First Scum list against anyone other than my sons was this

They form the basis of the swarm:

I won my first X-wing match with Scum the other day. I ran 2 Thug Y-wings with the A4 upgrade and ion turrets to use as jousters, and then three M3-A interceptors, all with mangler cannons for 100 points total. My opponent was running a loaded-out Falcon with Han and Chewbacca as well as Jan Ors in a HWK and a Z-95. My strategy was to take out the Falcon first at all costs, and then to concentrate on what was left. It ended up working perfectly. I dropped the Falcon by the third turn, and after that it was pretty much clean-up.

My takeaway lessons from the match were - target lock is so useful on those M3-As with the manglers. That's pretty much the only ability I used with them, even though they can barrel roll (arc dodging didn't play a major role in a match against two enemy ships with turrets). Lesson #2 those 3 evasion dice on the interceptors are fantastic. Lesson #3 being able to change a hit to a crit is so much more useful than I thought it would be. That really made a difference in the match.

I may end up running this list at the store championship as I think it gives me some interesting flexibility. I was considering running Laetin Ashera with mangler cannon and four M3-As with ion cannons, but now I'm rethinking that. My Y-wings kept the ions flowing nicely, and it was great to have three ships that just did damage (and always critical damage) when they hit.

Massed M3-A manglers massacre Millennium Falcons. Maybe.

I am really looking foward to bringing 1 or 2 cheap ones with flechette cannon, or possibly one flechette and one ion.

I don't think I'd personally be okay with paying 4 to 5 points for flechette/ion on a Scyk

It's the ion cannon bearing ship apart from the 'spray, but I think I'd rather rely on Ys for ionization and something apart from the flechette for stress control (which S&V are sadly light on)

I did finally try out the M3a last night. I ran...

2 x Cartel Spacer + Title + HLC

PS3 Z95

Kath + Predator

Against...

3 x Blue + FCS

Roark + Ion Turret + Chewbacca

And the Syck's performance was exactly as expected. They flanked together, did a good amount of damage at range 3, then one got tore up at range 1, as expected, and Kath used that rear arc to hurt things to victory.I think the ships do exactly as you expect. PS 2 you don't expect them to arc dodge, or to NOT get PS killed, but it is definitely possible that in their short life span they manage to pump out enough damage to make them worthwhile. I think I would include 2 of them with some sort of end game ship, like an Engine Fett or Kath that would let you clean house after the Syck's go down.

I like Scum's theme of: BIGGER GUNS, MORE RED DICE, BLOW MY OWN SHIP UP, SCREW DEFENSE, AHHHHHHHH

I'm going to be running two with flechette and ion as part of a control list. Add in Dace with tactician for a double ion/stress combo and Blaster Kavil for extra punch.

I've yet to fly it, and I've been hearing a lot of negative talk about the flechette cannon at the moment, but I'm going to give it a try and see how I go. There's a bit of easy slack in the list at the moment so I can easy swap the flechette out for ion if I don't think it's working. Just signed up to a 4 game event with it, so that'll force me to try it against a few different lists and see how it goes.

Cheerio,

Ben

What am I doing with M3-A Interceptors? Well that's easy, I'm shooting them down with my Imperial TIE INTERCEPTORS!

i'm currently experimenting with everything. but a build i made up on the fly net me a couple wins the other day

Cartel Spacer with Mangler x2 (40)
Guri with predator, virago, Autothrusters, inertial dampeners (37)
Torkil Mux with Blaster turret (23)

not sure how competitive it is, but it sure was fun to fly. your opponent has tough choices to go for in this list right off the bat as everything can be very threatening if you aren't careful
late game guri is a monster, Torkil mux shuts down the opponents largest threat and can easily turn them into cannon fodder before they even shoot back and the pair of M3-A's tear ships asunder

So far I plan on using a Scyk swarm for fun just to see how well it can do.

Going with

Serissu: determination "heavy scyk" interceptor, stealth device , mangler cannon.

Cartel Spacer x3

"Heavy scyk interceptor" x3

Stealth device x3

Mangler cannon x3

Could be fun. But will more than likely use my Scyk's for escorts to my Firesprays.

A player took 1st place at a 10-person local tournament this weekend with that list, with swarm tactics instead of determination. Crushed my Whisper, Soontir, Lambda in the finals when I messed up and Barrel Rolled Whisper into range 3 so she could shoot and recloak. Oh yeah, no range bonus against the Mangler Cannon, oops [face-melt].

Flechette, Mangler and HLC may cost 2 points more on the Scyk, but you get an extra attack die from them. If you look at Expose, HLC and Opportunist you can see how much extra attack dice tend to cost. Two points is pretty good going.

Flechette I think is probably my go to starting Scyk cannon, HLC if I'm splashing out. Mangler I'm a little more hesitant on. It'll need field testing.

I've only had two opportunities to fly them so far. The first time, I flew two Cartel Spacers with HLC, backing up a Star Viper and the PS7 Z-95 pilot (forget his name at the moment). My impression was that you pay a lot of points for something too fragile. Any time one got shot at, I lost an HLC; that's green dice for you in this game.

The second time, I swapped the HLCs for Ion Cannons, and upgraded the Star Viper to Guri. The results were much more favorable. Scyks seem to be great ion cannon handlers. Their 5 K-Turn lends itself well to ionizing, then swooping far behind their helpless target (even if they're moving first due to low PS), which also allows your other ships (like Guri) to get in at a safe range 1 where they want to be.

Not sure Mangler cannons will work well on them, considering you already have the opportunity cost of paying for the Heavy Scyk title, you may as well just go for the HLC (though, as above, I don't think they're great with the HLC, either!). The other cannons, I'll probably test some.

Another list that I want to fly but don't have a third Most Wanted set. I call Kaa'to, Serissu, Nikto:

I've only had two opportunities to fly them so far. The first time, I flew two Cartel Spacers with HLC, backing up a Star Viper and the PS7 Z-95 pilot (forget his name at the moment). My impression was that you pay a lot of points for something too fragile. Any time one got shot at, I lost an HLC; that's green dice for you in this game.

The second time, I swapped the HLCs for Ion Cannons, and upgraded the Star Viper to Guri. The results were much more favorable. Scyks seem to be great ion cannon handlers. Their 5 K-Turn lends itself well to ionizing, then swooping far behind their helpless target (even if they're moving first due to low PS), which also allows your other ships (like Guri) to get in at a safe range 1 where they want to be.

Not sure Mangler cannons will work well on them, considering you already have the opportunity cost of paying for the Heavy Scyk title, you may as well just go for the HLC (though, as above, I don't think they're great with the HLC, either!). The other cannons, I'll probably test some.

In some lists, six points is better spent on upgrades, but in a scum list six points between two ships can mean the difference between bringing N'Dru and a pirate.

So far I plan on using a Scyk swarm for fun just to see how well it can do.

Going with

Serissu: determination "heavy scyk" interceptor, stealth device , mangler cannon.

Cartel Spacer x3

"Heavy scyk interceptor" x3

Stealth device x3

Mangler cannon x3

Could be fun. But will more than likely use my Scyk's for escorts to my Firesprays.

A player took 1st place at a 10-person local tournament this weekend with that list, with swarm tactics instead of determination. Crushed my Whisper, Soontir, Lambda in the finals when I messed up and Barrel Rolled Whisper into range 3 so she could shoot and recloak. Oh yeah, no range bonus against the Mangler Cannon, oops [face-melt].

Thats interesting..when I was making this squad I was actually bouncing swarm tactics and determination but went with determination instead...Ill take swarm tactics into consideration on a game

Not sure Mangler cannons will work well on them, considering you already have the opportunity cost of paying for the Heavy Scyk title, you may as well just go for the HLC (though, as above, I don't think they're great with the HLC, either!). The other cannons, I'll probably test some.

I can easily see going for 3 pts for the Ion and then up to 4 pts for the Mangler. I still feel uncomfortable with paying 7 for the HLC, though. For me, I see going from 4 to 7 as too much of a jump.

At today's store championship in Denver, I know 2nd place out of 25 ran a 3 M3-A swarm with 2 Z's. I'm not sure what the exact build was, but I know it took down an 8 TIE swarm.

I don't think people are giving the scyk enough credit yet, but they will.

That would be me!

1 Binayre, 3 Cartel with Heavy Scyk and HLCs, N'Dru with Lone Wolf. The semis against the 8 Tie Swarm saw some very hot dice, both offensive and defense. One M3-A got shot at 9 times - with a mix of 2-3 dice and with/without focus and only took 1 damage. Unfortunately the dice gods evened things out in the finals, where 2 M3-As were one-shot!

So close to one of the first Scum store championships wins!!!

The squad worked really well, considering I didn't play test it at all before the Store Championships. I thought it was a good meta call, since I still expected a fair amount of large ships - turrets plus new Scum Firesprays. The idea was to pile on the offense - defense be damned!

From planning to the squad I actually played, I traded down from Serissu and some mods on N'Dru to get the 12 points for the Binayre. I thought the 5th ship would be worth the trade-out of the toys and a couple extra defensive rerolls. In actuality - I don't know if it was. Overall, I was very impressed with the M3-As performance. Agree it is the Scum equivalent to the a-wing, but with lots more customization options and a 1-2 point cost premium.

This build needs to be tested with Mangler cannons, freeing up 9 points from the HLCs. I'd like to find some good options for the 40 points available at that point (more toys for N'dru, Serissu instead of the Binayre, maybe a 40-point Firespray or Aggressor, and a maxed out StarVirper are all possibilities to try.)

Lee

Had my first game with Scum yesterday.

I flew

3 x Tansarii Point Veterans w/ Push the Limit and Mangler Cannon

1 x Spice Runner w/ Ion Cannon

vs.

1 x Chewbacca w/ Luke Skywalker and Engine Upgrade

2 x Red Squadron

The result? I was quite impressed with the Sycks, despite losing. Let's face it, Chewie ignoring Mangler crits, Gunner Luke, I was up against it... but while I was tabled, I still had everything when he was down to 2 hull on chewie and 1 hull on the X-Wing. The problem is getting one shot by the Falcon, and it's something I have to master, that the Manglers are best used at long range because they don't give bonus dice, whereas the opponent does have to deal with the dice. And in hindsight I might have been able to finish off the falcon if I had not broken one of the Sycks away to deal with an Ionised X-Wing.

They do have a bit of a funky dial (no 3 turn when looking for it is a bit Wha?), but I had a good time. Will fly again

Real question is if Engine Upgrades are worth it.

As of now all 7 are in their spots in the Scum case. I will be testing some lists soon with them.