Yesterday I had my first chance to play in a LGS against unfamiliar and much more experienced competition. Thus far, all my X-Wing play has been in comfortable settings versus friends and family whom I have taught to play. So, you know, I haven’t really been put to the test yet. Against strangers, in an unfamiliar and public environment, with a few casual onlookers, I was surprised how much nerves became a factor for me.
I knew going in that my opponent was going to be fielding Phantoms. Expecting a two-phantom list, I came up with the following hodgepodge, hoping to have some guaranteed ion control, options to deal out (and deal with) stress, and at least one ship with a healthy handful of attack dice.
[PS6] Lieutenant Blount (17)
- Ion Pulse Missiles (3)
- Wingman (2)
[PS6] Dutch Vander (23)
- Ion Cannon Turret (5)
- R5-K6 (2)
- Flechette Torpedoes (2)
[PS8] Ten Numb (31)
- Ion Cannon (3)
- Advanced Sensors (3)
- Engine Upgrade (4)
- Predator (3)
- Flechette Torpedoes (2)
Total = 100
I’m not saying this is a great list, but it performed fairly well despite some clumsiness on my part, and came one hull point from victory. My opponent had a 2nd place finish in a recent store championship under his belt, so when he complimented my list after the match as having some good potential, I thought, “Hey, maybe I do know a thing or two about this game.” We’ll see.
First, a few takeaways and lessons learned:
* Flechette Torpedoes never got fired. A shield upgrade somewhere would have served me better for the cost.
* R5-K6 got activated once (with no joy). I had originally wanted to fit R3-A2 into the list for dealing stress, but decided against it when I settled on fielding only one Y-wing (hence my equipping the Flechette Torps). I might rethink this one.
* Engine Upgrade activated by Advanced Sensors is awesome … which is why I was constantly forgetting to use it. My opponent graciously let me “undo” a couple of mistakes and take advantage of AS. Flying casual … thanks, man.
The match:
My opponent caught me off guard right from the beginning by going with a Phantom + 3x TIE list. I had assumed somewhere along the way, before we met, that he was going to play dual Phantoms. Well, no battle plan survives contact with the enemy, and that was certainly true here.
His list came in at just 95 points, and I’m not sure why he didn’t use 3 or 4 points to beef up Howlrunner:
[PS4] Black Squadron Pilot (14)
- Predator (3)
[PS4] Black Squadron Pilot (14)
- Predator (3)
[PS8] Howlrunner
[PS9] Whisper (32) + VI (1)
- Advanced Cloaking Device (4)
- Advanced Sensors (3)
- Rebel Captive (3)
Total = 95
Setup saw asteroids generally weighted toward his left near corner, and they never became much of a factor in our game. His deployment was grouped in the center: BSPs template-width apart in front, with Howlrunner behind center, and Whisper behind and offset slightly to the left. I had Blount and Dutch template-width apart at far left (Blount on the outside), with Ten Numb at center right.
Initial activation rounds saw everyone move straight ahead, with only my B-wing using a bank boost to get positioned facing toward the center of the mat and his Whisper-side flank.
The first round of combat began after my Z-Y formation banked right, and ended up staring down his 3x TIE formation well within Range 1, which had also banked right. His Whisper continued forward to face off against my B at long range. Whisper stripped three shields off Ten Numb, but Ten successfully ioned Whisper on the return fire. Dutch ioned one of the BSPs and Blount failed to land a hit. The TIEs massed fire on Dutch, leaving him with just two or three hull.
In the second combat round, Dutch somehow got an ion hit through on a cloaked Whisper, leaving her without shields and once again adrift. So far so good on my ion control!
In the next couple of rounds, I clumsily failed to keep Ten Numb aimed at Whisper. (I wasted AS for focus, then bumped on an attempted K-turn, rather than using EU to make sure I got good position and facing the proper direction with my chosen maneuver.) But, Ten eventually one-shotted one of the TIEs that had K-turned at my far left. Meanwhile, Whisper was back in action and finished off Dutch, who was left-banking around toward the right side of the mat, hoping in vain to get one more lucky ion hit on Whisper. Somewhere along the way, the first wounded/ioned BSP got put down. Blount, with the help of some cold red dice, survived far longer than he should have, and I almost couldn’t believe it when he was able to fire off his Ion Pulse Missiles at Whisper to bring her down to a single hull. A round or two later, Blount and Howlrunner each got shot down by their more potent sparring partners.
The endgame resulted in a faceoff between a stressed B-wing at two hull and a cloaked Whisper at one hull. We were less than a base width apart, with Whisper pointed “south” at my Rebel edge and Ten Numb pointed “northwest”, almost touching Whisper’s left front corner. I knew I had few options for maneuver. I needed to destress so I could be ready to K-turn if the opportunity presented itself to take a killshot for the win, but there was no way I was going to get lined up at Whisper this round. So I picked a 1-bank to clear stress and hoped Whisper decided to do something stupid.
No such luck. Whisper AS-barrel rolled left, then decloaked left some more, then took a right 1-turn to line up on my tail. I can’t remember if I got a range bonus on my defense roll, but that was all she wrote. I ended my first truly competitive game getting blasted from behind by that slippery Phantom of the Meta, just one un-evadeable crit shy of victory.