This past Friday night, I got in a pair of 3-player games of X-Wing. This was purely casual scenario play. I made all the first game's 50-pt lists beforehand to develop a narrative: Luke teamed up with Rebel agents to rescue a captured comrade from the Empire but a ruthless bounty hunter working for the Hutts got to her first.
Krassis Trelix w/Heavy Laser Canons, Cluster Missiles, Rebel Captive
Luke Skywalker w/R2-D2
Rebel Operative w/Saboteur
Howlrunner w/Swarm Tactics
Black Sqn Pilot
Black Sqn Pilot
Krassis started in one corner, the Rebels on the other corner of the same side, and the Imperials in the middle of the far edge. Rather than heading for the center of the table, as I expected, the Rebels started to turn sharply along their edge of the mat toward the TIEs. The TIEs moved forward cautiously, mindful that my Firespray was edging toward the center with its HCL. The Imperial player did some skillful maneuvering into action while the Rebel player, and this was his first game, boldly if awkwardly forged ahead with no plan other than simply to attack. Luke lost his shields immediately and the mini-swarm finished the job on the next turn.
Meanwhile, I had crept in on the TIEs and put a bit of damage on them but came away without any kills. The TIEs for their part made short work on the HWK-290, suffering very little in return. It was then all three of them, two with one damage and one with two, against my slightly-damaged Firespray. This was my first time flying the strange ship but I had a blast with its front & back arcs even if I spent the balance of the game unskillfully shooting from the back one. But it was enough, one by one the TIEs dropped even as they continued to pile on the hurt. At last, we were down to one hull point left each and the Force was not with the Empire. Krassis escaped with his prisoner.
At this point, the Rebel player demanded a rematch with a different list. I obliged, quickly drawing up new builds (some of which I cannot now remember):
Krassis Trelix w/Heavy Laser Canons, Proximity Mine, _____
Tycho Celchu w/Deadeye
Red Sqn Pilot w/_____
Saber Sqn Pilot w/Veteran Instincts, Stealth Device
Saber Sqn Pilot w/Veteran Instincts, Stealth Device
This time, the Rebel Pilot turned directly toward the Imperials. He wanted blood. He was also flying very capably now, which is a great testament to the accessibility of the game. The Imperial player ignored me for the time being. He seemed just as eager to engage the bold Rebels. I planned to approach gingerly as before, hoping these guys would beat on each other and let me clean up the resulting mess. The Imperial player was bit more cunning than that. As soon as I moved in, he broke off his attack on the Rebels and attempted to come about on my Firespray. For my part, I also swung around edgeward and figured this was the best time to drop the proximity mine:
I later found the mine had the desired effect, making the Interceptors waste a turn of movement to avoid it. But in the meantime, they turned their considerable firepower onto Tycho. The farther away Interceptor in the picture above opened up first:
In case the picture is hard to see, yes, that is three critical results and four blanks on the agility dice. Tycho's critical cards made sense: damaged cockpit, injured pilot, and weapons malfunction. But he never had to worry about that considering the apparent shot to the cockpit blew him up. Once again, the Rebel player lost most of his points early on. Even worse, in a bizarre demonstration of shell shock, the Rebel player immediately turned his X-Wing into my proximity mine. Fortunately for us both -- given only one of the Interceptors had lost its Stealth Device thus far -- it was not enough to do him in.
At that point, the Imperial player really turned on me. If he thought the Rebel player was out of the fight, however, he couldn't have been more wrong. The lone, damaged X-Wing pursued the Interceptors like their shadow. It was some very impressive flying for a new player. I picked off one of the Interceptors and cordially told the Rebel player that I was now a much greater threat to him than the Imperial player. Despite the Imperial player's sincere agreement, the Rebel player could not forget Luke and Tycho. With determination and not a little gallantry, he jousted with the Interceptor while I tried to recover a line of fire into the center of the mat. To his jubilation, especially after taking such catastrophic losses, the Rebel managed to shoot down the last Interceptor before I could finish either of them off. Unfortunately, the limping X-wing was at that point particularly easy prey for my Firespray.
