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Hey folks, firstly thanks for reading. TLDR: look for bold and colors

I've become a bit of an x-wing nut but I'm also somewhat of an armchair general for lack of a good solid truly local gaming community. Gonna see about entering an x-wing tournament a few towns over. As far as I know it should be a pretty standard 100pt affair, gonna see about signing up and getting details later but 100pts is a pretty safe assumption in a vacuum. I've more or less got the rules down, probably enough to keep from blatantly embarrassing myself, but I have no idea what's going on with the meta meta or local meta, or what *really* works in a list against a competent opponent who both knows what they're doing and has also researched competitive builds. So far I've only had luck flying relatively casual.

I honestly like all three factions just fine, and have mostly followed the one-of-everything approach so far. I'd prefer to not buy anything else to use for the tournament, though I'm missing a couple of expansions from my collection that will probably deflate some common builds.

I've got 3 starters and one of everything else except for: Millennium Falcon, Slave 1, original b-wing, original tie-interceptor, aggressor, tie bomber, or any of the epic ships.. So there's a lot to work with but I'm missing certain pilots (Fel), and a few key cards like engine upgrade, and I don't have too much in the way of saturation of any one thing ( except x-wings, ties, sort of z95s).

I'll be picking up falcon and slave if they happen to come back in stock anytime soon, but for now it's best to assume I don't have access to them.

So are you up to the challenge? I'm sure my lack of inexperience will be my greatest enemy, but I'd like to bring a solid list so I can put up the best fight possible. Something sturdy and easy to drive if possible, though I've got a bit of time to practice trickier stuff if necessary.

Thanks again for looking

Well you said you have 1 of everything except "X" which means you have 1 phantom and 1 Decimator which means you can run probably the most popular meta defining list which is "Whisper" and Rear Admiral Chiraneau with the requisite upgrades. if you want the net list, just Google it and you'll be good as gold. The Decimator is sturdy and easy to fly. The Phantom takes some getting used to but is really not hard to fly either. It'll be almost hard countered by Super Dash (or Han) and Corran Horn but you'll do fine in a tournament regardless.

You could also run SuperDash and Corran.

First, you'll have to narrow this down a bit. There are a lot of lists with very different strategies that can be viable in a tournament, especially if you aren't determined to win the whole thing or die trying. What do you use in casual games? What kind of ships/lists do you enjoy playing with?

IMO your biggest problem is going to be your lack of ships. A lot of the lists that only use one of each ship type are elite-focused lists (Dash + Corran, Whisper + decimator, etc) that require a lot of practice to be successful. The straightforward lists like TIE swarms and BBBBZ obviously need multiple copies of particular ships.

Fair points.

To better condense my jabberings:
Punchy ships over arc dodge/awings or similar.
Mini TIE Swarm + Elite ship?
Stress/Ion List?
If I had to buy one or possibly two ships, I would still consider a list if sufficiently fun/viable.


@bocatt: Do those lists work without engine upgrade? I was under the impression that Dash tended to get it (but I could be totally wrong) and that it turned the Deci into an arc dodger practically. Running the Decimator could be fun, a bit intimidated by how fragile the phantom is, however.

@Peregrine: I've taken most of my ships out for a spin but I've not really settled on a playstyle I prefer yet, not enough games. I guess I would like something punchy. I really thought I liked fast zippy ships but the last game I took A-wings saw a couple of A-wings and Ties circling eachother at the end for turns and turns. Felt like playing a WoW arena match with good healers and bad DPS, drug on for days and we were getting a little bored. I guess I'd like to maybe step away from that and focus on hitty ships that are going to get the job done or get blown up. Probably a bit more straightforward to play to some degree as opposed to arc dodgers (as neat as those can be).

But then I only have one B-wing and just a couple of Y's (which probably aren't as great as B's even with the new stuff from scum). I've got Z's and lots of missiles, but I think most ordinance is kind of suboptimal these days? An assault missile would be great fun to feed to a tie swarm, but 2 ship lists would probably just giggle at the waste of points.

What about stress/ion control, have we seen that pick up steam yet? It sounds a bit annoying but some of my favorite MTG decks of yore were dispel/discard/land destruction, and stress/ion seems kind of similar.

I do have 7 tie fighters, but I'd need a lot of practice to run a swarm of them without crashing them into eachother. Something like 7 seems like a nightmare without a lot of practice...

Do Empire players run much in the way of mini-swarm+elite ship nowadays? Something like the Decimator/defender/phantom/whatever backed by a blob of ties (but not a massive blob that I'm gonna trip over my own feet with). Or is it easier to fly 6-7 ties in formation than I'm thinking?

I would *really* like to make use of the TIE Defender, but supposedly the white K-turn tends to make it more predictable than versatile and it's a bit expensive for what it does.

Yup the Defender is predictable but still awesome. And you can actually fool people by not taking the predictable maneuver. It's not competitive because it's overcosted.

Decimator with Darth Vader crew and a mini swarm (Howlrunner and 2 academy TIEs) can do a lot of damage and its enough hull points to be hard to chew through for other lists.

Ok, here are a couple of ideas that I've been using recently:

Blue squadron b-wing with fire control x2
Gold squadron y-wing with R3-A2, ion turret, BTL-A4
Roark with ion turret and recon specialist

Two b-wings to be nice straightforward brawlers, and the y-wing to pile on stress tokens (two per turn at range 1-2!) and occasionally even ion something. And of course Roark gives you PS 12 when you need it against phantoms or to get in one last shot with a damaged ship. Against phantoms and similar maneuverable ships you sit in one corner, spread your arcs, and let Roark boost whoever has a shot (preferably the y-wing since once the phantom is stressed and can't re-cloak your other ships can kill it easily). Against big ships you have efficient firepower from three of your ships, as even the y-wing can put quite a bit of damage on a low-agility target. Against lists like this you have two ion sources and can take b-wings and similar low-agility targets out of the fight while you focus on killing the rest of their ships.

Alternatively:

Corran with PTL, FCS, R2-D2, engine upgrade
Gold squadron y-wing with R3-A2, ion turret, BTL-A4
Garven or Biggs (add a bomb to the y-wing if you take Biggs)

Again, quite a bit of firepower with the stress y-wing adding control. You give your opponent a difficult choice: go for Corran and chase him around the table while the other two ships get free shots, or take that y-wing out ASAP before it cripples something with a dozen stress tokens and let Corran get into endgame and avoid focused fire. The problem is that this list requires a lot of practice to get used to it. Between shooting on alternate turns and having to do green banks/straights every turn Corran doesn't fly like most other ships. You have to learn things like how to get turned around and back into the fight with only 45* turns on your dial, when to move in aggressively for the kill vs. when to sit back and stay in turtle mode, when to skip using PTL to set up a k-turn (and how to avoid taking too much damage in the process), etc. But once you figure it out Corran seems to be the kind of ship you want: once he sets up a good shot (potentially two shots at range 1 with focus and TL, if Garven helps) ships just disappear from the table.

And now I just realized that you don't have engine upgrade, so this second list doesn't work. Corran without the boost option can't get back into the fight with only 45* turns.

@bocatt: Do those lists work without engine upgrade?

They can, but not very well. Find a way to get engine upgrade, either buy the card or borrow it from someone who has a YT-1300.

What about stress/ion control, have we seen that pick up steam yet? It sounds a bit annoying but some of my favorite MTG decks of yore were dispel/discard/land destruction, and stress/ion seems kind of similar.

Stress/ion as a list element? Yes. Stress/ion as your entire list? No. The problem with "control" lists is the same one that people found in MTG: you don't win the game fast enough, and you give your opponent too much time to find a way to come back. And it's even worse in a timed tournament where you might have your opponent completely locked down but fail to finish them off before the round ends. So what you actually see is the equivalent of aggro-control decks in MTG. You use the stress/ion/whatever element to take a key target out of the fight and give yourself an opportunity, and then you use your offensive threats to exploit that opportunity and wipe your opponent's ships off the table before they can figure out a way to deal with the control.

I would *really* like to make use of the TIE Defender, but supposedly the white K-turn tends to make it more predictable than versatile and it's a bit expensive for what it does.

It's not just the white k-turn, it's the combination of having such a great maneuver and such a poor dial otherwise (turns are red, all greens are straight). It has its one gimmick, and you will very often know what it wants to do because that one option is so clearly better. But predictability wouldn't be such a bad thing if it wasn't so fragile for its point cost. The lack of an evade action and ability to use PTL means those 6 HP disappear way too quickly. Pretty much every time I've seen a TIE defender in a game, whether playing with it or just watching, it has died before it could really do much to justify the investment.

I should have mentioned no epic ships. I honestly thought I had, whoops =/ I had been considering getting the transport but I dunno about on this time table, and the lists you posted looked cool too... I'm sure having R3-A3 on the y-wing is the lynchpin though. My bad.

Crikey, engine upgrade is 9 dollars on eBay, thats halfway to a properly discounted falcon once they're back in stock... shoot I think i'd just as well lose horribly than pay such extortion lol.

So no total control list but something like what you put above, stress/ion sprinkled to taste to get the job done, cool.

I feared as much for the defender, kind of lame.

Thanks for the info, I shall have to do some more pondering.

Forgot to mention no TIE bombers either, though I don't think it's a big issue.

Saw a game from a year or two ago involving two B-wings with advanced sensors, a rookie pilot, and Biggs. Seemed pretty straightforward and punchy. B-wings are a bit harder to come by these days though, of course.

Seems like running Dash w/o engine upgrade would be unwise. I've got access to Leebo, of course, but that's probably exactly the card you *don't* want to use at tournaments for how predictable it makes that second boost. R7-T1 could boost Horn around but at the cost of R2-D2 that's kind of self-defeating. Does Dash work with something like a couple of refit prototype pilots and a Z, or a few z's or something? Though, really, still relying on leboost probably means I shouldn't even consider Dash for now.

I mean, I'm a nice guy, but handing out easy wins is really just throwing the math off for players who don't get to play me

The lack of the Rebel Transport is a pity, I'm currently loving my X-Wing squad that's based around a lot of the droid cards in it. - It can quite comfortably kill a decimator in 2 rounds of shooting. They struggled a bit hunting down a phantom though.

================
Holiday Squadron
================

100 points

Pilots
------

Garven Dreis (29)
X-Wing (26), R2-D6 (1), Wingman (2)

"Hobbie" Klivian (27)
X-Wing (25), R3-A2 (2)

Biggs Darklighter (31)
X-Wing (25), R2-F2 (3), Experimental Interface (3)

Tala Squadron Pilot (13)

However, Hobbie is really quite an annoyance for a phantom, and a competant player (EG not me), can take advantage of that.



If you want to try something more scummy, I had an enjoyable time fielding Emon Azzameen combined with an Intelligence agent and a bomb or two. (I imagine a proximity mine would be pretty hilarious - Sure thing Mr Phantom, I may have no idea where you're finishing... but I know where you're going to be going...) This may require some competence at judging distances though.

I may pick up the 3 epic ships and any missing expansions down the road this year, especially if I don't go to any conventions or back too many/any kickstarters...

Wonder if there's any point to taking a Y-wing with the title and a turret of some sort, along with the R7-T1 so he could have a little help turning back around to take advantage of both guns in the main arc more often...


Emon with bombs would be amusing, when I eventually pick up a Slave 1 I'll be eager to try it out.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Was looking over my scum stuff, seems like it could be fun to run a kind of a swarm.. something like...

Suhlak 20-22
lone wolf
hotshot?

Serissu 23-25
stealth device
swarm tactics, squad leader, wingman, nothing?

Binayre Pirate 12

Binayre Pirate 12

Palob 25-30
Ion Turret
Some kind of crew?

Obviously it's really shaky at this point, partly because I'm expecting it to get torn up and something better suggested The hawk could just as easily be a Y-wing with a turret and some useful astromech or similar. Obviously Suhlak flies around by himself and tries to do some damage before going down. Lone wolf seems ideal, the hotshot blaster would give him something to do if he got outmaneuvered at any point.. kind of like bringing a cheaper missile that's a turret...

I may be overestimating the value of Serissu to the rest of the group though. If it's not too useful, could bring along a Y-wing in it's place for a solid boost in health. Drop the hawk and take 2 y-wings and2 z's flying together, and Suhlak flying off to the side.


Am I heading down the wrong road here?

So I managed to order a Falcon and Slave1 from Miniature Market, should be here in a couple of days... that ought to significantly open up my options, no?

I guess it's mostly using either ship itself, VI, and engine upgrade that has changed...

Also how does

Scum 100pts

Kavil (31)
24
2 R4 Agromech
4 Blaster Turret
1 Veteran Instincts

Syndicate Thug (25)
18
0 BTL-A4 Y-Wing
2 R4 Agromech
5 Ion Turret

N'dru Suhlak (19)
17
2 Lone Wolf

Binayre Pirate (12)

Binayre Pirate (12)

sound?

I think there's a point left over for initiative, could switch to unhinged mech on the thug but still not enough points for clusters on suhlak.

I guess I have a slave 1 I could consider too.

Yeah I would trade Suhlak and the Thug for

Boba Fett (39)
Push the Limit
Recon Specialist

Leave Kavil and the 2 Binyares alone.