Astromech droids! Who doesn’t love a good astromech droid? They’re the coolest. They’re an iconic part of the Star Wars universe and they also have a little niche in X-Wing Miniatures.
There are only a few ships in X-Wing that can take an astromech; the X-Wing, the Y-Wing, and the E-Wing. With only three ships capable of equipping them, astromech droids are far from a common sight on the battlefield. Battlefield? Battlespace? Whatever you get it.
So. Let’s look at what droids are out there waiting to help you stand up to the might of the Empire (or whatever foes you happen to run into in space).
R2 Astromech
The R2 series astromech was the most successful line of astromech droids in history. R2 units saw use decades after their initial production and were by far the most sought after model of astromech.
In X-Wing the R2 Astromech card offers a lot of utility. “
You may treat all 1 and 2 speed maneuvers as green maneuvers.” For only 1 point this is a fantastic little droid to slap onto an X-Wing or Y-Wing. E-Wings could probably care less, but with the X-Wing and Y-Wing’s limited amount of green maneuvers, the generic R2 Unit is worth the inclusion if you have one point left to add to your sqaud.
R2-F2
R2-F2, as far as I know, is the first instance of Fantasy Flight Games making up something for X-Wing, which is awesome. R2-F2 didn’t exist before X-Wing Miniatures. Since the core release of X-Wing, FFG has created “Echo” and “Whisper,” the Tie Phantom pilots, as well as the amazing looking new Imperial Raider.
R2-F2 allows you to increase your agility value by 1 until the end of the round. The catch is this costs your oh so precious action. Little ol’ Eff Too tends to find the most use on his buddy Biggs Darklighter, who needs to stay alive as long as possible. He’s usually just not worth it. He costs 3 points, and you need to use your action to get anything out of him. Experimental Interface might be a good combo with him, though at an additional 3 points you better think good and hard before you try that one out.
R2-D6
R2-D6 flew with Wedge Antillies as well as saw Starkiller do some stuff on Kamino or something.
In any case, Deesix let’s you give your “less talented” pilots some new moves. If you’re pilot skill is 3 or more, and you can’t already take an Elite Pilot Talent, this guy lets you take one, which can be pretty great. Though he is unique, so only one of your talentless guys get’s to up his game in your squad.
Deesix is particularly good on Y-Wings since none of the Y-Wings pilots can take an EPT without his help.
R2-D2
R2-D2, in my humble opinion, is the most reliable character in the entire Star Wars universe. You need something done, you go don’t go ask Obi Wan to get it done, don’t ask Luke, don’t ask Yoda, go ask R2. He’ll get it done. R2 will do it all. He’ll bring you your lightsabers so you can chop off some chumps’ heads off, he’ll get you some jogan fruit, to helping you blow up the Death Star (hey maybe he aimed those Proton Torpedoes ’cause he knew Luke would miss. Who Knows). R2 get’s shit done.
Anyway. R2’s got your back in X-Wing too. Debatably the best astromech in the whole game, he’ll regenerate your shields whenever you execute a green maneuver. That’s fantastic. Shields are a big deal. Though if an enemy ship has you in his sights, R2 might make your moves somewhat predictable.
He fits well on pretty much any ship, but he seems to find his best match with Luke Skywalker (D’awww.)
R3-A2
R3-A2 was one of the droid chilling at Echo Base (no pun intended. Ok it was intended). That’s pretty much all there is to him.
Aytoo, or “Stressbot” as he’s more commonly called is a droid who has been getting a lot of use these days. “When you declare the target of your attack, if the defender is inside your firing arc, you may receive 1 stress token to cause the defender to receive 1 stress token.”
This guy is great. He must just start throwing out the nastiest insults, resulting in the enemy getting stressed, as well as the poor sap flying his ship, since he had to listen to all of that. or something.
Put R3-A2 on Hobbie and you’ll have some fun.
R4-D6
R4-D6 was a blue droid. That’s about all there is to know about him. He was around at the battle of Yavin.
Basically if R4-D6 is riding along on your ship and you fail to avoid at least 3 hits, you can cancel those hits until there’s only two left. But you take a stress for each hit you cancel like that.
This guy is a tricky one. You could mitigate damage down to two each time you’re shot, which could be great on a low agility Y-Wing. But you get a lot of stress out of it. This guy hasn’t seen much play yet, but maybe he’ll find his niche somewhere. Hang in there R4-D6. Hang in there.
R5 astromech
The R5 series astromech was what you bought if you couldn’t afford any other type of astromech.
“A meter-tall stack of the worst business decisions you could possibly want.“―Mechtech Illustrated, criticizing the R5-series.
This generic R5 uinit will help fix your ship during combat. A bit. If you have any faceup damage cards with the SHIP trait, you can flip those cards facedown at the end of the round. Not bad.
I don’t think I’ve ever flown with an R5, nor have I seen anyone else fly with one. For one point, the ability to ignore a potentially crippling crit, particularly the dreaded direct hit, seems like a good deal. Particularly on a Y-Wing who has more hull to potentially get crits.
Pairing the R5 with the Determination EPT is a decent combo, Determination ignores PILOT crits, and R5 flips down SHIP crits. No crits for you!
Try him out, see if you can be the one to make the R5 Astromech work for you. Be a trend setter. Or don’t. Whatever.
R5-D8
R5-D8 was Jek Porkin’s droid. Best friends since childhood (or so I imagine) they flew together at the Battle of Yavin, and both exploded into a horrendous fireball together, just how they would’ve wanted.
R5-D8 is one of the few droids who will essentially regenerate health for you, though it costs your action to do, and even then it’s not guaranteed.
Though this droid’s ability has a high cost (3 points + your action), he fits really well with Porkins, who might hurt himself using his own ability. A fun risky combo to try out.
R5-P9
R5-P9 was just some droid who blew up on a Y-Wing at the Battle of Endor.
R5-P9 is a fantastic droid who rivals R2-D2 when it comes to fixing your shields. You have to spend a focus token at the end of the combat phase to recover a shield. A lot of times you might end up spending that token, but sometimes, just sometimes, you’ll have that sweet token leftover at the end of the phase and then R5-P9 will hook you up with some juicy shields.
R5-K6
R5-K6 was the droid of Garven Dreis. He died with Dreis when they were shot down by Vader at the Battle of Yavin.
R5-K6 is probably one of the least used droids in the game. It’s almost impossible to justify using him.
After you spend your target lock, if you roll an EVADE result on one evade die, you can re-aquire that target lock. So it’s similar to a fire control system, it even costs the same amount of points, but it’s not guaranteed! Why?! R5-K6 would be amazing if he was guaranteed to work every time! Or at least let me roll 2 green dice to try get him to activate. I don’t know. R5-K6 is probably doomed to stay in the hangar and never make it into combat ever again.
Just look at the art on his card! He’s staring at that X-Wing going “Please let me fly with you. Please?”
R7 Astromech
The R7 series astromech was designed specifically for use with the E-Wing.
The R7 astromech is a good defensive upgrade. If you’ve got a target lock on the guy who’s shooting at you, you can spend it to reroll the 
attacker’s attack dice. Not bad.
The R7 astromech is just begging to be put on board Tarn Mison’s X-Wing, and in fact this is really the only place I seem to see the R7 used. They’re perfect for each other. The only minor setback is that you can only use the R7 once per round.
R7-T1
R7-T1 was in an E-Wing when Luke Skywalker needed to use one one time. Luke wasn’t quite comfortable with the E-Wing or Artee.
Artee is a pretty neat little droid. He let’s you target lock and boost for one action. Though you need to be in the firing arc of the guy you’re target locking and at range 1-2. This can be pretty handy for closing the gap on an enemy, or putting a some more distance between you and the guy tailing you. R7-T1 is a good choice for Y-Wings (particularly Dutch) since they could use the added mobility.
Well that’s it for all of the astromech droids in X-Wing Miniatures! Pretty soon we’ll be seeing the crazy exciting new “salvaged astromech” upgrades coming with the Scum and Villainy facition.
I can’t wait for these crazy guys and their crazy friends.
P.S. Go back up and click the link on R2-D2.