Rebel Saboteurs are a collection of numerous but subtle changes made from the original FFG design. First off the nerfs made to them from the early part of the game by FFG have been rolled back to restore them to their former glory, the elite version at least. Sabs were truly ahead of their time and the game just wasn't ready for them, but in the post Jabba's Realm era the pre-nerf Sabs would probably be just fine and possibly not even strong enough to stand up to things like Jet Troopers and Weequays.
To help them keep up with the power creep that FFG introduced to the game after their initial release, their Accuracy and Health were bumped up by 1 and their figure cost (not deployment cost) dropped from 4 to 3 points.
You'll still need to get close with Sabs to do damage, but if you are able to get them close and get some tokens onto them, you can do a ton of damage to an opponent that hasn't properly spaced out their figures. In fact it's very common for a Sab attack to do more damage to the figure's adjacent to the target than to the target itself.
Sabs benefit greatly from any support abilities that can help them add surges to their rolls. Surge power tokens from Jyn Erso or Ko-Tun, Hidden tokens from Murne, and extra surges from cards like Blitz and Overwhelming Impact will help them to maximize their Overload ability. Many Sab players will tell you that you should also never leave Targeting Computer off of them when playing them. Heavy Fire is also fantastic with Saboteurs for adding to their spread damage but also being a great way for them to push damage through things like Zillo Technique when they need to just get that last damage in on a target to finish it off. The Stun is rarely a problem because they are usually already close to the enemy when they attack and priority target means they don't have to worry about moving to get line of sight past a blocking figure.
Sabs also have the Spy trait which opens up Command card disruption like Intel Leak, Strategic Shift and Comm Disruption. And having access to a surge for Stun makes them very good at countering things like On the Lam, Call the Vanguard and Dying Lunge as well as abilities like Return Fire and End of Round attacks.
