Whenever I play X-Wing, my overall strategic goal is always the same: Divide the opponent's ships while my ships stay united, or at least more united than my opponent's ships. If I can get my opponent to divide their ships, I can create situations where my entire list is fighting against a fraction of my opponent's list.

If I cannot get my opponent to divide their forces against me, then I want them to fight me where I am strong and not fight them where I am weak. I want them to attack my more durable and more maneuverable ships first, or bring them into the asteroid field if I am outnumbered. I want to be the one that sets the terms of the engagement so that I have the advantage. The tricky part is getting your opponent to accept those terms of engagement. That's where deception comes in.

A decently skilled player is not going to willingly divide their forces against you or willingly fight you where you have the obvious advantage, so to get them to do so requires deception. You need to convince your opponent that it is in there best interest to move where you want them to move. You need to convince them that a certain engagement favors them when in fact it favors you.

For this article, I will be talking about deception using our maneuvers in the game, and not any kind of angle-shooting using bluffs or lies outside the game. Actions speak louder than words, and your actions in the game are going to be what influences your opponent's actions the most without giving you away and perhaps more importantly without tainting your reputation.

Before you can start using deception, before you can even lay down the first asteroid, you need to compare your list to your opponent's and figure out where you are strong and where you are weak. Who is favored in a head to head joust, which ships represent the most firepower with the least amount of relative durability, who fights better in the asteroids, what range do you want to fight at, which of your ships are the most vulnerable to dying, which ships are the most valuable in the end game, etc. Once you have figured out where and which engagements favor you over your opponent, you can then figure out how to manipulate your opponent into fighting those engagements where you are favored. Deception is a means to an end, and you need to know what that end is.

There are two primary methods I use in X-Wing to manipulate my opponent's movements. Baits, and Threats.

One method of manipulating our opponent's movement is to offer them a bait to go after. Something of value that looks vulnerable but that you can pull away from the opponent at the last second once they've committed to attacking it. This can be used to get your opponent to come into a part of the board that favors you, or to get them to ignore a ship that is trying to attack the opponent's flanks. Then while they're ships are out of position from committing to attacking a bait that isn't there anymore, you can strike at whatever weak point they've left undefended to go after the bait. The best bait is the kind that can punish the opponent in some way for ignoring it.

An example from a recent tournament I played in. My opponent was playing BBBBZ against my Super Dash and Fat Keyan list. The asteroids were thick and staggered on my side of the board, with my opponent's corner being almost completely free of asteroids. I knew that with so many ships, if I just deployed Dash behind all the asteroids, it would be unlikely that my opponent would dive in after him, he would just slow roll his B-Wings back in forth and wait for Dash to come out and fight him in the open. Instead, I deployed Dash right in the jousting alley on the same side as his whole squad, basically offering to joust with his B-Wings, which would have been amazing for him. I even did a 1-straight on the first turn to sell it, and my opponent dove straight in thinking I was going to joust with him, only to see Dash do a 1-turn on turn 2 and boost and barrel roll into the asteroids away from his B-Wings, who had now come far enough forward that they had no choice but to turn into the asteroids where they started to lose actions and shots.

The other way to get your opponent to move the way you want them to is to make a big noisy threat against a key position that they must defend, in order to distract them from whatever it is that you don't want them to attack or defend against. This is basically the same concept as the Bait, but in reverse. Instead of pretending to be weak to get the opponent to attack you where you are strong, you pretend to be strong to get the opponent to ignore you where you are weak. Key positions are usually an opponent's flank, but could also be a key ship that the opponent doesn't want you to kill and will rush to defend. A fast ship with good offense (so not a single A-Wing) that can quickly move up the board and threaten the opponent's flank is a good way to get them to turn their forces away from the rest of your squad which can then attack the opponent without retaliation for a few turns.

This is a good way to counter an opponent's pincer maneuver if they are trying to attack you from two sides. Threaten their left group with your full list, then turn sharply to face the right group instead. The opponent hopefully held the left group back, thinking they had baited you into attacking.

This is also a good way to avoid jousting with an opponent that has you outnumbered but is less mobile than you. Threaten their swarms flank with a fast flanker to get them to turn their swarm away from the rest of your ships. Ideally the ship you're using as a threat should be mobile enough or durable enough that it can escape from the opponent's counter attack without dying while the rest of your ship gets to shoot at the opponent's flank for a few turns.

An example from the same tournament I was up against a Lambda and a 6 TIE mini-swarm. I needed to win 100-0 to qualify for 1st place, and I knew that if I didn't keep his swarm away from Keyan he would be toast. So I deployed Keyan in the middle and Dash in the opposite corner as the TIEs, and on turn 1 Dash went forward 4, banked in and barrel rolled towards his deployment zone, the fastest forward linear movement possible on turn 1, while Keyan meandered forward with a bank and a barrel roll. I had sent a clear message to my opponent here, yes you can keep going forward and kill Keyan, but if you do you'll be in the asteroid field and Dash will be hammering your flank, you should turn away from Keyan and pay attention to Dash. And he did, Dash was able to block Howlrunner on turn 3 and arc-dodge 2 other TIES with a clutch barrel roll right into the heart of the swarm, and on turn 4 all the TIEs had to k-turn while Dash and Keyan met the lagging Lambda in the corner and destroyed it in 2 turns without it ever getting a shot off and the TIEs struggled to get back to the fight. By threatening my opponent's flank and getting his TIEs to turn away from my weak point and attack my strong point, I was able to engineer a 100 vs 24 fight and then a 100 vs 66 fight, all while keeping Keyan out of the enemy's firing arc and moving him toward the enemy's ships.

Another great example, and in fact the one that opened my eyes back in November to how deception can win games, was the finals of Worlds 2014 between Paul Heaver and Morgan Reid. Paul used his Fat Han as both a bait and a threat against Morgan's Whisper swarm, and knowing that Han was both a threat to Morgan's flank and a primary target to go after first, Paul positioned Han perfectly so that when Morgan turned his swarm into Han, Han was able to shoot past them with a boost and the Z-95s were now able to shoot at the TIE swarms flank with impunity. Han was both the perfect bait and the perfect threat to get Morgan to turn his ships away from the less mobile and less durable Z-95s. And of course I have seen Morgan do this to other players in his games as well with his masterfully played Phantom, using the Phantom as both a bait and a threat to get his opponent's to turn their ships where he wants them to.

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The best Baits and the best Threats are the ones with teeth that can bite the opponent if they do ignore them. I think this is why I've come to love Super Dash so much in spite of his weaknesses, his mobility and long range can sometimes make it feel like he can be in 2 places at once.

To use deception to manipulate the opponent, you need to be able see the battle as a whole, see where you have the advantage and convince your opponent to fight you there. Draw his attacks away from your weak points and concentrate your attacks on his weak points. To do this you need to get inside your opponent's head, figure out what you need to do to get them react to your moves in a way that gives you the decisive edge. You don't need parlor tricks or mind games for this to work, if you play decisively and purposefully, the implicit threat that comes from each of your moves will influence your opponent more than any trick.

If you can use deception to impose your will on your opponent and dictate their movements, you will have a much easier time predicting their next move, you'll already know where they're going to go because their next move was secretly your idea all along!