Hey all,

Ok, having fought two battles now in "team epic" format against the transports Both games playing as Imperials, and both games coming out as victories. I can now say the Transport is not as scary as I thought it would be, nor is facing two of them in one battle.

In the first game I ran 3 squints, Vader, and 4 ties. My teammate ran Col. Jendon, a Firespray-31, and 3 Tie Bombers. The Rebel team ran 5 X-wings, a Y-wing, a B-wing, HWK-290, and of course the Transport. ( sorry I cant recall all the upgrades that were taken, but there are a couple of images of that game my buddy took I'll try to add later.)

Game one had my teammate moving up the left side with Jendon and the Bomber formation, and having the firespray-31 start out on the left flank. While my Tie formation moved slowly up toward the center of the board along with Vader, while my Squint group soft (left) 3 banked from the right board edge. Rebels on my teammates side moved rather quick up to engage the bomber formation and the transport with it's three X-wing support fighters also began turning to engage the bomber formation.

Turn two Seeing as the transport and it's X-wing escort started to make their turn toward the bombers I rushed my Ties up to engage the escorting X-wings, and my squints moved template 5 ahead to catch the transport. Both Rebel and Imperial ships on my teammates side were in a nasty furball which showed no sign of letting up. Those bombers though, yeah six hull each.. very nasty to deal with, they were weathering the punishment they were receiving.

Turn three saw my ties take out one of the Transports X-wing escorts, ah I believe it was "Hobbie", and put some a couple hits on the transport. Where it really mattered however, two of my Interceptors tore into the transport, taking the rest of it's shields and inflicting a regular and 2 critical damage hits on the "front" part of the transport.

Turn four we suffered some losses, we lost one or two bombers I can't remember which, and Col Jendon, but the remaining rebel fighters were in bad shape for the most part, as was the Transport. The Reb player running the transport had to use the action that recovers shields, but it wasn't enough to save it in the following turn.

Turn five was the end of the transport, Vader shot up template 5 to basically be millimeters from contacting the transport's base, one of my ties hard turned 1 inside and was point blank to the transport, and again two of my Interceptors were right there all those ships peppered the last of the transport's shields and hull. We call the game after that. Imperial victory.

Game two saw Imperials field twelve total ships. 2 shuttles, 2 firesprays, 2 tie bombers, 1 tie fighter, vader, Fel, Tur, Carnor Jax, Kir Kantos. The Rebs fielded Han, HWK-290, B-wing, Luke, Wedge, Wes, Dagger pilot, and two. Yes count them, TWO transports. I was not feeling confident facing two that's for sure.

Turn one saw me advance slowly up the left flank of the board, this time however, the Rebs put the bulk of their fighters on the same flank to prevent the Squints from zipping up the flank and owning the transport. everything else was pretty evenly spead out.

Turn two saw Kir Kantos go down to concentrated X-wing fire, but Wes Janson was also claimed in the exchange so it was a one for one trade off. the Imp bomber ground had a harder time this game though, Reb transport (1) kept pulling focus, evade, blue TL's off the bombers making it tough to do much, but soak up hits.

Turn three saw Luke K-turn and just get past the firespray-31 Soontir had pulled a hard one so he was posed to end the upstart Jedi with the shooting phase, Wedge who was right behind luke also attempted to K-turn but bumped the firespray stopping the turn, and putting Wedge in arc to and range one of Fel. All I could do was shake my head. Atleast Fel would be shooting first because of initiative. Deciding to instead of Luke I took a shot at Wedge. taking most of the shields off, then Wedge popped Fel due to me rolling zero evades like a boss. Sigh, the life of an Interceptor pilot. Vengence would be had next turn though.

Turn four saw my teammate begin to lose faith because he couldn't do anything with his list since the transports were at this point denying his bombers any kind of ordinance assaults, his firespray and the Rebel Falcon were going head to head, with the falcon winning that battle in the end. But here is where it came apart for the Rebs, it started off great, Transport (1) drove right into Vader insta-plodding him. Followed up by ramming their HWK-290 and exploding that. Luke was finally eliminated by Turr, and Wedge was downed by my teammates shuttle. While Carnor Jax finished off the Dagger B-wing. At this point the store was going to be closing so we called it, but had it gone on, it still looked bleak for the Rebs, two transports and a damaged falcon. outcome Imperial Victory. (there are a couple images from this game as well, i'll try to get them added to it later as well.)

I'v found that don't even bother with the transports, just wipe the fighter escorts out, and it's game. Take Markmenship on everything, since transport abilities can't wipe it. and you should do fine.

It will take time to develop good transporting strategy. The IMPS have the advantage because you pretty much know how all your ships work together.

Great report! I bet the lack of attacks from the Transport really makes it tough to use effectively, especially if you spice it up with tons of upgrades. It seems like a lot of fun though!

I'm starting to think A-Wings are really going to shine as escorts: since Co-Ordinate is so nice because the Transport will be the last thing to move in the action phase, they'll be able to better position the A-Wing's using Boost, or having them use Evade or Target Lock or Focus as appropriate. In this deployment you can have the benefit of A-Wings who also don't require the use of PtL every single turn (except Tycho, because Tycho). Comms Booster seems absolutely worthwhile for the purpose of close escorts.

Jam seems nice, but without another upgrade to make stress more threatening it seems difficult and somewhat lackluster to use effectively.

In the second game Moore's partner was frustrared as his ships were stressed constantly keeping jendon and the bombers from TLing anything. It also made manuvering to get cannon shots with the bombers rough as they were always shooting the fore of the Birght Hope!The double reinforce is brutal!

So the frustration climaxed as the Bright Hope turned towards a pile of fighters (Imps and Rebs) but only overlapped Vader! A rough night indeed.

However with all that frustration it really was his only loss at that point. Granted Fett was out of the picture mostly due to stress and Solo hunting him down.

As for us Rebs... well our intial placement could have been better. If the HWK was with the X-Wings I think things would have been better. Also I piloted Luke like trash and forgot to have him use opportunist... well the entire game. I feel the extra die I would have had on several shots could have helped.

Finally with all the actions and pilot abilities that strip focus and other tokens it made elite pilot talents like marksmanship really shine.

overall both games were fun even with sometimes very frustrated player outbursts. I will say that epic team games are more like a marathon rather than the 100 point dogfight sprints!

I will have to say Jam was very effective against the bombers, shuttle, and the firespray. With the load out I had on my ship I was able to jam a target out to range 3 and put one stress on a non-stressed ship within range 1 of the target ship. I was able to effectively limit movement on two ships a turn and prevent the support ship (Jendon shuttle) for getting target locks.

It may be corner case but it effectively bogged down most I of the Imp fleet.

oh and I agree A-wings as close support or flanker/finishers will be great. If you can pilot the transports so the A-Wings can advance using the cover of the transports... they will be throwing respectable amounts of evade dice...

I forgot about huge ships granting extra green dice... I'll try to abuse that when I play one.

Yeah, that ability to deal two stress to one ship and one to another at range one would really be devastating had I rolled my regular Tie list. Interceptors with their sweet sweet dial have a lot of green to off set most of the stress dealt to them. Yes, it does hinder them from taking marksmanship action, but I can live without it for the most part. Just fly those squints like a pro and you should be good. A-wings I agree would make the most Ideal transport escort with their cheapsish cost, and high evade numbers. But due to my love of Interceptors and the fact that I almost always run 100% Squint lists, I feel running all A-wing escorts favors the Interceptors throwing 2 dice outside range 1, and even at range 1, the Tie/Int still has the advantage throwing an equal number of evasion dice. But yes, A-wings will be tougher to kill and require more skill to hunt down while trying to avoid letting the transports ram your fighters. so I guess it all evens out... unless the dice gods go back to hating me, and my dice start turning up blanks for evades. Which happens a lot to me.

I will have to say Jam was very effective against the bombers, shuttle, and the firespray. With the load out I had on my ship I was able to jam a target out to range 3 and put one stress on a non-stressed ship within range 1 of the target ship.

You mean, not at range 1?

If there is one thing that I learned from playing the campaign that comes with the transport, it is that there is a tricky balance to using it. The transport can be a great way to defend your fleet, but you also need your fleet to defend it back with the proper mix of pilots to pull it off (Wes Janson, Biggs, etc).

I will have to say Jam was very effective against the bombers, shuttle, and the firespray. With the load out I had on my ship I was able to jam a target out to range 3 and put one stress on a non-stressed ship within range 1 of the target ship.

You mean, not at range 1?

No...Frequency Jammer states,

"When you perform a jam action choose 1 enemy ship that does not have a stress token and is at Range 1 of the jammed ship. The chosen ship receives 1 stress token."

So unless our group is reading it wrong (very possible) then a second ship at Range or in Range 1's band, not in Range 2 or Range 3, receives a stress token.

Now if you mean the jam action it normally is working on ships at range 1 or 2. I was running the Duty Free title which allowed me to jam a ship at range 1, 2, or 3.

The transport can be a great way to defend your fleet, but you also need your fleet to defend it back with the proper mix of pilots to pull it off (Wes Janson, Biggs, etc).

Wow, using a transport to protect your escorts. .. that's pretty counter-intuitive. I know what you are saying but it just seems odd to me that anyone would consider using a large, lumbering, valuable, expensive, unarmed asset like a transport to ensure the safe passage of a group of small, maneuverable, (relatively) expendable, (comparatively) inexpensive, armed fighters. I know that you are speaking in terms of functionality within the game (every shot that hits the transport is one less that hits the escorts, allowing the escorts to live longer and continue to kill the enemy before they can kill the transport...) but it still seems weird to me

I tend to think of Transports being more of the objective of the game, rather than a combat asset. In other words, something to protect rather than something to protect purpose-built combat ships. That said, I realize from the three games I have played with them that they are not defenseless... but really that big a threat either, more like a nuisance

Fly Casual

Chris

The transport can be a great way to defend your fleet, but you also need your fleet to defend it back with the proper mix of pilots to pull it off (Wes Janson, Biggs, etc).

Wow, using a transport to protect your escorts. .. that's pretty counter-intuitive. I know what you are saying but it just seems odd to me that anyone would consider using a large, lumbering, valuable, expensive, unarmed asset like a transport to ensure the safe passage of a group of small, maneuverable, (relatively) expendable, (comparatively) inexpensive, armed fighters. I know that you are speaking in terms of functionality within the game (every shot that hits the transport is one less that hits the escorts, allowing the escorts to live longer and continue to kill the enemy before they can kill the transport...) but it still seems weird to me

I tend to think of Transports being more of the objective of the game, rather than a combat asset. In other words, something to protect rather than something to protect purpose-built combat ships. That said, I realize from the three games I have played with them that they are not defenseless... but really that big a threat either, more like a nuisance

Fly Casual

Chris

It kind of depends upon which "named" transport that you are using and which upgrade. In the case of "Bright Hope" with a shield projector, the transport can protect your fleet as long as you manage to keep the enemy in front of you. Standard ties cannot even damage the transport if it reinforces its front (+2 evade results against any attack), leaving it free to use its projectors to intercept attacks meant for other pilots (allowing them to use their focus and target locks for offense). Even the few hits from ships with more firepower can be mitigated using a backup shield generator, leaving the transport free to use its action again to reinforce its front on the next round.

If, however, the enemy gets on one side of Bright Hope then things start to suck really, really quick... unless you happened to have Biggs, flying on the other side of the transport and using it as an obstacle to protect himself... and the list goes on

The possibilities are so long that it makes my head spin just thinking about it too much, lol.

A strategy I have found interesting is Biggs flying along side a transport rocking the EM emitter. Behind Biggs is a a pair of y-wings with turrets to cover the rear and fire out from behind the transport. Everyone must fire at biggs 5-6 defense dice. Its defensive, but worked pretty well. Certainly a different style of combat.

Biggs doesn't protect the transport though, does he?

Nope.

Biggs Darklighter’s card text should read "Other friendly

small and large ships at Range 1 cannot be targeted by attacks if the attacker could target you instead."

That's what I thought. In that case it would make more sense to attack the transport I guess.

The Transport's ability to jam ordnance launch is nasty - it takes away the bomber's ability to make actions when close. The **** thing is almost worth it for the Jam action alone...

I'm intrigued to see how bombers packing proton bombs do, though. A GR-75 isn't an especially manouvrable beastie, and shield-piercing criticals are just as scary to it as to its smaller escorts...

I'm not sure what would be better for the job, but I'm leaning towards scimitars - I think you want to fly into the position the transport's going to occupy next turn, then - before it moves - drop your bomb pattern and skedaddle, which means being a lower pilot skill than it is.

The Transport's ability to jam ordnance launch is nasty - it takes away the bomber's ability to make actions when close. The **** thing is almost worth it for the Jam action alone...

I'm intrigued to see how bombers packing proton bombs do, though. A GR-75 isn't an especially manouvrable beastie, and shield-piercing criticals are just as scary to it as to its smaller escorts...

I'm not sure what would be better for the job, but I'm leaning towards scimitars - I think you want to fly into the position the transport's going to occupy next turn, then - before it moves - drop your bomb pattern and skedaddle, which means being a lower pilot skill than it is.

Remember that the Huge ships move after all small and larger ships so your bombers will always move before transports.