Hello all,
On Sunday I got a chance to attend my local store championship (Black Moon Games in Lebanon New Hampshire). It was my first tournament since Wave 5 was released, let alone Scum and Villainy, so I wasn’t sure what to expect.
The squadron that I took was the result of pretty extensive playtesting. I love Dash, and I find Super Dash to be particularly fun… but limiting. I was finding myself routinely beaten by foes with 8+ pilot skill and post maneuver options. Whisper, Soontir, Turr with Vet Instincts and Han with EU were all giving me major headaches in regards to the heavy laser cannon's “donut hole”. I played against Echo once and found that Super Dash was basically insta-lose in this matchup (at least for me)
I basically saw two ways out. The first option would be to go the mangler cannon route and eliminate the donut hole entirely. I rejected this option after experiencing the pretty significant damage dropoff that is going from 4 attack to 3. Particularly in the era of autothrusters, I simply need more damage.
So I settled on taking the other option instead. That would be Vet Instincts. Giving me the PS to compete against the big boys was key and early playtesting showed it made a huge difference in my matchups against these ships. This presented another problem though because it meant that I had to ditch PTL. One of the things I liked about super dash was his action economy, so I wanted to recreate that somehow. After some hemming and hawing, I came up with the following list, which I have affectionately termed “The Cool Side of the Donut”, which sacrifices some of the movement of Super Dash for higher PS and some Lando Tankiness.
Dash Rendar
Veteran Instincts, Heavy Laser Cannon, Lando Calrissian, Outrider, Experimental Interface.
3x Prototype Pilot
Chardaan Refit
100 Points
All told we had 13 players there the day of the tournament, which is pretty good considering that we had received a generous helping of snow the night before. Scum were heavily represented, making up nearly half of the competitors. Two ship builds of all varieties abounded as well, making up seven out of the thirteen lists.
Round 1 vs Devin
…speaking of which, my first round opponent was running a two ship scum list.
Emon Azzameen
Inertial Dampener, Seismic Charge, Andrasta, Gunner, Proximity Mines, Proximity Mines
Kath Scarlet
Inertial Dampeners, Gunner
94 Points
If his points look odd for a list that doesn’t really need an initiative bid, I can explain. His list initially had autothrusters on both ships as well. As we were reviewing each other’s squadrons I pointed out that this was an illegal upgrade given the requirement of a boost action. He promptly spoke with the TO and removed them from the list. I’m 100% positive that it was a harmless mistake and in no way intentional. He’s a relatively new player, and I know firsthand how hard it is to keep all the card interactions straight. I encouraged him to approach the TO about picking up the Slave 1 title on Kath and a proton torpedo (a simple four point upgrade) but he insisted that he needed to live with the mistake.
On to the game.
We built a nice wall of asteroids across the middle of the table. I positioned my protos roughly in the middle . He responded by putting his two firsesprays coming down one of the corners. I put Dash in the other corner.
As Dash moved into position, my A-Wings sped towards the center of the board and entered the asteroid field. He turned in to engage them and quickly destroyed one of them with Emon’s Bomb and another with Kath’s potent booty-cannon. However, in the middle of this engagement Dash entered the fray and started burning Emon down. He jetted both firesprays quickly out of combat in different directions, Emon towards the corner where dash had started, and Kath towards my board edge. I opted to pursue the wounded Emon and finished him off with a combination of Dash magic and a lucky long range A-Wing shot from the last surviving proto.
The following turn he revealed 1 bank for Kath, who was already in my deployment area, TOWARDS the board edge. He looked up after performing the maneuver and said “I think she’s going off the board next turn”. I looked down and saw that he was right. He could have burned his intertial dampners, but it would have only delayed the inevitable. We went one more turn and he tried a hard turn away from the board edge and found that, as predicted, it was not enough to keep Kath on the board.
Victory 94 – 30
Devin mentioned afterwards that he was unused to flying the large ships and the speed snuck up on him. I replied that there probably isn’t a player in existence who hasn’t flown a big ship off the board. I know I have, several times. Emon with bombs on the other hand is terrifying. Getting a proximity mine dropped right on your head one turn and then a seismic the next will make anyone give him a wide berth. I will need to be more cautious in the future.
Round 2 vs Chris:
Chris is a veteran gamer from our league. He normally runs rebel control builds, but for the store champs, he had brought the following terrifying scum list:
5x Cartel Spacer
Heavy Scyk Fighter, Mangler Cannon
100 Points
Only 15 HP throughout the squad, but a truly horrific amount of firepower that is able to hurt from any range. I resolved to use my plan from the previous game (engage with the Protos while Dash gets around behind them), reasoning that it would be even more effective against ships without a rear arc.
The TO had mentioned that we were allowed to use debris fields, so I decided to place my three obstacles as debris fields (the largest possible). The obstacle field ended up looking a little bit like last time with two clumps forming a diagonal wall across the table. He deployed in one corner. I put Dash in another and the protos in the middle.
The initial engagement went well, as my Protos feinted following dash before turning back into face the wall of mangler cannons. With focus, my A-wings proved relatively hardy to the cannons and only took a shield or two on the first volley. Dash meanwhile had snuck up on the flank of the space formation and one-shotted one of the trailing ships.
The following turn, I made what I consider to be the first of my mistakes of the game. Thinking he’d either 3K or slow roll forward, I moved my protos around in a wide bank to try and block him. To my horror he had 4ked instead, meaning that his entire formation of spacers were now behind A-Wings and Dash was very far out of position.
He blasted two of the A-wings this turn and proceeded to swarm quickly up the board, punshing Dash as they went. I found that even with Lando I was suffering damage. I realized how much it hurts losing that extra evade die at range three (something I should have anticpated, given it is a staple of how Dash hurts people).
Then I made the second of my mistakes. I waited a turn too long to try and get Dash away from the oncoming spacers and ending up boxing myself into a corner where my movements became predictable. I was hoping to take out another and reduce the incoming fire, but the agility of the spacers is pretty impressive and I only got one down to one hull. The following turn he was able to successfully block my turn movement from Dash with his swarm, meaning another round of punishing firepower taking Dash down to 1 hull. The last A-wing did eliminate the wounded Spacer this turn, but I was in a dire straights. The following turn, my movement FINALLY cleared the spacers and I was able to get Dash free. Too little, too late as the spacers simply 3 k-turned and destroyed Dash at range 3.
This left a single A-wing against 3 spacers (one of whom was down to one hull thanks to Dash’s last round of fire). The lone prototype pilot put up a valiant effort, flying and fighting for probably 20 minutes after Dash had died, drawing the Spacers into the asteroid field where the wounded one died and another one lost its mangler cannon to a debris field critical hit. But as time was called my evade dice finally abandoned me and the prototype lost its last hull to the final mangler-equipped Scyk.
Loss 60-100
Chris played brilliantly, using classic swarm-style tactics to block and corral dash and to concentrate firepower. I meanwhile, bumbled around with Dash in the mid-game, leading me to lose him far quicker than I should have. I somewhat redeemed myself with my fancy A-Wing flying in the late game, but it was too little too late. It was disappointing to lose, but it was one of the best games I’ve played in a very long time. In case you were wondering how nasty mangler cannons truly are, I can tell you that out of the 11 hull in my entire list (which I lost all of), I had EIGHT faceup damage cards at the end of the game. That’s right, EIGHT crits.
Round 3 vs Kevin:
Kevin was the champion of our store league last year. But this year he seemed to be having something of a matchup problem against me. My Dash squadrons in particular seem to give him fits. This time, however he was not running his usual Empire squadrons but instead a dual falcon list, albeit an unconventional one:
Outer Rim Smuggler + R2-D2 + Luke Skywalker + Millennium Falcon + Engine Upgrade
Chewbacca + Push the Limit + Engine Upgrade + C-3PO + Gunner
100 Points
Kevin did not oblige me like my last two opponents had with asteroids and instead stuck his asteroids in the corners. I was able to build a central debris cloud haven for Dash, but it was nothing like the monstrous wall of space junk that featured in my last two games.
I won initiative and deployed my protos centrally. He responded by putting the ORS in one corner and Chewy in the other. Flummoxed (Dash doesn’t like to jousted, as Kevin knew), I opted to put Dash next to the protos in the center of the board.
The game started with him advancing both YTS down the flanks while my force attempted to thread the needle against them. I tweaked my bearings slightly towards the ORS, but it was actually Chewy that closed first. He unloaded on a prototype at range three through an asteroid. Despite five defense dice with focus, both of the shield and one hull got stripped from the Proto. Congrats little buddy! You just got put on “chewy delay” duty.
Splitting him towards chewy, I was able to delay the wookie for one turn on a bump. Which was a good thing, since I managed to boost one of my other protos into the way of Dash, resulting in a bump. In the following turn, the prototype got gunned down by chewy but the remainder of my force jetted up through the debris field. The ORS landed on an asteroid and took a punishing round of firepower from Dash. Chewbacca and the ORS finally got together, but the Protos were effectively able to block them on several key turns. The Smuggler got aced first while Chewy held on for a few more turns, managing to gun down an A-Wing in the process. Finally though, Dash was able to land a target-locked round of firepower on a blocked Chewy and take his last hull away.
Victory 100-30
In the final analysis it was the Prototypes that really won me this game. Dash is great, but an engine upgraded YT can be a major problem for him. By blocking him (it must have happened at least half a dozen times throughout the game), I was able make sure that he was unable to use that mobility and let Dash escape.
This annoyance factor also caused Kevin to concentrate his firepower almost exclusively on the A-Wings, meaning that Dash came through with minimal damage. Given how well I was able to block with the protos, I’m not sure this was a bad choice on Kevin’s part.
Kevin’s initial deployment threw me for a loop and forced me into the center, but I’m not sure it was the best move for the rest of the game. By separating his forces, he allowed me to pick a side (the ORS) and concentrate on it to the point that when Chewy did arrive, the smuggler was on its last legs.
Round 4 vs Dan
Dan is another local player in the league. I believe I may have been his first opponent ever back in January, with him borrowing some of my ships as he put his fresh-out-of-the-box ships on the board. He’s a great guy and we had a lot of fun joking throughout the match. His list was:
Captain Oicunn
Marksmanship, Gunner, Ysanne Isard, Navigator, Proton Torpedoes, Proton Bombs, Anti-Pursuit Lasers
Avenger Squadron Pilot
Academy Pilot
100 Points
Dan won initiative and his style of asteroid placement is definitely not out of the Paul Heaver playbook. What he does is flip the big rock up in the air and let it drop where it may if its placement is valid (if not he flips again). With this random effect, I was able to build a nice junk field for Dash to play in.
I had protos and Dash in the center with the Avenger and Academy pilots across from them. Oicunn lurked in the top right corner.
The opening rounds were actually surprisingly eventful, with Dan using his intecerptor to land a spectacular range three, through an asteroid shot that stripped the shields from a prototype. Karma was in full effect though as the return fire from the A-Wing dealt a hit and a crit (damaged sensor array) to the interceptor. Don’t trust green dice, folks.
Dash got around the flank and destroyed the academy pilot in a blaze of heavy laser cannons. Meanwhile, Oicunn was tearing through the A-Wings dropping all three with a combination of the bomb (direct hit) and successive ramming maneuvers. Throughout this, Dash was pouring HLC fire into the decimator, meaning that by the time Oicunn turned in to Dash he was low on health (though Isard was active. Soon he only had 3 hull remaining.
At this point I did make a mistake, speeding Dash through his formation and giving the Decimator a front arc shot (as I opted to target lock instead of barrel roll). To make matters worse, Lando decided he was going to take this turn off. My target lock removed two of Dan’s remaining hull, leaving him on one. Dan unleashed his proton torpedoes, doing 2 hits and 2 crits to Dash (who had one shield and 5 hull left). I rolled 2 evades and survived with a direct hit to the hull. The interceptor, critically, whiffed its shot this turn and Dash would live to fight on.
The following turn, I opted to NOT pull stress off of Dash with a green maneuver, instead taking a sweeping three maneuver that brought me out of the interceptors arc and, critically, outside of range one of the decimator. Dan had clearly expected me to pull a green maneuver this turn, and had planned accordingly.
I rolled my unmodified HLC dice, praying to get two or more (because Isard was active) hits in. The dice gods rewarded me and I got exactly two hits and the decimator exploded.
The following turn I cleared stress and blew the interceptor away.
Victory 100-45
Hell of a game. Dan’s Oicunn truly has numerous ways to hurt you. It’s a rare situation in which he’s not able to put out at least a couple damage each turn between ramming, gunner and ordinance. I probably should have stayed away, but as in my game with Chris, my aggressiveness cost me. Instead I got in WAY too close to the decimator and nearly paid the price with a loss.
Tourney Recap
And that was it! The store had decided to do 4 rounds swiss with no cut. It was a little disappointing to realize that the victor was being crowned a couple tables over. I was praying for a tie, but it was not to be. The eventual victor was a Guri/Boba build. You can see all the lists over on list juggler. http://lists.starwarsclubhouse.com/get_tourney_details?tourney_id=286
I ended up taking third overall, with my MOV putting me ahead of Chris, who also finished 3 and 1. I had a great time overall and I am really hoping that this drives turnout to next month’s tourney.
For my own part, I love my list and feel that it legitimately gave me a chance to win the day. The reason that I didn't do so was that I really need to play my “Cool Side of the Donut” Dash differently than Super Dash. It rewards careful movement even more, since by losing the boost you have one less way of escaping arc. I need to control my aggressiveness and learn to take a measured approach instead. I also need to learn when NOT to use experimental interface and leave myself clear of stress for a cool maneuver.
The A-Wings on the other hand were a treat to fly with. They complemented Dash well and are extremely annoying for opponents in a way that Z-95s simply aren’t. Their better dial agility paid off in spades.
Thanks for reading!