The biggest problem is I only have 4 rebel ships.

YT-1300

X-wing

Y-wing

HWK-290

It's pretty good at annoying my friends with all the turret fire, but I'm not sure how to make it a little stronger competitively.

Advice?

Buy more ships.

I'm waiting on rebel aces.

You could try a Han Shoots first variant with Han Solo, an X-Wing, and a Y-Wing with an ion turret. That should be a pretty solid list versus most things, though swarms will give you trouble.

I think you could have a fine list here. Han with two Y's is already a fairly strong list. You just need to modify it a bit.

You could have Han Shoots first (Han Solo and Gunner) as a foundation, backed up by a Y-Wing with Ion, and then either use the Hwk as your second Ion, or an X-Wing for some additional firepower. Should be a fairly strong list.

Here is a (non-optimized) setup:

Han Solo + Gunner (51)

Gold Squadron Pilot + Ion (24)
Roark + Ion (23)
Total = 98

That leaves you with 2 points for upgrades. Roark buffs one ship to PS12 each turn. This is great for Han if you are going up a Phantom, and great for Gold if you are going up against anything else. Obviously, you can swap Han out for any other pilot and beef up the other two ships fairly easily. I've seen Falcon + 2xY-Wings do very well at tournaments, so it should be a strong list.

I would also note that Outer Rim Smuggler + Gold with Ion + Hwk with Ion + Rookie X-Wing only comes to 92 points. You could do a fair amount with those last 8 points and have a very tanky, high damage output 4 rebel list. Outer Rim Smuggler is criminally underrated. Sure it doesn't shoot that hard, but it does have a 360 degree turret, and only costs 27 points. You could throw Luke or even Wedge in there, or just provide minor updates to all the ships, and I think it could be very strong.

Adding 2 B-Wings to your collection will help it out immensely.

These are easily the best dog fighters in the game.

I think you could have a fine list here. Han with two Y's is already a fairly strong list. You just need to modify it a bit.

You could have Han Shoots first (Han Solo and Gunner) as a foundation, backed up by a Y-Wing with Ion, and then either use the Hwk as your second Ion, or an X-Wing for some additional firepower. Should be a fairly strong list.

Here is a (non-optimized) setup:

Han Solo + Gunner (51)

Gold Squadron Pilot + Ion (24)

Roark + Ion (23)

Total = 98

That leaves you with 2 points for upgrades. Roark buffs one ship to PS12 each turn. This is great for Han if you are going up a Phantom, and great for Gold if you are going up against anything else. Obviously, you can swap Han out for any other pilot and beef up the other two ships fairly easily. I've seen Falcon + 2xY-Wings do very well at tournaments, so it should be a strong list.

Gunner comes with the Slave I.

^ yeah, I don't have the firespray, so gunner is out.

I think you'll be fine with a standard Lando-Dutch-Rookie list.

44 Lando

7 Luke Skywalker

23 Dutch Vander

5 Ion Cannon Turret

21 Rookie Pilot

---

Seriously though, pick up an X-Wing expansion and some B-Wings.

How about adding blaster turret to the HWK and Y instead of ion? It's cheaper, and it gives those guys some flexibility in attack instead of relying on the 1300 and the X to do all the killing?

Ion Cannon Turret is far and away superior to Blaster Turret.

I've never gotten any mileage out of ion. I'm probably using it wrong.

Plus, with the recon specialist and moldy crow title, I can keep and have a near infinite supply of focus.

Plus, with the recon specialist and moldy crow title, I can keep and have a near infinite supply of focus.

Blaster Turret is a trap card. In order to make it viable, you have to spend a lot of points on more upgrades on a support ship. The net effect is that you're spending points to give a support ship offensive potential when you should be spending those points on your other ships. Instead of spending 6 extra points on a ship with Blaster Turret, just spend one more for the Ion Cannon Turret instead, and put those other 5 to use elsewhere.

The only ship that I would ever use Blaster Turret on is a Rebel Operative with Recon Spec, and even then only for fun. Even a naked Tarn Mison is better than an upgraded Rebel Op.

In order to accurately answer this question I need the following info: What sets do you have so I can figure out what upgrade cards you have?

I assume the following: Core set, Falcon, HWK, and Y-Wing.

Plus, with the recon specialist and moldy crow title, I can keep and have a near infinite supply of focus.

Blaster Turret is a trap card. In order to make it viable, you have to spend a lot of points on more upgrades on a support ship. The net effect is that you're spending points to give a support ship offensive potential when you should be spending those points on your other ships. Instead of spending 6 extra points on a ship with Blaster Turret, just spend one more for the Ion Cannon Turret instead, and put those other 5 to use elsewhere.

The only ship that I would ever use Blaster Turret on is a Rebel Operative with Recon Spec, and even then only for fun. Even a naked Tarn Mison is better than an upgraded Rebel Op.

Yeah, I could probably get the gun ship effect I'm trying to ape with the HWK with a pretty standard B wing.

In order to accurately answer this question I need the following info: What sets do you have so I can figure out what upgrade cards you have?

I assume the following: Core set, Falcon, HWK, and Y-Wing.

I also have imp aces, tie advanced and a Phantom.

Imperial lists seem to make themselves much more readily apparent.

X-W •Biggs Darklighter (25pts)

Y-W Gold Squadron Pilot (18pts) with Ion Cannon Turret (5pts)

HWK Rebel Operative (16pts) Ion Cannon Turret (5pts)

YT13 Outer Rim Smuggler (27pts) with •Millenium Falcon (1pts), •Nien Nunb (1pts)

You can ion lock and use the smuggler and Biggs to damage.

In order to accurately answer this question I need the following info: What sets do you have so I can figure out what upgrade cards you have?

I assume the following: Core set, Falcon, HWK, and Y-Wing.

I also have imp aces, tie advanced and a Phantom.

Imperial lists seem to make themselves much more readily apparent.

Should have said that because now we know upgrade cards .....

YT13 •Chewbacca (42pts) with Push the Limit (3pts), •Millenium Falcon (1pts) Nien Nunb (1pts)

HWK •Kyle Katarn (21pts) Blaster Turret (4pts), Recon Specialist (3pts)

X-W •Biggs Darklighter (25pts)

The idea is to double focus and dodge with the falcon each turn.

Kyle provides crazy focus, and Biggs soaks damage.

You also can 360 each turn with Kyle and Chewie which is nice against the phantom or anything else.

I would run the following:

Chewie: Naked

Kyle Kataran: Blaster Turret, Recon Specialist, Moldy Crow

Gold Squad Pilot: Ion Turret, R2-D2

Everybody has a turret, so they can all plod along in formation with Kyle dishing out focus tokens like candy on Halloween. All of the ships are tough as nails, except for the HWK. Analternate is to ditch the HWK and add Luke with R2-F2.

I think you could have a fine list here. Han with two Y's is already a fairly strong list. You just need to modify it a bit.

You could have Han Shoots first (Han Solo and Gunner) as a foundation, backed up by a Y-Wing with Ion, and then either use the Hwk as your second Ion, or an X-Wing for some additional firepower. Should be a fairly strong list.

Here is a (non-optimized) setup:

Han Solo + Gunner (51)

Gold Squadron Pilot + Ion (24)

Roark + Ion (23)

Total = 98

That leaves you with 2 points for upgrades. Roark buffs one ship to PS12 each turn. This is great for Han if you are going up a Phantom, and great for Gold if you are going up against anything else. Obviously, you can swap Han out for any other pilot and beef up the other two ships fairly easily. I've seen Falcon + 2xY-Wings do very well at tournaments, so it should be a strong list.

Gunner comes with the Slave I.

So he can't use it in tournaments (unless the TO allows it, which our local game store does). But there is no reason not to use it in friendly games. And Han Solo is still pretty mean, even without Gunner.

How about adding blaster turret to the HWK and Y instead of ion? It's cheaper, and it gives those guys some flexibility in attack instead of relying on the 1300 and the X to do all the killing?

Blaster turrets kind of suck outside of some very specific builds. Luckily, most of those builds use the HWK. You may want to read up on how to make it work before running it. Taking the Moldy Crow title is a must for this. Basically, it relies on you having focus to burn, because an unmodified attack (even with 3 dice) is pretty crappy overall.

On the other hand, Ion turrets are generally awesome, and typically help you a lot more than a blaster turret.

Long story short, never put a Blaster Turret on a Y-Wing unless you really know what you are doing and have a compelling reason to do so. But it can be ok on the Moldy Crow. Though, probably not as good as an Ion Turret.

I've never gotten any mileage out of ion. I'm probably using it wrong.

A few tips on using Ion well:

First, remember to focus. Shooting with out modification (focus, target lock, or some ability) is a recipe for disaster.

Second, the strength of Ion is that you know exactly where your opponent is going to be the next turn. This is invaluable against interceptors, phantoms, A-Wings, and B-Wings. You know they will do a one forward, and can thus guarantee focus fire.

Third, if someone is stressed, Ion them. Remember how I mentioned that unmodified shooting sucks? If you ion someone who is stressed, that is TWO turns they can't modify their attack.

Fourth, use Ion to break up formations. Many builds rely on formation flying (tie swarm, for example). Ioning one of the lead ships screws up the whole swarm.

Finally, remember you CAN ion large ships, it just takes two hits. Large ships get run off the board with ion fairly often.Many times they aren't even ioned when they go off the board. They were ioned the turn before, and now they are to close to get away.

Ion is one of the best abilities in the game. Against low PS builds with lots of ships, they break up formations. Against high PS builds it can keep 1/3-1/2 of their force, which isn't bad for a 23-25pt ship.