Just played another practice match against the biggest nemesis of the Echo list I'm bringing:

Echo + VI + ACD + RC (38)

BH + Flight Instructor (37)

OGP + Vader (24)

99 pts

vs

Chewie + EU + PTL + Luke + C3PO + MF Title (60)

3 Talas (39)

99 pts

I deployed the shuttle and BH on the left corner, and Echo on the right corner facing left. He had his Talas and Chewie my right (same side as Echo).

First 2-3 turns included him racing Chewie behind the Talas across the right edge of the board, and my Echo flying left to where the Shuttle and BH were.

The Shuttle bumps the BH to keep it slow, and the BH is flying up the left side. I made a crucial error when I decided to be fancy and K-Turned the BH (4K) to try to cut through the middle asteroids (we left the middle relatively empty) and intercept Chewie. But the 4K was shorter than I thought even with the large base, and I ended up not being able to do my 2 turn to get into the middle, and had to circle around the closest asteroid on my left side (R2 from both edges).

In the shooting rounds, Chewie had a couple pot shots at the BH, taking 1-2 shields off, and no one shot at Chewie. Echo couldn't get behind the Talas since they were at my right hand corner and did a good job fanning out their arc. Looking back, I should have sent Echo that way and took my chances to get behind the Talas.

The Shuttle had no chance of turning to meet Chewie, so I decided to focus on shooting the Talas.

After the BH came around the asteroid and was facing right in the same direction as the Shuttle, , they were able to kill one Tala in one round of shooting.

I then turned the BH to face Chewie and block his move, causing the two to crash into each other face to face. Without the focus+Evade action, I decided to take a chance with Echo and shoot at Chewie for a few rounds.

I was able to take 5 shields off in 2 rounds of shooting, and the 2 remaining talas were not effective in killing the shuttle or the BH. Eventually they all crashed into the Falcon/BH traffic jam or the shuttle.

Then my 65 min timer went off, and this is when I realized, even though I made the mistake of not focus firing on the Falcon, in a tournament setting, I would have won (by 13 points) if I just decided to let Echo fly off away from everything. Unfortunately I decided to let Echo shoot at the Falcon one more time (which she whiffed), and the Falcon and a lucky Tala R3 shot killed her in our last turn.

After this, I'm thinking of a completely different strategy for using my list in tournaments when facing a Super Falcon + escort. Try to use my BH or shuttle to deny the Falcon movement, and kill 1-2 escorts while keeping Echo alive. If the Falcon keeps flying away, then I just won't bother chasing it and will focus on the escorts even more.

Once I kill the escorts, I keep both shuttle and BH flying away and keep them alive as much as I can. Even if the shuttle dies (24 pts), if I can kill all the escorts, that's about 30-40 points and would give me a modified win. They'll never catch Echo, so the goal is to keep the BH alive.

I think this may actually work without having to change my list to a 5AP or 4 BSP escort for Echo.

What do you guys think?

I have flown with Echo a few times but not yet against a falcon with Engine upgrade, I would have thought it quite hard to run from a big base ship with EU, even with a Phantom, though maybe as you so you only need to do it for a coupe turns for it to matter.

I'm not a big fan of Hit & Hide tactics, though I do find it hard to believe that a game with 7 total ships on the board to start manages to go to 65 mins, especially if 1 of them is a Doom shuttle.

I would think one of you is taking too long to select manoeuvres or actions.

Yeah, well, it depends on if the Falcon's goal is to chase the Phantom. If the Phantom hides behind the shuttle and the BH, then the Falcon will have a harder time reaching it or will just shoot at R3.

While I'm not a big fan of hit and hide, there's just very little I can do when playing a Phantom against a Falcon tank. And in tournament settings, if someone brings the Falcon tank, that person is probably there to "win", so all is fair in love and war.

As for time, I think both of us were a bit slow, so I was actually surprised that the time ran out when the timer sounded.

I think you lost this game due to your deployment. Placing echo directly across from his entire squad neutered her usefulness and forced you to run away with her, instead of utilizing her 4 attack dice from the get-go. Basically, your opponent's deployment was designed to counter placing echo away from your other ships to try to stop her flanking. However, you can still flank, but you have to do it differently in this case.

Since Echo has highest PS, you have the advantage of deploying last after all of chewie+talas are down. You only deploy Echo on the opposite side of your other ships if your opponent is on their side or in the middle of the board. In this battle, having opponent deploy opposite corner to your bounty+shuttle forces you to place echo right in the corner beside your other ships. In the early turns, you set up the flank move by having echo move straight fast as possible to your opponent's side while your other ships slow bank/turn to the middle to force your opponent to engage them, since they will be closer. Unfortunately, echo will probably only have a R3 initial shot, but that kind of works out since she's the easiest kill for your opponent.

Try replaying this exact scenario modifying your placement of echo and see if you have an easier time killing chewie with all of your ships focus firing. As you noted, if your opponent kills echo and turtles, he can pretty much win or at worse draw since your big ships will struggle to take out chewie by themselves. I think echo will die no matter what, but if you maximize her damage on chewie so that he goes down before time is called, you will probably win because those talas won't be able to kill one of your big ships without chewie

My friend and I played a similar game but with only 1 ship per side. Echo was equiped with: Veteran Insticts, Recon Officer, Sensor Jammer, Advance Cloak. It might have been just dice/luck but 1 on 1 Echo brought down the tanky falcon down to 3 hit points before being shot down.

Thanks for the feedback blade! Yeah, I played 2 more games last night, one against Han with light upgrades (just Marksmanship) with Wedge and Prototype A-Wing, and the other with Chewie at 51 points (C3PO, Falcon, Gunner) with Wedge and Prototype A-Wing.

I was able to win both pretty easily, partially because of good die rolling, the other part because:

1. I was able to get the opponent to not shoot at Echo because she either had 5-6 agility dice (R3 with asteroid) against Han/Chewie, or the other ships didn't have firing arc on her.

2. I deployed Echo far away from his ships so she can flank the escorts easier.

3. Every turn I noticed the Falcon not taking a focus/marksmanship/will bump, I decloaked Echo into the fray and take pot shots at the Falcon.

I was able to take out Han VERY easily since he doesn't turtle, and Chewie was definitely harder so I was only able to kill him after I killed A-Wing and Wedge, and my Bounty Hunter died after whittling Chewie down while Echo and the shuttle finished him.

Unfortunately I never got to use Sensor Jammer even once, since no one shot at Echo.

After these two games I think I can do well with my build unless the guy is a) very good at playing the Falcon and b) played like I did against myself, gunning for Echo every turn and ignoring everyone else.

Focusing on Echo is a problem if the person has a power hungry list. I run Vader+Daredevil+Engine, Turr+VI+Stealth, and Echo+VI+ACD.

If you ignore Vader and Turr, they'll blast you from behind. If you ignore Echo, she'll do the same thing. That's the joy of power-hungry builds. Also, don't be afraid of pot-shotting the Z's from Range 3. With the right luck, you might just be able to kill a few before the Falcon can really come to bear.

Haha yeah, the problem with fighting the falcon is for Turr and Echo, there is no "behind" in "blast you from behind". If you give the Falcon a chance, he'll shoot you and dare you with all the gunner/Luke rerolls.

I do like having BH and Shuttle though, because they have 10 HP each and can dish out 3-4 dice per attack and be fire magnets.