I killed Dash in two rounds tonight in my TC match, he only got 1 shot off. Unfortunately I still lost the game though.

Dash is going to make everyone complaining about fat Han now wish they were playing against fat Han in another month or two.

Best ship in the game

An EI Exposed RAdm is a poor candidate for a gunner.

Is it because he most likely will cause a hit with 4 dice?

I killed Dash in two rounds tonight in my TC match, he only got 1 shot off. Unfortunately I still lost the game though.

Nice! What did you use and how did you kill him?

Just tried my first 2 games with the Outrider. Did a variation I've seen others play before:

Dash Rendar

HLC

Outrider Title

Engine Upgrade

PtL

Kyle Katarn crew

58 pts

Corran Horn

VI

Engine Upgrade

FCS

42 points.

Played against a good player who tried:

Soontir (PtL) + Howl + 4 TIEs (2 OSP, 2 AP)

The first game my Corran died horribly without firing off a shot (bad play on my part and bad dice rolling - 2 evades from 12 dice), so Dash was on his own taking on Soontir+5 TIEs. Guess what? even with very poor rolling early on (I lost 4 shields getting shot by 2 TIEs in one round) and a few sub-optimal boost/barrel roll arc dodging moves (where I ended up in firing arc when I could have been out of it), I killed Soontir and 5 TIEs with 5 hull left.

We reviewed our moves and analyzed what the Imperial player could have done, and it was almost impossible since the TIEs tried to fly in formation (Dash easily got out of arc) and then spread out (Dash was able to take out one with HLC before it shot or turtle up). the only thing we could think of is maybe take some chances with Soontir and just trade shots at R3, or dive in and try a few shots at R1.

This is a very, very difficult position for the Imperial player to be in. The reflex reaction is "well break formation and spread out your arcs!!" But the issue with this, is that only around half of your ships will end up catching Dash in arc. And Dash shoots first, so all he has to do is attack the closest ship that has him in arc. At best the Imperial ship will lose its focus, spending it on defense, and at worst it gets outright destroyed by a TL+F 4 dice HLC attack. This is more likely than you might think: 4 dice TL+F has a 25% chance of 1-shotting a TIE with focus for defense. Either way, the Imperial player's attack power is going to be less than half of what you would get if your entire squad could focus on Dash. Dash just has to keep playing the dodge / nuke game, and he is golden. Nevermind that in a "normal" game he can have 3 escorts that can tear into your blockers.

A couple of defenders with HLC will ruin dash`s day pretty quick and there's no need to fly them in formation unless you want to take Jonas for the re rolls, the k turns will give them distance enough that dash will have a hard time rolling out of arc.

And with six hit points and three dodge his HLC can't one shot you even if the green bastards try to screw you over.

The problem is that he can pretty easily avoid your K-turn arc if he moves himself perpendicular to your current flight path. Moving at PS7 and having Engine Upgrade with PtL, makes this a near-certainty.

Also, if he doesn't need to Boost or barrel roll, then he will have TL + 2x focus.

Dash's attack

4 dice TL+F vs 3 dice F = 1.88 average damage. 3.18 turns to kill a Defender

Defender's attack back - (assuming the Defender even has a shot)

With focus (less than 50% of the time, since you'll spend it on defense instead): 4 dice + F vs 2 dice + F: 1.77 avg dmg. 5.65 turns to kill Dash

w/o focus: 0.92 avg dmg. 11 turns to kill Dash.

Lets just say that the Defender has focus 50% of the time, so that's 7.4 turns to kill Dash.

You can add a 2nd Defender to make it 58 points of Dash vs 74 points of Defenders, so now it takes about the same time for Dash to kill one Defender as both Defenders take to kill Dash. But, as soon as Dash starts dodging arcs to avoid damage completely, he will outright beat the Defenders.

In completely related news, the jousting value of a HLC Outrider is WAY higher than any of the other 360 turreted large base ships. When you add on PtL and Kyle for triple action, it just gets crazy.

Play the blocking game. Denying actions stops PTL and boosting.

Use prototype A wings or ORS for Rebels

Use AP's for Empire.

I agree, this is one of the few strategies that can work. However, trying to block Dash who can go through asteroids and debris fields with his eyes closed, and can then boost and barrel roll, I will say this:

" Good Luck. You're gonna need it."

TL;DR: Fighting 58 Dash with generics is like trying to play dodgeball against a Ninja who has nukes.

HLC Dash will be more disruptive to the long term meta-game than ACD Phantoms. Yes, I am calling it now.

That's what I've been feeling and I'm not happy about it. 3 dice turrets were bad enough. This is just dumb.

An EI Exposed RAdm is a poor candidate for a gunner.

Is it because he most likely will cause a hit with 4 dice?

The only time I played against dash, I chased him down with Fel (boost + barrel roll) and killed him with the constant r1 attacks. It wasn't quick, but it was inevitable.

The only time I played against dash, I chased him down with Fel (boost + barrel roll) and killed him with the constant r1 attacks. It wasn't quick, but it was inevitable.

Dash with PtL and an Engine Upgrade has an range of movement that at the extreme has a diameter of range 5+. There is no possible way even PtL Soontir can hedge against that kind of mobility to even get a shot in each round never mind stay at range 1.

Yep. With a pseudo focus, target lock, and 4-5 dice, it'll be rare to completely miss an attack. It will happen of course, but it probably won't happen every game. Probably not even every other game.

The only time I played against dash, I chased him down with Fel (boost + barrel roll) and killed him with the constant r1 attacks. It wasn't quick, but it was inevitable.

Good to know. This is my modified list without gunner:

Chiraneau

Expose

EI

Ysanne

RC

Tactician

Seismic Charge

64 pts

Soontir

PtL

Hull Upgrade

TC

35 pts

99 pts

Seismic just there against other swarmy lists.

The only time I played against dash, I chased him down with Fel (boost + barrel roll) and killed him with the constant r1 attacks. It wasn't quick, but it was inevitable.

Dash with PtL and an Engine Upgrade has an range of movement that at the extreme has a diameter of range 5+. There is no possible way even PtL Soontir can hedge against that kind of mobility to even get a shot in each round never mind stay at range 1.

Definitely true *if* Dash is not stressed. if he is, then he only has 1 bank, 1 straight, and 2 straight to get rid of the stress, otherwise he won't be able to boost or BR. In that case Soontir has a very good chance if he guesses the direction correctly (which makes it even more important to keep Dash near the edge of the board).

I heard about this build from a friend today whom I think was in that team covenant tourney and I've been thinking about it since. Seems like Ions can be ignored easily with actions, and stress won't work against Dash because of Kyle. Terrain doesn't matter to him either. Moreover with those two actions and maneuver actions it means he moves like an Interceptor but with considerably more hit points and a 360 4 attack die turret (!). It's almost as bad as the stupid Borg cubes from Attack Wing, but at least the rebel player is devoting more half his list to this one ship, and we're not in the universe where 2 agility is impressive.

But looking at the Kyle card, seems he gets a focus only when he removes a stress, and only one stress can be removed per green manuever. So unless Dash has some wingmen with... well, wingmen (like two 18 point GSPs with Wingmen and Chardaan), he can still only reduce one stress per turn. Unless you run with something like this:

Pain in the Dash (99)

Dash Rendar // Outrider / HLC / Kyle Katarn / Push the Limit / Engine Upgrade / Ion Pulse missile

2x Green Squadron Pilot // Wingman / Chardaan Refit

Though it pretty much relies entirely on Dash's HLC shots and stress-wiping with the A-Wings in range 1.
But I can still imagine some counters.

Echo // Veteran Instincts / Mara Jade / Sensor Jammer / Hull Upgrade (43 points, +1 if shield upgrade instead)

Stay cloaked by the time Dash is shooting, which should be after you do. Park yourself as close to Dash as possible and keep shooting other stressful things at him. Giving stress at the end of the combat phase means, if those GSPs aren't in range 1 of Dash, Dash will be locked at least into a green maneuver for his next move.

Maarek Stele // Marksmanship / Concussion Missiles / Munitions Failsafe (35 points)

The whole idea is to farm for one critical hit card that will completely ruin Dash's day, Munitions Failure. Once he draws that I think the Outrider becomes practically unarmed. The idea is, as much as possible, is to use Marksmanship as the ship's action and on a turn earlier set up the target lock to give to Stele so he can fire his missile and look for a crit.

Scimitar Squadron // Proximity Mines (19 points)

You're probably already flying these for their tanking hull value, now you take them to put some area-denial on to the board for just three points. Dash can ignore obstalces but he can't ignore bombs that could do up to 3 points of damage to his ship he's not rolling evasion dice for. This might not actually hurt Dash but it will control some of his movement.