Can you build a 3 ship list with the empire like you can with the rebels?

Looking at the following:

Onyx Squadron Pilot + HLC + Engine Upgrade (43)

Onyx Squadron Pilot + HLC + Engine Upgrade (43)

Obsidian Squadron Pilot (13)

99 points.

Yeah the Obsidian is just there for the extra ship. Is it crazy to spend 86 points on two ships?

I think yes, but Love HLC on the B-wing so I figured it'd work well on its imperial counterpart.

The Engine Upgrade adds a little more short-range maneuverability to the Defender, but again... 8 points?

Here's an even crazier one:

Colonel Vessery + HLC + Outmaneuver + Engine Upgrade (49 Ouch!)

Echo + Predator + Advanced Cloaking Device (37)

Obsidian Squadron Pilot (13)

99 Points.

Again, It seems crazy to have almost half your points wrapped up in one ship.

Three ship lists have always been semi-viable. Vader + Soontir + Turr were a thing for a while. There's double and triple Firespray lists. I've heard people are putting up good results with 2-3 Phantoms.

I played Echo, Vessery, and Omicron the other night and it went very well. 3 ship builds are viable, but consider evening out the upgrades. It would suck to lose a a basket full of eggs and be left with the Obsidian to play chicken with.

I keep trying to build a 3 ship list with the new wave and keep ending up feeling like I'm 5 points from decently happy with the result.

I like a OGP and BH with a named interceptor, flavor as you like. Flank with the squint and your opponent has a hard choice. Either go after the flanker and leave two 10 hit point ships with 3 attack to pound them. Or face the large ships and leave a squint running amok behind his squad.

Depends. Your lists I would put on the lower end of viable. 3 ships at PS 3 is pretty bad. Firesprays get away with it because they have 2 arcs and 30 hp on the table.

Engine upgrades are semi useless on no-name pilots because said pilots need to either focus or TL to maintain 'value'. The defender doesn't have any pilot that really benefits from dog-fighting so the engine upgrade is kind of a dud for this ship.

Your defenders are crying out for Jonus in this list. He is a great force multiplier. You need to drop the engines, and dropping to deltas gives you 4 points to play with.

For a 3 ship build to work you need tanky ships such as a defender/firespray/interceptors with royal guard titles and/or very capable arc dodging ships, phantoms, vader with EU, and PTL interceptors

Of course some ships fall under both categories and those are the ones you will enjoy the most success.

I'd say they were viable, albeit squishy, before, but with Wave 4 out now they've become much more likely to appear.

Actually three ship lists became my thing after a few weeks of swarms, and getting sick of them. Intereptors and named TIEs mostly, or Major Rhymer decked out a bit. Then Imperial Aces came out, and I had more fun. I actually prefer the builds with fewer ships. Usually more fun to fly, and planning takes less time.

I did quite well at AoIA with

Mauler Mithel + Expert Handling

Soontir Fel + RGT + PtL + Shield Upgrade + Targeting Computer

Krassis Trelix + HLC + Mercenary Copilot

truly abysmal luck in one match stopped me from going 3 and 0.

Just ran a very simple 3 ship imperial list and it worked great

Delta Squadron Pilot — TIE Defender 30 Darth Vader — TIE Advanced 29 Squad Leader 2 Krassis Trelix — Firespray-31 36 Ion Cannon 3

Vader isn't an offensive threat, but he has great survivability and good maneuvering. With squad leader, he is a priority target, as he makes his squadmates much more dangerous even tho he himself isn't that hard-hittin. This allows him to take some of the heat off of the defender.

The defender is only a ps1 but moving first to block the opponent, and evading means his isn't likely to be hurt by the ships who DONT bump into him and vader can later give him another action to boost his offensive output as needed.

ion cannon re-rolls are a constant threat from the firespray. Get a successful Ion hit on a ship, then use the defenders white k turn to pop up behind the ioned target and shred him to bits.

The weakest part of this list is vader. His action sharing greatly helps everyone else but he just doesn't have the teeth himself to do anything that major other than being a nuisance and handing out actions. This is a good role for him, and his action giving is key to making the remaining two ships offensive enough to pull their weight, but he just doesn't quite justify the 31 points. I'm thinking of tweaking vader out and replacing him with Jendon.

I want to try 2 Onyx squadron pilots with HLCs and Jonus. It's 100 even

If you try to fit both a phantom and a defender in your list, you are basically stuck at 3 ships (or 2 adacemies and the other two,) not sure if it's a good list yet but it might work well. We still have several wave 4 regional events that should help show us

I am surprised that no one said,

FS Bounty Hunter (33pts)

FS Bounty Hunter (33pts)

FS Bounty Hunter (33pts)

Also give it 5 months and the decimator is going to be out. I know that the one of the named pilots is a lot is going to soak 50-60 alone.

Rear Admiral Chiraneau† (46pts)

I want to try 3 defender or 3 phantoms so those builds will be right there.

That particular build, probably not. When looking at ship numbers counting a Tie as a whole ship for a low ship count build is a mistake. You have 15 total HP, and still have a lower PS than many builds. If you're running a 3 ship build you need to have higher PS so you can drop a ship before the enemy starts firing. IF you can't do that you're screwed. Bloody Daggers will shred you. Many 3 ship rebel builds will shred you unless you manage enough damage round one to kill one of their ships.

But if you think you can fly what amounts to a 2.5 ship build and make it work, more power to you.

I ran a 3 ship Imp list last night -

Delta Squadron Pilot (30)

"Echo" (30)
Veteran Instincts (1)
Stygium Particle Accelerator (2)

"Whisper" (32)
Veteran Instincts (1)
Tactician (2)
Stygium Particle Accelerator (2)

Total: 100

View in Yet Another Squad Builder

The SPA didn't seem to really work great, but with my Whisper, I thought all was lost, but some maneuvering and I took out 2 ships solo in 2 rounds. And that was with a previous attack of 5 from me (rolled 1 hit) which was evaded. I thought at that point it was done, as that would have been huge. I think 3 ships with the wave 4 stuff in there will be more common

For a 3 ship build to work you need tanky ships such as a defender/firespray/interceptors with royal guard titles and/or very capable arc dodging ships, phantoms, vader with EU, and PTL interceptors

Of course some ships fall under both categories and those are the ones you will enjoy the most success.

This put exactly what I have been trying to accomplish into words. I use three Interceptors or two Interceptors and a Defender.

I am 6-0 running

Rexler Brath, Predator

Carnor Jax, PtL

Soontir Fel, PtL

99 total

This list is punchy and survives well, but must be flown correctly.

I am 6-0 running

Rexler Brath, Predator

Carnor Jax, PtL

Soontir Fel, PtL

99 total

This list is punchy and survives well, but must be flown correctly.

I ran that list for a while too, lining up Rexlar on the inside and the interceptors on the flanks really seemed to help, Rexlar being the most durable seems to take the early fire and that allows the interceptors to get behind their targets and really shine.

I think it comes down to spreading your pts evenly. As opposed to 80+ pts for 2 ships. BH, shuttles and both wave 4 ships seem to lend themselves well to a 3 ship squad.

IMO, you need bulkiness and or menuverability to be successful. No 2 ship builds with a Tie Fighter tact on at the end.

I look forward to trying out an Echo + Delta + BH squad.

They've always been viable and now with the defender, phantom, and decimated they are even improving!

No one has mentioned this gem:

BH+gunner x2

Howlrunner

Lots of 3 ceptor lists. I almost alway stretch to four ships with Nightbeast and Backstabber instead of the 3rd 30pt ship though.

BH + Recon

2x Onyx Squadron

Thats a lot of tank and some pretty good spank.

I'm excited to try this one.

Kath with EH and Rebel Captive

Echo with VI, AdvSen, RecSpec and ACD

Night Beast

Comes to 99 points. I could run Backstabber or Curse instead of Night Beast, but this gives me an initiative bid.

This will also be fun and hurtful:

BH + Mara Jade

BH + rebel captive+ seismic

Shuttle + tactician+ Vader

Call it Big Stress.

You want a good 3 ship empire build?!

Maarek w/ Marksmanship

Vader w/ Squad Leader

Whisper w/ VI, FCS, ACD

Trust me.

You want a good 3 ship empire build?!

Maarek w/ Marksmanship

Vader w/ Squad Leader

Whisper w/ VI, FCS, ACD

Trust me.

you lost me when you mentioned maarek stele

for the same cost you can run Soontir Fel with PTL instead, you'll have a highly more survivable ship and one that's also more maneuverable and packs more of a punch