So this weekend I finally had an opportunity to run these two lists against each other.

I ran 5 Z95s -

Cracken, Cluster Missiles and Veteran Instincts

Lt. Blount, Assault Missiles

3x Bandits with Homing Missiles and Munitions Failsafe

My opponent ran -

Jake Farrell, Refit, Test Pilot, PTL and Outmaneuver

Keyan Farlander, PTL, E2 title and Kyle Crew

Etahn, PTL and R2 Astromech

My opponent ran the A and E side by side and his B on the opposite side of the table. I had the 3 bandits in formation on the right, Cracken to the left of them and Blount on the far left.

Both sides moved forward to come in range. Some crappy flying on my part and unfamiliarity with the Headhunter dial placed Cracken squarely on an asteroid losing a shield. One of the bandits also landed on an asteroid but rolled clean. Coming into range, Cracken fired off the Cluster and as planned handed off 2 actions- in this case target locks to 2 bandits. Cracken's attack did some damage to Etahn but didn't take him out.

My opponent used his abilities as best as he could. All 3 of his ships had eyes on Etahn's targets, thus they were able to take advantage of his ability to flip hits to crits. He managed to take out Cracken and I managed to take out Jake. On the next turn my 3 bandits k turned behind Keyan and each unleashed their payloads taking him out. Etahn went down next from Blount's assault missile.

It was an interesting game. 30 minutes maximum. I admit to some sloppy flying and my formation could have been a tad tighter. But the action passing and concentrated arcs with missiles went off without a hitch.

I originally developed this list to take on Fat Han. Now that I've flown it and know what I did wrong, I'm confident it will do well.

This has convinced me not to take Z's lightly.

I'm actually a lot more impressed with them than I thought I would be. Blount was effective, but the assault missile probably could have been swapped for something else. I put it on him in case I ran into a swarm and/or to take care of any escorts that might have been hanging around Han should he have been on the table.

The real star was Cracken with the Clusters. Having him at range 1 and allowing him to hand off Target Locks frees up the Bandits to Focus for either offense or defense. The Homing Missiles were a conscious decision - again to mitigate Han as it would prevent the use of evade tokens.