Darth Vader - Pilot Skill 9 - TIE Advanced (29)

Ion Pulse Missiles (3)

Squad Leader (2)

Engine Upgrade (4)

Rear Admiral Chiraneau - Pilot Skill 8 - VT-49 Decimator (46)

Expose (4)

Gunner (5)

Mercenary Copilot (2)

Tactician (2)

Dauntless (2)

Tactical Jammer (1)

This is a build I've been looking at making for a while. I think that Vader with Squad Leader can be a really awesome support if played right, because he can hand out free actions and has good enough mobility to stay behind Chiraneau and get that extra evade die. The idea is to keep Chiraneau Exposed cuz the Decimator doesn't have an evade die to begin with, so why not get an extra attack for free? While he is Exposed, Vader sits behind him, preferably at about range 2 so that he can give him 1 or 2 free actions every turn, Like Focus and Target Lock, to put that Expose to good use.

What do you all think?

It's interesting, but you're basically committing to putting all your red dice eggs in a single three (well, four with Expose) attack, zero agility basket, especially if the plan will be to keep Vader behind the Decimator. A swarm will probably eat you alive here. Or dual IGs which can stay at a distance from RAC and just plink away with HLCs or Manglers.

And you can only use Squad Leader once per turn, even with Vader (no "double" actions).

You seem set up to try and protect Vader, but he's not the one you want to protect here; it's Chiraneau. Even with 16 total health, a Decimator can melt fast if they get focus fired on, and while he'll be doing some solid damage, it's not enough to guarantee you'll be taking targets off the board quickly enough. Heck, you should just drop Expose and spend those points on an Engine Upgrade for Chiraneau. Expose is almost never worth its high cost, but an Engine Upgrade is golden on a Decimator. That would give you two mobile ships, while allowing Chiraneau to boost out of arcs and then still grab a TL.

I'd also drop, say, the Tactical Jammer and Mercenary Copilot for a Rebel Captive to punish the enemy for shooting at Chiraneau.

Just briefly messing around in Squad Builder, I'd go with something more like this:

Vader:

Squad Leader

Homing Missile

Engine Upgrade

Chiraneau:

Engine Upgrade

Tactician

Rebel Captive

Gunner

Still not really my personal tastes, but you make yourself harder to pin down, Vader's double action will allow him to do at least one solid damaging shot with that Homing Missile, and the various crewmembers of the Decimator will pass out a healthy amount of stress. Even then, that Tactician is dodgy... you have to get them in range two of your primary firing arc for it to work. If it does, cool, you can use Gunner to possibly cause double stress. But that's much easier said than done.

Use Vader and Gunner and I believe you have enough fire power to deal with most things.

update: I played 3 games with this build today with friends. I kept the exact build and went 2 wins and 1 loss today.

Game 1 - Dual IG's - Win - It was a close game, but my Decimator stayed within range 1 of both IG's most of the game. I can see them being a problem if im not careful. The IG's had ion cannons and mangler cannons and they kept Vader ionized and made pretty quick work of him, but while IG-B was focusing Vader, the Admiral was focusing IG-B. Once IG-B was gone, the game got a lot easier.

Game 2 - Keyan Farlander and Dash - Loss - Not a close game at all. I used debris for obstacles and he used a few too. My Decimator got stuck on debris for 3 turns and the stress didn't allow him to use expose. Without expose, this build is really weak.

Game 3 - Keyan Farlander and Dash - Win - Stayed far away from debris. Kept up expose and Vader stayed close enough to keep dumping focus on the Decimator.

Im still afraid of the swarm, but with expose, I think that I can wreck at least one ship per turn.

I'd be really concerned about the lists that eat decimators, like any build with rexler brath, or more likely dual hlc. If someone focuses down the decimator Vader is going to have an incredibly rough time I think.

What do you all think?

I'm not a fan of spending points on sub-par support pieces (Squad Leader) to make up for the deficiencies of terrible upgrades (Expose). Having Vader sit in the back is a lot of wasted potential, especially for a two ship list.

What do you all think?

I'm not a fan of spending points on sub-par support pieces (Squad Leader) to make up for the deficiencies of terrible upgrades (Expose). Having Vader sit in the back is a lot of wasted potential, especially for a two ship list.

Vader does attack, but his place in this build is a support. That is all he can really do with 2 attack. I could chance the missile slot, but hed still be pretty much a one trick pony on offense. Squad Leader on anyone but Vader can be pretty trivial, but I think that expose works well on the decimator. That is purely opinion though. The only threat that Im worried about are the swarm builds with more than 4 ships. Every scenario I think of with swarms ends in me losing, so I am hoping and praying that the next tournament just doesnt have any swarm builds. Or Maybe Ill just use my Dual IGs.