I flew this list against a friend a couple of days ago and lost badly.

Horton Salm v/ Proton Torpedoes + Ion Cannon Turret
Blue Squadron Pilot x2
Prototype Pilot v/ Assault Missiles (5)

I faced off against

Soontir v/ PTL + stealth device

Backstabber

Dark Curse

Bounty Hunter Firespray

Set up to one side, and ended up jousting vs Dark curse and the BH, while Soontir and backstabber flanked me. A-wing died with the missiles still in the tubes.

Any tips on improving the list or how to fly it?

Cut away proton torps from Horton. Yes, it is powerful when Horton is the one using it, but it really isnt vital. Instead you could consider engine upgrade.

Next, Prototype + missile isnt good at all unless you have ways to set it up. As your opponent would not give you 2 turns to TL + F + get a nice target, you will have to speed it up yourself. Dutch / Garven / Kyle / Squad Leader are good ways, but if going the Awing route, you should simply use Green Awing + PTL instead.

Bwings are very lackluster without any sensor upgrades. If you are going vanilla, I would much rather you used Xwings instead.

Here is my prospective as an imp player.

Horton Salm v/ Proton Torpedoes + Ion Cannon Turret (Horton is nice but I would think having two basic us with ions would be more effective and drop the a-wing also drop the torp seeing the ion is the bread and butter shutting down the hunter for a single turn is huge)

Blue Squadron Pilot x2 ( this is good and as an imp player I hate facing two with or without upgrades)

Prototype Pilot v/ Assault Missiles (5) (why this over cluster, if your not facing a 6 swarm)

Also your at 96 points I believe (without torp) why not upgrade even if it's a single adv sen or extra hull.

If you change nothing you should be ok I think at least run it again and switch to cluster missiles, upgrade to daggers (again if you have no torp) During game play focus your b-wings and missiles against the worst target on the board. And ion the second biggest target to come back for a finishing kill.

Ouch! Unfortunately I think I can see why you lost.

A fragile PS 1 ship carrying 1/4 of its points in ordnance isn't a pretty thing as you learned. With PS 1 you move first and when no one is in range it is hard to TL so you could fire the missile; when you do get the chance to TL you're already taking fire, and you can't take much, or the enemy gets a chance to avoid the missile shot. Prototypes with ordnance isn't something to shoot for.

In this engagement you're low PS really hurt as you basically had everything all set up for your opponent to react to. Not a lot you could do against that but it is still something to keep in mind. You let him set up to joust with stronger ships that could either take a hit from your and/or had a better chance at avoiding damage.

Without any upgrades I'd certainly look at the X-Wing instead of the B-Wing but that is almost a wash. There it comes down to whose dial you like better.

Horton is interesting but could be hard to utilize here and against that opponent. If you can do a good job staying at R2 the Ion turret can be interesting but I'd almost rather see the second Torpedo with an R2 unit on to help line up shots.

Thanks for the feedback.

I'll try to post an updated list after I put the kids to bed.

I only have one Y-wing and one Advanced Sensors, so that limits my options a bit, but nothing fatal.

Horton is good. Keep him the way he is. Who was your priority target? You faced a tough squad. If Horton gets a shot at Soontir with the torps I'd take it. That Firespray is still tough, though.

I think that you would be well served to drop Horton and add Dutch with Ion Cannon and give both B-Wings Adv. Sensors. Horton can then pass your Proto a TL so you can shoot TL and Focus and can then pass TL's to B's as well.

It makes for a great list.

Baron's Focus is a beast of a list to fly against. Drop the PT and downgrade to a cluster on the awing at least. Should net you a few points to upgrade. If you're expecting that imperial list a lot then don't bother upgrading the daggers, the squishy imperials ships all still shoot first.

Ok, so my buddy came over for a rematch, with both of us flying slightly modified lists.

Mine:

Horton + Ion turret

Blue Sq. B-wing x2

Green Sq. A-wing + PTL + Cluster Missiles

His:

Backstabber + Stealth Device

Dark Curse

Royal Guard Pilot + PTL+ Royal Guard Tie + Shield upgrade + Hull upgrade

Bounty Hunter Firespray

The result: A chrushing defeat for the imperials.

We faced off in different corners this time, with most of the asteroids along his deployment area. I sent my A-wing across my deployment zone and kept the other three ships together as they moved up and swung towards the center,

He sent all his ships after the A-wing, which hid behind an asteroid and turtled up with PTL evade/focus, which allowed it to survive a barrage from three ships unscathed. It also exposed his flank to my B's and Y's as they came in.

Some mistakes on his part and really hot dice on mine sent Dark Curse one-shotted out of the board by Horton, and burned most of the shields off the BH. Then he expected me to K-turn my B-wings, and banked Backstabber right into both their firing archs at point-blank range. Goodbye stealth device, and Backstabber was left with one hull in a bad spot.

Meanwhile, his Royal Guard and my A-wing were headed for each other, and this is where I really saw the value of the PTL/cluster missiles combo. We exchanged fire at range 1, and he only burned one shield off of my, while I took him down to a single remaining hull.

My B's and Horton had swung towards the BH, and reduced that to a couple of hull as well. At this point, he forfitted the game, since I had lost a total of four shields distributed over three ships.

Thoughts:

- Horton didn't really do much. Dutch or another support for the B's would probably be a better choice. Maybe a HWK.

- The PTL Green Sq. rocked! And clusters were definitly the right choice, since he was up close and personal most of the time.

- Ensuring that the asteroids are placed to leave the B's ample room to maneuver is super important.

- Hot dice wins games!

Horton Salami is a bad mamma jamma. I find he is best utilized with 2 protons and a blaster turret.

Horton Salami is a bad mamma jamma. I find he is best utilized with 2 protons and a blaster turret.

That's what I thought, and my initial intention for the list. But I found it was hard to use Horton to his full effect, getting off the PT's with both focus and TL, and staying at range 2-3.

Who should a fully tooled up Horton have at his side to do well? Dutch/Kyle/Lando to enable him to get both focus and TL? Someone to run interferrence for him, like a cheap A-wing perhaps?