Everytime I see a list with dual Aggressors, the list is filled with a bunch of useless crap that could be trimmed off for more effective upgrades. Hot shot is nice, but you could use those extra 3 points to upgrade your mangler cannon to the hlc, which is better if you have the points.

The best build is probably:

igB & igD

Title

Predator

Advanced sensors

HLC

With two points to spare for initiative or autothrusters on one of them or inertial dampeners. Perhaps you could go FCS and get autothrusters on both.

All other builds are trash, and mangler is nice but over rated. Always go hlc if you have the points.

If you fly D advanced sensors is a must. You're taking a custom red maneuver and you need to preserve the action economy.

Does adv sens allow you to do an action even if you are already stressed? (e.g. if you did a sloop the previous turn)

No. But you have plenty of green to keep your action after a loop.

It's cool to see that after 2 weeks, people are still not agreeing on what the best way to build the Aggressor is.

I think so far the best combinations I've seen are

B&D with Advanced Sensors and Predator

B&C with FCS and PTL

Obv FCS and Predator are nombos, as is D and PTL. I also think B and HLC are nombos, with that much dice you should be hitting with your first shot more often then you miss and you lose your ability at range 1. VI + PS 6 is a nombo outside of the Scum mirror match, and isn't even that valuable there. I actually think IG88C with PTL + Advance Sensors, while it seems great at first, puts too much emphasis on defense and makes it hard to kill your opponent's ships quickly enough, which forces you to rely on green dice too much. FCS is needed to maintain a consistent damage output on the PTL + C lists.

These are my thoughts as someone who has played a ton of games against Dual Aggressor builds.

Edit: I didn't mention it, but any build with B is running Mangler Cannons or Mangler+HLC.

All other builds are trash, and mangler is nice but over rated. Always go hlc if you have the points.

I'll take the bait you're setting out.

I disagree with your post on two points: 1) HLC > "Mangler", 2) all other upgrades are garbage.

1) As Tvboy mentioned above, HLC doesn't work that well with IG-88B. I love IG-88B's ability and I don't like that it gets turned off at range 1, especially if the target also has me in his sights. I hate losing that reroll. For me, choosing "Mangler" is about keeping B's ability at range 1 and denying the opponent an extra die at range 3. Sure, I lose the extra die at ranges 2 and 3, but for 3 points cheaper, I think that's fair. And I get to land some crits that could potentially cripple my targets. Against beefy enemies, I like the "Mangler" Cannon because it will take several round to take them out anyway, I might as well cripple them along the way.

2) The upgrade you didn't include in your build was Inertial Dampeners. I cannot praise that card highly enough. It can do so much for a Dual Aggressor build. With the two points you had left over, I would slap those on the Aggressors in a heartbeat. I will concede, however, that there are some upgrades that just don't do a whole lot. Bombs are the biggest ones that stand out to me. Maybe they're good for some people, but I just don't see how you'd want to spend your points on that in a Dual Aggressor build. But yeah, Inertial Dampeners! Never leave home without them.

FCS is cute, but sensors is what makes Aggressors such a massive pain in the ass. Without it, they become several times easier to block and play around.

I don't really agree that PTL + sensors is a great way to play them (shutting off sensors or limiting yourself to green is no bueno) but just having sensors to secure an action be it a focus or to boost into an unexpected position/around a blockade is invaluable.

So quick question about ig88 c. It says after you perform an attack that does not hit. It doesn't specify primary or secondary so could you attack with mango cannon miss and then attack again with mango cannon?

So quick question about ig88 c. It says after you perform an attack that does not hit. It doesn't specify primary or secondary so could you attack with mango cannon miss and then attack again with mango cannon?

88B, you mean. Yes, ONLY the second attack is required to be a cannon shot, the first one can be primary, cannon, Hot Shot, etc

So quick question about ig88 c. It says after you perform an attack that does not hit. It doesn't specify primary or secondary so could you attack with mango cannon miss and then attack again with mango cannon?

that's B. there is no secondary or primary condition, only that the ability triggers a cannon shot

and it's once per round (per ship)

So quick question about ig88 c. It says after you perform an attack that does not hit. It doesn't specify primary or secondary so could you attack with mango cannon miss and then attack again with mango cannon?

It's B, and yes, it's any form of attack.

And really? How has people become so biased towards what's "right" and "wrong" to put on an Aggressor? Obviously both ways work, otherwise people wouldn't feel so strongly for them. The only difference is how you play them, and yes, certainly some of you think AS is the way to go as you might prefer to get up close and throw Manglers around with a second attack insurance, others might prefer to use HLC and FCS from a distance and get much use of Autothrusters and everything in between. That doesn't make the other builds sh*t just because you can't or won't play the ship that way.

If you're not slooping, every maneuver you take is green. Thus you can adv sens ptl every round THEN perform a green maneuver to shed the stress, leaving you stress free.

If you don't use adv sens, using sloop will likely leave you very exposed (no actions)

I wondering how you could reconcile the conflict between adv sens ptl and slooping, the latter of which is a defining aspect of the Aggressor. Also, because the Aggressor is a large based ship with no turret or rear arc, slooping seems to be quite necessary.

I fly the aggressor differently. (B+C)

When advancing on a target, I'll do a combination of focus/evade/boost/tl based on the situation, then the green move clears the stress. If I'm going to be shot at by more than 1 ship, I normally focus/evade. Next round, if it looks like I can arc dodge, I'll adv sens focus then sloop. But slooping on a large ship is normally pretty predictable and leaves you the most vulnerable. I only do it if I know I'm not going to die in the process. With only 16 hits combined, dropping to hull to get smacked with a mangler cannon is extremely risky.

So instead of slooping, I run away. 3 bank/straight + boost is equal to a small ship's 5 straight and boost, which is also equal to range 2. Even if the ship you just jousted with k-turns, you're at least at range 3, and thus, autothrusters. If your opponent chases, he leaves himself open to your other aggressor. If he doesn't, then the aggressor that just ran away will be back in 2 rounds, or less if he's able to find a target on the other side of the engagement. The worse thing your opponent can do for himself is split his forces. That's what you're really hoping for. A single ship getting through a 3 agility evade+focus+AT ship is difficult to say the least.

It's about being patient more than arc dodging. If you just want a weapons platform, fly a heavy scyk. You can get 2.5 mangler scyks for the cost of 1 aggressor (loaded)

I have played several games using the same list, Dash + Corran, against B+C with Mangler, PTL and Adv Sensors, and while it's true that they're crazy maneuverable and that it's a **** to hit them when they're armored up with focus+evade, their damage output is really low because they always have to spend that focus token on defense, not enough to punch through a tough list like BBBB or Fat Han, and if you chase them aggressively enough they eventually have to k-turn, which is when they become vulnerable.

I think the fundamental concept of red dice > green dice comes into play here, that the best defense is a good offense. If you maximize your red dice and kill your opponent's ships quicker, you don't have to rely on your green dice so much. That's why I think I the lists with FCS or Predator are going to be better than the lists that rely on PTL+C.

There are a couple things that I really like about FCS: (1) you get the target lock without having to do an action and (2) you can apparently get the target lock even if your ship is stressed. As other people have mentioned here, IG-2000s are very prone to stressing (especially with all the stress-inducing upgrade cards floating around - Mara Jade, Rebel Captive, Flechette anything, etc.)

There are a couple things that I really like about FCS: (1) you get the target lock without having to do an action and (2) you can apparently get the target lock even if your ship is stressed. As other people have mentioned here, IG-2000s are very prone to stressing (especially with all the stress-inducing upgrade cards floating around - Mara Jade, Rebel Captive, Flechette anything, etc.)

Again, though, you can just take Predator and it's much the same thing as having FCS (occasionally it's a bit worse, I'll grant). Advanced Sensors will greatly increase your action economy and allow you to adjust the angle and length of your K-turns and S-loops. Given that this ship literally lives and dies by those maneuvers, I honestly cannot fathom why you would not want that.

All other builds are trash, and mangler is nice but over rated. Always go hlc if you have the points.

I'll take the bait you're setting out.

I disagree with your post on two points: 1) HLC > "Mangler", 2) all other upgrades are garbage.

1) As Tvboy mentioned above, HLC doesn't work that well with IG-88B. I love IG-88B's ability and I don't like that it gets turned off at range 1, especially if the target also has me in his sights. I hate losing that reroll. For me, choosing "Mangler" is about keeping B's ability at range 1 and denying the opponent an extra die at range 3. Sure, I lose the extra die at ranges 2 and 3, but for 3 points cheaper, I think that's fair. And I get to land some crits that could potentially cripple my targets. Against beefy enemies, I like the "Mangler" Cannon because it will take several round to take them out anyway, I might as well cripple them along the way.

2) The upgrade you didn't include in your build was Inertial Dampeners. I cannot praise that card highly enough. It can do so much for a Dual Aggressor build. With the two points you had left over, I would slap those on the Aggressors in a heartbeat. I will concede, however, that there are some upgrades that just don't do a whole lot. Bombs are the biggest ones that stand out to me. Maybe they're good for some people, but I just don't see how you'd want to spend your points on that in a Dual Aggressor build. But yeah, Inertial Dampeners! Never leave home without them.

1.) 4 attack dice that can't crit is still better than 3 with a hit to crit conversion. Yes, HLC is 3 points more expensive, but you have enough points for it so it's not much of a loss.

2.) I did mention that my build was 98 points and that could put inertial dampeners on them or autothrusters on one for 100.

You know, both of these things don't have to have the same loadout. You could give one FCS and HLC with igB and keep it far away, and then give the other one mangler and advanced sensors. Hlc strips shields, mangler attacks second and crits.

2.) I did mention that my build was 98 points and that could put inertial dampeners on them or autothrusters on one for 100.

I think this is where people start to run out of points for HLCs, because for quite a few people there is no consideration given to ever leaving home without Autothrusters on both ships. I know I personally spend way too much time sniping at range 3 to think about not taking them.

There are a couple things that I really like about FCS: (1) you get the target lock without having to do an action and (2) you can apparently get the target lock even if your ship is stressed. As other people have mentioned here, IG-2000s are very prone to stressing (especially with all the stress-inducing upgrade cards floating around - Mara Jade, Rebel Captive, Flechette anything, etc.)

Again, though, you can just take Predator and it's much the same thing as having FCS (occasionally it's a bit worse, I'll grant). Advanced Sensors will greatly increase your action economy and allow you to adjust the angle and length of your K-turns and S-loops. Given that this ship literally lives and dies by those maneuvers, I honestly cannot fathom why you would not want that.

I did about 1-2 sloops/k-turns at most in every game I played, and that was when I was too far away to get shot at or I had bumped. I agree that sloops brings a lot of versatility, but you don't have to abuse it for Aggressors to work.

As for Pred vs FCS I prefer FCS for B, as Pred will eat up the EPT slot, so no PtL. That together with FCS will ensure you a very balanced action economy. You got TL for offense, Evade for defense and Focus which goes either way. Using C you will even get a Boost on top of that. But then again, it depends on what you run. If I'd run D I'd happily take AS and Pred or Outmaneuver.

So I have 7 games of twin IG88 builds under my belt. Here's my takeaway so far:

If you fly IG-B mount FCS. NOPE NOPE NOPE TO ANY OTHER SYSTEM SLOT. Advanced sensors looks good, but FCS is just better ALWAYS.

Autothrusters are TOTALLY worth it. IG excels at the range 3 shot.

Avoid upgrades that cause stress or are action dependent. IG tends to boat stress like crazy, because he frequently has a hard time shaking it.

HIT AND RUN. IG excels at the shoot and run. Attack at range 3 whenever possible, avoid close range slugfests.

MANGLER MANGLER MANGLER. It wins games for you period.

I totally agree with FCS and works well with IG-88B's ability! When I first flew the double IG-88's I had a hard time maneuvering them and been dealing with stress due to PTL and S-loops. Advanced Sensors can be usefull at times but it's really hard to navigate a large ship. After a series of trial and error, I found that HLC + FCS works well and removed the PTL add autothrusters and inertial dampeners after that I've been having great games.

So does anyone bother running Ion Cannons on their Aggressors? I've found them to be, in my opinion, THE BEST Ion Cannon platforms in the game. B + D paired with Predator and Advanced Sensors is insanely wicked to fly with Ion Cannons and Manglers. You can easily pick on Corran Horn or Soontir Fel and just keep Ioning them to death or off the board. It's also nice Ioning two out of the six ships formation flying in a swarm or Ioning Biggs restricting the rest of the flight for you to do the Crazy Ivan (Hard Sloop) and gun them down at range 1, or continue to troll them and Ion them.

My usual setup is Ion + Mangler instead of HLC altogether because I really like having the option to Ion or Crit. It puts pressure on your opponents whether or not they want to be Ioned or Critted. One thing I've actually been considering is dropping the Mangler to a Flechette Cannon so I can Ion a ship and then follow up with a Flechette volley so that ship will remain stressed after its Ion move.

However, my biggest gripe and what I feel to be the bane of Aggressors in general, is being PS6. VI puts them at PS8, but things don't really matter in the PS bid unless you can hit PS9-11. Getting blown up by Han or Whisper before getting that chance to shoot back while they have 1 or 2 hull left drives me crazy. But still, these things are insanely fun nonetheless.

I'm sill surprised at the number of people building double agressors identically, If you build each agressor according to it's strength - when you lose one, the other one doesn't find itself in a worse situation - For example...

FCS + Mangler on IG-88 B and Adv S + Predator + HLC on IG-88 C - If C dies, B is getting re-rolls at all ranges with the FCSness kicking in to pickup the action loss from C, where as if B dies, C still has a highly accurate gun and crazy positioning options for the pre-maneuver boost - helping to keep that HLC at range 2-3...

Non-Identical builds also tend to make the opponent target one agressor more than the other for which one they want to fight last, vs which ability they'd like to get rid of first (which is often B in my experience, but not always) - now, you can bait and run with whichever they make a priority a bit more easily - and that decision becomes harder for them as having different loadouts can be more difficult to valuate than the same loadout with a different skill.

They share their strengths, so it makes sense to build them similar.

So does anyone bother running Ion Cannons on their Aggressors? I've found them to be, in my opinion, THE BEST Ion Cannon platforms in the game. B + D paired with Predator and Advanced Sensors is insanely wicked to fly with Ion Cannons and Manglers. You can easily pick on Corran Horn or Soontir Fel and just keep Ioning them to death or off the board. It's also nice Ioning two out of the six ships formation flying in a swarm or Ioning Biggs restricting the rest of the flight for you to do the Crazy Ivan (Hard Sloop) and gun them down at range 1, or continue to troll them and Ion them.

My usual setup is Ion + Mangler instead of HLC altogether because I really like having the option to Ion or Crit. It puts pressure on your opponents whether or not they want to be Ioned or Critted. One thing I've actually been considering is dropping the Mangler to a Flechette Cannon so I can Ion a ship and then follow up with a Flechette volley so that ship will remain stressed after its Ion move.

However, my biggest gripe and what I feel to be the bane of Aggressors in general, is being PS6. VI puts them at PS8, but things don't really matter in the PS bid unless you can hit PS9-11. Getting blown up by Han or Whisper before getting that chance to shoot back while they have 1 or 2 hull left drives me crazy. But still, these things are insanely fun nonetheless.

I think Ion Cannons are great on Aggressors. My biggest problem is that you're usually ionizing small ships and you can't really trail behind them like you can with a Y-wing or B-wing because you'll overlap. S-loop helps, especially with D. You can also set up with one IG and attack the ionized ship with the other IG.

There have been many times where I only got one hit through, so you might as well get the ion effect with it!

So does anyone bother running Ion Cannons on their Aggressors? I've found them to be, in my opinion, THE BEST Ion Cannon platforms in the game. B + D paired with Predator and Advanced Sensors is insanely wicked to fly with Ion Cannons and Manglers. You can easily pick on Corran Horn or Soontir Fel and just keep Ioning them to death or off the board. It's also nice Ioning two out of the six ships formation flying in a swarm or Ioning Biggs restricting the rest of the flight for you to do the Crazy Ivan (Hard Sloop) and gun them down at range 1, or continue to troll them and Ion them.

My usual setup is Ion + Mangler instead of HLC altogether because I really like having the option to Ion or Crit. It puts pressure on your opponents whether or not they want to be Ioned or Critted. One thing I've actually been considering is dropping the Mangler to a Flechette Cannon so I can Ion a ship and then follow up with a Flechette volley so that ship will remain stressed after its Ion move.

However, my biggest gripe and what I feel to be the bane of Aggressors in general, is being PS6. VI puts them at PS8, but things don't really matter in the PS bid unless you can hit PS9-11. Getting blown up by Han or Whisper before getting that chance to shoot back while they have 1 or 2 hull left drives me crazy. But still, these things are insanely fun nonetheless.

I wouldn't bother with flechette cannon. Its usefulness is far too situational. For example, if facing a large-base ship, you need both ships to use ion in order to get the ion effect, so no chance to use flechette. Against enemies that have PtL, your flechettes are deadweight. Against b-wings/y-wings, ion is usually enough and you want the second ship hitting hard to take it out. If you have too much control in your list, your damage output suffers, and you need to destroy ships to win. Having only 2 ships already hampers damage output as is (compared to other lists using more ships).

I'm sill surprised at the number of people building double agressors identically, If you build each agressor according to it's strength - when you lose one, the other one doesn't find itself in a worse situation - For example...

FCS + Mangler on IG-88 B and Adv S + Predator + HLC on IG-88 C - If C dies, B is getting re-rolls at all ranges with the FCSness kicking in to pickup the action loss from C, where as if B dies, C still has a highly accurate gun and crazy positioning options for the pre-maneuver boost - helping to keep that HLC at range 2-3...

Non-Identical builds also tend to make the opponent target one agressor more than the other for which one they want to fight last, vs which ability they'd like to get rid of first (which is often B in my experience, but not always) - now, you can bait and run with whichever they make a priority a bit more easily - and that decision becomes harder for them as having different loadouts can be more difficult to valuate than the same loadout with a different skill.

You make a good point, but I think a lot of people are trying to play in a way that keeps both Aggressors alive. The reasoning seems to be that if one dies, you will lose the game. I have tried having two different loadouts, and I think both approaches can work.

Just played with IG-2000. Some thoughts:

* Stress is a big problem with IG-2000. I had Push the Limit on both and rarely got to use them.

* Because stress is such a big problem, FCS was actually quite useful especially when paired with IG-88B. On many turns, Advanced Sensors would not have been used because of stress.

* The lack of a turret really limits the IG-2000, especially since I was up against TIE Phantom + 2x Squints with AT. Because of that, Hot Shot Blaster is very important, but it is single use only.

Any advice?

There are many ways to build out dual IG-88's. You do not need Advanced Sensors, Push the Limit, or Predator.

You must unlearn what you have learned.

I'll be a tease and let my squad details stay a secret (unless you have played/watched me on vassal!) until NOVA Squadron episode #20 airs in a few days....