Right guys,

I work largely from home (perk of the job) but it does mean i procrastinate loads and tend to leave important projects while i do other 'important stuff' (re surf these forums).

So while im in a cafe trying to bash out a 2000 word article on East German Border Guard Uniforms of the 80s (exciting huh?) can you help me avoid mucking about on squadron builder and on here by helping me out with an 'obsolete rebels' list.

I'm looking to get a playable, reasonably competetive but still characterful rebel list of 100 points using the following mins

4 Z95 headhunters

1 HWK 290

As they are all in the same colour scheme.

As for upgrades, check my sig but i pretty much own at least one of everything you can get on the shelves in the UK.

So 100 points using dated ships, suggestions please?

P.s. I'll check this in an hour or two... it's my incentive to get some work done!

Not sure if it would work but:

Jan Ors + Ion Cannon Turret + Veteran Instinct (31pts)

Airen Cracken + Swarm Tactics (21pts)

Bandit Pilot + Concussion missiles (16pts) x3

Each turn, you focus with you Bandits. During the comat phase, when you attack with Airen, you give a Target Lock to the Bandit you chose for swarm tactics. Yo then shoot your missile with the help of Jan for a 5 dice focus attack with 1 blank becoming a hit. Repeat for the next 2 turns. Jan have VI to raise her PS to 10 and help counter the possible phantom threat.

Hmm seems like S&V practice, Throw in a Y-wing or two as well.

Hmm. Wow. Good challenge. I can't think up anything good so far.

your restriction on ships makes it very difficult.

here is what I personally came up with:

Alright, I thought about a variant that might be more touchy to fly but offr a better Alpha Strike.

Jan Ors + Swarm Tactics + Blaster Turret (31pts)

Airen Cracken + Swarm Tactics + Cluster Missiles (25pts)

Bandit Squadron Pilot + Concussion Missiles (16pts) x2

Bandit Squadron Pilot (12pts)

Like the first time, focus with both Bandit with missiles and use Swarm tactics from Jan and Cracken so they both attack at PS8. Use Cluster Missiles to attack 2 times with Cracken and give a TL to both Bandit. Shoot both missiles with a focus and boost one of the 2 to 5 dice with Jan. After the initial strike, Jan boost the attack of the Z95 of her choice to 3 and Cracken give a focus to Jan so she can use her turret even when action denied. It could be interesting to fly but probably need some timing and range practice: Having a Range 1-2 missile on the high PS ship while the lower one have a range 2-3 missile can be tricky to approach correctly.

Alright, I thought about a variant that might be more touchy to fly but offr a better Alpha Strike.

Jan Ors + Swarm Tactics + Blaster Turret (31pts)

Airen Cracken + Swarm Tactics + Cluster Missiles (25pts)

Bandit Squadron Pilot + Concussion Missiles (16pts) x2

Bandit Squadron Pilot (12pts)

Much better off with the first iteration of this.

The big red flag is the Blaster turret on Jan. Blasters take Focus to fire and Jan may have hard time with that. Throw in an ability that leaves her stressed and that makes her very predictable. To put things nicely the Blaster Turret is NOT something you usually want to use. If the ship has a single Focus token the Ion Turret is barely behind it in damage dealt to most targets. Now if you can generate "extra" Focus tokens it almost becomes playable but is still vulnerable. Although it adds to the cost the only time you probably should even consider the Blaster is when you also have a Recon Specialist and are most likely flying the Moldy Crow.

While Cracken could hand out two actions using a Cluster Missile I'm not sure it's worth the risk if you are trying to get in some kind of alpha strike with missiles that reach R3. That's also more points on it when it finally does go down.

I put up a 5 Z-95 alpha strike build in a different post but you seem to want the HWK in there as well which would actually push me away from the Alpha Strike idea. Maybe something like this if you are trying to run these five ships specifically.

Roark + Ion Turret

Cracken + Swarm Tactics

Blount + Swarm Tactics + Ion Pulse Missile

Tala + ion Pulse

Bandit + Assault Missile

I'll come out and admit that is sucks when it comes to damage but does have a bit of control. Change up ordnance if you like. The idea is that Roark can boost PS for either named Z and each named Z can boost the PS of another ship. It's possible to shoot at 12,12,12,4,4 if desired or 12,12,8,8,4 depending on when you want Cracken shooting to pass an action.

Kyle Katarn

-Rec. Spec.

-Moldy Crow

-Ion cannon turret

Airen Cracken

-Swarm Tactics

Lt. Blount

-Assault Missiles

Tala Sq.

Bandit Sq.

Kyle Katarn

-Rec. Spec.

-Moldy Crow

-Ion cannon turret

Airen Cracken

-Swarm Tactics

Lt. Blount

-Assault Missiles

Tala Sq.

Bandit Sq.

Now with this one I may go with the Blaster Turret on the HWK. Granted Kyle may pass out some tokens at least he can also generate two each turn and store any he doesn't use. That point pushes the Bandit into another Tala. Looking into the options for the Elite Pilot skill may not be a bad idea.

Alright, I thought about a variant that might be more touchy to fly but offr a better Alpha Strike.

Jan Ors + Swarm Tactics + Blaster Turret (31pts)

Airen Cracken + Swarm Tactics + Cluster Missiles (25pts)

Bandit Squadron Pilot + Concussion Missiles (16pts) x2

Bandit Squadron Pilot (12pts)

Much better off with the first iteration of this.

The big red flag is the Blaster turret on Jan. Blasters take Focus to fire and Jan may have hard time with that. Throw in an ability that leaves her stressed and that makes her very predictable. To put things nicely the Blaster Turret is NOT something you usually want to use. If the ship has a single Focus token the Ion Turret is barely behind it in damage dealt to most targets. Now if you can generate "extra" Focus tokens it almost becomes playable but is still vulnerable. Although it adds to the cost the only time you probably should even consider the Blaster is when you also have a Recon Specialist and are most likely flying the Moldy Crow.

While Cracken could hand out two actions using a Cluster Missile I'm not sure it's worth the risk if you are trying to get in some kind of alpha strike with missiles that reach R3. That's also more points on it when it finally does go down.

Normally I would share your view on the Blaster turret and quite frankly, it's there because I didn't have the point needed to make it into a Ion Cannon Turret. But I tought about it and in this case, it can work. Like I said in my post, as long as Cracken is there, except for the first turn of offense, he can give an action to Jan even if she's been action denied. So let's say she move at her turn, clear her stress and take a focus action, Cracken shoot and allow Jan to take a Target Lock right before shooting. If she don't use it, she don't need Cracken help next turn, unless she's been blocked (like you said, needing to clear stress every turn make you predictable and easy to block). So, as long as Cracken is there to help her, she will always have a focus to at least use her turret. Also, she is in the team as a support unit, not to deal a lot of damage, that's the job of the Z-95 that she boost the attack each turn. But yeah, if I had one more point, I would squeeze a Ion Turret in there.

As for Cluster on Cracken, like I said, it can be tricky to approach correctly: Either you move with your higher PS in front and move fast so you don't collide or, the turn of engagement, you move your Bandit slowly and move up front with your high PS ships. Also, if you see that it won't work, you can always move to plan B and shoot just one boosted Concussion missiles per turn, like in the first team I posted. What this team can do though is, for the first strike, deal three 3 dice attack, one 4 dice+focus and a blank into a hit, and one 5 dice+focus and a blank into a hit; all fireing at PS8 and one 2 dice attack at PS2. That can really mess with your opponent early, especially since both TL are given during combat phase.

So, definetely not a team for new players, but I can see it work if played correctly. Definetly more tough to fly than the first team I posted.

Awesome suggestions so far, thanks guys!

The HWK is a trap. As a support ship, you should be keeping the cost as minimal as is humanly possible. If you're going to spend 30+ points on something, it had better be able to put out a lot better damage than a Blaster Turret is capable of.

It saddens me to say so, but Kyle is probably the worst of the HWK pilots. Slap an ICT on either of the other two and call it a day.

I've always found mouldy crow with a blaster turret gives people a surprise.

As it's not that visible on the model a few times people just forget its got a turret, trail it's tail and get atomised.

I'm guessing they're not very experienced players if they're expecting a ship with 1 attack and no K-turn to, well, do anything at all.

Blaster Turret is just outright bad, for the same reason Expose is bad. If you're paying points for something, you shouldn't have to forfeit an action as well. Blaster Turret, on its own, costs 4 points. Recon Spec will cost you another 3 if you want to modify it. Like I said, the HWK is a trap. It tempts you into spending an inordinate amount of points just to give some lackluster offense to a mediocre support ship.

...

The big red flag is the Blaster turret on Jan....

Normally I would share your view on the Blaster turret and quite frankly, it's there because I didn't have the point needed to make it into a Ion Cannon Turret. But I tought about it and in this case, it can work. Like I said in my post, as long as Cracken is there, except for the first turn of offense, he can give an action to Jan even if she's been action denied. So let's say she move at her turn, clear her stress and take a focus action, Cracken shoot and allow Jan to take a Target Lock right before shooting. If she don't use it, she don't need Cracken help next turn, unless she's been blocked (like you said, needing to clear stress every turn make you predictable and easy to block). So, as long as Cracken is there to help her, she will always have a focus to at least use her turret. Also, she is in the team as a support unit, not to deal a lot of damage, that's the job of the Z-95 that she boost the attack each turn. But yeah, if I had one more point, I would squeeze a Ion Turret in there.

...

So, definetely not a team for new players, but I can see it work if played correctly. Definetly more tough to fly than the first team I posted.

I'm seeing Cracken more as support for the lower PS ships instead of being need to feed Jan actions she needs just to use a weapon system. Without a good way to gain Focus token on its own a ship running the Blaster is just too vulnerable. We'll say that when one tries to run it Y-Wings, especially Dutch, that is expecting Focus tokens to come from other sources . Here not only are you expecting the token to come from another source you're actually expecting to get an action which may not always work.

I'm not advocating that a blaster turret is a good upgrade that you should take over the Ion turret everytime, I usually avoid it, but in this particular situation, with the Alpha strike dynamic that I wanted to set, there was no point left to upgrade it to a Ion turret. But, unlike some others, I'm just not the kind of guy to automatically discard an upgrade because the math doesn't support it as being the optimal choice. The ship doesn't suddenly become useless, you don't absolutely have to modify a roll to make it worth it. Would it be better? Of course! But it's not an automiss if you don't. And using Dutch as an exemple for why you should never take a blaster turret is the worst candidate: His ability ask him to take a TL, not a focus, so of course if there is nobody to give him a focus he will either never use his turret, or never use his ability, and if he does use his ability, he won't be able to shoot, that would be just dumb.

In that scenario, I can personally see it work. You personally see Cracken more as support for the lower PS ship, I don't; I see him supporting Jan just as well. They are also the same PS, so you can give the action to Jan just before she attack and if she boost another Z95, even if he also attack at PS8 thanks to swarm tactics, she won't be already stress to receive the action from Cracken. And Jan is not part of the group to be the big hitter, she's there to support the others by boosting one attack to 3 dice, and have 3 candidates for that, excluding Cracken. And he don't have to always give her the action: if she was able to take a focus herself, there is nothing preventing you from giving the action to the Z95 that she will also boost the attack for a foucs+TL 3-4 dice attack.

But as I already said, the blaster turret is there because there is not enough point for a Ion turret and I don't personally see that upgrade as an auto-fail for the team. Look at the first build I made in this thread, notice that Jan have a Ion Turret. Why? Because there was enough point for it. The OP asked for a playable and reasonably competitive team, I believe it fits those criteria, maybe just not to your personal liking.

I tried making a build for this thread using Kyle right after it was posted, but as Waaagh said, the cost is too high.

Honestly, I would run Roark with ICT and maybe Nien Numb to keep him in the action easier. Add Cracken with Swarm Tactics and some other Z's with missiles and you can get some nice shoot firsts to gib things.

Roark passes PS12 to Cracken, Cracken shoots and passes action to a Swarmed generic Z at PS12, generic Z lobs missiles at value targets they could not lock onto after their low PS maneuver.