Wasn't the point of this topic a way to find ways to beat the turrets without having to change the rules? I mean dear god you will never win if instead of trying to make good builds you try to come up with rule changes. You can control your builds and play style not the rules.

So back on topic I don't think Macar said what the build was he lost too was or maybe he did I can't remember lol. In any case it was Lando w/ gunner, c3p0, luke, title, and engine. Blount with dead eye and ion pulse, Tala with concussion missiles. Eric B is the guy who flew that and I thought he did a great job and came up with a fantastic list.

Before regionals he was talking about his plans to beat fat turrets. Blount was a big part of it. An instant ion is no joke and it changes the way you fly. You now don't want to be facing a rock a the edge. So it changes the way you fly. He'd make people come to him through the field and with lando's ability it makes it easy for Blount to still get the missile off even if he k turned. Once he ioned a big ship he knew where it was going and would send in Blount to block the ship or the boost lanes, send the Tala in to either get a range 1 shot or get the concussion missiles off and have lando just blast it range 1. That's a pretty easy and consistent way to get damage on them.

I like the use of ion pulse missiles in that list and it really help sets up good opportunities to punch damage through. I mean we kill fat turrets by throwing a lot of red dice at all once at them. The hard part is getting all of our guns on target. So you either gotta stress em or ion em and then block the escape routes and or the ship itself and then unload on them. I think some creative use of ion pulse missiles will help good players bring them down.

Wasn't the point of this topic a way to find ways to beat the turrets without having to change the rules? I mean dear god you will never win if instead of trying to make good builds you try to come up with rule changes. You can control your builds and play style not the rules.

Yes, please! Quit coming up with rules changes.

I think it's very clear that really good players are currently more likely to take a turret.

Let's focus on this for a minute. It is very clear that good players are taking fat turrets. These are people who know the game well. They are very competitive. They will go with what wins. Why are so many good players taking fat turrets? If such a large percentage of good players are taking fat turrets, why is that? Surely, it isn't just preference.

One fundamental flaw with stacking C-3PO and R2-D2 crew together, a Hawk with just a primary attack can never kill said ship.

All you can do at that point is stick out your hand and say GG. FFG better not make a 1 primary attack ship again, EVER!

beating turrets without rule changes ... the best I have is to block them or stress them before they can use that engine upgrade to boost out of arc. this definitely makes it tough when you are playing a list that doesn't have a good blockers or doesn't have a stress mechanic.

captain obvious statement: with 2,600 games imported into ladyluck , the overwhelming (and obvious) conclusion from the data is that, generally, the player who rolls more red dice wins. with those big turret ships you have to strive to keep them arc, and focus fire them down until they die. boosting big ships make this very hard, as they can boost out of firing arc/out of range 3, so shutting down that engine upgrade is key.

EDIT: turrets are doing well at regional top cuts, for sure, but not overwhelmingly so; ~24% of top cut lists from the listjuggler data (21 tourneys, 14,617 points spent)

I think it's very clear that really good players are currently more likely to take a turret.

Let's focus on this for a minute. It is very clear that good players are taking fat turrets. These are people who know the game well. They are very competitive. They will go with what wins. Why are so many good players taking fat turrets? If such a large percentage of good players are taking fat turrets, why is that? Surely, it isn't just preference.

At least partially due to people on the internet telling them they have to.

I have to give respect to the top players. They are good players. If they know of an advantage to be gained from doing something non-standard/non-meta, they will take it. I don't think these top players fall for "you have to have x to win" traps. If these guys found a way to win without the same-same, they would take it. I don't buy into that thought.

Even if you are right, though, you admit it's only partially due to people on the internet. What are the other reasons? You have to admit that it's odd how such a large percentage of good players take fat turrets, right?

EDIT: turrets are doing well at regional top cuts, for sure, but not overwhelmingly so; ~20% of top cut lists from the listjuggler data (21 tourneys, 14,617 points spent)

So this is some fascinating data.

If you pare it down to regional elimination round lists only, the ship taken most frequently is: the TIE Fighter, followed by the B-Wing. Not shocking when you think about it, as any list that is running those is likely running more than one. It would only take a couple of TIE swarms to heavily skew the numbers like that anyway.

If we look at things in terms of where the points are going, though, the data is definitely more telling. Nearly 41% of the total points fielded in elimination rounds are tied up in Aggressors, Decimators, YT-2400s, and YT-1300s. Another ~5% is in Firesprays. Aggressors make up the largest chunk of that, nearly 14%, though if you lump the 2 Rebel turrets together as one group they come out on top at just over 15%.

To me, this doesn't show that players prefer turrets. It shows that they prefer point fortresses. Many of those happen to be turrets, but Aggressors and Firesprays certainly aren't and show up at almost a 20% clip.

Something else worth noting is that the most common upgrade card across all builds is Autothrusters, followed closely by Predator, VI, FCS, and PTL.

If we're looking for solutions on how to combat Fat Turrets, what do you guys think about this list?

B-WING: Blue Squadron Pilot (22)

Flechette Cannon (2)

Accuracy Corrector (3)

B-WING: Blue Squadron Pilot (22)

Flechette Cannon (2)

Accuracy Corrector (3)

B-WING: Blue Squadron Pilot (22)

B-Wing/E2 (1)

Intelligence Agent (1)

B-WING: Blue Squadron Pilot (22)

Fly the swarm at a decent spread and fly towards the Fat turret. Acc correctors guarantees 2 hits for the fletchettes, if you can get both shots off, even at R3, you are almost guaranteed to give the ship stress (no extra evade for cannons!)

The turret is now limited to greens to clear the stress, or move without action (no boost/evade/action economy craziness) which will make him more predictable. Spread the fletchette B's to cover the ranges of maneuvers, and get the intelligence agent close. His job will be to be able to see where he's going in future turns.

From my experience, flying turrets against stress builds is pretty annoying/intimidating. So that might be the best route to go. Now I want to play test this...

EDIT: turrets are doing well at regional top cuts, for sure, but not overwhelmingly so; ~20% of top cut lists from the listjuggler data (21 tourneys, 14,617 points spent)

To me, this doesn't show that players prefer turrets. It shows that they prefer point fortresses.

Strongly agree.

If we're looking for solutions on how to combat Fat Turrets, what do you guys think about this list?

B-WING: Blue Squadron Pilot (22)

Flechette Cannon (2)

Accuracy Corrector (3)

B-WING: Blue Squadron Pilot (22)

Flechette Cannon (2)

Accuracy Corrector (3)

B-WING: Blue Squadron Pilot (22)

B-Wing/E2 (1)

Intelligence Agent (1)

B-WING: Blue Squadron Pilot (22)

I would think you would do better to Ionize with ordnance.

If we're looking for solutions on how to combat Fat Turrets, what do you guys think about this list?

B-WING: Blue Squadron Pilot (22)

Flechette Cannon (2)

Accuracy Corrector (3)

B-WING: Blue Squadron Pilot (22)

Flechette Cannon (2)

Accuracy Corrector (3)

B-WING: Blue Squadron Pilot (22)

B-Wing/E2 (1)

Intelligence Agent (1)

B-WING: Blue Squadron Pilot (22)

I would think you would do better to Ionize with ordnance.

I'm always skeptical of using ordinance. Use them once and they're gone. Maybe extra munitions will help alleviate that.

What about swapping the fletchettes for ion cannons and dropping the int agent?

Or a mix? Nothing like stressing and ionizing.

Wasn't the point of this topic a way to find ways to beat the turrets without having to change the rules? I mean dear god you will never win if instead of trying to make good builds you try to come up with rule changes. You can control your builds and play style not the rules.

It is possible to do both: thinking up rule changes doesn't stop anyone from trying to figure out how to counter turrets with the rules and cards that we have. The problem is that countering fat turrets is not a new topic, and the discussion hasn't been particularly productive. They just don't seem to have any weaknesses big enough to exploit. Most of them aren't very action-dependent, so blocking and stress have a limited impact. Ions can be useful, as you point out, but they're still less afraid of getting ionized than any ship with an arc. (On the other hand, landing a fat turret on a rock is going to have a much bigger impact than doing the same to a B-wing or a TIE, so I think IPM's are still worth discussing.) High PS means they can't arc-dodge your ships, but that choice makes it that much harder to bring enough firepower to take them out efficiently.

Basically, much better and smarter players than I have addressed the question of how to beat fat turrets, and it seems that their answer often involves bringing a fat turret of their own.

I think it's very clear that really good players are currently more likely to take a turret.

Let's focus on this for a minute. It is very clear that good players are taking fat turrets. These are people who know the game well. They are very competitive. They will go with what wins. Why are so many good players taking fat turrets? If such a large percentage of good players are taking fat turrets, why is that? Surely, it isn't just preference.

At least partially due to people on the internet telling them they have to.

I'm sure that's part of the reason for plenty of players that take fat turrets. But for the top players? I don't think it's just groupthink in those cases. I also don't think it's necessarily a meta call (i.e. "I'll need a turret to deal with Phantoms/Soontir/IG's"). I think there's two main strategic reasons:

1. They're reliable. On defense, they have enough bulk to survive a turn or two of your opponent rolling hot dice and you rolling awful. When they're attacking, Han and Chiraneau have great abilities to make them more consistent, and plenty of room for upgrades like Predator, Gunner, etc. to ramp up their effectiveness. Nobody wants to get knocked out of the tournament by simple bad luck, and fat turrets give some of the best protection against it.

2. They're flexible with their maneuvering. This is the other side of the "turrets are easier to fly" coin. With any ship that is limited to an arc, the player is going to need to make some tough decisions, which may involve not shooting for a turn or two while they get into a better position, or just to avoid a dangerous position. Primary turret ships don't need to worry about that, so the player is free to make whatever maneuvers put them in the ideal position for the current turn and future turns.

There's more to it than that (I'm sure most top players are considering the MoV advantage, for example), but I think those are the reasons that fat turrets are always going to be an attractive choice for competitive players, regardless of the current meta or what people are saying online.

Wasn't the point of this topic a way to find ways to beat the turrets without having to change the rules? I mean dear god you will never win if instead of trying to make good builds you try to come up with rule changes. You can control your builds and play style not the rules.

That's how the Phantom got nerfed, don't see why we can't just ***** until Turretwing players have to play something other than their pancakes.

Wasn't the point of this topic a way to find ways to beat the turrets without having to change the rules? I mean dear god you will never win if instead of trying to make good builds you try to come up with rule changes. You can control your builds and play style not the rules.

That's how the Phantom got nerfed, don't see why we can't just ***** until Turretwing players have to play something other than their pancakes.

You don't honestly believe that the decloak FAQ happened because people complained on the Internet, right?

Wasn't the point of this topic a way to find ways to beat the turrets without having to change the rules? I mean dear god you will never win if instead of trying to make good builds you try to come up with rule changes. You can control your builds and play style not the rules.

That's how the Phantom got nerfed, don't see why we can't just ***** until Turretwing players have to play something other than their pancakes.

You don't honestly believe that the decloak FAQ happened because people complained on the Internet, right?

Maybe in part.

I don't think that the game designers look at every regional's top 8 being 7/8 fat turrets and think that's good for the game. But if no one complains about that then they might not do anything.

Wasn't the point of this topic a way to find ways to beat the turrets without having to change the rules? I mean dear god you will never win if instead of trying to make good builds you try to come up with rule changes. You can control your builds and play style not the rules.

That's how the Phantom got nerfed, don't see why we can't just ***** until Turretwing players have to play something other than their pancakes.

You don't honestly believe that the decloak FAQ happened because people complained on the Internet, right?

Maybe in part.

I don't think that the game designers look at every regional's top 8 being 7/8 fat turrets and think that's good for the game. But if no one complains about that then they might not do anything.

They seem to be much more concerned with tourney results than with forums posts, but they do certainly troll the forums to see reactions. In the FFG interview with Team Cov, they stated that they'd keep an eye on the next season post wave 6 to see how it effected the turret meta...I think the results speak for themselves.

Wasn't the point of this topic a way to find ways to beat the turrets without having to change the rules? I mean dear god you will never win if instead of trying to make good builds you try to come up with rule changes. You can control your builds and play style not the rules.

That's how the Phantom got nerfed, don't see why we can't just ***** until Turretwing players have to play something other than their pancakes.

You don't honestly believe that the decloak FAQ happened because people complained on the Internet, right?

Maybe in part.

I don't think that the game designers look at every regional's top 8 being 7/8 fat turrets and think that's good for the game. But if no one complains about that then they might not do anything.

They seem to be much more concerned with tourney results than with forums posts, but they do certainly troll the forums to see reactions. In the FFG interview with Team Cov, they stated that they'd keep an eye on the next season post wave 6 to see how it effected the turret meta...I think the results speak for themselves.

49 points of impossible-to-kill Corran accomplishes the same goal as a 50ish-point Chewie with defensive upgrades. So does 50 points of autothruster IG88C

What's wrong with scoring points for every point of damage dealt to a ship at the end of the game? A little math won't kill anyone and I think point fortresses will dry up when the opponent gets points for every bit of damage. Say you did 14 damage to a 64 point decimator and didn't kill it, if you get 4 points per damage (64 total points/16 total health) you'll get 56 points for your several turns of concentrated fire instead of 0, and the last 20 minutes of the game won't consist of chiraneu running away.

Wasn't the point of this topic a way to find ways to beat the turrets without having to change the rules? I mean dear god you will never win if instead of trying to make good builds you try to come up with rule changes. You can control your builds and play style not the rules.

That's how the Phantom got nerfed, don't see why we can't just ***** until Turretwing players have to play something other than their pancakes.

You don't honestly believe that the decloak FAQ happened because people complained on the Internet, right?

Maybe in part.

I don't think that the game designers look at every regional's top 8 being 7/8 fat turrets and think that's good for the game. But if no one complains about that then they might not do anything.

They seem to be much more concerned with tourney results than with forums posts, but they do certainly troll the forums to see reactions. In the FFG interview with Team Cov, they stated that they'd keep an eye on the next season post wave 6 to see how it effected the turret meta...I think the results speak for themselves.

The results are pretty consistent, but they point towards beefy ships in general, not just turrets.

49 points of impossible-to-kill Corran accomplishes the same goal as a 50ish-point Chewie with defensive upgrades. So does 50 points of autothruster IG88C

but if aggressors prey on PWTs, then we kind of have another justification for why they're so heavily represented

PWTs lost their supposed reason for existing when Whisper got errated, but here they remain.

Firesprays, who lack the anti-turret mantle (and autothrusters) showed up at nearly half the % right alongside shuttles (yay shuttles!)

Speaking from experience, I know Corran is not taken for point fortressing nearly as much for how he both complements 2-ship builds and counters them. The PTL + r2-d2 combination is nearly invincible when taking only 3 dice worth of damage, and the range 1 double tap gives 2-ship builds some much needed volume of fire/is capable of ripping a decimator in half.

I also know you're simply not beating a turret 1v1 unless you have at least as much damage mitigation. Between guaranteed shots and incredibly beefy stats + mitigation, you're simply not winning 1v1s without luck on your side. When two 2 ship builds are facing off, this fact is incredibly relevant.

What's wrong with scoring points for every point of damage dealt to a ship at the end of the game? A little math won't kill anyone and I think point fortresses will dry up when the opponent gets points for every bit of damage. Say you did 14 damage to a 64 point decimator and didn't kill it, if you get 4 points per damage (64 total points/16 total health) you'll get 56 points for your several turns of concentrated fire instead of 0, and the last 20 minutes of the game won't consist of chiraneu running away.

This is exactly what I said earlier in the post:

Turrets don't need fixing.

I don't know why people feel posts like this are a contribution. You've stated an opinion without even bothering to expand upon why you have that opinion. It's fine if you want to provide a dissenting opinion, but at least say WHY you think what you do. You've added nothing to the conversation, and I can't fathom why you would even feel like it was worth your time to click reply and type this.

I don't know why people feel posts like this are a contribution. You've stated an opinion without even bothering to add anything to the purpose of the thread. You've added nothing to the conversation, and I can't fathom why you would even feel like it was worth your time to click quote and have a go at my comment.

Wasn't the point of this topic a way to find ways to beat the turrets without having to change the rules? I mean dear god you will never win if instead of trying to make good builds you try to come up with rule changes. You can control your builds and play style not the rules.

That's how the Phantom got nerfed, don't see why we can't just ***** until Turretwing players have to play something other than their pancakes.

Offering rules changes won't do much. Trying to figure out ways to beat them (like the OP intended) is better.

I've not heard much comment on my Prince Xizor w/ 5 Z-95's. It is good vs. YT's, but I haven't had much practice vs. Rear Admiral Soontir.

Offering rules changes won't do much. Trying to figure out ways to beat them (like the OP intended) is better.

I've not heard much comment on my Prince Xizor w/ 5 Z-95's. It is good vs. YT's, but I haven't had much practice vs. Rear Admiral Soontir.

I haven't flown the matchup, but I have a hard time envisioning a scenario where you don't down the Admiral in a couple of rounds of focused fire. Decimators hate swarms and rely on their mobility and Engine Upgrade to avoid them. If you are able to land a block and pour fire into Chirpy, he's toast.

Fel is trickier. Xizor is a threat to him, and I think the Prince can get shots with superior piloting; the problem is going to be getting through all of his tokens. You may want to consider a variant where you run 4 PS3 Black Sun Soldiers with Feedback Array instead of 5 PS1 Binayre Pirates. That would certainly give Fel a lot more headache to deal with.