First thing's first. This took me a few days to design but it's kinda cool. The Punch Droid beats everything in the 5th or 10th level challenge in a way that's not that interesting to write about, it's just everything exploding to punches. I decided to make a build that would be new to me and here's what I got.
Reaction Jackson, 5th level Near-Human (Soldier 2, Scout 3)
Str 13
Dex 19
Con 14
Int 11
Wis 10
Cha 6
Hp 57
Ref 22
Will 15
Fort 19
Soldier 1, Feat: Heavy Weapon Prof, Weapon Focus, Talent: Armor basics
Scout 1, Talent: Evasion
Scout 2, Feat: Quick Draw, Return Fire
Soldier 2, Feat: Dual Weapon Mastery
Scout 3, Feat: Combat Reflexes, Talent: Blast Back
Attacks: Grenade Launcher +9 or +4/+4 (8d6+2)
Skills: Mechanics +7, Use Computer +7, Initiative +11
Gear: Highly modified Krail 210 Power Armor with shield generators and mounted weaponry. Krath Thinsuit, Bronzium Shield Gauntlet, Double-bladed sword, SR 20 Energy Shield, Stealth Field Generator, Holoshroud
Tricks: I had an idea for a build based on reaction shots so I mixed that with the Iron Man concept I posted about earlier and made Reaction Jackson. He's still got an Iron Man suit so his AC is really high, he flys, and he's got a bunch of different grenade launchers and missile launchers. His build is based around getting as many shots on enemy turns as possible. When someone misses a ranged attack against the character he gets to make an attack back and also if anyone hits him with an area attack he gets to make an attack back. Punching him is really the only thing that makes him not hit you with missiles on what was supposed to be your turn.
His armor is also really cool, it's special abilities are: It gives him DR 2 and SR 10 which is basically DR 12 against most things, it can double his shield bonus by reducing his to-hit score, it can cancel one attack per encounter, and it has an asston of grenade launchers and other weapons.
5th Level Challenges
6 Thugs: Even if we assume that I am somewhere where flight is not an option these guys still eat it. They can surround me and swing all day and they will only hit me on 20's which I can then cancel or just let through to be eaten by my shield rating anyway. I could just stab every thug to death and still win.
Bounty Hunter: His best trick is that I only hit him on a 19 but since this idiot didn't take evasion I will deal him 30 damage even on misses. I'll drop him to at least half health in an opening salvo of shots that will never hit him and then he'll die from the same treatment + reaction shots on round 2
2 Droideka's: These guys have shields that are really impressive, letting them chop 20 damage off anything that hits them. If I only use one shot instead of two my accuracy goes up which makes it more likely I do full damage with both my regular and return shots. Their first round of shots will wipe out my shields but only a few points of actual damage and generate a response attack. By round two their shields would be depleted a bit now so I'd go full offense and launch 2 attacks which would damage them enough that the next time they miss I'll kill them a reaction shot. I'd come out of this fight beat up, probably only 10-20 hp but I'd win.
2 Wampas: Hahaha suck a dick Wampa's. They miss too much and barely damage me, even if this fight is in a closet I can just launch grenades at my feat because I have evasion and they don't so I'm immune and they'll take 30-60 damage a round. They'll die before round 2 is over.
Luke Skywalker: I've tried every strategy I can think of and Luke kicks my ass in all of them. Luke has Evasion, more HP than me, and I only hit him on a 17+ and even then he's only taking half damage. Luke will hack at me until I'm dead. Even in a location where I could fly he could actually wait me out until my Jet Pack eventually failed and then just keep murdering me. This is a loss.
5th Level Wins: 4 out of 5. Next up the tenth level version.
Reaction Jackson, 10th level Near Human (Soldier 4, Scout 6)
Str 13
Dex 20
Con 14
Int 12
Wis 10
Cha 6
Hp 81
Ref 30
Will 20
Fort 25
Soldier 1, Feat: Heavy Weapon Prof, Weapon Focus, Talent: Armor basics
Scout 1, Talent: Evasion
Scout 2, Feat: Quick Draw, Return Fire
Soldier 2, Feat: Dual Weapon Mastery
Scout 3, Feat: Combat Reflexes, Talent: Blast Back
Soldier 3, Talent: Armor Specialization
Soldier 4, Feat: Dual Weapon Mastery 2
Scout 4, Feat: Sniper Shot
Scout 5, Feat: Heavy Armor, Talent: Second Strike
Scout 6, Feat: Attack Combo
Attacks: Grenade Launcher +15 or +13/+13 (8d6+5), Proton Torpedo +15 (12d10+10)
Skills: Mechanics +12, Use Computer +12, Initiative +15, Stealth +32
Gear: Highly modified Krail 210 Power Armor with shield generators and mounted weaponry. Krath Thinsuit, Bronzium Shield Gauntlet, Double-bladed sword, SR 20 Energy Shield, Stealth Field Generator+various other Stealth boosting gear, Holoshroud
Tricks: Move forward a few levels and this guy just fills the air with explosions. He took a talent called Second Strike which says "When you miss A TARGET with single melee or ranged attack" you can move and make another attack as a free action. Combining this with an AOE attack is amazing because odds are good you'll miss one target in the pile of dudes you're shooting at which now generates a whole nother attack. This character now gets two shots on his turn +1 if he ever missed anyone under his AOE's +1 for every person that missed me +1 if anyone hits me with an AOE. This mixes well with a feat called "Attack Combo" which says that if I hit with two attacks a round I deal an extra die of damage, so past the first round he'll deals an extra d6 or d10 or whatever. The character also has a Proton Torpedo Launcher now which can deal a fuckton of damage and he'll save that for use against vehicles. Finally the character has a lot of gear which buffs his Stealth checks. I'm not including that ability of his in any of the combat breakdowns below but I would build the character this way in a real game because being able to go invisible and go off the RNG of people's perception checks is always a great ability.
10th Level Challenges
Darth Vader and Stormtroopers: The Stormtroopers are a huge help to me in this fight. Darth doesn't have Evasion and whenever a Stormtrooper shoots at me I'm gonna return a grenade. Darth's force powers can let him stunlock me for a round or two but thats about it. For my part I can hit him for 50 damage a round and get a move on top of it. Ignoring even any return fire I'll get from the Stormtroopers I will kill Darth in 4 rounds and can either outmaneuver him or just let him attack me. Basically this is the Luke Skywalker fight but without Evasion and with me having 5 more levels.
2 Rancors: I have a lot of capabilities the Rancors don't like Stealth fields and flight but if a floor underneath me opens up and just drops me into a Rancor Pit I'm fucking dead. Rancors are grapple monsters and their monstrous +27 check is 14 points beyond mine and every round they pin me they can wail on me for 25 damage. This is one of those fights I definitely lose in a closet but definitely win in a forest. Still I'll call this one a loss.
3 Arc Troopers: Arc Troopers are probably the nastiest troop type in the whole game. I'm more likely to go first than they are and I do enough damage to drop one a round but they have "destiny points" which can be used to negate attacks. On their round the two healthy ones could just declare that they crit me for 10d10+10 damage apiece which between the two of them is enough to kill me immediately. My armor can negate one of those attacks but the other is either gonna take off half my health. That sucks but after that things swing back in my favor. They only hit me on 20's once they've used up their auto-hits and if they use missiles on me they'll realize I'm immune to AOE's. Every miss they make also gives me another shot back so I'm going to burn through these guys incredibly quickly. The only way I lose this fight is if I miss every shot on the opening round. Since I hit on 5's it's not super likely but it's possible so it would probably be wise for me to add a Force Point to one of those attacks to make it all but certain I hit.
6 Droideka's: Suck my butt droids I've leveled past you. These guys can't hit me anymore and every shot they miss gives me free shots back and I only miss them on a nat 1. This would just be me raining grenades on hapless droids who showed up to die.
AT-AT and 10 Stormtroopers: As before the Stormtroopers actually help me in this fight. I'd never realized just how tough an AT-AT is in this system, it's got 300 hp and DR 20 which actually made me check my ammo count to make sure I wouldn't just run out before it died. I only deal about 25 damage a turn even with direct hits so for the first round I'd probably just clear out the troops. Everyone on their side only hits me on 20's so I'll have all the reaction shots I could want. On round 2 hitting the AT-AT twice activates my attack combo which means on my next turn I can fire my proton torpedo launcher for 14d10+10 damage which even through DR 20 still lands about 70 damage. I think it would take me about 11 rounds of pouring fire into the AT-AT to kill it which actually includes a round to reload. It can't hurt me but if this was a "Save the Orphanage" style mission I think there'd be a lot of dead british children around.
10th Level Wins: 4 out of 5