Bastila JM. But that's a tired debate.

I think the "dead horse, over beaten" have broken the laws of logic

No. Just...no.

Uggies overpowerd, underpriced, or broken......BOOM! That was my head that just exploded......but yet i am still able to type.

the mouse droids. 3 point figure with a def of 20 is clearly broken, as well as relay orders. IMO should be worth at least 10

A Flame war thread in the making perhaps? I think its a good topic; critically examining what a broken piece is and how they are actually broken/changing the game and altering strategy.

I think the whole meta-game concept behind consciously making 'broken' pieces was good; get the whole game to update (sorta like Magic cards).
Back in the day,
Override + Gambit attacks from R2 Astro came under a lot of scrutiny
Darth Vader Jedi Hunter/Admiral Thrawn in Black and Blue were really broken,
then came the "Big D hacks!" and banning of Boba Fett, Bounty Hunter,
the X-1 Viper droid was held to be hacks for a while in local meta...
then complaints over GOWK + force batteries...

Id have to say the GG:DAC is a fairly broken piece, especially with Gha Nackt and San Hill in 200-250.
Proxy from TFU had potential to become fairly broken in some droid squads...
Come to think of it, the Republic Commandos/super stealth squads are pretty broken too...

Nom-bombs were more of a nuisance than an actual threat.

---

What actually makes a piece broken?
I suspect its in the juxtaposition/comparison: who are they fighting, and against all possible combinations of opposing squads, what are the odds that a squad containing the suspected broken piece will win?

Is there a particular quantity or ratio at which any mini becomes "broken"?
Do pieces become more broken, relative to the opposition squad?
What are the general attributes of a broken piece?
Does turn structure/design benefit or break particular pieces?

Often the broken mini: is unique, has consistently better stats, abnormal survivability and an "I Win button" special ability or commander effect.
Its then a matter of synergy between other figures; broken figures synergise unexpectedly and a little too well: they're the social butterflies of the SWM universe.
From a meta perspective, a broken piece forces people playing tournaments/competitively to play a much more generalised squad (just on the off chance they have to go up against a highly specialised Broken squad); i suspect this causes both a hitpoint disparity and an activation/tempo control disadvantage (though I haven't investigated/rigorously tested the relationship, if any).

More often than not though, a broken piece just winds up a glass cannon/damage sponge that a whole strategy relies upon: similar to the "kill the tech tree" approach to RTS videogames.
Without the broken piece, which is usually the backbone of the broken squad, that squad becomes very uncompetitive.

I hope this helps, and I look forward to reading how this thread develops.

+1

I think it's once again important to distinguish between Broken and NPE (negative play experience). Different people have different NPEs...I love Mace, but others hate him. I hate the stinkin' Naboo Pilots/Troopers with deathshots, but others love them. That's just part of any game that is as long-lived and as complex/deep as ours.

There are actually very few pieces I would consider broken. Maybe none. Here is my definition for broken: A piece that is so dominant and powerful that it consistently wins tournaments, even at the hands of sub-par players. Is there any piece that dominates play right now?
--GOWK did, several years ago...you either played GOWK (or GOWK-hate) or you lost. There was no other option.
--There was also the tempo control issue (Dodonna/San/Ozzel) for a while, where you either played activation control or a mass-kill piece (yobuck/lancer/arica) or you lost. But even then, I'm sure that some people would classify tempo control pieces as NPEs or meta-shapers, and not as broken.
--I would probably consider Lord Hoth broken (esp paired with Bastilla) at the Epic 500pt level, because there are very few squads that can counter a well-built and well-played Hoth squad at 500.

There are dozens of pieces that I consider NPEs. NPEs are pieces/combos that are certainly powerful and game-changing, but they either don't win consistently, or they have some glaring weaknesses. NPEs are pieces that have mechanics/abilities that can be abused and/or exploited to gain a strangle-hold on the game in one way or another. I think that probably most of the pieces people call "broken" are actually just NPEs.
--Sorry, Bastilla is not broken. She's powerful, and she's a game-changer for sure. But the best Bastilla squad at Gencon this year rolled over and died in the first round of the playoffs. She won Gencon 2011, but hasn't done much since then. She's certainly an NPE for many people, though.
--Mace is not broken either. He may have won Gencon this year (and I, for one, and not sad about that!) but that was 2 sets ago, and there are now so many ways to beat him that he didn't even make a dent at the recent MI Regional.
--Atton Jaq Rand is absolutely not broken. He's rock-solid good for his points, and I honestly hope that we never see another piece as under-costed as he is, but he's not broken. He doesn't dominate the game.
--R2 Astromech is certainly strong, and has been for years. I wasn't playing when RotS was released, but I can imagine that he might well have been broken at that time, when there were no other movement breakers. I think that WotC probably didn't realize at the time just how powerful the movement-breaking mechanic (esp with Flight!) was for the game, and so they cost him at a mere 9pts. There's no question that R2 remains a huge bargain, but he's not broken.

And there are probably a dozen pieces which I'd think would be completely fine with just 1 or 2 minor adjustments.
--Mouse Droids...give them a new SA and they'll be fine: Diminutive (This piece does not provide cover, and it moves to an empty adjacent square when an enemy enters its square). This would remove the whole dumb Mouse-Wall problem which has plagued the game since the piece was released.
--Poggle the Lesser...make it Self-Destruct 10 (rather than 20) and REMOVE THE RAPPORT! and he'll be fine. We don't ever need another 2pt piece...especially not one that hits you for 20dmg when it dies.
--Mace...drop Flurry and he'd be fine.


Anyway, I could continue to add to these last 2 lists for a long time, but these are my thoughts. Take them for what they're worth. :)

I'm curious as to what your ideas for an alternative to the Ugnaught is at 3-4 points (as far as I'm concerned, 2 point pieces should never have been a possibility in the first place). The role an Ugnaught plays is purely destroying doors, and you can't get much different than Satchel Charge without getting over 4 points.