A few days ago, I posted this list:

1. Kath (Rebel Captive, Expert handling), 2x Alphas, Howlrunner (Swarm Tactics)

I've added these ideas for slightly more elite lists as I feel the Alphas would be fun but would be going last and bulking out numbers:

2. Kath (Rebel Captive), Howlrunner (Swarm), Black Sq. Obsidian Sq, Academy

or:

3. Kath (Expert handling, Rebel Captive), Black Sq (Veteran Instincts) x3, Academy

As usual, thanks for any thoughts or additional tweaking!

The odd thing to me, in these smaller lists, is why do people take Howlrunner over, say, Dark Curse? To get good effect with Howlrunner in these small lists you are constrained to keeping your formation tighter for a chance of utilizing her ability with fewer ships while simultaneously she has less opportunity to be protected by range. Perhaps it's because you hope she becomes a target of opportunity instead of Kath?

I feel that Dark Curse's action denial might be more useful in the smaller lists.

How about:

Kath Scarlet

+ Rebel Captive

[41]

Academy Pilot

[12]

Night Beast

[15]

Backstabber

[16]

Dark Curse

[16]

The odd thing to me, in these smaller lists, is why do people take Howlrunner over, say, Dark Curse? To get good effect with Howlrunner in these small lists you are constrained to keeping your formation tighter for a chance of utilizing her ability with fewer ships while simultaneously she has less opportunity to be protected by range. Perhaps it's because you hope she becomes a target of opportunity instead of Kath?

I feel that Dark Curse's action denial might be more useful in the smaller lists.

Because Howlrunner's ability is still great when applied to even 3 - 4 ships. It's just better the more ships you have, so I see your point, but you don't need 6 other ships to use her effectively. I'd argue you can actually utilize a more loose formation with her in a smaller build than in a larger build. She's still PS 8, and allows an effective use of swarm tactics.

How about:

Kath Scarlet

+ Rebel Captive

[41]

Academy Pilot

[12]

Night Beast

[15]

Backstabber

[16]

Dark Curse

[16]

Not sure why I didn't consider something like this -- I'll consider playing around with this.

Because Howlrunner's ability is still great when applied to even 3 - 4 ships. It's just better the more ships you have, so I see your point, but you don't need 6 other ships to use her effectively. I'd argue you can actually utilize a more loose formation with her in a smaller build than in a larger build. She's still PS 8, and allows an effective use of swarm tactics.

Thanks for your perspective. I can see where PS 8 and Swarm Tactics helps.

This is what I have played twice now:

Kath EH + RC

Mauler Mithel

Backstabber (or you could sub Curse, but I like the extra firepower)

Academy Pilot x 2

The downside to Howlrunner besides likely excluding a second named tie is that you are forced to move with her to take advantage of the ability. This drastically reduces your movement options to justify her extra points. I have found this is a liability in a firespray mini swarm. Your movements are predictable and you often have to end up jousting the bulk of the enemy fleet.

Frankly facing down a b-wing heavy list on the first pass in tight formation is just going to cost you 1 or two tie fighters and leave a B banged up but not dead. Howlrunner is not an auto include, and can be dubious in smaller swarms. Under perfect conditions she performs great, but personally I'm happy to not bring her into lists like this.

Named ties with increased damage potential, or a survivable curse bring more to the table in this type of list.

This is what I have played twice now:

Kath EH + RC

Mauler Mithel

Backstabber (or you could sub Curse, but I like the extra firepower)

Academy Pilot x 2

The downside to Howlrunner besides likely excluding a second named tie is that you are forced to move with her to take advantage of the ability. This drastically reduces your movement options to justify her extra points. I have found this is a liability in a firespray mini swarm. Your movements are predictable and you often have to end up jousting the bulk of the enemy fleet.

Frankly facing down a b-wing heavy list on the first pass in tight formation is just going to cost you 1 or two tie fighters and leave a B banged up but not dead. Howlrunner is not an auto include, and can be dubious in smaller swarms. Under perfect conditions she performs great, but personally I'm happy to not bring her into lists like this.

Named ties with increased damage potential, or a survivable curse bring more to the table in this type of list.

Kath + EH + Rebel Captive

Howlrunner

Night Beast

Academy x2

I would drop the Academy and Night Beast in the suggested list and go with Turr Phennir with VI.

That leaves you with 4 highly competent ships to tear up the enemy. I might even forgo the Rebel Captive and get Expert Handling on Kath for initiative and barrel rolling Kath is ultra useful.

I would drop the Academy and Night Beast in the suggested list and go with Turr Phennir with VI.

That leaves you with 4 highly competent ships to tear up the enemy. I might even forgo the Rebel Captive and get Expert Handling on Kath for initiative and barrel rolling Kath is ultra useful.

Oops. It should read expert handling and not elusiveness. Sometimes my brain flips those two. That's an interesting flip, and one I may play around with as I work named ships in and out, which based on the suggestions, seems like the way to go.

This is what I have played twice now:

Kath EH + RC

Mauler Mithel

Backstabber (or you could sub Curse, but I like the extra firepower)

Academy Pilot x 2

The downside to Howlrunner besides likely excluding a second named tie is that you are forced to move with her to take advantage of the ability. This drastically reduces your movement options to justify her extra points. I have found this is a liability in a firespray mini swarm. Your movements are predictable and you often have to end up jousting the bulk of the enemy fleet.

Frankly facing down a b-wing heavy list on the first pass in tight formation is just going to cost you 1 or two tie fighters and leave a B banged up but not dead. Howlrunner is not an auto include, and can be dubious in smaller swarms. Under perfect conditions she performs great, but personally I'm happy to not bring her into lists like this.

Named ties with increased damage potential, or a survivable curse bring more to the table in this type of list.

Great points, but I like including Howlrunner because it forces the opponent to choose to focus on Kath or Howlrunner. Most people will want to go after the ties first and save Kath for last but their ships will hopefully be so damaged Kath just has to clean up the scraps.

Kath + EH + Rebel Captive

Howlrunner

Night Beast

Academy x2

This is what I have played twice now:

Kath EH + RC

Mauler Mithel

Backstabber (or you could sub Curse, but I like the extra firepower)

Academy Pilot x 2

The downside to Howlrunner besides likely excluding a second named tie is that you are forced to move with her to take advantage of the ability. This drastically reduces your movement options to justify her extra points. I have found this is a liability in a firespray mini swarm. Your movements are predictable and you often have to end up jousting the bulk of the enemy fleet.

Frankly facing down a b-wing heavy list on the first pass in tight formation is just going to cost you 1 or two tie fighters and leave a B banged up but not dead. Howlrunner is not an auto include, and can be dubious in smaller swarms. Under perfect conditions she performs great, but personally I'm happy to not bring her into lists like this.

Named ties with increased damage potential, or a survivable curse bring more to the table in this type of list.

Great points, but I like including Howlrunner because it forces the opponent to choose to focus on Kath or Howlrunner. Most people will want to go after the ties first and save Kath for last but their ships will hopefully be so damaged Kath just has to clean up the scraps.

Kath + EH + Rebel Captive

Howlrunner

Night Beast

Academy x2

I still like the idea of Howlrunner, but I think the offensive nature of some of the other Ties might create the same effect (especially Backstabber) both offensively overall that wouldn't be lost with a single ship, but also present difficult options. Definitely going to play around with things though, and I a nice title for a Kath/Howlrunner list, too...

Woooo Girls

This is what I have played twice now:

Kath EH + RC

Mauler Mithel

Backstabber (or you could sub Curse, but I like the extra firepower)

Academy Pilot x 2

The downside to Howlrunner besides likely excluding a second named tie is that you are forced to move with her to take advantage of the ability. This drastically reduces your movement options to justify her extra points. I have found this is a liability in a firespray mini swarm. Your movements are predictable and you often have to end up jousting the bulk of the enemy fleet.

Frankly facing down a b-wing heavy list on the first pass in tight formation is just going to cost you 1 or two tie fighters and leave a B banged up but not dead. Howlrunner is not an auto include, and can be dubious in smaller swarms. Under perfect conditions she performs great, but personally I'm happy to not bring her into lists like this.

Named ties with increased damage potential, or a survivable curse bring more to the table in this type of list.

Great points, but I like including Howlrunner because it forces the opponent to choose to focus on Kath or Howlrunner. Most people will want to go after the ties first and save Kath for last but their ships will hopefully be so damaged Kath just has to clean up the scraps.

Kath + EH + Rebel Captive

Howlrunner

Night Beast

Academy x2

I still like the idea of Howlrunner, but I think the offensive nature of some of the other Ties might create the same effect (especially Backstabber) both offensively overall that wouldn't be lost with a single ship, but also present difficult options. Definitely going to play around with things though, and I a nice title for a Kath/Howlrunner list, too...

What I have found is that Howlrunner is essentially a support ship and is rarely an accessible target given the owning player's nature to position her to maximize her bonus while still being as defensive as possible. This means that you are often making an opponents choice to shoot Kath for him by denying easy shots on howlie. This is counter productive when you want the named ties to be prioritized.

Also since the ties and Kath have to stick close to get the bonus you are making it much easier for your opponent to keep his fleet together and concentrate fire power on the targets of his choice.

I have found that with Mauler and Backstabber that the threat is much more pronounced than with howlie and since these ships need to maneuver in close to be effective; this encourages your opponent to fire at them first. Backstabber, due to his flanking nature, often pulls enemy ships out of formation to deal with his threat sometimes leaving them out of position on the following turns.

Rebel squads, especially b-wings, are much less effective if they cannot stay in formation and concentrate firepower on high agility ships. TIEs have the dials to attack on multiple vectors and still concentrate fire while remaining relatively unpredictable. With Howlrunner though, few pilots fly TIEs this way because her ability encourages tight formation flying and first combat round alpha strikes that often aren't favorable to mini-swarms.

Also it's a classic twofer: when howlie goes down few Fire Spray mini-swarm lists have a second named or dangerous tie to be next. With Mauler & Backstabber, each one is a very tempting target and redundancy in perceived threats for targets over Kath is key in this list. With Rebel Captive you are trying to get Kath to the end game, making the rest of the list synergize with that goal can be very helpful.

I love Dark curse, but his ability often means opponents do not want to shoot him. It be can entirely too much effort to get his two attack dice off the board. YMMV, but for me I want glass cannons supporting Kath not a ship that can be justifiably postponed in target priority since it is not as serious a threat combined with being a difficult target.

In the list I presented above I am usually positioning Backstabber in a place where he is very vulnerable, but my opponent is forced to break formation to deal with him. The academy pilots try to block, but generally they are usually making tempting targets themselves but using every defensive advantage I can come up with. Mauler just flies right up to the first target I can dump a four die attack on while Kath is eyeing a flight path that will maximize shooting opportunities and potentially surprising my opponent with an unexpected barrel roll.

This is my play style, and there are probably players who can fly a tight formation fire spray mini-howler swarm very well. For me though, my thoughts above express how much better this has worked for me and why.

How big of a trade off is dropping Expert Handling in order to change an Academy Tie to a Named Tie?

How big of a trade off is dropping Expert Handling in order to change an Academy Tie to a Named Tie?

It wouldn't kill the ship's effectiveness, but for only 2 points Expert Handling does provides movement flexibility one cannot get anywhere else. The big base of the Fire Spray allows for some impressive shifts. You won't use EH every turn, but the turns that you do can make the difference of getting a shot, not getting shot at, getting the fire spray into range one shots, dodging the fire spray into longer range defense, or avoiding an obstacle next turn. The action denial of shedding a target lock (target locks being more effective on ships with a lot of hit points) can be a life saver.

The stress one gets from the action can be problematic though as there isn't a lot of green on its dial but a rear firing arc helps to mitigate the reduced maneuvering options that come with stress.

Rebel captive is the more important of the two upgrades, but you might as well be looking at a bounty hunter if you don't need the EPT or care to use a secondary weapon that would make the extra points for Krassis worth it.