Ohai fellas !

So, I've been running the Big D in all my Rebel Fleets and loving the combinations with Luke Skywalkers, Dodonna's Pride and whenever you focus fire ships.

I'm curious to try out Bel Iblis to vary the pleasures, but his Admiral abilities confuse me quite a bit. I'd love your take on him if you've played him !

In the mean time, I'd also love do get your insight on my analysis of him, to see whether I got him right

So, Bel Iblis says that at the beginning of Turn 1 and 5, every friendly ship can get a number of Command Tokens up to his Command Value. The latest FAQ states that when using his ability, a ship can not have more than one Command Token of the same type.

Now, this is a major pro. The fact that you can get up to 3 tokens per ship is indeed very interesting. There's one drawback if you do that : you have to ensure that your first Turn Command hits the mark, otherwise you're going to have lost a token you banked. Obviously you can still use it to change a token to respond to battlefield conditions, but this is a bit of a missed opportunity.

So, now I ask the question : Is Garm Bel Iblis the man for the Alpha Strike on the Rebel side ? Plan your turn 1 in order to maximize the damage output you can throw when you have the iniative, then activate the ships in the order to get both the command token and the command dial to maximize the impact of what you do in the first turn. Even going for expending several tokens in the process should the need arise.

Garm's deal is flexibility over raw power

stacking up the usual CF + Squadron + Nav token (cause engineering is one measly shield; usually not too important) lets you hit harder ( especially with paragon, that CF token is a life safer) and, more importantly, move better.

the fattie's absolute greatest strength is solid maneuverability plastered on incredibly wide and powerful side arcs; Garm's nav token lets you make the most out of that with split second speed changes.

recently, I have not been using Garm because the points I save by going to general D lets me outfit both fatties with Intel Officers and Enhanced Armaments. At 400 points, and if Akbar isn't just the most broken **** ever, I could be switching back.

The biggest problem with Garm is his interaction with Hyperspace Assault. According to the FAQ "ships and squadrons set aside are not in play...they cannot be affected by any abilities" so they will miss out on Garm.

This is a problem because Hyperspace Assault is basically cheating with Paragon

you'll have to replace it with either Fleet Ambush (which is okay with fatties, since they can concentrate fire and then book it away from the enemy fleet, but doesn't have nearly the same payoff) or Firing Lanes (draw heavy competition with VSDs, but you can tailor the fattie's wide, impressive side arcs for this objective; not a done deal by any means, though). Would not recommend outpost, since fatties just love being big, mobile bastards

I definitely agree with you on the objectives and the flexibility, but when looking at Garm Bel Iblis : if you max up your token count you lose out on the first turn command dial, unless it's a nav or possibly squadron.

Which is why I was thinking about using Bel Iblis' commands for a nasty Squadron Alpha Strike if the circumstances allow it, or a maneuver dial to get to the appropriate position turn 1 and be a real annoyance turn 2 if the Alpha Strike will be limited. With a Fattie, a Neb and a Sniping Vette, you could potentially activate 7 squadrons in the first turn and a concentrate fire dial + token on the Vette at long range provided you activate her last. That is quite a high number of dice thrown early on, capable of destroying most bomber wings, even exhausting the shields or a couple defense token on a Victory or Gladiator and that without any upgrade cards

first turn command with Garm is always navigate (fleet ambush allowing for turn 1 squadron shots excepted)

it's a boon, really, because it lets you reposition (and set speed) according to the enemy deployment

wouldn't recommend vettes with Garm. Nebs are fairly decent, but the Command 1 of the corvs pulls double duty in allowing minimal returns out of Garm with minimal necessity (don't really need stored commands when you can pick them every turn)

I was just thinking about him. Usually he's my default admiral unless I need the 5 points and go with D. The big thing is the turn 5 token reload, which can really help out. Garm Bel doesn't need to be built around, but if you do I currently prefer at least 1 Neb-b to bring in redemption. The point being that engineering tokens now do 3 points. So I'll take engineering and nav to start, or CF or Sq depending upon fleet build.

But really GBI won't come into his own until 400 points. Then you can have 4 AFM2s or even 5-6 Nebs (and of course the MC-30 depending upon pricing). The token generation on turn 5 will be great.

Oh, I also try for early turn strikes with GBI, but that requires the right objectives which you may not always have. So really consider him only for the turn 5 reload (and turn 3 if using the AFM2s). If I use the early turn tokens, it's just gravy.

So, sorry for the necro of this thread (I'm getting a feel of Zombie Lord Riekaan ) ! I had two games with Garm Bel Iblis in the past couple of days and I'm starting to feel that there might be some hidden gems with him.

I'm not really seeing the flexibility he brings on the table, compared to let's say Tarkin. The fact that Tarkin lets you pick on a turn-by-turn basis what you want from your ships is still superior when you go for flexibility (and the 13 points additional cost is appropriately priced). Sure, you can decide to execute 2 to 3 different commands per turn with him which is great, but I'm starting to feel that what he brings to the table is really "burst actions" on the larger ships.

What I mean by "burst actions" is pairing both the command tokens and the command dials on a ship to really increase its efficiency, rather than doing multiple things. On an AFMK2 for instance, I feel you get more utility of using both a repair token and a repair dial on the same turn (2 damage cards or up to 3 shields) rather than using a Repair token and a CF command. Same goes for Navigate (Change of 2 speed and a yaw), or Concetrate Fire (extra die + reroll). Squadrons are a bit less needed here.

Anyone else felt something like this ?

not really, for me

with Garm, the thing I love most is he gives the Afmk2s a free "oh ****!" button to speed up or slow down on demand

the other tokens are, as far as I'm concerned, just so much gravy. Re-rolls for big CF shots are nice and the extra repair giving back a shield is minimal but noticeable. The CF re-rolls really do add up across multiple fatties, though.

if your ships make it to round 5, well now that's when garm gets mean usually your opponent is commited to a plan of attack when suddenly, bam! free navigate tokens

not really, for me

with Garm, the thing I love most is he gives the Afmk2s a free "oh ****!" button to speed up or slow down on demand

the other tokens are, as far as I'm concerned, just so much gravy. Re-rolls for big CF shots are nice and the extra repair giving back a shield is minimal but noticeable. The CF re-rolls really do add up across multiple fatties, though.

if your ships make it to round 5, well now that's when garm gets mean usually your opponent is commited to a plan of attack when suddenly, bam! free navigate tokens

I do agree that the Navigate token is the great panic button, but for 25 points just for that, I feel it's just as good to bank one in turn 1 and go for Dodonna

Which is why I feel it's meant to do some burst actions by coordinating the commands and the tokens. Deploying at Speed 3, then boom going down to speed 1 is going to seriously take the opponent off guard, much like having an Engineering value of 6 for a turn

So, sorry for the necro of this thread (I'm getting a feel of Zombie Lord Riekaan ) ! I had two games with Garm Bel Iblis in the past couple of days and I'm starting to feel that there might be some hidden gems with him.

I'm not really seeing the flexibility he brings on the table, compared to let's say Tarkin. The fact that Tarkin lets you pick on a turn-by-turn basis what you want from your ships is still superior when you go for flexibility (and the 13 points additional cost is appropriately priced). Sure, you can decide to execute 2 to 3 different commands per turn with him which is great, but I'm starting to feel that what he brings to the table is really "burst actions" on the larger ships.

What I mean by "burst actions" is pairing both the command tokens and the command dials on a ship to really increase its efficiency, rather than doing multiple things. On an AFMK2 for instance, I feel you get more utility of using both a repair token and a repair dial on the same turn (2 damage cards or up to 3 shields) rather than using a Repair token and a CF command. Same goes for Navigate (Change of 2 speed and a yaw), or Concetrate Fire (extra die + reroll). Squadrons are a bit less needed here.

Anyone else felt something like this ?

Yep, which is why Garm so far has not seen any fleet action so far in my rebell builds. His ability is need, yet far too situational. You need a fleet that only/mostly has command values of 3 (or more) to make any good use of him, yet only one rebell ship so far has a command 3 value. You also need a fleet in which all/most ships can make good use of 3 out of 4 available tokens, as you may not have multitudes of them. But most vessels tend to be build towards one purpose (carrier, tank, long range damage..) and have little use for, say, a squadron token. Moreover, I need to use them till turn 5, when Garm is handing out the next batch of tokens.. I also have troubles understanding why it had to be turn 1 and turn 5 , and not turn 1 and turn 4 in a game that usually goes by 6 turns.

Garm is amazing. I always bank CF, Nav, and Engineering in the first turn. Turn 5 is just based on the needs of the moment. Since I often don't run Advanced Projectors I typically use the Engineering token to shift 2 shields to the needed arc rather than regen 1.

I think both of you are right in that Garm gives flexibility and burst. Some games I trickle the token use out as needed, while others they all get used at once.

Raymus Antilles will give 1 ship great "burst actions" every turn though! I think I wil use him more often, he's made for the MC80.

You can usually bank a Nav token on the first turn anyway, I do.

I think my "two potato+" fleet will be running Garm. I like the tokens to get large heals on Turn 5 or even a last ditch CF token for a re-roll to maximize the last two rounds of firing. Last night I used the extra nav token to bump my speed to get away from a GSD riding my rear.

I also really enjoy Garm in my 2 AF + 1 other + a handful of A-wing fleets or, god forbid, in a 3 AF fleet. An underrated virtue is that if you only have 2-3 squadrons then you probably don't have to think about a squadron command for a while, as Garm can boss them with the tokens that he gives to each ship for the earliest part of the game as needed (turn 2-3).

The turn 5 token refresh can be especially good for AFs who can use the Nav to engage/disengage and the repair to survive it.

He's terrible with 5x or 6x CR90, but that is to be expected.

I think the best use of Garm is to wrong-foot your opponent with your deployment then rapidly alter course by spending your turn 1 Navigate command. This will be golden with for e.g. an MC80 with Engine Techs who could be deployed at speed one then all of a sudden be rocketing off with effectively a speed 3 maneuver with 4 clicks! i.e. deploy broadside then redeploy for an Akbar slash or vice versa. When something that large moves that fast it will mess with your opponent's plan/head. Sure you can do this without Garm but Garm lets you do it with a navigate/eng/conc fire token in the bank for turn 2...