Here’s everything you need to know about the Star Wars: Legion Swoop Bike Riders, including an unboxing and build of the models!
In our latest unboxing, Rob looks at the newest Legion release. He’ll see what it takes to get it ready for the tabletop, show the models’ size, and tell you the GOTCHAS to be aware of when building them!
We will show you everything, including the sprues, bits, and of course, the size. That way, you can decide if this is worth your hard-earned hobby dollars.
Star Wars: Legion Swoop Bike Riders: $34.99 August 19th, 2022
Click here to get yours from these retailers: Amazon | Asmodee |
The support unit of two Swoop Bike Riders found in this expansion helps players get their forces into the thick of the fight quickly where they can cause the most chaos and destruction before zooming out before the might of planetary authorities can be brought against them. Able to be fielded by either the Rebel Alliance or gangs of mercenaries, these riders add a fast and furious new element to any army.
While this is a smaller box, the minis inside make up for it as they are just cool, and who doesn’t want to zoom around the battlefield? Now, let’s see what they can do.
Swoop Bike Rider Unit Card (c0rrected)
Swoop Bikes offer a full suite of offensive and defensive abilities to those willing to hire their services. These mercenaries can fit into the Shadow Collective, Rebel Alliance, and the Galactic Republic. At first glance, Swoop Bikes possess many of the same advantages as 74-Z Speeder Bikes. They are speed-3 repulsor vehicles with native Cover 1, a Comms upgrade slot, and a surging white defense die. They also surge to hit on attack dice and include the Speeder 1 keyword. But what sets them apart from their 74-Z counterparts, is their riders’ propensity for engaging the enemy at extremely close range.
Swoop Bike Riders have two weapon options available to them. The first is their Heavy Blaster Pistol, which rolls one red and one black attack die per miniature. Second is the addition of an overrun weapon: the Vibro-Ax. Not only does this weapon roll a respectable three dice, but it also gives the unit access to Overrun 1. Assuming one of the riders has not met their untimely demise, this allows the unit to make up to 2 Overrun attacks per activation. This fly-by assault is sure to give any army backed up by Swoop Bike Riders the aggressive attack capabilities needed to gain the edge in your next game of Star Wars: Legion.
To reflect their flexibility, the unit also has Independent: Aim 1 or Dodge 1. This allows them to react to any situation they may find themselves in. Additionally, the Swoop Bike Riders have Reinforcements, which lets the unit deploy after all units without reinforcements have deployed. This gives them clever choices that enable them to have the most impact on the battlefield.
Just like with all the SWL stuff, you get all the cards. They have some pretty cool rules, and the weapons also look strong. There also seems to be a card error for the defense surge, which AMG has also mentioned that the critical symbol above should be the surge symbol.
Another Correction:
Before we get started, AMG did make a statement on the bases, as the box images are not actually the correct bases included with the box. Check out their statement below, but remember that the bases in the box are not the same size as the box image.
Star Wars Legion Swoop Bikers Sprues
The quality of the newer sprues has been really good recently. This actually has more bits than most of their kits, which lets you do a few variations.
One thing to keep in mind is that these are very small and fiddly parts, so Rob suggests putting some blue-tac behind the above bits so you don’t break them or have them go flying all over the place.
Assembled Minis
Well, these aren’t assembled, but you actually get 4 extra heads with the kit, which is pretty cool, and you can use blue tac like this to test out and see which ones you like the most.
There are parts left over so you could build a few variations. Overall, the models are really cool and go together fairly easily but the second bike had an issue which we’ll cover below.
The main issue with building them is that they line up so well, that it might be hard to paint the riders separately.
The hardest parts are the handle and legs here, as there is they are very tight. You just have to glue it together as you go, which makes painting them separately even harder.
You can do either set of arms (pistol or vibro axe) which is nice.
Size Comparison
Just in case you wanted to use it for other games, here it is compared to a Space Marine.
Overall, they are some really cool minis and worth a pickup if you like how they look.
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About the Author: Travis Pasch
Travis Pasch
Job Title: Head Writer & Editor
Socials: @paschbass
About Travis Pasch: Travis has been a Warhammer 40k hobbyist since the 1990s, playing the game since Third Edition. Through extensive traveling, he’s seen a lot of the miniatures hobby from across the world, giving him a unique perspective on the latest gaming topics and trends.
Travis’s brother even owns a commission painting studio, where he’s picked up a lot of good advice and techniques for painting Warhammer and tabletop miniatures over the years, as well. Travis joined the Spikey Bits team in 2019 and has been the lead writer since 2020.
Currently, he’s working on converting all his 40k Adeptus Mechanicus models and becoming a true tech enjoyer, complete with both sad and happy robot noises!
