800 Point Madine vs Thrawn

This one was our first 800 point game. We also had a third player to make it a two on one game. I took the rebels and Andy and Anthony took the Imperials. Mine was a a Madine list with an MC80 Mon Karren, MC75 Ordnance Cruiser, 3 MC30 Scouts, a CR90, a pair of GR75s, and an A-Wing/YT2400 squadron ball. On the other side, Andy had the SSD Command type with an MMJ squadron ball in Rapid Launch Bays and a pair of Gozantis. Anthony had a Vic1, Vic2, and Demo with Ciena/Valen. I had a substantial deployment advantage and so was able to position the bulk of my fleet on the right in order to hit his flank and roll the fleet up. At least, that was my intent on deployment. Here is the opening of round 1:

In the first round, I lined up my MC30s to apply rapid pressure on the Imperial flank. My MC75 moved along slowly to threaten the SSD should it turn hard to engage the rest of my fleet. My CR90 sped in to double-arc the SSD and prepare to jump out of range. Here is the opening of round 2:

In the second round, my fleet worked the Vic1 down and almost finished it. Here is the opening of round 3:

In the third round, I was able to finish off the Vic1 without issue and put pressure on the Vic2. My MC30 formation scattered after two of them took some relatively substantial shield damage. The SSD dropped the MMJ ball on my MC75, but it was unable to destroy it outright and my A-Wings were able to kill the Jumpmaster and tie up the opposing squadrons. Demo scored an APT hit on the Liberty that resulted in the Blinded Gunner critical. That was the absolutely pivotal point in the fight as I was depending on an accuracy to lock down the Vic2 brace and destroy it before it could shoot. Here is the opening of round 4:

In the fourth round, I was unable to kill the Vic2 outright with the Liberty thanks to the Blinded Gunners. As a result, it was able to kill my Liberty flagship instead before my MC30s could finish it. My MC75 was also finished off by the SSD. With the destruction of my two heavy-hitters in return for the the 2 Victories, we called the game. I may have been able to hunt down Demo with Lando and a TY2400, but the rest of my squadrons would have been eliminated by Maarek, Morna, and Jendon and my flotillas were also in danger. Here is the final board state:

This was a really fun game. Having 800 points to play with was great and allowed me to get some ships out that rarely see action. My TRC Scout Frigates are normally far too expensive for what they do, but with the extra points, I felt like I could justify their inclusion. Without Ackbar, Arquittens are just better for the cost, but they are a lot of fun. My Liberty did some work, but went down very quickly against the combined firepower of Demolisher and the Victory. In retrospect, it would have been better to keep the MC30s close to the Liberty to cover its approach and to help against Demo, but I was expecting them to do better damage on the first pass and then to simply use the Liberty as a finisher. All in all, great game!

Garm MC80 vs Palpatine Quasar & Arquittens

For this game, we randomly drew underutilized admirals. I drew Garm and Andy drew Palpatine. Rather than taking some dumpster trash, I went with a big heavy with some rogue support. I brought an MC80C with ET, HIE, LTT, ECM, and EST; a CR90 with ET, LTT, Jaina’s Light, and Draven; a Toryn Farr GR75; and a squadron ball consisting of Shara, Tycho, 2 A-Wings, Lando, Dash, and 2 YT2400s. On the other side, Andy brought a pair of Arquittens, a Quasar, a Comms Net Gozanti, Bossk, Maarek/Jendon, Moralo Eval, and a pair of Lambdas. He had the bid and picked second. I chose his Targeting Beacons. Here is the opening of round 1:

In the first round, I decided to hit his far left flank (where he positioned his flagship) hard and try to draw him away from the station. To effect this, I needed to try to cut the said flagship off from the rest of his fleet. I also wanted to knock out Moralo as fast as I could. I positioned my squadrons to go for the alpha-strike. Here is the opening of round 2:

In the second round, I managed to kill Moralo on my second activation but lost Shara and Lando in the process. Andy dropped his flagship to speed zero to avoid entering medium range of my MC80. This was a reasonable move, but left him exposed at long range. Here is the opening of round 3:

In the third round, I was able to take down the flagship with the combined fire of the CR90 an MC80. I also lined up a sweet double-arc shot on the remaining Arquittens with my MC80. Here is the opening of round 4:

In the fourth round, my MC80 completely whiffed with the side-arc shot against the Arquittens, only managing a couple of damage. I moved the CR90 in to pursue the Quasar and Andy positioned his Gozanti to hit my already-damaged CR90. The squadron fight was pretty much mine, but it had been a bit of a Pyrrhic victory as I had only Tycho, and A-Wing, and a single YT2400 remaining. Not enough to do meaningful damage to the Quasar. Here is the opening of round 5:

In the fifth round, I had a real dilemma: let the Arquittens escape and save my CR90 or kill the Arquittens and potentially lose the CR90. I went for the kill. I dropped the remaining Arquittens, but the Gozanti used a CF dial to finish off my CR90 in return. The Quasar took a bit of damage from the MC80, but was able to keep at long range and so stayed out of danger of destruction. It ended up being a decent victory my way.

It worked well to put everything into taking down Moralo. I was also able to tie up one of the Lambdas and so gave Moralo a single token-move quasi-activation. If Moralo had an escort and the Lambdas had Intel, I probably would have hit the first Arquittens but turned away from the rest of the fleet to the right in order to keep well away from the station. I played my CR90 rather aggressively and paid for that. Draven played no role and I ended up not using LTTs against squadrons. The traditional TRC setup would have been superior.

As for the Admirals, Palpatine provided little value. He did help against Shara by forcing me to discard a scatter, but played little role against my ships. Garm on the other hand was actually a lot of fun. It seems that he enables aggressive play, which really encouraged me to get the fight moving early to utilize all those sweet tokens. He is a solid admiral that I would certainly run again.

Leia Swarm vs Tarkin Cymoon & Demo

After spending the last several games preparing for primes, Andy and I decided to bring out some commanders that rarely see the light of day for this fun game. I decided on Leia and Andy picked Tarkin. I brought an Assault Frigate with LTT and ECM, 4 Scout type Hammerheads with Slaved Turrets, 4 Y-Wings, and 4 A-Wings. Andy brought a Cymoon heavily kitted out, Demolisher with Iden Verso, Arquittens with ETs and QBTs, a Gozanti, and a small squadron component consisting of Valen and Jonus. I had bid, took first, and picked his Most Wanted. In retrospect, I should have taken second player. Here is the opening of round 1:

In the first round, we lined up our approaches. Things did not look good for me, but I was hoping that my A-Wings and Y-Wings would contribute meaningfully. Here is the opening of round 2:

In the second round, I got a shot off with my lead Hammerhead on the right, but Demo and the Cymoon teamed up to kill it. My Frigate sent the A-Wings over to hit Demo as the Cymoon was just out of range. Here is the opening of round 3:

In the third round, I lost two more Hammerheads, only one of which was able to activate and shoot. The remaining Hammerhead sent some Y-Wings to help against Demo. The Frigate jumped over Demo. Here is the opening of round 4:

In the fourth round, the Assault Frigate scored a single damage on Demo from the LTT-enhanced double-arc. That was highly disappointing. The Arquittens was able to dispatch my only remaining Hammerhead. I was unable to get out of the front arc of the Cymoon and ended up giving Andy a double arc shot at medium range. Even with ECMs, the Frigate popped in very anti-climactic manner, giving Andy a crushing victory.

I failed big time to concentrate fire with my assets. Andy was able to effectively focus fire with the Cymoon and Demo to knock out my Hammerheads quite handily. In the third round, he very successfully forked my last Hammerhead and Assault Frigate. The dice certainly failed me with that activation, but even with Demo destroyed it would have been a 10-1 victory for Andy just the same. Well flown by him. I can’t even blame my loss on Leia. I suspect I need a lot more practice with Hammerheads to unlock their potential.

Florida Prime Report

Here is my Florida Prime write-up. I managed to claw my way to the regional/prime victory for the second year running. This year, I brought a very similar list to the last year, with some notable changes to the squads due to the anti-squad tech on the typical SSD. Here is my list for reference:

Assault Objective: Surprise Attack
Defense Objective: Rift Ambush
Navigation Objective: Superior Positions

[ flagship ] Interdictor-class Suppression Refit (90 points)
-  Admiral Screed  ( 26  points)
-  Interdictor  ( 3  points)
-  Captain Brunson  ( 5  points)
-  Engine Techs  ( 8  points)
-  Disposable Capacitors  ( 3  points)
-  Heavy Ion Emplacements  ( 9  points)
-  Targeting Scrambler  ( 5  points)
-  Grav Shift Reroute  ( 2  points) 

Gladiator II-Class Star Destroyer (62 points)
-  Demolisher  ( 10  points)
-  Agent Kallus  ( 3  points)
-  Ordnance Experts  ( 4  points)
-  Engine Techs  ( 8  points)
-  Flechette Torpedoes  ( 3  points) 

Gozanti-class Cruisers (23 points)
-  Comms Net  ( 2  points) 

1 Tel Trevura ( 17 points)
1 Morna Kee ( 27 points)
3 VT-49 Decimators ( 66 points)
1 Dengar ( 20 points) 

My changes from the previous year involved going all-in on the Decimators for the benefit of their high resilience as well as adding Dengar and Tel Trevura to keep them going. I also changed up the objectives to provide a modicum of benefit against an SSD. I felt that Most Wanted was a weak choice for me in that match-up as well as against a Raddus fleet.

Game one was against Scott, who brought a TRC90 swarm with significant squadron support including VCXs. We tied for bid, rolled, he won the roll, and he chose second. I picked his Targeting Beacons, deployed centrally, moved some obstacles and the game was afoot. Here is the opening of round 1:

In the first round, I pushed forward, aiming to focus my ships on the left side while my Decimators occupied a central spot. Here is the opening of round 2:

In the second round, my ships played it conservatively while my Decimators softened the first CR90 to come in range. Here is the opening of round 3:

In round three, my Interdictor softened the lead CR90 on the left with HIEs and brought the lead CR90 on the right to a single hull remaining. Scott had to activate one of them. He chose the one on the left as it was threatened with Demo before it could get a shot. My Gozanti used a CF dial to get the requisite damage to kill the lead CR90 on the right. Demo did it’s thing and the Decimators killed the trailing CR90 on the right. This left a single damaged CR90 at the opening of round 4:

In round four, Demo activated first to finish the CR90 for the tabling. Tel Trevura was able to weather the squadrons and that concluded game one with a strong Imperial victory.

Game two was against Austin, who was fresh from his Prime victory in Georgia last month. I had the benefit of knowing his list and practicing against it ahead of time. He had the standard (he sort of set the standard as far as I know) JJ Ravager build with IO, Kallus, Brunson, H9s, QBCs, QLTs, etc. I had a solid plan for second player, but alas, he guessed this and gave me first. I took his Contested Outpost and positioned the Dictor and Demo to go around either side. Here is the opening of round 1:

With Austin’s activation advantage, I really had to play cautiously. I knew that neither of my ships could survive front arc medium range fire and I also knew that his flak would be really painful even against my Decimators, so I played it conservatively. So did he. Here is the opening of round 2:

In the second round, Austin continued to play it safe, even as I turned in aggressively with my Dictor and held the station with Demo. Here is the opening of round 3 without a single shot fired:

In the third round, I was still out of range with the Dictor. Demo drew first blood at long range and promptly exited weapons range. My Dictor was pursuing. My Decimators finally entered the fight. Here is the opening of round 4:

In the fourth round, I moved my Dictor in to start ramming the SSD. My Decimators did their thing. Austin whittled away at them. I didn’t have many obstacles to use for cover so they took a lot of damage and his single dice counter fire almost never missed. Here is the opening of round 5:

In the fifth round, the Dictor continued to double-ram and repair, kind of like a parasite really. Austin kept the SSD in place to prevent giving Demo any opportunity to contribute. Here is the opening of round 6:

In the sixth round, Austin activated his lead Gozanti, which allowed me to ram it to death with Demo before shooting the SSD at long range. I was able to get the SSD down to half points while Austin killed one of the Decimators (he rolled consistently well on the counter-Fire) as well as Tel Trevura. This gave me a 7-4 win. Good, but not great.

For game 3, I was paired against an Orlando regular, Tyler, who I had played before. I knew him to be a very competent Raddus player. Both of us understood that to win the tournament, we had to win this game big. He was running a Raddus list with a pair of Hammerheads, a pair of GR75s, and a fighter ball consisting of Dutch, Wedge, Lando, Dash, Gold, Biggs, and a YT1300. His hyperspace ship was an MC75 Ordnance type kitted out for serious brawling. I took first and selected Superior Positions. Here is the opening of round 1:

In the first round, I positioned Demo out front while keeping the Dictor in reserve. My Decimators were able to put some pressure on his obstructed YT1300. He was set up on the station and definitely had the early advantage in the squadron fight. Here is the opening of round 2:

In the second round, I pushed Demo up to Flechette-activate Dutch and some others. I hit the Hammerhead on the right flank with a DCap HIE shot to soften it up. Dengar freed three of my Decimators to finish off the same Hammerhead, denying the ideal Raddus drop. Interestingly, Morna managed to not roll a single hit, despite rerolls. Tel Trevura went down to the opposing squadrons without getting to use his ability. Here is the opening of round 3 after the Raddus drop:

In the third round, I activated Demo to double-flak the squadrons to keep some of them them out of the fight. The MC75 moved forward fast to block in my Dictor, getting a double-arc position in the process. My Dictor stripped most of his shields and my Decimators went to work, rolling exceedingly poorly once again. I missed the fourth round picture in all the excitement. In the fourth round, I tanked the MC75 shots and continued to wear it down. Demo went after the remaining hammerhead and my Decimators finished off the MC75. Here is the opening of round 5:

At the opening of round 5, I was able to activate Demo and hit the rear of Raddus’ fleeing remnant, sealing the victory for me. Funny note, it wasn’t until this point that I realized that I should have been collecting tokens for the rear shots. I totally forgot about the objective play. Tyler, meanwhile had collected a good number. Nevertheless, it was insufficient to prevent the 10-1 victory to me. Here are the final standings:

All in all, this was a great tournament with a good bunch of guys at a solid venue (Critical Hit Games). The next two in the standings were both JJ Ravager SSD lists. Travis was running an almost identical setup to Austin, who I faced for game 2. Maxwell dropped Gozantis for Bombers and Jonus. The SSD did extremely well in this tournament. I was glad I faced one and thrilled that I was able to pull it down to half hull, especially against someone who is as competent as Austin. It’s a tough matchup for my list. Great games Scott, Austin, and Tyler!