Confirmed mechanic

Is Hawks Required on Story Missions?

Hawks must deploy on every story mission, while skirmish missions allow any Operator combination.

Official answer

Direct answer

Hawks must deploy on every story mission, while skirmish missions allow any Operator combination.

Why it matters

This rule makes the protagonist a fixed planning constraint only for the main story layer.

Practical planning rules

Reserve one story-mission slot for Hawks.
Use skirmishes to test squads that omit Hawks.
Do not interpret roster freedom as permission to bench Hawks in the campaign's critical missions.

These rules translate the published mechanic into a pre-release planning checklist. They are not a tier list and do not assume unpublished costs, damage values or difficulty modifiers.

Launch-day verification

At release, this page will be checked against menus, tooltips and live mission behavior. If the development build changed, the dated official statement will remain in the update history while the direct answer is corrected for the shipping version.

Source and evidence boundary

The direct answer on this page is grounded in a first-party publication. It does not convert unreleased values, inferred story beats or marketing footage into confirmed gameplay data. Any development-stage value will be checked again against the launch build.

EA: Answering the Internet's Biggest Questions · Fact-check: July 25, 2026