Anti-Hailfire Droid Squad - TCW [SOTDS] - Battle Packs

Hailfire droids present a significant challenge to the clone trooper army. They quickly establish a special squad to fight these rolling devastators. Bantha Squad includes specialists in heavy weapons, aerial recon and demolitions. With these combined skills, the squad can pinpoint these droids and attack them with the weapons and firepower necessary to immobilize and demolish them early in any assault operation.

Stop sending in the clones! We aren't being entirely serious here, so don't sweat it. More The Clone Wars episodes on television means more styles of clone troopers seen in those episodes which ultimately means more clone troopers in Hasbro’s action figure line. And the more clones we see in this multimedia event, the more numb we become towards them. Is it really possible to become so apathetic to an army of Star Wars characters that are the precursor to our beloved Imperial Stormtroopers? We’re afraid the answer to that is a resounding yes. It is no doubt that we are all inundated with a rainbow of clone trooper styles, and to be honest, we need that diversity to keep our interest piqued. But you know what? After two complete seasons on television and gearing up to start the third, clones have become so overbearing that we would be thrilled if they didn’t appear in half the of the new season. This may sound ridiculous, but how many more times can we look at all of the Expanded Universe clones and say “wow, now there’s something I haven’t seen before?” No, we compare one clone to the next and it has become increasingly difficult to tell many of them apart. How many clone troopers do we have now that are decorated with dark red (burgundy) paint? How many white clones with orange color flashes do we have that have been described as both 327th Star Corps and 212th Attack Battalion simultaneously? We could go on and on but we think you get our point. Yes, clone troopers are awesome, but goodness gracious, we think we need a little bit of a respite at this point.

So after all of that whining, you would expect us to rip apart the Anti-Hailfire Droid Squad Battle Packs set right? Well, you would be kind of incorrect about that. Yes, we are bored of clone troopers, but this set offers collectors and kids a nice new take on a clone trooper style. The clone troopers in the set are all sculpts we have seen 100 times before, but the paint jobs on their armor are a nicely done and make this a refreshingly new. Inside the package you get two generic Clone Troopers, an Aerial Recon Trooper and finally a generic Clone Commander. All of the clones are either repaints or kit-bashes of other figures released in the prolific The Clone Wars line so far. The paint jobs are relatively done well, but you will unfortunately find some instances of bleeding onto the white portions of the armor. And sometimes the visors don’t looks as crisp as they should. But overall, this set should make you happy. The clone troopers are more than properly accessorized and as a bonus, collectors have been treated to an all-new cannon that just completes the set perfectly. This set is definitely a good value. You get four action figures and a large accessory. We haven’t seen this much product in a Battle Packs set for a very long time. If you dig out one of your older Hailfire Droid vehicles from the previous lines and set it up with these figures, the whole “scene” does in fact looks pretty amazing. Hasbro must have known what they were doing here because it’s hard not to be even mildly impressed with the final results.

The Anti-Hailfire Droid Squad is very welcomed into The Clone Wars line. Hasbro got us our four Battle Packs in the new line look at the August 2010 launch. One of those sets, Holocron Heist, is a straight repack, so thankfully the other three are new. It is our prayer that Hasbro keeps repacks at a bare minimum. Already, Holocron Heist is clogging up shelf space and it the last to move. This is a big surprise, right? But hopefully they learned with the demise of the Comic Packs and Evolutions lines. Repacking after repacking is not the answer. And we are sorry for going off topic here. Battle Packs, when new, really do provide collectors with a nice “immediate” miniature collection of great characters. Army builder will probably eat this set up immediately. You have a small new army to pose with your AT-TE and your Clone Turbo Tank. And since these vehicles are huge, you really can’t get enough clones to populate them. Look at this set as a reinvention of the 2009 TCW AT-TE Assault Squad Battle Packs set. Our clone armies are growing exponentially. This could be a good or bad thing depending upon your point of view. We would like to see The Clone Wars line develop non-clone trooper characters a bit more. But clones are safe when it comes to the kids who really support this line. Anti-Hailfire Droid Squad is actually a no-brainer set to pick up. But if you’re tired of clone troopers, you may find passing on this set a bit of a holiday.