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Hey all,

I happened to catch a video of a match with the Inquisitor backed up by 2 scimitar bombers and a cutlass Punisher. That list looked pretty good but there were a few points that it seemed like the player had to cut too many things for the 4th ship. However, it got me thinking about multiple bomber builds.

At first I thought about trying to sub in Backdraft for Inquisitor but I couldn't come up with a build that saved any/enough points to make up for what I thought was missing. So I basically settled on a 3-ship list:

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Bombing Run
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99 points

Pilots
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Tomax Bren (31)
TIE Bomber (24), TIE Shuttle (0), Cool Hand (1), Twin Ion Engine Mk. II (1), Systems Officer (2), Fleet Officer (3)

“Deathrain” (40)
TIE Punisher (26), Enhanced Scopes (1), Extra Munitions (2), Concussion Missiles (4), Cluster Mines (4), Experimental Interface (3)

Gamma Squadron Veteran (28)
TIE Bomber (19), Deadeye (1), Extra Munitions (2), Flechette Torpedoes (2), Concussion Missiles (4), Guidance Chips (0)

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The idea is that Tomax will fly 1 turn behind the other 2 passing TL/ focus to the others at PS8 (with cool hand to give him an evade token to keep him alive a bit longer). Ex interface is on Deathrain so he can bomb after taking an action (probably boost) with scopes so I can bomb where aces are, not where I'm guessing they might be.

I picked Concussion missiles because it has the same % boost that proton torps, but with Tomax to pass focus tokens hopefully that won't be a problem.

Thoughts? Is this concept really just better with a 4th ship? Or is it just not a particularly competitive concept to begin with?

i like the idea of Systems officer and Fleet officer on Tomax. though i've ran the fleet officer on a bomber shuttle and honestly once you loose that it's sort of your lynch pin and it starts to fall apart quickly after that.

me personally i prefer the double tap of cluster missiles.

but other than that i like it. might be a bit of fun.

So, first of all, this is not a good list at all. I guess you have a theme in mind, but don't expect to win many games with this. That said:

Tomax needs crack shot instead of cool hand. Infinite crack shot every turn is way better than a free token. Also you have things completely backwards with firepower vs. support ships. Tomax with infinite crack shot is your best missile/torpedo platform here, but you're using him as your support ship to buff much less powerful ships. Give him homing missiles and extra munitions and put the support officers on the generic.

Deathrain wants advanced sensors instead of enhanced scopes and conner nets instead of cluster mines. Enhanced scopes is a waste of a slot, the aces you need to drop action bombs on are already higher PS than you, so all you lose is the ability to drop dial reveal bombs on lower-PS ships. Advanced sensors, on the other hand, gives you a lot more flexibility in bomb drop locations. Cluster mines are just too weak, you have to get some good luck with them just to break even vs. conner nets on damage, and the conner nets set up a target for a kill shot with conventional weapons. The concussion missiles are weak because you don't have guidance chips and will be spending your actions on making your bombs work, not taking target locks for missiles. Finally, experimental interface is an expensive luxury item, you're probably better off taking additional bombs. I've had some success with advanced sensors + conner net + proton bomb + extra munitions, you have two nets for aces and to AoE bombs for generics. It's way too expensive to be competitive, but at least it doesn't suck too badly.

The gamma vet is ok, I guess, but not amazing.

Tomax as a a support ship with a regenerating shield is nice in theory, but - as noted - if you're building ordnance-armed bombers you might as well use him as an 'attack' bomber because he's one of the best available - high PS and with access to reusable crack shot.

I'm not a massive fan of loading out a bomber with extra munitions and two seperate torpedoes or missiles; there's a pretty good chance it's going down with ordnance still in the tubes.


Deathrain is awesome fun to fly - especially, as suggested, with advanced sensors. Being able to drop a mine then get a free barrel roll on a ship that can't normally barrel roll at all is awesome. I'd probably stick with equipping deathrain as a bomb/mine ship (connors and.....I'd say probably thermal detonators - the stress token is generally worth the extra point because messing up your opponent's maneuvers is a good way of making yours better by proxy).

If you really want to try an interesting bomb/mine list, you could always try Deathrain and Deathfire (and their less well known cousin, Deathwind, and presumably, by their powers combined, Death Captain Planet).

The problem is that both are good at throwing out connor nets to mess up aces, deathrain is good at throwing out thermal detonators to mess up generics and swarms, but neither really has the stopping power to actually put someone down once you do so; I'm not sure what you'd put in as a third element.

If you're flying Deathrain, and dropping bombs using your front arc, then you really really really need to pay attention to which ships have tractor beam... I don't want to talk about how I found that out...

Peregrine, you are totally right about Tomax... I let myself get too focused on him as a shuttle (where crack shot is good but maybe not mandatory) instead of thinking about his basic power.

Maybe Jonus or a generic are the way to go for TIE Shuttles.

I guess the idea needs some work at the drawing board

Shuttle Tomax isn't bad, but if you're using ordnance-carrying bombers anyway, it seems wierd not to use the best ordnance-carrier in the game as a gunslinger rather than a support ship.

You could give a Rhymer shuttle with Snap Shot and a Tactician a try. For gaks and giggles.

Can I ask why a Rhymer shuttle with snap and tactician? Wouldn't a generic work as well?


What about the following?

Jonus + Shuttle + Vet instincts, + systems officer + fleet officer
Bren + crack shot + xtra munitions + homing missile
deathrain + extra munitions+ conner net+ proton bomb + advanced sensors

Rhymer extends the range of Snap Shot to range 2, so tactician gives your foe a stress automatically, making sure he has no action, so he remains at range 2 of you, so you give him another whack with the stress stick. It worked annoyingly well against me tonight.