Yesterday I took my two Agressors out for a ride and I have to say: I'm impressed.

Here's what I've been flying:

How did it fly?

I have to say I'm amazed how FFG managed to create a ship that feels so completely different than everything that I have flown so far. I've been flying against a list of 4 M3As equipped with different canons (I think 2 Mangler Cannons, 1 Flechette and 1 Ion) and a Lone Wolf N'Dru Suhlak. Most of the time I've had to fly far to turn around to get good shots. Typically my turns would look something like this: Starting close to the M3As, doing a boost (if not blocked), then doing an S-Loop (or S-Turn) to get a good shot, next turn doing some green to clear the stress, then doing the S-Loop again and so on. Ideally I would get at range 3 as my canons shoot the same in this distance and my autothrusters kick in on defense.

The Agrossor is definitely not a close combat jouster. You want to cover some distance most of the time. Even if you engage the opponent as slowly as you can, you will move a distance of 3 small ship bases. And boost ist definitely not good in close combat fights. So move! Get away from the opponent and turn around! That's how you have to fight.

What else have I learned?

1. Push the limit is an auto-include? Think again! As much S-Loops as I did, I hardly ever had the chance to use Ptl. You definitely want to end your turn without stress, because you need to be ready to do a red maneuver next round. And if you want to do a S-Loop every second turn, there's not much time to push the limit! I will rebuild the squad with other EPT. Probably I will try to free two points to get a second HLC.

2. Advanced Sensors were great (as always)!

3. Autothrusters were incredible! They saved me a lot of damage! I managed to get at range 3 of my opponent several times and was focus fired by all of the 4 M3As at least twice. I hardly got a scratch. Untill the very last round my 2 robots only each lost 2 shields in total.

4. Mangler Cannon is meh... The best thing about it is that it denies your opponent that additional green die at range 3. But for the Agressor, that's about it.

5. I like the C and D combination a lot. As I described, you want to get far and turn around on your opponent. That's not always as easy as it sounds as obstacles and other ships will block your boost and S-Loop options. Sometimes I had to do suboptimal moves just to get out of the firing arcs of the M3As and ended without a shot. But often I had several good moves that I could pick of. Other combinations of 2 bots might fly differently, but for the moment I will stick with these two.

6. Stay away from the asteroids. That sounds easy, but beware! It doesn't take a lot to be too close to an asteroid to screw up your next move. Think ahead! When you choose your maneuver, already think about your possibilities for the next turn. You should do that with other ships too of course, but I found, that it's even more important with the Agressor.

7. This squad is good at surviving, but has a mediocre damage output. It took me a while to get those 5 ships down. So If you're looking for a quick win, get something else.

That's all for now. Thanks for reading!

IG-88 sure does look nasty (it's hard not to build a wicked two-ship squad out of any combination). It's cool to hear he's fun to fly, too. Glad you had a good time!

I played against this exact build (even same pilot abilities I think) today at a store championship. The guy playing it only went 1-3 with it.

Just remember, the IG-88s are scary even by themselves. Don't feel restricted to flying 0 or 2

Thanks for sharing. Think I'll playtest this sometime.

How would this list work with Lone Wolf instead of PtL?
How often was C's Freevade relevant?
If you're having trouble with damage output could a switch to B and two HLCs make up for it or just wasted points?

I flew something similar last night.

IG-88B and IG-88D

Both with:

Push the limit

Advanced sensors

Inertial dampeners

Mangler canon

Autothrusters

and IG-88D also carried Seismic charges.

I chose 88B because of the gunner like effect and it worked amazingly. It frees up the possibility to take Evades and be more defensive in crucial moments. I really found the Mangler canon quite effective. Not getting that extra range 3 defensive dice was important against mostly 3 agility enemy ships. The Crits also did the job well.

Having PTL was super nice on several occasions during the game. Being a big ship with no turret you need that boost to get around for new engagements while still taking Evades for those times when you don't get a shot yourself. With so many greens on the dial it's no hinder being stressed. Lots of times the stress is even cleared after moving due to the Advanced Sensors. There was a couple of times where I needed the Segnors Loop while stressed but the amazing dial saved me.

A crucial note on this list is PATIENCE. Don't worry about not getting shots off all the time. Protect yourself. Fly big. I mean HUGE. I've never been around the table as much as with these crazy robots. Get those asteroids out of tight formations.

The biggest surprise was how well the Inertial Dampeners worked! On both occasions when I trickered the White stop, I ended up in range 1 of small ships and chewed huge chunks out of M3-As. Using Advanced Sensors allowed for some amazing damage output. But make sure to choose a useful movement just in case your opponent surprises you

Autothrusters was a big waste. Or maybe I just forgot about them on occasions. but due to the amount of turrets out there I will still keep them on.

I will agree 100% that FFG really has been extremely successful in creating a ship that feels so different from anything else. You totally get the feeling of these two crazy a** robots behind the wheel, going all over the place, flying super fast and pulling some great surprises at crucial moments. I will definetily be flying this list a lot in the coming weeks.

I agree you don't need ptl on it, in fact with multiple ways to give stress around it could get you killed with a front fire arc only you could get stuck endlessly turning while getting picked appart.

It's interesting to see how differently we evaluated PTL and Autothrusters. Don't get me wrong. Ptl is still my favourite EPT and I can totally see how it worked for you. I could use it a couple of times with my Agressors and when I did, it was always awesome. But once I started getting in S-Loop-mode, I couldn't trigger Ptl anymore. And I think another EPT would have helped me more.

And I think it's a good sign, your Autothrusters didn't help you much. It would be bad if you'd get an auto-win for 2 measly points. You really have to work for your Autothrusters to kick in. Get away, get in range 3! And as an opponent you have to follow closely the ships with the Autothrusters. For me, the Autothrusters were great. I think they saved me at least 5 damage.

"feels good, meatbag"

When I was looking at the cards it seemed hard to skip over B and it's free gunner effect for the cost of Mangler cannons. 1 point cheaper than Gunner and you get an auto crit out of the deal.

I tried a B and C with ion cannons. Now... I can't go back!

Sure, it sometimes feel like a death by a thousand paper cuts... but I'm ok with that

I've been playing a bunch of Scum squads the past few days just to try them out. Had a lot of success with this list:

Push the Limit doesn't work well with the idea of using Segnor's Loop often so I may drop that to either Expert Handling or Elusiveness.

Yes if you are going to be expecting to use the S-loop or the K-Turn often, I have a seggestion for you. Try out Advanced Sensors with Wingman. With both of them clearing stress an darting all over the board facing who knows what direction, it will be hard for your oponent to get inside your head.

I guess I'll have to try IG-88B sometime to increase my damage output. But I still like D the best. I love the flexibility of his ability. With PS 6 you'll move after a lot of other ships, so it's important to be able to react to your opponents moves. That's also why I prefer Advanced Sensors over FCS (even though I'd like those free Target Locks). I even consider Stay on Target as EPT to further increase the flexibility of the S-Loop.

Push the Limit doesn't work well with the idea of using Segnor's Loop often so I may drop that to either Expert Handling or Elusiveness.

Yes if you are going to be expecting to use the S-loop or the K-Turn often, I have a seggestion for you. Try out Advanced Sensors with Wingman. With both of them clearing stress an darting all over the board facing who knows what direction, it will be hard for your oponent to get inside your head.

I'm not sold on Wingman. With 2 large base ships I don't manage to maneuver them side by side through all the asteroids and between the opponents ships. If you can pull that off, Wingman will be very good for you, but I don't see myself doing that. Last time I played I had to take the two robots apart to cover some ground. I'd rather take Lone Wolf on one of them, but also there, I'm not sure if I can trigger its effect on a regular basis.

I'd be very tempted to try Stay On Target instead of PTL on any list that includes Iggy D
Combine the option for 4 different loops with Adv sensors for pre-loop positioning and you'll be very difficult to predict or block

And that'll give you the extra 2 points you were after

Push the Limit doesn't work well with the idea of using Segnor's Loop often so I may drop that to either Expert Handling or Elusiveness.

Yes if you are going to be expecting to use the S-loop or the K-Turn often, I have a seggestion for you. Try out Advanced Sensors with Wingman. With both of them clearing stress an darting all over the board facing who knows what direction, it will be hard for your oponent to get inside your head.

I was thinking just the same thing today. C and D with Wingman and AS can pull quite some k-turn and Segnor shenanigans.

Push the Limit doesn't work well with the idea of using Segnor's Loop often so I may drop that to either Expert Handling or Elusiveness.

Yes if you are going to be expecting to use the S-loop or the K-Turn often, I have a seggestion for you. Try out Advanced Sensors with Wingman. With both of them clearing stress an darting all over the board facing who knows what direction, it will be hard for your oponent to get inside your head.

I was thinking just the same thing today. C and D with Wingman and AS can pull quite some k-turn and Segnor shenanigans.

Yes! This! I have been saying it for a long time, it's absolutely possible to keep them in range 1 of each other, while being incredibly unpredictable. boost-S-turn, simple K, boost-hard-S-turn, ... the possibilities...

Yes! This! I have been saying it for a long time, it's absolutely possible to keep them in range 1 of each other, while being incredibly unpredictable. boost-S-turn, simple K, boost-hard-S-turn, ... the possibilities...

Well hats off to some mad flying skills, because I can't keep them at range 1 of each other for very long, what with asteroids and enemy ships getting in the way. I have tried Push the Limit and Predator on 2 IG88s and I think both are strong for different reasons. Same goes for FCS & adv. sensors.

As for cannons, here's the scoop on what seems to be the best (from my admittedly limited experience so far):

If taking IG88B, a range 1 - 3 cannon is basically mandatory or you lose out on his ability at significant points in your match. Therefore, Heavy Laser & autoblaster are bad on him. IG88B & the 'mangler' are BFFs! If you take B, don't leave the hangar without your mangler, seriously! You'll regret it.

If not running IG88B, heavy laser is the best cannon for damage obviously, and autoblaster will have its uses, but its limited range and relative high cost make it still questionably effective.

Ion & Flechette are both good and relatively cheap. Ion I think is ultimately more useful in more situations and only 1 point more. Mangler + Ion is the same cost as a heavy laser cannon and combined with IG88B is a killer combo. So useful against so many different ships...

Autothrusters. Basically an auto-include. So **** useful on Aggressors!

That's what I got so far...

I tried ptl on the combo but when you come up against stress lists it becomes hard to use and when want to do the k turns you cant use it either

I am very curious about a couple aspects of the IG-2000s that I have not heard about anywhere yet:

How does it actually play out being limited to PS 6's? (or 8's if you lock up your EPT slot in a VI) I am very interested in this question, especially concerning the activation phase and the need for enough space to move where you planned to go. (on a slightly different note, I'd love to see an IG-2000 list vs. a Phantom & TIE Interceptor list)

Why not Predator instead of PTL? (The idea behind PTL is to increase your attack power, right? But PTL won't kick in when you use that clutch S Loop and land yourself in a slick position behind the enemy. Predator doesn't give you a stress (So you can do more S-Loops possibly), kicks in even on the turn you've done an S-Loop, and punishes low-PS swarms (possibly this list's big weakness, with autothrusters helping vs. turrets and swarms threatening your important freedom of movement).)

I am very curious about a couple aspects of the IG-2000s that I have not heard about anywhere yet:

How does it actually play out being limited to PS 6's? (or 8's if you lock up your EPT slot in a VI) I am very interested in this question, especially concerning the activation phase and the need for enough space to move where you planned to go. (on a slightly different note, I'd love to see an IG-2000 list vs. a Phantom & TIE Interceptor list)

Why not Predator instead of PTL? (The idea behind PTL is to increase your attack power, right? But PTL won't kick in when you use that clutch S Loop and land yourself in a slick position behind the enemy. Predator doesn't give you a stress (So you can do more S-Loops possibly), kicks in even on the turn you've done an S-Loop, and punishes low-PS swarms (possibly this list's big weakness, with autothrusters helping vs. turrets and swarms threatening your important freedom of movement).)

PS 6 is obviously a disadvantage against phantom/interceptors with high PS, so it depends on the skill of the players, I think. One aggressor can block and the other line up a shot to take out an actionless interceptor/phantom, or with IG88B, use your prodigious offense to push some damage through all the tokens and green dice (unless you get arc-dodged, of course). The s-loop and having lots of green on the dial do help make up for the aggressor's lower PS, but again, it takes a good player to get the most out of those things.

Push the Limit is versatile. It can give you good offense with TL + focus, but it can also give you strong defense through combinations of boost/focus/evade. Obviously the downside is the stress token, limiting your ability to do red moves next turn and you have to be careful how you use it vs. stress builds. Predator has none of the downsides of push the limit, but is not as strong in the sense that its offensive push is not quite equal to TL+focus and it provides no defensive boost at all. I think both are good and the decision to use one over the other is probably mostly personal preference or local meta (like if stress builds are rare, push the limit is probably the better choice, but if they are common, go with predator).