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Besides assault missiles of course. List in question, and yes I know it's well known:

2 PS1 tie fighters
3 PS3 tie interceptors
howlrunner with shield upgrade

I've played against it with 3 rookie xwings, a bandit squad zwing and a blue squad bwing. I didn't really do anything. Others with different setups had similar results. Even a guy who's really good with his tie phantoms got totaled.

On paper running 8 zwings would work, but 2 attack dice vs 3 evade dice isn't the best.

The evasion is high, to re-roll is stupid and it seems my only option is to break their formation, but I can't do that without sacrificing 1-2 of my ships.

I know not to meet the group head on, to try to get around them, but it's always the same moves with this guy. Deploy on side with less rocks, move up 2, move up 2 and shoot at anything in range, then start turning or flipping.

It's complete nonsense TBH, the sheer volume of dice is impossible to stop, both defending against it and shooting at them.

Finally it's no secret that no one actually likes playing against this player at our FLGS, so aside from simply not playing this guy, what do? I don't want to advocate list tailoring but this setup is just, well, something FFG itself doesn't even like.

Thanks.

Well, there's this.

Boba Fett — Firespray-31 39
Seismic Charges 2
Assault Missiles 5

Scimitar Squadron Pilot — TIE Bomber 16
Seismic Charges 2

Scimitar Squadron Pilot — TIE Bomber 16
Seismic Charges 2

Scimitar Squadron Pilot — TIE Bomber 16
Seismic Charges 2


He would have to break formation, or likely die in one intense turn. You could even spread your bombers out a bit and use Slave 1 to mop up the survivors. the important thing is, it would make him change the way he plays. You would also be clobbered by most any balanced list.

That's not what I'm asking for. I don't want a list that would beat it, I'm wondering if there is any tactic that could be used to deal with the list.

Also him losing doesn't actually change it, so we can't count on that. Same is true for other games in question the individual plays. I need to find a way to keep this setup from killing everything.

We are fed up with the list, but there's no non-list tailor counter. Being able to place asteroids closer to the sides of the board could help, but otherwise I can't find anything that would work.

In truth, changing how howlrunners rule works would fix the problem, and as consolidation biggs rule could get changed as well. But that's house ruling a problem, not solving it.

What is the asteroid set up for your games like?

Hmm- in that case, why not try a more elite list? a trio fo high skill pilots, like Luke, Biggs, and somebody else, or even Corran, ought to be able to fry one of the ships on the first pass. If that's howlrunner, you should be home free.

 guardpiper wrote:
What is the asteroid set up for your games like?

Generally, tie spammer guy tries to place all asteroids on one side of the field, other player gets wind of the plan and tries to place some on other side.Tie guy doesn't like asteroids, he only flies in preset paths.

 Gitzbitah wrote:
Hmm- in that case, why not try a more elite list? a trio fo high skill pilots, like Luke, Biggs, and somebody else, or even Corran, ought to be able to fry one of the ships on the first pass. If that's howlrunner, you should be home free.

Been tried. Many other players tend to use 3-4 ship lists of all varieties. Shooting first hasn't mattered too much as the ties either cause collision and no action, or you end up too far away to do much damage. It's possible to be range 1 with no actions or range 2-3 with actions.

Of course, even if the inital pass kills howlrunner on turn 2, that means there's still 13-18 shots coming from the leftover ties, all probably with focus. I've tried sensor jammers, stealth devices, tanking the damage with large ships, ect ect. It's pure weight of dice, and it always works.

Please note this isn't a "we can't beat this" tread, it's more of a "xwing community, how do we stop this?" thread.

Rebel Operative/HWK-290 + Ion Cannon Turret
Outer Rim Smuggler/YT-1300 + Anti-Pursuit Lasers

The tactic is… ram the enemy head-on with your YTs and have the HWKs ionize them. Once they are rammed (in tight formation), the only move your YT should do is a 1 turn.

The initial hit against you does 1 damage to them.
The ion blast does 1 damage to them.
The next round, since they can’t move past you, they take 1 more damage and go by-by.

At the same time, you have a pair of YT turrets at range 1 for the rest of the flight and a pair of Ion Turrets that are locked and loaded as you forget about the pesky gnat ramming your bow.

I'm a pretty new player of the game, but I noticed you mentioned "besides Assault Missiles", but that sounds like part of a workable tactic. Especially paired with Munitions Failsafe on some Z-95's, maybe, and try for the early Howlrunner kill?

I know what you mean about tailored lists, though. I prefer to approach specialty lists like TIE spam with tactics/equipment combinations, rather than just spamming large ships.

Needs more Homing Missiles, you do. Try throwing an Airen Cracken Alpha strike component at him

Airen Cracken+Swarm Tactics+Homing/assault
Bandit +Homing

At PS 8 You move and lock Airen on to a target, the bandit focuses. Then Airen shoots and tells Bandit to lock on after you survey the damage, so he can fire with lock and focus. I like to bring an extra Bandit and Etahn as so

Etahn Abaht+Sensor Jammer+Stealth Device+Elusiveness+R2 Astromech

Also if it helps try just staying away from him and waiting on the other side of the board. Let him make the first mistake if his moves are so predictable. War is deception. Happy hunting!

Assault missiles on Lt Blount is an effective way to rack up some hurt quickly. Maybe B-wings with auto blasters & flechette torpedoes. A HWK-290 focus factory. Wedge with protons getting a free focus from Kyle will off howlrunner in a single shot. Lt Blount will add on some damage & a couple blue Bs with autoblasters for the kill.

I know it's not a 100pts list exactly. Needs tweaking & work but I've faced this very list a few times & defeated it using some combo of the above 4/7 times

Tell him to stop playing an illegal list for one? As written that list 106 points. It's legal if he's using the low PS Interceptors since that knocks off 6 points, are you sure it's the PS3 versions?

 juraigamer wrote:
Besides assault missiles of course. List in question, and yes I know it's well known:

2 PS1 tie fighters
3 PS3 tie interceptors
howlrunner with shield upgrade.

Yeah, I could beat 100 point lists when I'm using a 106 point list against them (24 + 60 + 22).

The list is as follows, it's 100 points: it seems I mistyped the PS of the interceptors, sorry.

100 points
Howlrunner
Shield Upgrade
Academy Pilot #1
Academy Pilot #2
Alpha Squadron Pilot #1
Alpha Squadron Pilot #2
Alpha Squadron Pilot #3

It seems we are straying from the topic. If we kill ties 1 by one, we get overwhelmed by firepower. If we focus on howlrunner, we still get overwhelmed by firepower. What's the counter to this? Is there one? The odds are stacked in the imperials favor.

Adding stress to them does nothing, they can always pull green moves. Assault missiles work, when they actually hit, but they don't normally finish the job.

Echo + Mini Swarm
Rebel Swarm
Whisper + Mini Swarm
Super Han/Chewie + 3 Talas

You just have to fly in away you don't hit the entire swarm head on in the first pass.

I've actually seen that Echo is a Swarm killer. His final decloak location can put him in prime territory to take out Howlie with one pass. Once that happens, the rest of the swarm will usually fall apart.

That is a raw firepower list. It doesn't have especially good maneuverability in formation, and you'll know exactly where it's going to be before you deploy your stuff. That being the case, I'd try to make sure the asteroid field didn't have any good lanes. During placement, I'd do my best to make sure there was no swarm size holes. This might make the overall footprint of the asteroid field smaller, but that's okay.

From turn 1, you want to head straight for the field. Optimally, you want to be coming out of the field toward his formation (roughly). Make him turn into the asteroid field to get all his guns on you. You'll be coming out, so some of your ships will get +1 defense dice. You'll probably get hit harder on the first exchange, but once the rocks start denying attacks and actions, you can make it up pretty fast.

This strategy requires that you don't fly in formation. Your ships and flying skills will have to be up to that. You want to be pretty dispersed in order to navigate the field without hitting rocks, but still have most of your guns trained on the enemy formation. You can't engage that squad head-to-head. It's pretty much points optimal to beat the crap out of stuff that's right in front of it, but it's not as capable at other stuff. If you have anything with Boost or Barrel Roll, this strategy is much easier to use, because you can adjust your line after you see his moves. Those abilities also make asteroid fields a lot simpler to deal with.

Really, though, asteroids should be your best friend.

The trick with Swarm fishing in Asteroids is to make him come after you. Turr is most effective because you can line up a good shot through the rocks at range 3, and then place another rock between you and the swarm.

Even if you have to pull K-turns and green straights to get the swarm to hit the rocks first, you will do yourself a favor. If you are in an Imp team with Echo, have her decloak behind and harass the swarm from their 6 o'clock.

Alternatively, use a doorstop. Sigma with Stealth Device and Advanced Scopes. You move first and can place yourself right in the middle of where you know Howlie will be ending to make her slam you and get out of position of the rest of the swarm. All you need to do is stay cloaked and Focus and you will be practically untouchable. If you add saboteur, this is a great build for taking out Chewie, too.

The counter is Blount with an assault missile, and a point-efficient list (generic x/b-wings, etc) that doesn't invest in fancy tricks instead of numbers. Blount gives your opponent a difficult choice: start the game with 2 HP on all of his ships (at which point you can just joust at him and win easily), or break up his formation and be exposed to focused fire on 1-2 ships while the rest of the blob is out of range/arc.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Flagwaver wrote:
If you add saboteur, this is a great build for taking out Chewie, too.

Strongly disagree with this. You're spending 30ish points on a ship that needs to be at range 1, spend an action, roll to hit, have a target with no shields and damage cards, and flip over a relevant crit. For the same points you could just bring some conventional ships and shoot the Falcon to death.

 Peregrine wrote:
The counter is Blount with an assault missile, and a point-efficient list (generic x/b-wings, etc) that doesn't invest in fancy tricks instead of numbers. Blount gives your opponent a difficult choice: start the game with 2 HP on all of his ships (at which point you can just joust at him and win easily), or break up his formation and be exposed to focused fire on 1-2 ships while the rest of the blob is out of range/arc.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Flagwaver wrote:
If you add saboteur, this is a great build for taking out Chewie, too.

Strongly disagree with this. You're spending 30ish points on a ship that needs to be at range 1, spend an action, roll to hit, have a target with no shields and damage cards, and flip over a relevant crit. For the same points you could just bring some conventional ships and shoot the Falcon to death.

What about cheap z95s in a mini Rebel swarm, supporting Blount?

 alarmingrick wrote:
What about cheap z95s in a mini Rebel swarm, supporting Blount?

I think it has potential. I'm trying a list with Blount + assault missile and 6x Tala z-95s. The z-95 is pretty close to a Howlrunner-boosted TIE in stats and better than a TIE without Howlrunner, so Blount should be able to swing that in favor of the z-95s by either taking away 1/3 of their HP as soon as the game begins (swinging the match decisively in favor of the z-95s) or forcing the ball of TIEs to break up and lose the re-roll. And a giant ball of PS 4+ z-95s is still the same kind of swarm firepower that beats other lists, with PS 4 to let you shoot before or tied with almost every non-unique pilot.

And don't forget to use Munitions Failsafe, so you don't lose that Assault Missile till it hits.

 Peregrine wrote:

 alarmingrick wrote:
What about cheap z95s in a mini Rebel swarm, supporting Blount?

I think it has potential. I'm trying a list with Blount + assault missile and 6x Tala z-95s. The z-95 is pretty close to a Howlrunner-boosted TIE in stats and better than a TIE without Howlrunner, so Blount should be able to swing that in favor of the z-95s by either taking away 1/3 of their HP as soon as the game begins (swinging the match decisively in favor of the z-95s) or forcing the ball of TIEs to break up and lose the re-roll. And a giant ball of PS 4+ z-95s is still the same kind of swarm firepower that beats other lists, with PS 4 to let you shoot before or tied with almost every non-unique pilot.

I agree with the Munition Failsafe for Blount.
Would it be worth it to give 1 or 2 of the other Z-95s assault missiles?
Even if it means down grading the pilots? Or is it not worth it to dilute the squad numbers for the upgrade?

It's Blount, the Failsafe does nothing for him because his attacks always count as hitting.

 alarmingrick wrote:
Would it be worth it to give 1 or 2 of the other Z-95s assault missiles?

Probably not. With only 1-2 missiles your chances of hitting aren't all that great, and you just gave your opponent 1-2 very obvious targets to kill before they can fire. Blount works because he auto-hits and gives you reliable splash damage without over-investing in one-shot weapons that are only really effective against swarms or Biggs lists. Dropping a ship to add a couple missiles once you have Blount would definitely be a case of diminishing returns. I would consider it, but I'd probably go all the way to a 5-ship list and bring missiles on everyone.