You could put R2-D6 on a Gray Squadron and give it Marksmanship, that would give the A4/Ion some bite for both shots.

Is that worth 29 points?

Maybe. I just ran some numbers, a Y-wing with a-4/Ion and Marksmanship would do more average damage (!) than two Tie Fighters at range 2. Add to that the possibility of crits on the first shot, the control aspect of Ion, extra PS vs 2 Obsidian coming in at 26 points. The cons would be maneuverability and extra cost, less damage at range 1, less damage at range 3.

So yeah, maybe is my final answer. We shall see.

Don't compare it to the opposition - compare it to what else you could take in your own squad. Consider the opportunity cost.

29 points is Wedge. It's Farlander, or a Blue Squadron with HLC, or one point shy of a pair of A-wings, any of which are tougher, more maneuverable, and hit just as hard, if not harder. It's two points shy of a full focus factory Kyle with an ion turret of his own that's handing out focus to the rest of the squad, although admittedly more fragile for it.

That's what you need to compare it to, and I don't think it looks terribly appealing in the comparisons.

Have I mentioned you can shoot two different targets?

I don't care about cost of opportunity, because it means I would compare apples and oranges. This is neither a damage dealer, nor a pure Ion dispenser, but a bit of both. I withhold my judgment until I've seen it on the table. It's interesting to see how damage + Ion on a single ship plays (have you tried 4y Ion? it's a 3-hour game, nobody can hit you but you do almost no damage), another question is whether you can keep a target in your sights with the Y-wing (now that you're really trying), whether you can finish off a ship while Ion'ing another... There are open questions that will get answered in testing, not in this phase.

So it's still a maybe

Why take marksmanship when you can take predator instead for the same price, and get almost the same damage bonus on each attack but without using up your action? You still get to shoot when you get bumped, get focus + TL stacked on one attack, etc.

Why take marksmanship when you can take predator instead for the same price, and get almost the same damage bonus on each attack but without using up your action? You still get to shoot when you get bumped, get focus + TL stacked on one attack, etc.

Wow, yeah. Predator should be much better in this situation. I just got more than 50% improvement in actual damage done by using focus in the first attack and putting predator, and that's just with 1 reroll! So yeah, now he will do more damage than naked Wedge!

I just read the wookiepedia article on the btl-a4. How cool would it have been to have the turret locked to the backwards firing arc on it?

So yeah, now he will do more damage than naked Wedge!

How exactly are you getting this conclusion?

So yeah, now he will do more damage than naked Wedge!

How exactly are you getting this conclusion?

For Wedge I'm taking the case of a simple TIE Fighter at range 2, which will defend with 2 dice (no focus).

For the BTL-A4 I'm taking the "supposed" damage of a 3dice shot with no focus on 3 defense dice for the Ion Turret attack and a 2-dice shot with Predator and focus for the primary attack. The defender has no focus for this exercise

Wedge's attack is a standard 3-dice focus on 2-dice focus. Damage probabilities are:

NrDmg 0 1 2 3

Prob. 0.30 0.38 0.26 0.06

For the Y-wing, the Ion damage (with 1 Predator reroll) should be:

NrDmg 0 1 2 3

Prob. 0.39 0.31 0.23 0.08

Of course, you only do max 1 damage, so it becomes

NrDmg 0 1

Prob. 0.39 0.61

To this we add a primary attack of 2 dice with focus (with Predator):

NrDmg 0 1 2

Prob. 0.39 0.41 0.21

We now add the damage from the Ion attack and the primary attack:

NrDmg 0 1 2 3

Prob. 0.10 0.39 0.35 0.15

Average damage is 1.55

Average damage for Wedge is 1.53

The situation is slightly more in favor of the BTL-A4 and I didn't reuse my own focus token (I assumed I always use it in the first attack). Furthermore, I used only the first predator reroll (the second one has fewer benefits though). The odds are in Wedge's favor if the TIE Fighter has focus.

You also get an Ion token in 61% of cases. GJ on the Predator idea iPeregrine, I don't know how I missed it!

EDIT: Corrected Error Buhallin has signaled, it now outperforms Wedge only if defender has no focus.

You're overestimating the effect of predator. It isn't a 50% chance to upgrade your damage, it's a 50% chance to upgrade your damage if you rolled at least one blank or un-focused eye . So, for example, if you roll three hits with your ion shot and your target rolls three evades predator won't give you any benefit. But your math counts this situation as one where predator can help you.

And what does it do at Range 3?

You're overestimating the effect of predator. It isn't a 50% chance to upgrade your damage, it's a 50% chance to upgrade your damage if you rolled at least one blank or un-focused eye . So, for example, if you roll three hits with your ion shot and your target rolls three evades predator won't give you any benefit. But your math counts this situation as one where predator can help you.

The math accounted for it, I just didn't express it in words properly. Of course you get 50% on blank dice. A focus is a miss on the Ion rolls, so that would count. What I meant to say is that every damage number category (1dmg, 2dmg, 3dmg) has a 50% of upgrading, if there's a place to upgrade . So the 3dmg position stays the same, but gets 50% of the probability of 2dmg.

50% chance of upgrading the number of hits, which you can then evade, not the other way around.

And what does it do at Range 3?

It's still higher average because Predator + focus is really good, but the variance is smaller and there's no possibility of 3 damage (Wedge has 2%).

Range 1 has better stats as well, albeit with a smaller difference than at range 2.

With the new calculation, it looks pretty bad at range 3.

I think you're applying the Predator Reroll to the post-evade numbers as well, which is incorrect. Zero results on your two-die attack doesn't get quartered because you rerolled one die. 2v3 doesn't get to an 85% hit rate even with a full target lock+focus, it certainly doesn't get there from half a TL.

I think you're applying the Predator Reroll to the post-evade numbers as well, which is incorrect. Zero results on your two-die attack doesn't get quartered because you rerolled one die. 2v3 doesn't get to an 85% hit rate even with a full target lock+focus, it certainly doesn't get there from half a TL.

That changes things... Never post after 2am people. I'll fix it.

The math accounted for it, I just didn't express it in words properly. Of course you get 50% on blank dice. A focus is a miss on the Ion rolls, so that would count. What I meant to say is that every damage number category (1dmg, 2dmg, 3dmg) has a 50% of upgrading, if there's a place to upgrade . So the 3dmg position stays the same, but gets 50% of the probability of 2dmg.

No, your math is wrong. Look at your math for the ion shot doing zero damage. You have a 77% chance of zero damage without predator, and a 38% chance of zero damage with predator. IOW, what you've just claimed is that half of your zero-damage shots will add a damage and become one-damage shots once you use predator. This would be true if you assumed that predator always re-rolls a die, which will become an extra point of damage 50% of the time. But here's the real situation:

24% of the time your opponent rolls all evades and you do zero damage no matter what your dice results were.

53% of the time your opponent rolls one or more blanks and you do zero damage because you didn't roll enough hits to overcome their evades. This is composed of X% where you roll exactly equal to their evades and Y% where you roll less.

The sum of 24% + 53% is 77%, the total chance of doing zero damage. Now we add predator:

24% of the time you still do zero damage because your opponent is automatically evading whatever you roll.

Y% of the time you still do zero damage because your opponent rolled enough evades to avoid your initial roll +1 (for example, two evades against one hit followed by a predator re-roll adding one hit).

X/2% of the time you do zero damage because predator failed to give you an extra hit.

X/2% of the time you do a single point of damage because predator added an extra hit.

But what you did is apply the predator re-roll to the entire 77% instead of just the relevant X% (where X is less than 53%). Even if you disregard Y entirely and assume that predator boosts the entire 53% you're still doing zero damage 50% of the time (all evades or zero damage followed by a failed predator re-roll), not 38%.

(And then you make the same mistake with the primary weapon, just with different percentages.)

The math accounted for it, I just didn't express it in words properly. Of course you get 50% on blank dice. A focus is a miss on the Ion rolls, so that would count. What I meant to say is that every damage number category (1dmg, 2dmg, 3dmg) has a 50% of upgrading, if there's a place to upgrade . So the 3dmg position stays the same, but gets 50% of the probability of 2dmg.

No, your math is wrong. Look at your math for the ion shot doing zero damage. You have a 77% chance of zero damage without predator, and a 38% chance of zero damage with predator. IOW, what you've just claimed is that half of your zero-damage shots will add a damage and become one-damage shots once you use predator. This would be true if you assumed that predator always re-rolls a die, which will become an extra point of damage 50% of the time. But here's the real situation:

24% of the time your opponent rolls all evades and you do zero damage no matter what your dice results were.

53% of the time your opponent rolls one or more blanks and you do zero damage because you didn't roll enough hits to overcome their evades. This is composed of X% where you roll exactly equal to their evades and Y% where you roll less.

The sum of 24% + 53% is 77%, the total chance of doing zero damage. Now we add predator:

24% of the time you still do zero damage because your opponent is automatically evading whatever you roll.

Y% of the time you still do zero damage because your opponent rolled enough evades to avoid your initial roll +1 (for example, two evades against one hit followed by a predator re-roll adding one hit).

X/2% of the time you do zero damage because predator failed to give you an extra hit.

X/2% of the time you do a single point of damage because predator added an extra hit.

But what you did is apply the predator re-roll to the entire 77% instead of just the relevant X% (where X is less than 53%). Even if you disregard Y entirely and assume that predator boosts the entire 53% you're still doing zero damage 50% of the time (all evades or zero damage followed by a failed predator re-roll), not 38%.

(And then you make the same mistake with the primary weapon, just with different percentages.)

I was applying Predator on damage not on hits, sorry for that. It was a difference of order of operations, I'm sorry. I blame it on the late hour and my getting excited too much on the new toys to play with .

It's still higher average because Predator + focus is really good, but the variance is smaller and there's no possibility of 3 damage (Wedge has 2%).

Range 1 has better stats as well, albeit with a smaller difference than at range 2.

I'm going to guess that this is also due to the bad math with Predator, but this is wrong too.

Wedge throws 3Fv3F = 54%/31%/13%/2% for 0/1/2/3 hits

Y-wing throws 3F+TLv3F = 86%/12%/2% for 0/1/2 hits.

And that's generous to the Y, because it uses the full Target Lock rather than Predator's single reroll.

At Range 1, Wedge will throw 4v2 compared to 3v3, plus the ion for the Y. Not sure how that one will fall out, honestly, but I suspect the lower defense dice for Wedge will overcome the potential for the ion.

It's still higher average because Predator + focus is really good, but the variance is smaller and there's no possibility of 3 damage (Wedge has 2%).

Range 1 has better stats as well, albeit with a smaller difference than at range 2.

I'm going to guess that this is also due to the bad math with Predator, but this is wrong too.

Wedge throws 3Fv3F = 54%/31%/13%/2% for 0/1/2/3 hits

Y-wing throws 3F+TLv3F = 86%/12%/2% for 0/1/2 hits.

And that's generous to the Y, because it uses the full Target Lock rather than Predator's single reroll.

At Range 1, Wedge will throw 4v2 compared to 3v3, plus the ion for the Y. Not sure how that one will fall out, honestly, but I suspect the lower defense dice for Wedge will overcome the potential for the ion.

As you put it, Wedge at range 1 has 6% /17.6% /32.5% / 31.31% / 12.36% for 0/1/2/3/4 damage

Ion is still 61% hit, The primary is 14.5% / 29.9% / 37.6 % / 18.02% for 0/1/2/3 damage

which leaves Wedge at about 2.26 average damage

and 2.20 for the Y-Wing

Again, I have taken out focus since it doesn't seem to have a chance if there's focus involved.

The other disclaimer is that I still don't take into account splitting focus between two different attacks and the second reroll for Predator.

As I said before, I'm sorry I reversed the operations, but some of the conclusions still stand: The Y-wing deals damage in this setup. Half the time it Ions somebody. And that's if it shoots TIE Fighters. Imagine it can shoot its primary at an A-wing then Ion a B-Wing (a more easy target for an unfocused Ion). It has its disadvantages, but it kinda seems to work. We'll have to see.

In responding to the OP, I'd rather have the R2 astro I think. R3 astro might make things tough cuz the Y wing's greens are just straight.

Against a small ship that takes 1 to ionize, then I can see R3A2.

Looks like Corran Horn + R2A2 might be losing his job as a Double Stress Dealer to Horton or Dutch with A4 + Ion + R2A2. Or possibly to a Gold or Gray.

The thought I'm having is to try running Y-Wings like slow-mo B-Wings, except using the two attacks as the 'thing' the Y-Wings do over a B-Wing HLC. At least to range 2, that's one attack to strip tokens and a second attack with potential damage. Problem is, the one turret that can do it needs a focus. So you're essentially spending a focus for a second attack with 3 dice. At least until a better turret comes along?

The autoblaster becomes a little more interesting. Range 2-3 are going to be standard shots, but range 1 you have a 3-dice normal attack and then a second 2-dice attack that ignores all agility results. The biggest problem is going to be getting there, though I can also see using X-Wings to lead and trailing with some Y-Wings right behind them to open fire. Then K-turn when you have the opportunity.

The A4 title at least makes Horton a little more attractive of a choice now. If you can line a target up at range 2 packing a blaster turret you're blowing the focus for that second attack you'll have a re-roll with anyway. Specific, but how many of you are having fun with tacticians at that bracket too?

I am wondering about the how well Opportunist might work with an Autoblaster Turret on an A4. This would mean that your target has the choice of using his tokens on your first shot, thereby allowing for Opportunist to kick in for your Autoblaster attack, or saving his tokens whilst knowing that he won't be able to use them against your second attack either.

The biggest problem I can see with this is that you have to accept a stress token to use Opportunist, which is never great on a Y-Wing, but with a supporting craft to help remove the stress it might be an option.

I am wondering about the how well Opportunist might work with an Autoblaster Turret on an A4.

Badly, because of the cost and range restriction. You're spending quite a few points for the EPT (and EPT droid if you want a rebel y-wing) and the turret, and then you probably need engine upgrade/support ships/etc to get your target at the correct range and arc. You probably won't be able to use it very many times before the game ends or your y-wing is destroyed, so it's a huge investment for so few (if any) shots. Even when you have opportunist on a ship like Wedge or HLC Farlander, with much more consistent ability to get a good shot, investing that many points and your EPT slot is a pretty questionable decision.

It would be 5 points for Opportunist on a Rebel Y, plus 4 for the Blaster Turret, and you'd be stuck with the base dial. Not good.

It's worse for Scum - Kavil is the only one who could do it, and spending 4 points for Opportunist so you can stress yourself to get the +1 attack die his ability would give you if you hadn't mounted the -A4 seems... bad.

With the BTL-A4 title you need to fly the Y-Wings different.

Fly it like the heavy fighter it used to be.

You need to use the K-Turn - take a droid that helps you to shred stress.

I've said it once and i'll say it again. Engine upgrade will be mandatory. I don't think that this card will be as good as people are saying because as was pointed out, Y-wings aren't great at turning.

I think unhinged astromech would do the job, it turns all the red turns of the Y-wing into green turns. So what if the 2 turns are still white, the Y-wing no longer has red turns.

The Y-Wings in the movies all had the BTL-A4 title, don't they? ^^

It would have been too easy to blast or ion Vader and his pals behind them.

Vader was a genius:

"Good news everybody: I sense their Y-Wings have equipped the title. We are save to approach them from behind."