Greetings!

If you've read any of my recent posts, you know I've been toying a long time with decimator builds. This vessel never stops to amaze me, and my opponent's hate is justified. After a long time building resilient decimators that could outlast the enemy via attrition, and building lethal decimators that could outgun most enemies. It's been fun, but the most fun list I've played is very different.

I played a squad loaded with stress dealing mechanics. The thing is Kath will stress agile targets about once every two turns, even twice if you're lucky, but is not very reliable in the end. Oicunn carried predator (He needs to deal damage after all), Ysanne, rebel captive and Mara Jade.

The list:

Kath Scarlett

Gunner

Lone Wolf

Cpt. Oicunn

Predator

Yssane Issard

Rebel Captive

Mara Jade

My first rival were a loaded trio with Roark + Nera + Keyan, which fell horribly because he really wanted to target kath, and while he was chasing Oicun turned around his formation. This game was a total destruction without losses that he could have prevented if he had gone fo the VT-49. Mara Jade became MVP.

The second game was against Corran Horn and Dash. My ship started close together but rapidly parted ways. Luckily for me the enemy got the initiative, so I followed Dash with Kath, and dealt a double stress first shooting turn with the gunner. After that he never managed to keep me out of his Dash's range 1. I used Oicunn to force stress in Corran, who didn't manage to chase to Kath and only managed to doubletap her once until the final round. Once Kath finished Dash, Oicun had 8 hull points left. Corran bolted 5 towards the Firespray and almost destroyed it, Kath was this turn returning from the opposite side of the board shieldless, and received a heavy range 1 attack that left her at 1 hull (**** you crits and blanks). Even with only 1 shield and 1 hull remaining, Kath's return fire only blew the remaining shield, but Oicunn did the rest with a powerful shot and the lack of deffensive tokens of the E-wing. A second double tap would have been fatal.

I was thinking, what kind of combinations/squads would you use to keep the enemy under control? Could tactician be reliable without hurting our Firespray's damage output that much? Do you think the lack of engines is a fatal flaw for the list?

Your opinion will be appreciated!

edit: I forgot to add Predator to Oicunn.

Not a lot of Ion for stress.

When I hear control it does mostly two things.

1. Restrict Movement (ion, blocking)
2. Prevents Actions (stress, Canor Jax)

You have the stress but not a lot of movement restriction. There are green maneuvers throughout the spectrum of X-wing from 1 to 5, straight to turns. So the stress will likely get cleared and not stop any actions unless you can knock out some movements with Ion or blocking. You would need to double stress and Mara Jade will not add stress after the rebel captive.

I really like your battle plan. Looks great.

Wouldn't change anything in your lists

I really like your battle plan. Looks great.

Wouldn't change anything in your lists

Agreed, It is a solid list, good firepower and good defense, but don't expect much control.

Stress can be a really big deal for wave 5 meta. 2 ship and 3 ship builds.

Im actually gonna try this build when I can borrow my friends firespray.

Not a lot of Ion for stress.

When I hear control it does mostly two things.

1. Restrict Movement (ion, blocking)
2. Prevents Actions (stress, Canor Jax)

You have the stress but not a lot of movement restriction. There are green maneuvers throughout the spectrum of X-wing from 1 to 5, straight to turns. So the stress will likely get cleared and not stop any actions unless you can knock out some movements with Ion or blocking. You would need to double stress and Mara Jade will not add stress after the rebel captive.

I like stress as a mechanism of control. No k-turns (Only with the Defender, but you don't want to be stressed with a defender), no cloak, no PTL, no Expose + EI, or if you manage to doublestress, no action at all, and you're forced to green. Sometimes, if double stressed, people tend to play white maneuvers without considering the actions anymore. I like stress as a control mechanic, and it's very reliable against most enemies, who will have hard times to get away or to outmaneuver you. Mara jade helps when Oicunn is not the first objective, since it's going to be Kath most of the time.

Kaths really not that great for causing stress tbh you can't reliably get her to crit.

You'd be better off with a phantom carrying a rebel captive but that's a waste of a phantom.

Kaths really not that great for causing stress tbh you can't reliably get her to crit.

You'd be better off with a phantom carrying a rebel captive but that's a waste of a phantom.

Rebel captive is unique, so can only have the one in the Decimator. Also, Kath is there for the damage, and the ocassional stress, which is an added bonus that is more effective vs high agility. Actually, 1/8 attacks have a crit result in it. I'm shooting one/twice with one reroll on each shot. Not that hard!

Nevertheless I get your point: RNG is strong in her, and she may survive a whole game without stressing anyone, as well she can doublestress an enemy every turn and make my day.

My current Imp control squad is:

Krassis + Ion cannon + Cluster Missiles + Tactician

Omicron Pilot + Gunner + Tactician + Engine + FCS

Backstabber

There are 5 more points that I keep moving to different things, trying to find the best use for them. Last time I flew this I used a Proton Bomb, but I don't think that's the best use of them.

Basically, The OGP can possibly double-stress with Gunner. Krassis can stress + ion, or double-stress once with the cluster missiles and gets rerolls on both. The stress and ions make it easier for Backstabber to get on someone's 6.