The thought occurred to me while at my lunch break.

Given the increased role squadrons will play, especially now that 300 points is official at tournaments, will squadron heavy lists want to be first player most of the time?

There is a delicate dance that is done with inching up squadrons just outside of your opponents' "pouncing range". Some of that can be mitigated by being the first player. On turn 2 you can engage an unwise opponent, or a smarter one by turn 3. Of course Squadron commands are important to this.

So thoughts? Do you feel it is more important to be able to dictate the pace of the snubfighter game as opposed to the objective that will be used?

If your strategy revolves around squadrons, absolutely! Initiative is half the battle when it comes to squadrons. In fact I've found, as rebels, I'd rather have initiative than objective choice, for both squadron movement and since I usually have more caps than the imps, I can choose my activations in a way to better avoid those big guns.

For imperials, I can go either way about initiative, its great, but the wrong objective can lose you the game in a hurry.

Also deploying/counter-deploying will affect the first player as well.

Kinda like a mini-game

By that token, JJ, do you tend to still try to under-bid to nail 1st player, or bank on the fact that the opponent will gladly "force" you into that role?

If your strategy revolves around squadrons, absolutely! Initiative is have the battle when it comes to squadrons. In fact I've found, as rebels, I'd rather have initiative than objective choice, for both squadron movement and since I usually have more caps than the imps, I can choose my activations in a way to better avoid those big guns.

For imperials, I can go either way about initiative, its great, but the wrong objective can lose you the game in a hurry.

Even in a fighter heavy list player 2 can still be a working strategy. I think it is tougher because you may not have full control over when the fight happens, but you can dictate where it happens. As an Imperial player using max squadrons, I have been intentionally picking player 2 just to get used to how that side of the coin will be.

My first game cost me 7 of 10 fighter flights in two turns vs only a single X-wing flight down. My opponent only had 4 flights. I misjudged my distance and I paid for it as my opponent had the squadron commands 2 turns in a row and activated before me. So 1 pt for first player. Several games later with the same fleets however yielded different results. The objective in several cases worked to my advantage. Superior positions had my opponent spreading his limited squadrons thin for a chance at the back shots. My numbers made short work of him this time.

Either case I think smart play will be the key regardless of player #.

If your strategy revolves around squadrons, absolutely! Initiative is have the battle when it comes to squadrons. In fact I've found, as rebels, I'd rather have initiative than objective choice, for both squadron movement and since I usually have more caps than the imps, I can choose my activations in a way to better avoid those big guns.

For imperials, I can go either way about initiative, its great, but the wrong objective can lose you the game in a hurry.

Being a Rebel myself, I totally agree. I want to be able to jump my little ship into range after those huge Star Destroyers have moved, blast away, and then jump back out of range before he can shoot me.

swissjak, to answer your question, I have a very limited play group, so I haven't had a large experience in the bidding war. If I was going squadron heavy, yes I think I would under bid just to be safe. I'd need more experience to see if my opponents would willingly give me initiative.

Hopefully with wave 1 just days away for me, I'll have a chance to play more games that have better variation in fleet builds and tactics!

Not having initiative could be mitigated by having more ships. Activate your ships not in danger of combat and trying to flank, while your other ships wait for your opponent to move CLOSER

Yes Kinnision, but then next round your opponent gets first shot on your now closer ships, where if you have initiative you can move in as a final activation, then move away the next turn without the enemy getting a shot. I've done this with a neb-b before. I took long range from the front of a vic, I then did mine and shot at long range while moving to close. Next round I got a close range shot off and them moved past the vic to its rear. If not for initiative that would be one dead neb-b, especially since Advanced Gunnery was the objective.

Squadrons are still capped to only a third of the points though, so thats 2/3rds of the 300 points that has to be non-squadrons.

It really depends on the build, with the core set we saw how devestating it was to the Rebels to have to play an Imperial strong objective, far worse than not having initiative, so we will have to see how that pans out now there are more options to go toe to toe with Victory's - (Im looking at you Assault Frigate)

Yes and no. It is important because it makes things a bit easier moving second, but if you are flying a three ship squad heavy list you can still be very effective. Chances are you are using a Neb B and an assault frigate as your squadron movers, so on your first move you move the Corvette or your third ship first. Given this may not be ideal in the sense that you know where everything is at, bu the imperial player must move something. Even if they don't move the right ships, You can not spend you squad dial, and wait until ship three gets to go and just move most of your squad. There are ways around it, it obviously easier to move second, but I think you'll still be okay.

The choice for first/second on is more important for which faction you play right now than your list build.

I really feel that the Rebels want to force the scenarios and build for the 300pts and let the imperials take the initiative.

It works really well because right now, Imperials love going first. they get the bigger attacks so getting to go first increases their odds of lighting up an enemy ship before things can move out of the way.

Rebels combat this by moving as best as they can and not giving up those crazy shots.

The use of squadron commands, now combined with flight controllers means that even as second player, if you are squadron heavy you will be getting the alpha. If you are building with emphasis on squadrons and then just letting the squadron phase activate them, i think its a mistake. it may be too early to tell but even if you use the command to shoot and scoot, its better than just attack and sit in place, especially if you are taking 100pts of fighters.