Thrawn ISD & Demo vs Ackbar AFmkIIs

In preparation for my upcoming Vassal Tournament match against GiledPallaeon, I decided to run my opponent’s list against my usual sparring partner, Andy. The list is fairly intimidating with a Kuat ISD, Demolisher, TRC Arquittens, and a pair of Gozantis for activation padding. The Kuat has the Darth Vader boarding team rather than the BTAvenger combo. It’s a very aggressive list that really benefits from going first.

On the other side, Andy brought a four activation Ackbar list with a pair of AFmkIIs, TRC90, GR75, scatter Aces, and a VCX. His TRC90 had FCTs to make the VCX do double duty with tokens. I chose first player and picked his Advanced Gunnery objective. Thanks to his squadrons, he was able to outdeploy me, so I had to work hard and fast to reposition. Here is the close of round one:

In the second round, I moved the ISD up fast to block the frigates while keeping my other ships out of range. I saved the ISD for last to prevent the double hit from the objective frigate in the rear with the intent of moving first in the next round. This was my main target due to the points bonus. Here is the close of round 2:

In the third round, I lost my Arquittens to the unavoidable double broadside from the objective ship while eliminating the TRC90. My ISD was damaged, but nothing serious and was in just the right spot to put serious pain on the frigates. Here is the close of round 3:

In the fourth round, I delivered the deathblow to the opposing objective ship, but wasn’t quite able to finish the deed on the flagship frigate, which was able to move out of the ISD front arc. Here is the close of round 4:

Round five was uneventful. The side arc shot from the ISD left the frigate limping, but couldn’t finish the task and Demolisher was too far away to move in on round six to finish the job. We called it at the close of round 5:

This was interesting to run an opponent’s list and it helped me to see the strengths and weaknesses of that list. GiledPallaeon’s list benefits from the flexibility of having Thrawn nav dials ready to go. I elected to set all three as navigate and set the ships’ dials to the second most useful command - repair came in very handy. Thanks to the flotillas, my combat ships had no shortage of tokens as well. The damage output was significant from both the ISD and Demo thanks to their Assault Concussion Missiles. Activation advantage was also powerful, as usual. On the flip side, five deployments seems very light. I had to commit my two heavy hitters before Andy placed his two frigates. This resulted in a less than optimal starting position.