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What’s In The Box?
The Count Dooku expansion pack comes with everything you need to field a powerful commander for your CIS forces. The Sprue for his miniature comes as his body and legs, his right arm, left arm, head and cape. The quality is good with excellent detail, however comparing it to newer miniatures you may find that the plastic used is a little softer. This can lead to a bend in the lightsaber, but this is easily fixed before painting and is otherwise a well-made sculpt.
You also receive his command cards, which will be covered in more detail later, and upgrade cards to improve his abilities in the field. The upgrade cards that are packaged with Dooku include options such as force choke, Fear and Anger. All are good options to upgrade him with and cards like Force Choke and Force Reflex synergizing well his Mastery of the force ability. You will also find in the box the standard additions, such as the order token required for game play and some additional wound, suppression and aim tokens to name a few.
Prepare For The Table
The miniature can be a little fiddly to put together. Due to the small size of the arms and how they are attached to the cape, they can easily come loose in transport or if knocked on the table. I have used super glue to attach the arms and would suggest this as a solution to what may otherwise be a long-term problem, but otherwise it is obvious how to assemble the miniature, even without instructions (which are included.) I would recommend painting the miniature before gluing it together as the cape may be difficult to cover when assembled due to the pose chosen. The cape aside, the Dooku is relatively easy to paint, with details clearly defined and no areas requiring a mastery of painting needed. Even with my own medico skills I have been complimented on the finish of (what I believe to be) the best-looking CIS commander, as with patients and effort you can have a commander that will look menacing as he carves a path through any unit unfortunate enough to be to be in his path.
On The Table
Count Dooku can be a daunting choice when deciding on a commander. With hefty points cost even before upgrades, he will take up a large amount of your force on a standard game and may be too much to use in skirmish games without major sacrifices. This can be made difficult to justify when you consider that he lacks skills such as Relentless and Charge, meaning you will be missing the free attack action that the vast majority of other characters benefit from. He also does not have the benefit of Jump which can make movement decisions a crucial choice on the table, as terrain needs to be navigated rather than traversed. That being said he has some clear benefits that you cannot gain with a different choice of leader. He can take advantage of Mastery of the Force 2, allowing him to reuse 2 force abilities each turn. Paired with Force Choke and Force Reflex, this will give you a free wound each turn as well as give you access to that all important dodge token needed to activate Deflect. Count Dooku also come pre equipped with the ability to use Force Lightning. This will allow you to ignore Sabre Throw, which is a staple for most force users and use that extra slot in his 3 force upgrades to make his already intimidating presence, more of a concern for your opponent. His Cunning ability negates the need to roll off what playing a command card with the same pip value as you opponent, instead automatically giving you the ability to go first. This can be invaluable if he ended the last turn in a sub optimal position, or if you need to make sure he gains the advantage of first attack on a target.
This brings us to his command cards. These are arguably the most important aspect of his character. These can give Dooku the Relentless, Arsenal 2 and versatile abilities for a turn. You can also force your opponent to return order tokens to their pool, wreaking havoc with their ability to activate that all important unit at that pivotal point, and give dodge tokens to himself and friendly units, helping with navigating the battlefield without taking a hail of blaster fire before you can use his formidable abilities to swiftly reduce your adversaries units to ash.
Dooku has formidable offensive abilities. With 5 red dice in melee and the ability to negate Immune to Piece he will is a match for even the most intimidating force wielder and the end of any character or unit without force use. He gains Force Lightning for free which is a range 2 attack with a 5 black dice pool, meaning even if you cannot get into melee combat, you can still make big hits on units as you close that gap.