Kavil + Veteran Instincts + Autoblaster Turret + Unhinged Astromech + Engine Upgrade is a lot of fun.

You gave me a thought:

Kavil + Expose + Autoblaster turret + Unhinged + Experimental Interface.

You get 4 autoblaster dice plus a focus or TL from your first action. You would only use it if you aren't in danger of getting ripped apart that round, but the 1 defense die is nigh useless anyway. Alternatively, take Expert Handling for better positioning + survivability. Unhinged droid still helps drop the stress.

You might be missing some information. Expose only increase the primary weapon firepower. The only thing that increases autoblaster is Kavil for out of arc shots.

We cleared this up like 2 posts after mine.

I've found ABTs useful a defensive measure for HWK -290s when I don't have the points to take an ICT, or have a better option for that 3pt difference.

Both Jan and Roark's ability are R3 allowing you to keep your distance while the pilots they buff are the larger threat since Jan or Roark are beyond range.

Sure BTs and ICTs are better tools but ABTs have the benefit of cost and doesn't necessarily need dice modification to be effective; a hit is a hit.

This allows Jan to take Nein Numb as crew to help deal with stresses or Kyle (crew) for extra Focus through Greens on the defensive, and possibly Decoy to dish out PS8 to a nearby Pilot or Squad Leader .

In Roark's case you can run him with Jan (crew) or even no Crew.

ABT allows you to fly defensively and use actions defensively. It does make the HWK an easier target being unable to attack outside R1 but if they're focusing shots on the HWK they're ignoring your Beaters. Which hopefully leads to you out positioning you opponent.

Autoblasters could do with being a point (possibly two) cheaper, but the turret is solid as-is: it projects an R1 bubble-of-death for ships that rely on agility, and has a decent chance of putting a damage or two on any ship that gets too close to you. If I were to make a change (aside from the aforementioned price decrease for the cannon), I would probably add in an HLC-style 'crits become hits' effect in addition to the existing rules for both.

Really, though, the Autoblaster turret is a pretty good buy for only two points. Sure, it might not do much on its own, but two! points! Take a few ships with them, and all of a sudden you go from 2 dice that they can't dodge to 4 or 6 dice they can't dodge. Useful against every ship, and it gives you the option to spread out your turrets and play an area-denial game against TIEs and the like.

Another option that may be useful after the next wave comes out is to run a Y-Wing or two with torpedoes, extra torpedoes, and an Autoblaster turret - two torpedo volleys for attacking hard targets out the front, and an Autoblaster turret for viability against high-agility targets. Wouldn't be too expensive, would be reasonably effective against a lot of targets, and could be done with either Rebels or Scum.

The problem i have with the turret is that only ships with pretty weak base stats (Y-Wing, HWK) can take them. So yes you create a bubble at range 1 but thats all you do for at least 18-20 points. So IF anything gets to range 1 it will propably take 1 100% hit maybe 2 if you are lucky but you pay 20 points for that and get some HP flying around on top of it. If there was an attack 3 Ship where i could put the turret on as an alternative weapon, i would gladly buy it for 2 points.

The other problem is that the HWK maneuver dial is a bad joke, sadly its very hard for FFG to do anything about it. Only with a title or crew that would work similar to what Juno Ecplises new skill does or that adds a Korrigan Turn to it.

the problem I have with the turret is that range 1 is roughly the same distance as a small ship barrel roll

makes me wish auto-blaster turret had a provision for shooting base-to-base targets

Also if you put them on cheap ships they have a low pilot rating and its actually not very easy to even get into range 1.

Autoblaster (the cannon) is solid on Dash with VI, Navigator, and the outrider title. At PS9 with two different ways to alter his final position there are not many ships that can stay away from Dash when he wants to snuggle up close to you.