I saw him used alot today in a local store tournament.

His Ability lets you remove 1 target lock, 1 focus, or 1 evade from an enemy he shoots at. However, normally when he shoots, they remove 1 when he attacks as a defensive roll.

So he attacks, the defender rolls his defense, then he removes any tokens the defender has remaining. Is that how it works?

Or is it he attacks, then removes tokens from defender, then defender rolls defense dice?

Does attacks mean roll attack dice?

Let me know.

I saw him used alot today in a local store tournament.

His Ability lets you remove 1 target lock, 1 focus, or 1 evade from an enemy he shoots at. However, normally when he shoots, they remove 1 when he attacks as a defensive roll.

So he attacks, the defender rolls his defense, then he removes any tokens the defender has remaining. Is that how it works?

Or is it he attacks, then removes tokens from defender, then defender rolls defense dice?

Let me know.

Defender gets a chance to use tokens before the end of the attack.

The point of Wes is to force the defender to "use it or lose it". Because Wes shoots pretty early, the rest of your list can get shots against a target without much in the way of tokens, and the target may not have shot yet so that attack gets neutered as well.

I understand that but in most cases I have seen. The defender always spends his tokens in defense, so Wes ability is not even able to be used.

I see him as overcosted a bit, but I guess I could see it.

I give him Veteran Instincts and let him set up Opportunist Shots for the rest of my list. Basically it sets up a pretty solid slam dunk for me on the next two shots.

I understand that but in most cases I have seen.The defender always spends his tokens in defense, so Wes ability is not even able to be used.

I see him as overcosted a bit, but I guess I could see it.

If the token is spent prior to his ability, it's because the defender KNOWS he's going to lose it just after anyway.

The ability forces your opponent to make a choice on YOUR terms rather than his, which is a big advantage.

That's a nice missile you got on that ship with a target lock. It'd be a shame if you couldn't fire it this turn.

Edit: Also, he's a counter to the upcoming Advanced Targeting computer

Very true!

When a VI Wes can set up an opportunist shot for Wedge, bad things are happening to your opponent list.

Alternately: if Wes is making someone use a focus token on defense, they're not using it on offense. He's got a nice ability, but your squad needs to be set up to take advantage of it.

In regards to the TL, enemies very well can't spend that in response to Wes' attack (unless of course they're rocking the r7 astro...)

Really really irritating for those squads that depend on a few high cost high performance ships (Such as phantoms or decimators)

Glad I opened this thread, because it probably saved me from making a fool of myself at some indeterminate point in the future.

I don't use Wes often, but I'd always assumed he removed focus/evade tokens before they could be cashed in. And I probably would have argued for it if I'd ever fielded him and shot at someone with a token. Congrats for saving me some embarrassment!

I ready admire his optimism in the face of adversity. Plus, he makes some great hotwings.

His ability is also really useful against enemies that stack a Focus & Target Lock to get maximum damage on their attack, and against enemies that turtle up, like Soontir Fel with 2 Focus' and an Evade.

really good against ships with multiple tokens. they spend, then he takes the second, but really, action denial is ALWAYS good, in any situation.

I understand that but in most cases I have seen.The defender always spends his tokens in defense, so Wes ability is not even able to be used.

I see him as overcosted a bit, but I guess I could see it.

If the token is spent prior to his ability, it's because the defender KNOWS he's going to lose it just after anyway.

The ability forces your opponent to make a choice on YOUR terms rather than his, which is a big advantage.

Agreed it can even go as far as your opponent considering not taking a token action on the ship that he thinks Wes will shoot at. Yay mind games... Thrawn would be proud.

It doesn't matter how crappy Wes rolls or how well his target rolls they'll lose a token. Wes is kind of sexy with R3-A2. Even if he wiffs his shot he strips a token and leaves his target a stress to take its place.

Put VI on him or pair him up with Roark and watch him shoot before everyone stripping off tokens like crazy.

It doesn't matter how crappy Wes rolls or how well his target rolls they'll lose a token. Wes is kind of sexy with R3-A2. Even if he wiffs his shot he strips a token and leaves his target a stress to take its place.

Wes is also great against Decimators. They don't even have a defense die to spend the focus on, so it's just a flat 33% drop in their expected damage output.

One year ago at regionals I took a top 4 spot with this build:

Wes Janson w/ Veteran Instincts + R2 Astromech

Wedge Antillies w/ Opportunist + R2 Astromech

Luke Skywalker w/ Opportunist + R2-D2

This list is still very strong in the current meta, the only builds I struggeled to beat was Tie Swarm.

Any time you take choice away from an opponent is a good time. Wes takes away choice.

I have seen him shine a few tiimes in Rebrl control lists. He enables that ion cannon hit afterwards or just indirectly causes more damage

But i am still not convinced about him. With R3A2 he is bearable but he has a few problems.

- For a support ship he pays a big amount of points for Pilot Skill and Ability. He feels overcosted to me.

- Often useless (because situational) ability. Enemy ships are stressed or don't get an action anyway? Enemy ships are just in Wes' arc? He is the only survivor on the board? Well then if you don't strip a TL he is useless.

- Sits in the wrong ship. I mean i read all the books about Rogue squadron, i know they flew X-Wings mostly, but if this guy was in a Z-95 for 10 points less he would be a good pick.

- He is supposed to be a Phantom counter because with VI he can reach that 10 PS and often gets R2A3 to play with. But then i still get the impression that for Wes+R2A3+VI it's a 50/50 chance at best against Whisper. Against Echo maybe less. A good imperial pilot will do whatever he needs to avoid fire until the turn comes that he can kill or cripple Wes. That's easier than it seems due to the X-Wing being an immobile brick with no repositioning that actually would make you benefit from PS10 fully. A formation of X-Wings is even easier to avoid even if it often means killing Biggs first...

So personally i can see his use but think he is overcosted even for an X-Wing and then he sits in one of the worst ships in the game at the moment. /Sadface

For what it's worth he's my favorite pilot in epic play with huge ships. He's a really phenomenal escort fighter, capable of damaging ordnance carriers and keeping them from delivering payloads on the same turn.

He's a lot like Major Rhymer in that he's a tad overcosted in deathmatch play, but he's a rockstar when the huge ships hit the board. In fact his cat and mouse games with Rhymer in those battles is usually the best subplot in the battle.

Wes + VI + R3A2 + flèchette torp is one of my favorite phantom killers. It's stunningly effective.

Wes + VI + R3A2 + flèchette torp is one of my favorite phantom killers. It's stunningly effective.

If your opponent does not know what to do!

You set him up on a side, the phantom will outflank you, or if you split your guys just kill anything Wes can't reach in time, or the rest of the list will have Wes killed before the Phantom goes in.

You set him up in the middle in formation, the Phantom will try and outflank or if you go for it simply avoid you, while the whole rest of the enemy list will get behind you and wreck you.

Lose/lose situations...

I have said this before but it holds very true. You get one shot on the Phantom with any X-Wing if you get lucky and outguess your opponent (and sure enough that's often all that's needed), after that, it's over.

Wes Janson is NOT a Phantom counter. The X-Wing's immobility andinsufficient defensive stats simply not allow for it. It's about 50/50 against Whisper (and much much worse against Echo), but he is utterly bad in alot of matchups while the Phantom is **** fantastic in most matchups. Then you have a ship that costs 32 points with R3-A2 and VI. If we are really honest, he probably needs Biggs to avoid just being killed in one turn too. Then we are talking about a rebel 3-ship most of the time. A Whisper with the absolutely necessary upgrades is 37 points, Echo is 35 points. I mean it's just ridiculous what those 2 can do that Wes can't for 3-5 points more.

Also if i really had no other ship at all but X-Wings at my disposal, i would still run Wedge over Wes, because his ability is at least working against anything but Decimators, and he is natural PS9 so you can save your EPT for something more useful than VI and just bid for initiative. I mean if then we shoot at a phantom he has 1 evade!

Real Phantom counters include anything that has PS8-9, has movement options beyond its mere dial, and at least 3 attacks.

Turrets also work, preferably with high PS on top. If you can get 4 attacks, that's also fine if some of the other prerequisites are fulfilled.

So for Rebels real counters that laves us at Han, Corran, Roark, Salm, Dash, Ten Nunb (but he is a bit too expensive), Jan Ors, Provided they are equipped right. I may forget a few here...

Other Turret ships and Ion weapons are also not bad to have around, but they feel like soft counters while the others are able to really wreck phantoms.

I'm not getting why one would take wes with R3A2 over anybody else with R3A2. If anybody wants the stressdroid, it's hobbie klivian, since he can clear his stress by spending a target lock (or getting one from dutch).

Wedge is cool for shooting at phantoms cause he is PS8, but so are a bunch of other things.

I'm not getting why one would take wes with R3A2 over anybody else with R3A2. If anybody wants the stressdroid, it's hobbie klivian, since he can clear his stress by spending a target lock (or getting one from dutch).

Wedge is cool for shooting at phantoms cause he is PS8, but so are a bunch of other things.

The idea would strictly be to deal with Phantoms. Since Wes is higher up on the Pilot Skill level the. Either named Phantoms he shoots first. If a Phantom is stressed at the time of thier attack they cannot activate the Advance Cloaking Device they so often have. So it simply means a Phantom that can't cloak is a dead Phantom!