Jesper Hills - UK Nationals 2015 - (Finals)

I have previously written about my experience in the Swiss rounds and Top 16 knockouts at the 2015 X-Wing UK Nationals. It's taken me a while to get this written up together with my opponent but this is the report of the final match. It's quite long! Quick recap:

List Theory

The Aggressor is one of my favourite ships to fly. It's a fast, maneuverable beast that rewards flanking and pressing a tactical advantage - but comes with the disadvantage of likely costing you the match if you get it wrong, or press that advantage at the wrong opportunity. High risk, high reward.

I've been flying Double Aggressor since the day it was released and have eventually, after much fine-tuning, settled on the following build:

IG-88B, Aggressor - 48pts

Push the Limit

Advanced Sensors

Mangler Cannon

Autothrusters

IG-2000

IG-88C, Aggressor - 51pts

Push the Limit

Advanced Sensors

Heavy Laser Cannon

Autothrusters

IG-2000

Many people prefer Veteran Instincts or Predator as the EPT, which are both excellent choices in their own right, but for me Push the Limit opens up more tactical options. Double Aggressor builds have a couple of key weak matchups (Interceptors, Phantoms and Corran) - the way I like to deal with them is through aggressive blocking maneuvers and the Push the Limit / Advanced Sensors combo allows for this while retaining a high level of defense.

I also made the decision to run an asymmetrical build (48pt/51pt) to force difficult choices in target priority on opponents; as well as putting a Mangler Cannon on IG-88B and the Heavy Laser Cannon on IG-88C to ensure both remain a credible threat if one goes down.

Final Matchup

After clawing my way through the Top 16 elemination, my opponent was none other than Dominic Wai - a fellow squadmate and somebody I've played quite often. In fact, we met up and had a couple of practice games at our local store three days before this match using these identical lists. I should mention again that Dominic had, just the previous day, placed 2nd in the National Tournament for Imperial Assault!

We're both competitive but enjoy keeping things casual. I knew right away this was going to be a great match. Dom was flying:

Chewbacca

Predator

C-3PO

Luke Skywalker

Millennium Falcon

Corran Horn

Push the Limit

Fire Control System

R2-D2

Initial strategy

It was a good build. Chewbacca is both an offensive and defensive monster here; rendering the Mangler Cannon useless and tanking a minimum of two damage per turn. Corran built for both survivability and consistent damage output. Both ships are able to throw out multiple attacks per turn if necessary and it was going to be difficult to stay in a prolonged close engagement. Removing Corran quickly or blocking to prevent his action economy was going to be the key.

I knew Chewbacca would be trying to keep arc as often as possible. What I didn't want was to slowly bleed shields one per turn throughout the game. Corran would likely flank and attack from the side; catching him in the act was going to be important.

Alex Davy came over to the table for a quick pep-talk and announced he would judge the match personally. No pressure.

Final Report

Turn 0

I'm fairly confident flying between asteroids with large ships. Dominic clearly wanted both room to throw Chewbacca around and multiple lanes of approach for Corran. Asteroids (and only asteroids this time) were deployed in a wide cluster in the middle. I don't feel the placement favoured either one and we were both fairly pleased with ourselves.

Both my IG-88s go in my bottom left corner, touching bases. IG-88C on the left, IG-88B on the right. Chewbacca gets placed in the diagonally opposite corner while Corran sits in the middle facing forwards. I wasn't going to be stupid enough to launch both Aggressors straight forward -- and Dominic knew this -- so it was going to be a tussle in the center. Getting the approach right was crucial.

Turn 1

Chewbacca turns slightly towards the middle and Corran inches forward. It was a stalling tactic to see how fast I would commit. Both my ships turn towards the edge with Hard 1 / Hard 2 turns respectively. Gives me room to launch forwards or bank straight into the asteroid fields.

Turn 2

Dominic continues the slow shuffle forwards. He's pretty set on a middle engagement, but I'm okay with that. IG-88C (leftmost ship) actions a focus/evade and banks 1 towards the middle. IG-88B boosts right and hard-turns in. I like this move; it spreads the ships out a little to cover more of the board with firing arcs while maintaining parrallel lines of fire and approach.

Turn 3

Dominic aggressively banks Chewbacca towards IG-88B, recognising the threat it represents with consistent damage output from the Gunner-like ability. Doing this puts him in front of an asteroid, but losing actions next turn a price he's clearly willing to pay for a good shot.

IG-88C moves one forward and IG-88B banks in. Corran shuffles slowl forward and attempts to Target Lock but was just shy of Range 3. Corran then executes a barrel roll to his left; putting him out of range of IG-88C and into range of IG-88B. It was nicely done.

Defensive tokens prove their worth and IG-88B loses a single shield. I knew he would attempt to block with Chewbacca next turn, so decide to shoot Corran to little effect. Chewbacca takes one shield from IG-88C.

Turn 4

As predicted, Chewbacca attempts the block IG-88C who is quite happy to use it to slow his movement and maintain arc on Corran. IG-88B attempts to block Corran with a boost right followed by 3 Left Bank, but overshoots. He's now facing an asteroid at point blank range and Corran sneaks past. Bollocks.

IG-88C, who quite happily double-actioned and cleared his stress on the Chewbacca speed bump, throws dice and after modifiers gets 4 hits on Corran. Corran rolls 3 blanks and after his evade token, all shields are removed and he's reduced to 2 Hull. Reaction follows .

Turn 5

Dominic knows Corran is in trouble; but also that the closest Aggressor (IG-88B) cannot maintain firing arcs without a K-Turn through the asteroid. He decides to K-Turn Chewbacca in order to shut down Autothrusters and get a better position for the next turn.

IG-88C takes a Target Lock on Corran and executes an S-Loop to the left. IG-88B pulls a 1 Hard Left turn, narrowly missing the asteroid by a few millimetres.

Corran does the sensible thing, guns his engines and moves 3 Forward. "Will you barrel roll out of my arc?", I ask. Dominic heartily nods and puts the template down, shifting to the left and puts himself half a centimetre in front of the asteroid.

Dom then realises what he's just done and stares at the table in shock before quietly asking if he can take it back. TO says moves are final but leaves the decision down to me. "Yeah, no problem." We share a joke about dastardly Jedi mind tricks and Dominic moves his ship back before taking focus/evade.

IG-88C can't resist the juicy target and hopes to remove the heavily damaged Corran from the table. But is unable to sink any damage whilst shooting through the asteroid. Chewbacca takes one shield from IG-88C.

Turn 6

Chewbacca does a 2 Forward, narrowly missing the asteroid and blocks IG-88C. Again, this was expected, and IG-88C happily bumps forward to maintain a firing solution on Corran.

IG-88B double actions and deliberately bumps IG-88C to reduce speed. Corran does a 2 Bank and turtles up defensively; annoyingly back up to two shield tokens from the constant green moves.

Both of my ships fire on Corran but do very little damage (1 shield). Chewbacca plinks away at the defending IG-88B and does one damage.

At this point I'm frustrated. Chewbacca is (very slowly) bleeding my shields and while applying pressure on Corran has successfully kept him out of the fight, I realise that isn't going to win me the game either. If he can't be caught in the next couple of turns, my focus is going to have to be on removing Chewbacca from the table as quickly as possible.

Turn 7

Dominic executes a 1 Hard Right with Chewbacca hoping to block. Again this was expected and again I'm quite happy to double-action and bump him, giving me one last turn of a good firing solution on Corran. IG-88B predicted the pile-up and double-actions as well, hoping to pump some Range 1 shots on Chewbacca.

Corran does a 2 Bank Right. Dom carefully wheighs up the distance and decides to barrel-roll to the left and evade. We slowly measure and he's just out of range of IG-88C's HLC. Crowd around us let out an "Ooooooh".

Congratulating him on a nice dodge, I pick up my dial and begin to plan the next move when Alex Davy pops his head in and asks why I didn't shoot with IG-88B. Oops! Dominic laughs and, grateful for the take-back earlier, graciously says "Of course you can take the shot, go ahead." Chewbacca loses a couple of shield tokens. For me, this kind of fly-casual attidue is what the game is about -- we're both here to win it, but we both also recognise that we're here to have a good time.

Now, at the end of Turn 7, I decide to cut my losses on Corran whilst I still have shields left to tank with. It's not worth throwing the game on chasing the rabbit. Next turn will be spent on repositioning to focus down Chewbacca instead.

Turn 8

Chewbacca does another hard turn, successfully getting in the way. I'm okay with that. I know that Corran can't turn around (while stressed from Pushing the Limit last turn) and I was going to use this turn to switch targets anyway. Both of the Aggressors maintain their Target Locks on Corran as a feint and take focus/evade actions for defense, bumping to remain mostly stationary.

Corran does his last 2 Bank, now at full shields, and declines to stress himself. Next turn, I know he's going to turn back into the fight.

Edited July 3, 2015 by floof

Turn 9

Chewbacca moves one forward towards the corner.

IG-88B knows that Corran will be attacking, so does focus/evade and pulls a 3 forward through the asteroid in order to get an important Range 1 attack on Chewbacca. IG-88C grabs a focus before S-Looping behind Chewbacca.

Having caught Dominic slightly off-guard with my aggressive focus on Chewie, he decides to be aggressive back and hard-turns Corran towards IG-88B and barrel-rolls out of arc, ready to do some serious damage.

Corran, even after double tapping, inflicts a total of 2 damage on IG-88B (who has now lost all shields). Both IG-88s open fire at Range 1 and take Chewbacca down to 6hp.

Turn 10

Dominic shoves Chewbacca into IG-88B to prevent getting shot by both. Corran banks away to clear the stress and prepare for what I'm assuming is going to be a K-Turn that I'm powerless to preent.

IG-88C creeps forward and stresses himself to focus/evade. He and Chewbacca trade shots at Range 1 and neither takes any damage!

Turn 11

Chewbacca pulls a surprise K-Turn! This was a great move - he knew I couldn't position quickly enough to get out of the corner. Corran does the expected K-Turn.

IG-88C executes a long 3 Bank Right and gets ready for a second Range 1 scrum with the Millennium Falcon. IG-88B is looking a little fragile and decides not to risk it; instead turning to the left and boosting away for the evade, hoping to slowly reposition around the edge for another fast approach.

IG-88C knocks two damage off Chewbacca and receives two damage in return. I've now lost all shields on both of my ships; Corran is undamaged; Chewbacca is down to around 4 Hull.

Turn 12

Dominic bets that I won't hard-turn a stressed Aggressor and hard-turns Chewbacca towards the centre, remaining stressed. Big plays!

IG-88C banks inward, boosts forwards and focus/evades, desperately hoping to bump Corran's approach and prevent him shooting. IG-88B does a long bank + boost, putting imself ahead of the asteroid and ready to hard turn in.

Corran moves slower than I expected ends up about 4mm away from the Aggressor's base. This will be a very decisive turn. His odds of destroying IG-88B are high and if he does, clawing back a win would be difficult (but not impossible) for me.

Corran throws four dice at close range; 3 hits! IG-88C rolls for defense; 3 evades!

IG-88C throws four dice back at Corran; 3 hits! Corran rolls for defense; 3 evades!

We both stand there dumbfounded for a while. Well, that's X-Wing.

Chewbacca roars and unloads on IG-88C. I'm forced to spend my focus despite expecting a double-tap from Corran and, after the dust settles, he's been dealt a hit and crit. I flip the card. Minor Hull Breach; ****. That will make doing K-Turns and S-Loops very risky indeed.

Corran double taps! Lots of blanks and fails to sink the Aggressor despite a re-roll. I'm painfully aware that I can't let IG-88C get shot like that again; I really need both Aggressors on the table in order to deal with Corran.

Turn 13

It's now really tense at the table. Chewbacca is limping and IG-88C is close to crippled. Corran can't shoot this turn, but I've firmly decided that Chewbacca has got to go. He should have been taken out several turns ago. It's business time.

Dominic looks like he's wheighing up wether to attempt a block or not. Chewie eventually slowly banks through the asteroids into the centre of the board and evades.

Both of the Aggressors now pounce, executing the pincer which was set up a couple of turns ago and take target lock/focus actions. Chewbacca is promptly removed from the table before he gets a chance to shoot back.

Turn 14

I'm not sure how fast Corran will be approaching, so play it safe slowly bank both of the Aggressors. IG-88C, the damaged and closest one, grabs both defensive tokens.

Corran turns and grabs both defensive tokens as well; he decides to try and finish of the damaged Aggressor but must shoot through the asteroid and isn't able to do any damage despite double-tapping.

IG-88B forced him to spend his focus on the defense roll, but it's not enough and Corran takes some damage.

Turn 15

Now we're in an interesting place. Corran cannot shoot again and is going to rely on his defense to see him through. I decide to set up a series of preventative blocks, hard-turning IG-88C around to just in front of IG-88B, who deliberately bumps. Both take target locks on Corran.

Corran moves 1 Forward, regains a shield and grabs defensive tokens again. I'm unable to kill him, but wasn't expecting to either.

Turn 16

I'm feeling confident at this point. I've got my heavily damaged ship out in front, so it won't get shot, and neither is stressed so I'm able to stack defense on both for the coming close-range encounter. It could still go horribly wrong.

Keeping the traffic-jam going, IG-88B stacks focus/evade and moves first, bumping into IG-88C and not shifting at all. IG-88C, in turn, bumps forward into Corran so he won't get shot.

Dominic didn't really have anywhere to go. To escape, he would have had to hard-turn out past the asteroids but it was risky - it could have been easily blocked. He goes for the 2 Bank Left, in the end, and bumps into IG-88C, leaving him where he is.

Corran shoots at IG-88B! Who shoots back! Then a double tap! Quick flurry of dice rolls and tokens later, Corran is down to 2 Hull and IG-88B has been reduced to the same amount also with a Minor Hull Breach!

Turn 17

Planning phase for the seventeenth turn seems to go on forever. Dominic looks unsure of where to escape to; he knows I'll move first but to where? Meanwhile both Aggressors are sitting on 2 Hull, each with a Minor Hull Breach, and facing the asteroid adjacent to Corran.

Minor Hull Breach: After executing a red maneuver, roll 1 attack dice. On a Hit result, suffer 1 damage.

It's obvious to both of us that my optimal move is to K-Turn both ships. But we also realise that there's a chance both K-Turn maneuvers would cross over the asteroid (50% chance of taking one damage), and to make matters worse Minor Hull Breach would also kick in with the further ~40% chance of taking one damage. It's one hell of a risk. Both of my ships could literally destroy themselves trying to make the difficult turn and hand victory over to my opponent.

Eventually we both, slowly, place our dials down and nod. Alex Davy leans over and watches carefully at what looks like it could be the last turn on way or another.

IG-88C takes a Target Lock on Corran and... reveals a K-Turn! He narrowly misses the asteroid and flips round, rolling blank for the Minor Hull Breach.

IG-88C takes a Focus and... reveals an S-Loop left! He's literally a hair's width from touching the asteroid with the maneuver template and the base ends up half a centimetre from it when completed. I roll blank for Minor Hull Breach.

Phew.

Dominic decided he couldn't risk getting blocked for a third turn in a row and Corran executes a left 3, putting himself a far aways as possible and grabs focus/evade tokens. But it's not enough.

Corran goes down. 100-0 win against the odds.

Last thoughts:

What a brilliant match. Dominic and I have met up both to organise pictures of the game and recount the turn-by-turn blows; it was one of the closest and tensest games of X-Wing either of us has played. Full credit to Dom for being both an excellent, competitive player and friendly, sporting opponent throughout.

Sorry if that was all a little long-winded. Thanks for reading! Here's me looking dopey, excited and tired at the same time.

Absolutely brilliant write up. Thanks for taking the time to do that.

I completely agree with what you said about "Flying Casual". Even at this level of competition, ti's nice to see people not being rules-nazis.

Break a leg at Worlds Jesper!

Congrats bud, and an excellent write up!

Congrats again Jesper - you did the 186 proud! Now onwards to the Scandi's and then Worlds!

Aye huge congratulations Jesper. You worked hard at making those double IG's work and it paid off. Also you're the first person to win a nationals event with scum!