I'm posting this here since there is no dedicated play strategy subforum.

If you're faced with a big turreted ship plus miniswarm, is it generally better to kill the big ship first, or does it depend too much on the exact matchup?

Let's take a hypothetical scenario:

Player R is running 58 Dash + 3 Talas.
Player I has Chiraneau/Predator/Rebel Captive + 4 Academies

What does Player R try to kill first?
What does Player I try to kill first?

To my thinking, Player R's decision is easy. Kill Chiraneau first, since he's a bigger threat.

Player I's decision is harder, but I think he has to go after the Talas first. Dash with EU is too good at arc dodging. If Player I keeps the Academies in formation, none of them will get shots on the Outrider, and if he spreads their arcs out, Dash will find a spot where he's only in one Academy's arc, then kill it before it can fire, so he still won't get shot at. Meanwhile the Talas will kill Chiraneau (or leave him mostly dead and easy for Dash to finish off).

In my experience, the goal is always to melt the big ship as much as possible early. Tala's can be dealt with late game, but a Fat Han or a Super Dash is all but invincible depending on what you have left.

So with big ships that can mitigate a lot of damage, the last thing you want is to face it end-game. My advice is always, always, take out fattie first (always). The beginning of the game is where the most damage can be dished out and the longer attrition wears you down, the less chance you have to do consistent, meaningful damage to it. For proof see regenerating Corran. The more you focus on him the more Han eats your lunch ten times out of ten. Any deci is toast to enough red dice, and Dash is only 10 behind 2 green dice. Even with RecSpec it's pretty easy to kill, so any list with at least 8 red dice per turn will kill it in 2 rounds (perhaps three if you're having one of those days). The trick is having those dice to throw and the longer the game goes on the less chance you have to do it. I know it seems like the escorts are an easy mark and less guns are less guns. But, you need to take the long view here. The end of the game is where winning and losing happens, and if you give up a large point advantage to your opponent at the end of a game then you don't win many.

To my thinking, Player R's decision is easy. Kill Chiraneau first, since he's a bigger threat.

I would agree.

Player I's decision is harder, but I think he has to go after the Talas first. Dash with EU is too good at arc dodging. If Player I keeps the Academies in formation, none of them will get shots on the Outrider, and if he spreads their arcs out, Dash will find a spot where he's only in one Academy's arc, then kill it before it can fire, so he still won't get shot at.

Here, I disagree. I would advocate going after Dash first, for the same reason as Player R wants to go after Chirenau: he's the bigger threat, and once he goes down there are only three grunt units left. Dash's arc-dodging ability is actually a reason for going after him first; you want to get as many arcs pointed his way as possible, so that he either takes fire or spends his actions avoiding it rather than modifying his attacks. And you want to try and get some blocks in while you still have the TIEs to do it.

Essentially, both players should have the same plan: kill the big guy and hope you have enough left over to mop up the grunts.

Actually, as R I might go for the TIEs first, they'll fall faster to focused fire. Destroying the Decimator removes 3 attack dice from the table but will take two rounds of firing.

That same two rounds would see two or three TIEs destroyed for a removal of 4 to 6 attack dice that might also creep close to Dash to become 6 to 8 attack dice.

I'm actually not sure you want to kill Chira first. He's one attack, albeit a harder one, and can't rob you of actions. The TIEs will take about as much to disagree to kill, but each one you pop prevents some incoming damage.

EDIT: Just had this situation comes up a couple weeks ago. Went hard for the Patrol Leader over the Howl swarm. Tried to burn down the Patrol, and the TIES tore me to shreds. The Patrol dies, but it was a suicide as he used Vader to kill my last A-Wing.

In a nutshell.

Your main goal is to eliminate the opponents "attack dice" the fastest, while still keeping yours.

I'm actually not sure you want to kill Chira first. He's one attack, albeit a harder one, and can't rob you of actions. The TIEs will take about as much to disagree to kill, but each one you pop prevents some incoming damage.

EDIT: Just had this situation comes up a couple weeks ago. Went hard for the Patrol Leader over the Howl swarm. Tried to burn down the Patrol, and the TIES tore me to shreds. The Patrol dies, but it was a suicide as he used Vader to kill my last A-Wing.

I think in this situation you have to kill the Howl swarm or at least Howl first. But against a non-Howl mini-swarm, I'd go after the Deci first. That Rebel Captive will be a pain in the butt when you only have 1 or 2 ships against it. It will make you fairly predictable (if you want actions). A mini-swarm without Howl will not be nearly as accurate or deadly.

I think you have to go after the turreted ship first unless its a Horn + Dash or Horn with anyone combo. Horn is just too hard to kill when you only have 1 or 2 ships left. Big problem is that a good player know this and will try to keep Horn out of the main engagement as much as possible.

If I'm playing a 60-minute timed game, I would still be torn. Do I go for the easy kills, in hopes of eking out a win on points, or focus on the big guy? Granted, if you knock the big guy out first, that should get you the win on points, but I would still fight with myself at the start of the game as to my strategy. 75-minute match, no-brainer. Take out the big guy first.

I would target Dash first and try block him with the TIEs to deny actions. As Dash, I would dance away from the TIEs to keep them at R3 and peg them with 4 dice. Talas would probably go after the Deci but depends how threatening the TIEs end up being.

In a nutshell.

Your main goal is to eliminate the opponents "attack dice" the fastest, while still keeping yours.

Totally agree. I don't think an "always, always, kill the big guy first" strategy is correct 100% of the time (although it often is). I look at how to most efficiently remove his red dice from play and it's very situational, with a large nod to what i'm running myself...

If i was facing a YT-1300 and B-wing escort i'd likely target the B-wing first (i'd eliminate the B-wing's 3 attack dice quicker than the YT's 3 attack dice). If it was a YT-1300 with an E-wing escort it would depend more on my ships, if they were 2 attack dice ships i'd go for the YT as i don't fancy wasting too many shots at the 3 agility E-wing. If i was running 3 attack dice ships that may sway my decision onto the E-wing, depending on how slippery he is to get into arc...

Look at 4 conditions:

Talas vs TIES

Talas vs Chiraneau

Dash vs TIEs

Dash vs Chiraeau

Which is the best match-up for either side? Answer that question and you have a pretty good idea of who to kill first

In my opinion, Player R goes after Chiraneau first, because Talas will be great at killing Chiraneau, but not so great at killing TIES. More importantly, as time goes on Chiraneau gets nastier because Rebel Captive will affect a larger portion of Player R's list. Finally, if 58 Dash is stuck in an endgame with Chiraneau, he's potentially going to have a lot of trouble. You need to prevent that from happening. So Player R sends the Talas in close to block up Chiraneaus actions and get as many shots as possible. They pretty much ignore TIEs, because if Dash can stay alive to the end game, the TIEs will not be very hard to dance around. Player R's final goal is Dash vs TIEs.

Player I is a little tougher, Part of me wants to go for Talas, because it will be easier to degrade the attacks of the Talas faster than the attacks of Dash (protecting Chiraneau), furthermore, Dash is somewhat mitigated by Rebel Captive, so he's not necessarily doing full damage. The other part of me, however, says to kick Dash while he's down. If he's stuck doing greens with only one action + Focus from Kyle (because Rebel Captive kills PTL), he's going to be easier to pin down with the Academies. So you take your lumps with the Talas, blow by them with Chiraneau, and put everything on Dash. If you can trade the Decimator for Dash, you're in good shape, because you're up on points and 4 Academies should kill 3 Talas most of the time. The downside is that those Talas will wreck Chiraneau quickly if they get a couple clear turns of fire on him, but that's what makes minis games great. You have to execute. Player I's final goal is Talas vs TIEs.

There was a discussion about this in WingCommander, way back when.

Angel said to go after the escorts first, then attack the big ship. Maniac said to attack the momma cat, then clean up the kittens. Maniac is always wrong.

I dunno if this advice has any bearing on X-Wing, but it's amazing that the conversation and bias has stuck with me for 20 or so years.

Dash is probably priority. Talas don't have diddly on Tie Fighters because 2 dice just don't enjoy 3 agility targets.

On the other hand, you can much more easily dodge talas or force them through some awful obstructions that Dash would ignore. Depending on how you slip the squad, you go for the most easily killable portion first.

Fat ship on fat ship, Chiraneau (especially with Rebel captive) has the definite advantage.