Greetings fellow commanders, and welcome back!  This time, we’ll be analyzing the Imperial Royal Guard, looking at their role on the battlefield and at different tactics they can employ.

The Unit Card

The best I can figure, the Imperial Royal Guard (Hereafter referred to as IRG) are aggressively costed at 75 points.  Two health a model is nice, 
made even sweeter with the red defense die. Taking just one damage won’t hurt your damage output at all.   Two courage is even better, making it rare the IRG lose an action.

They have two very powerful keywords, charge and guardian.

Charge – After you perform a move action, you may perform a free attack action.  

Luke Skywalker came out with the core set, so I don’t think I need to explain the threat range of a unit with speed of 2 and charge. (its approximately 12 inches or range 2)  Unfortunately, the IRG can’t jump over terrain.. Bummer

Guardian 2 – While a friendly trooper unit at range 1 and in line of sight is defending against a ranged attack, you may cancel up to 2 hit results.  for each result canceled, roll 1 of your defense dice.  Convert any surges, then suffer 1 wound for each blank result.  

For anyone that played X-Wing 1.0 knows, being able to take damage off of friendlies is very powerful.. Looking at you Biggs Darklighter.  Guardian 2 opens up an unique role for the IRG in your army, more on this later.

The disciplined keyword removes 2 suppression from the IRG when they are issued an order during the command phase.  This synergizes nicely with Emperor Palpatine and his entourage keyword, which gives the IRG a free order if they are in range.

Continue reading after the jump: http://empirelegion.com/2018/12/17/imperial-royal-guard-strategy-guide/