He gives crit up, not offense up, but that said I agree he will probably replace Poggle on HK lead droid teams. But droid hybrids with Pog/GS/88/86/tank will be interesting to see if they take him out. JE doesn't have leader skill and not sure who the leader would be 88 maybe??
"I find your lack of faith disturbing" - Darth Vader
I am sure, JE can replace Poogle - while Poogle itself is good with droids you face some problems, HK and IG-100 (and GS) can gain Offense Up by themself (100 even Speed Up) and in the current meta Droids are very slow and its common that you face the following situation: Poogle (the fastest Teammember) lead with "Buff", the other squad maybe already act (...) now QGJ (very common Arena Character) simply removes one Buff (thanks Poogle) and (which is the real pain) give Offense Up to the enemy Squad - from now on, you are not in a good position. The same can happen if your Opponent simply throw in Old Ben (Ability Block), Dooku-Stun, St.Han etc.
With JE you will start the match (before Dooku, Yoda, QGJ, Rey etc. acts) and that is super important since droids are designed to kill as fast as possible (think about IG86 and 88 they are Assassins, and can't fight a long battle - often your opponent will kill them first). Thanks to JE (a shame its a non-Droid^^) you should be able to act first, which means you are able to AoE (HK, IG88 and IG100 all have negativ effects) and (which is very important) should be able to kill one character. With HK-Lead you gain TM for crits (and you crit easily with JE Buff) so you can apply a lot of pressure from the start. Without JE you maybe fall behind before the Droids really act and in this case the match can be over.
The good news are, that even IG100 (and GG) got better now, because he will also act faster and will not only benefit from HK-Lead, he will also buff IG86 crit chance and JE speed, which can be important if you face other Teams with QGJ lead or simply another Droid Team with stuff like tanks or GS, because your JE act before the other JE thanks to 4 droids>2-3 droids. Ok its a jawa, but it let me smile, simply because i love nearly full droid teams and its a shame that some only run (in the past) with IG86 and IG88.
I got my little Jawa Engineer yesterday and currently level and gear him up, i will start arena with him after he got Gear Level 8 and his speed ability at least to level 6 (+9 tempo for each droid which means +36!)
It all depends on speed needed. Je will probably be popular for defense for his speed. Poe/Poggle will still be good against slower teams, because offense up trumps crit up on the first turn due to 88 and 86 using their specials on the first attack. And because poe dont work with JE. Since he is not a droid, he would go after 88 and 86 used up their specials.
HK47, Gear 8, 7*, Lvl 76
IG88, Gear 8, 7*, Lvl 76
IG86, Gear 8, 7*, Lvl 76
IG100, Gear 8, 6*, Lvl 76
Jawa E., Gear 7 (missed one piece), 4*, Lvl 68 (FTP and near no credits left..., so my JE is not full powered)
Faced (and some one will call it "Mirror") the following Squad:
Poogle (Lead)
IG88
IG86
GS
Lumi
So a Droid-Squad in a config i don't like to see (and hope with JE will not be common in the future), thanks to my JE i start with buff and AoE Fest + extra Turns.
After i was done, my opponent has only Poogle and Lumi on the field (so i killed 3 DPS characters before they act!) Poogle Buffs (great now) and smashes a little bit and i kill Lumi before they even got her first turn! After that i kill Poogle with an attack from IG88 and my Jawa (what a start for him) got a grenate kill(!) with a crit for 2600 (remember his stats and that his basic is only level 3 and it will get him over 90% bonus damage if full leveld, since every step will add 10% damage!).
Replies
With JE you will start the match (before Dooku, Yoda, QGJ, Rey etc. acts) and that is super important since droids are designed to kill as fast as possible (think about IG86 and 88 they are Assassins, and can't fight a long battle - often your opponent will kill them first). Thanks to JE (a shame its a non-Droid^^) you should be able to act first, which means you are able to AoE (HK, IG88 and IG100 all have negativ effects) and (which is very important) should be able to kill one character. With HK-Lead you gain TM for crits (and you crit easily with JE Buff) so you can apply a lot of pressure from the start. Without JE you maybe fall behind before the Droids really act and in this case the match can be over.
The good news are, that even IG100 (and GG) got better now, because he will also act faster and will not only benefit from HK-Lead, he will also buff IG86 crit chance and JE speed, which can be important if you face other Teams with QGJ lead or simply another Droid Team with stuff like tanks or GS, because your JE act before the other JE thanks to 4 droids>2-3 droids. Ok its a jawa, but it let me smile, simply because i love nearly full droid teams and its a shame that some only run (in the past) with IG86 and IG88.
I got my little Jawa Engineer yesterday and currently level and gear him up, i will start arena with him after he got Gear Level 8 and his speed ability at least to level 6 (+9 tempo for each droid which means +36!)
My Squad:
HK47, Gear 8, 7*, Lvl 76
IG88, Gear 8, 7*, Lvl 76
IG86, Gear 8, 7*, Lvl 76
IG100, Gear 8, 6*, Lvl 76
Jawa E., Gear 7 (missed one piece), 4*, Lvl 68 (FTP and near no credits left..., so my JE is not full powered)
Faced (and some one will call it "Mirror") the following Squad:
Poogle (Lead)
IG88
IG86
GS
Lumi
So a Droid-Squad in a config i don't like to see (and hope with JE will not be common in the future), thanks to my JE i start with buff and AoE Fest + extra Turns.
After i was done, my opponent has only Poogle and Lumi on the field (so i killed 3 DPS characters before they act!) Poogle Buffs (great now) and smashes a little bit and i kill Lumi before they even got her first turn! After that i kill Poogle with an attack from IG88 and my Jawa (what a start for him) got a grenate kill(!) with a crit for 2600 (remember his stats and that his basic is only level 3 and it will get him over 90% bonus damage if full leveld, since every step will add 10% damage!).
So nice start for my JE