Hello!

So, I decided to have my first post here, because I have very recently joined the great community of X-Wing players and I somewhat hit the wall..!

I wanted to mainly play Empire, so that was my biggest focus with the miniatures and, well, impulsive buying combined with disposable income gets you a bunch of various toys to play with! But there's a but - when I asked around, I was told that a Defender and Phantom are necessary purchase, along with the imperial aces box and.. tah-dah! They're all sold out in Poland!

So I heard the only reasonable build I can go for is academy TIE Fighter spam, which doesn't really float my goat if I may be honest, but I don't have Defenders nor Phantoms for the phantom + Decimator build, so I'd love to hear any suggestions on how to make a reasonable beginner-friendly squadron out of the stuff I already have for the Empire:

1x Decimator

1x Interceptor

1x TIE Advanced

2x TIE Fighter

1x Lambda Shuttle

I know it ain't much and that the Advanced isn't the most popular ship in the game, but I had to have it because Vader. The thing is - it doesn't have to be some kind of an ultra-competitive, tournament-winning list - it can be just something nice that's good to learn flying with so I could use it to play and eventually teach others. Of course you can suggest any additional purchases, I'll just have to check if they're even available here.

For rebels it's much better for me, because as far as I know no unit is sold out here. Here's my little collection:

1x Millennium Falcon

1x B-Wing from rebel aces

1x A-Wing from rebel aces

2x X-Wing (one from the starter set, one bought separately)

I heard that Falcon + 2 X-Wings makes a nice list and that 4x X-wing is a good beginner-friendly list, but I'd also love to hear feedback from others, maybe with some less typical lists that include other ships that could be still pretty playable while not copy-pasting championship meta.

At last but not least - Scum and Villainy! I must admit, I don't have any ships for that faction yet, so it's all clean slate for me - I like most of the ships there, especially Z-95s and StarVipers, I like the idea of both fielding a Firespray + some escorts OR having a fighter-centered list, I'm really open to suggestions what would make a fine noob-friendly list. Of course it should be as competitive as possible while still easy to get to learn the game, but it's all about introducing friends to it and figuring it out myself as a new player!

Now, ill start by saying that this probably isnt an AMAZING list, as Im fairly new to the game myself, but I expect it will be pretty beginner friendly. I went with the Falcon +2 Xwings you mentioned since you dont have the 4 Xwings on the Rebel side since their ships tend to be more forgiving for a new player. You make a mistake and take a crit to a TIE (or crash into an asteroid), it could be gone. Do it with an X-wing and your pilot just curses about missing shields.

http://geordanr.github.io/xwing/?f=Rebel%20Alliance&d=v3!s!1:-1,3:-1:-1:;3:-1,6:-1:-1:;34:-1,-1,-1,-1:2:6:

Theres not a lot of abilities for a beginner to get lost on, and therefore keeps it kinda simple. You fly the three ships fairly close so that after Garven shoots (or gets shot at) and you spend a focus, you can send it to either the other X-wing or the Falcon, and after he does a green move he can regain a shield with R2 if he got shot at. Your other X-wing is just a generic Red Squad Pilot that gets a chance to keep a Target Lock after he uses it. The Falcon gets to be a little beefier with another Hull point, and has good survive-ability with Chewie at the helm to negate Critical Hits on the hull and the possibility of the Evade token if you choose to use that Action.

its 99 points, so you might get initiative, or you could spend that last point on the Falcon somewhere; Switch out the Hull for a Shield Upgrade, toss a 1 point Crew on it like Nien Numb to give the Falcon two extra Green moves, or go for a 1 point Elite upgrade like Draw their Fire to pull more hits from the X-wings (which goes nicely with Chewie and a Hull/Shield upgrade)

I expect that the more seasoned veterans will have more to say and better lists, but there you go. A list with 3 ships that dont have too many skills to get lost on, and that has increased toughness to keep you in the game longer.

Oh, cheers for the exhaustive answer, mate! I really appreciate it!

I really like the sound of that list - seems to be simple enough to learn and still has some mechanics to practice, along with various pilot skill levels, letting me learn/teach friends how to take advantage of that!

I'll probably stock up on X-wings just to have the ability to field 4 so I could field a fighter-based list without a bigger model like the Falcon too, which should make for a nice way to alternate between them to not get weary.


Now I need to figure out a list for the Empire and Scum to play with those rebel squads.

Start with:

Patrol Leader w/ Darth Vader crew & rebel captive = 46 pts

2 academy pilot TIE fighters = 24 pts

Leaves you with 30 points to play with.

Personally, I would add Soontir Fel with Push the Limit, but I'm not sure you have push given your collection. Also, Soontir is not really beginner friendly. If you like interceptors, an easier one to fly is Turr Phennir with Veteran Instincts and a Shield Upgrade, but again, I'm not sure you have those cards (its hard for me to remember what upgrades come in each expansion).

You could run a shuttle, but I don't think you have any good cards for it, and it might not be the best pairing to go along with a decimator...

Scum built. Won rebel squad without loosing any ship, so I am quite impressed with this build.

Kath Scarlet(Firespray-31)

-Opportunist

-Greedo

Palob Godalhin(HWK-290)

-Opportunist

-Blaster Turret

-Outlaw Tech

Kaa'to Leeachos(Z-95)

Binayre Pirate(Z-96)

Woot! More replies! Thanks, guys!

Start with:

Patrol Leader w/ Darth Vader crew & rebel captive = 46 pts

2 academy pilot TIE fighters = 24 pts

Leaves you with 30 points to play with.

Personally, I would add Soontir Fel with Push the Limit, but I'm not sure you have push given your collection. Also, Soontir is not really beginner friendly. If you like interceptors, an easier one to fly is Turr Phennir with Veteran Instincts and a Shield Upgrade, but again, I'm not sure you have those cards (its hard for me to remember what upgrades come in each expansion).

Cheers for the help - while I don't have PTL (will try to get it as soon as possible), I can actually field Turr with those upgrades thanks to the Millennium Falcon box so I will try it out tomorrow!

As for shuttle, I heard it's not too noob-friendly, so I guess I'll try making a proper list centered around it when I get better with the game. :]

Scum built. Won rebel squad without loosing any ship, so I am quite impressed with this build.



Kath Scarlet(Firespray-31)



-Opportunist

-Greedo



Palob Godalhin(HWK-290)



-Opportunist

-Blaster Turret

-Outlaw Tech



Kaa'to Leeachos(Z-95)



Binayre Pirate(Z-96)

Thanks for the reply, mate! I must admit - I simply love this list - all of those ships are really cool, so I'll love to fly it, although there's one issue - opportunist is only included in Imperial Aces box which I can't even obtain. I can proxy it in some matches with friends, but I'd rather play with stuff I can get.

Here's a variation on blade_mercurial's suggestion that shouldn't require buying anything new:

Rear Admiral Chiraneau (46)
Rebel Captive (3)
Intelligence Agent (1)

Turr Phennir (25)
Veteran Instincts (1)

Academy Pilot (12)

Academy Pilot (12)

Total: 100

View in Yet Another Squad Builder

Chiraneau's ability is pretty strong, and makes him more forgiving - even if you lose your action, you still have his ability to improve your attack. Decimators have trouble turning around, so try not to fly him directly at the enemies. Try to keep circling around them instead. Rebel Captive punishes your opponent for attacking the Decimator, and makes their highest skill pilot easier to predict next turn, making them easier to pounce on with your other ships. Intelligence Agent I'll get to in a minute.

Turr Phennir is definitely the best Interceptor pilot if you don't have Push the Limit. Try to approach on the periphery - ideally, he'll get to shoot first, then boost or barrel roll out of the enemies' arcs before they can return fire.

The Academy Pilots round out the firepower of the squad, but they also serve an important role as blockers. This is where the Decimator's Intelligence Agent comes in. Blocking is an important skill to learn, and the Agent helps to know when to barrel roll and when to stay where your maneuver landed you.

That's my suggestion. It's not super competitive, but it should be reasonably effective, and give you a feel for the strengths and weaknesses of those three ships.

Here is one more built that I have played with good succes.

Emon Azzameen(Firespray-31)

-Recon Specialist

-Andrasta

-Proximity Mine x3

N'Dru Suhlak(Z-95)

-Lone Wolf

-Cluster Missiles

Dace Bonearm(HWK-290)

-Ion Cannon Turret

-Greedo

Total of 100 points.

Last time I played against Rebels with this set, I didin't loose any ships and hardly took any damage either. But this is also pretty fragile built with only three ships, but those mines really gets your opponent very paranoid, if you are familiar with Emon Azzameen's special pilot ability! Not to mention Dace Bonearms special pilot ability with the Ion Cannon Turret

I have played a game today - I bought a Firespray, HWK and the Most Wanted box, so I could field those kinds of lists and, boy, it was fantastic!

My friend ran a little modified version of that Kath + Palob + Kaa'to + pirate, but given the fact that we didn't have opportunist, we added hastily Moldy Crow to the HWK and it seemed to work great with Kaa'to's special skill as he could always reliably leech it. I know, we should've added another upgrade to even the points out, but it was all so chaotic we just went with that.

I ran the Chiraneau + Turr and 2 academy TIEs in this game, next time I'll try the rebel list against those Scums but, I must admit - my first game of X-Wing was fantastic - the rules are perfectly clear, there's very few of them and they're extremely intuitive, the cards really change -a lot- and it all feel very fast and it's action-packed, especially that we slapped a lot of debris/asteroid tokens to spice things up - it was great.

For the first time in years we had lots and lots of actual fun and the game felt really.. up close - we actually felt involved in what was happening and last time we had a game like that was with the reboot of Hobbit when one dwarf held back a bunch of orcs in a tight spot. It's one of the games where you're not just moving random pieces of plastic around the table but you really feel involved in it - thrice did Kath try to down one of the TIEs in range 1 and thrice has the TIE managed to roll 3 evades, making him the MVP of the match. In the end due to some silly moves and various circumstances the Firespray and Decimator were the only ships left and they had a cool duel, from which Chiraneau emerged victorious at 3 hull points left and it really felt like hard-won victory.

Of course it was first game of X-Wing for both of us, so we probably did lots of things wrong tactics-wise, but we'll get there with practice. Once again cheers for the help with the lists, of course feel free to drop more ideas in here, both I, my friends and most likely others who visit these forums will find it helpful.

The best thing is that there was no clear winner in our game until the very end when Kath ended up with one hull point in Chiraneau's 1 range zone, although if I missed I'd probably be in just as dire situation. I have played quite a few tabletop wargames and very few gave me so much joy, I'm glad I decided to pick it up!

P.s. - cheers for the list, Zazaa - it really looks interesting, I will have to try it out at some point because of all the mines - that must make for unique gameplay.