four Feats
The Goal: This provides a reason to revisit challenges as your squad grows, giving everyone, especially F2P players, more opportunities to earn rewards and engage with the new units throughout the Era.
4. Clear "Roadmap" for Cassian Andor
To eliminate the "moving goalpost" feeling, we want to be upfront about the Journey Guide requirements from Day 1:
Requirements: The requirements for Cassian Andor (Undercover) will be similar to the Maul event.
Andor Era Marquees (in order)
Kleya Marki
Vel Sartha
Cinta Kaz
Dedra Meero
Major Partagaz
KX Security Droid
Andor Event
Tier 1
Requires Marquees 1-5 at 4 stars, Kleya at Era Level 45
Unlocks Cassian at 4 stars
Tier 2
Requires Marquees 1-5 at 5 stars, Cinta and Vel at Era Level 55
Upgrades Cassian to 5 stars
Tier 3
Requires Marquees 1-6 at 6 stars, KX at Era Level 70
Upgrades Cassian to 6 stars
Tier 4
Requires Marquees 1-6 at 7 stars and Era Level 85
Upgrades Cassian to 7 stars
Scaling Rewards: Remember that Era materials scale exponentially toward the end of the 12-week cycle. The Free Track of the third Episode Pass will contain significantly more EL currency to help bridge the gap to those final levels.
Era Battle: The squads you recruit during the Era of Andor are your ticket to the exclusive Era Battle launching in the next cycle. Strengthening your team now ensures you're ready to secure high-value resources when the battle begins
Our goal is to have 12 Era Battle event runs per Era, alternating between "on" and "off" weeks throughout the cycle.
There will be two different Era Battles, each with different requirements
5. Transitions & Legacy
Unit Availability: Following the 10th Anniversary pattern, units will move to Shipments about a week after the Era concludes, and units will move to nodes on a bi-weekly cadence following that.
Post-Era Support: Once the Era of Andor concludes, these units will receive dedicated Squad-based FDCs to provide extra strength in the Legacy meta in GAC and TW.