Just playing around with a list at the mo and had a few questions, the list is

Garven Dreis-R2 astromech-proton torpedoes

Dutch Vander-R5-K6-advanced proton torpedoes-proton torpedoes-blaster turret-stealth

rookie pilot-R5 astromech- proton torpedoes.

first question is the faq states-can Garven Dreis spend a focus token to modify dice even if he didnt roll any eye symbols. what exactly does this mean?

obviously the idea of this fleet is the ships get their target lock on early and then garven can palm his focus off onto the y wing so it can fire its blaster turret or assist in its damage off torpedoes. I know this is a 3 ship build but does it seem competative? thanks for any feedback.

Let's say Garven attacks while he has a focus token and rolls [hit] [hit] [blank]. He can choose to spend his focus token even though it would have no results. All pilots can actually do this, but for most of them there would be no reason to. Garven, on the other hand, may want to spend his focus token so that he can use his pilot ability to pass it to another pilot.

thankyou for that feedback, it just seemed odd to start with but i suppose its like spending target locks and not rolling dice.

To answer your second question, no, that list is not competitive at all. Disregarding the fact that you have 18 points in torpedoes, and 3 points in a stealth on a Y wing... You're relying on having Garven alive in order to have Dutch attack with his blaster turret. Once Garven dies, Dutch needs to start taking a focus himself to use his turret, which means he's not handing out TL to your rookie.

The stealth device is adding 3/8 of an evade to the first attack against Dutch. And lets say for a second he does indeed keep the stealth for the second attack, it's only adding 3/8 there too, which ends up being something along the lines of sum[i=1, x](3/8^x) where X is the number of turns it lasts as a total value. The actual formula (which isn't quite that simple) converges at .6 hits avoided from the stealth device if the opponent rolled just 1 hit each attack. If he rolls 2 hits each attack, it goes down to providing .44 hits avoided. So that's 3 points essentially wasted, especially when the hull upgrade comes out.

R5-K6 doesn't live up to the action economy of PTL point for point, though it is a bit better with Dutch since it grants 2 TL in that case. But once you lose a ship, then it's kinda worthless since the other ship should already have a TL. I suppose that means that you can focus the next turn instead of TL, but whatever.

So, you have 21 points completely wasted, 2 points from R5-K6 mostly wasted, and another two points in R2/R5 that are sorta wasted. The only way to stress yourself in this list is by K turning, so the ability to clear stress isn't that big of a deal. The R5 does very little on the rookie, and since he doesn't have much hull anyways, he's going to die real soon after he can possibly help out.

This post is really in the wrong place. The "rules" part is simply asking how Garven's Focus passing works which is easy enough, and has also been answered many times and places. The "squad critique" really belongs in the general forum.

The has been a LOT of discussion on the interaction between Garven and Dutch as the two work well together and even with other ships. It's what you put with them that makes the squad far less impressive which Khyros has already touched on:

1. Astromechs: R5K6 on Dutch seems useful but is less than half the time. R5 is mostly useless as it would require the X-Wing to suffer a face up "ship" critical and only turns it back to a normal hit at the end of the round which doesn't do much to keep it alive. R2 on a stressless X-Wing doesn't do much although it has some benefit on a Y-Wing by giving it 8 green maneuvers instead of 2 to compensate for its 4 red maneuvers.

2. Turret: The Blaster is great IF YOU HAVE THE ACTIONS TO SPEND ON IT. This squad really doesn't as you want Dutch using, even needing, TLs while there will be times he can't get Garven's Focus for many reasons. Depending on what you're shooting at the Ion Turret is often just as effective as the Blaster T when it comes to damage (it may not get to deal 2 or rarely 3 but it can deal 1 a LOT more reliably when used with the Focus that BT requires) and has the ionization effect.

3. Stealth Device on a Y-Wing: Unlikely to last more than one attack anyway. It's even worse when you'll want/need the Focus token to boost your attack or even just make an attack in combination with the BT. Looking at the original squad this would do best on the Rookie which may already be the least desirable of the three ships to shoot at.

4. Torpedoes: I'm actually neutral here except to say the one with the Rookie may have a harder time getting fired with TL+Focus which I believe is what you want. The APL basically MUST be fired with TL+Focus but you have it on your least maneuverable ship and it is only good at R1 in your front arc.

If you are looking at a three Rebel squad featuring Garven and Dutch you may want to consider Kyle in the HWK. There have been a lot of threads on that combination and some of its incredible action passing.