IG-88

By Bahoola, in X-Wing Squad Lists

Hello! I have 48 points left in the list I'm currently working on. And I have very little to none experience of flying the agressor or LW, I tend to prefer Preditor insted. I intend to deploy the ships with a fair specs between them. Any how here are the two different IG-88 builds I'm considering andwould like some comments on.

Aggressor: · IG-88B (36)

Veteran Instincts (1)

Heavy Laser Cannon (7)

Fire Control System (2)

Autothrusters (2)

Aggressor: · IG-88B (36)

· Lone Wolf (2)

"Mangler" Cannon (4)

Fire Control System (2)

Autothrusters (2)

Glitterstim (2)

They will be backed by two TLT, R4 Thugs

Veteran instincts build is going to serve you better for a couple of reasons, in my opinion. Firstly, lone wolf is redundant with IG 88b plus fcs. The same, to some extent goes for glitterstim. I would rather have a 4 dice target locked attack than a 3 dice target locked focused attack. Also, the extra 2 PS from VI can help with the loss of the defensive benefits of LW due to the ability to boost out of arcs more often.

Veteran instincts build is going to serve you better for a couple of reasons, in my opinion. Firstly, lone wolf is redundant with IG 88b plus fcs. The same, to some extent goes for glitterstim. I would rather have a 4 dice target locked attack than a 3 dice target locked focused attack. Also, the extra 2 PS from VI can help with the loss of the defensive benefits of LW due to the ability to boost out of arcs more often.

Glitterstim is totally worth it. I don't know why you would even suggest there's redundancy when there isn't? Being able to convert all eyeballs to hits/eyeballs can be life-saving for a large-based ship caught in the middle of a large cluster of enemy ships, especially when you've been blocked, but even if you haven't, it allows you to take an evade action for extreme resistance to damage for that one round

For the OP, I would suggest both builds are not bad and both could work, so you should try each and see what you prefer. Personally, I would rather have advanced sensors on my IG88, or even sensor jammer to keep it alive longer, but in that case, IG88 B would really want to have predator (although Lone Wolf might still work).

Edited by blade_mercurial

I am not saying that stim is always redundant with fcs, I am just saying that fcs hlc is going to be better than hlc stim mangler

Can you even take 2 IG88B's? I thought they were unique.

Good point, I missed tht to I thort it was b and d but ur right, no two igs of the same name

Hello! I have 48 points left in the list I'm currently working on. And I have very little to none experience of flying the agressor or LW, I tend to prefer Preditor insted. I intend to deploy the ships with a fair specs between them. Any how here are the two different IG-88 builds I'm considering andwould like some comments on.

Aggressor: · IG-88B (36)

Veteran Instincts (1)

Heavy Laser Cannon (7)

Fire Control System (2)

Autothrusters (2)

Aggressor: · IG-88B (36)

· Lone Wolf (2)

"Mangler" Cannon (4)

Fire Control System (2)

Autothrusters (2)

Glitterstim (2)

They will be backed by two TLT, R4 Thugs

Can you even take 2 IG88B's? I thought they were unique.

Apologies I just read your post properly and realised that you weren't intending to run both. I'd probably run the first one, as others have stated, LW is only use once the TLTs are gone meaning it's not doing anything until at least round 3 or 4. If you were running the Ys with unhinged astromech it might have more mileage.

Okay, so I tested the first IG-88B build yesterday. My opponent piloted

Soontir Fel (34)

TIE Interceptor (27), Royal Guard TIE (0), Push the Limit (3), Autothrusters (2), Targeting Computer (2)

Darth Vader (33)

TIE Advanced (29), TIE/x1 (0), Predator (3), Advanced Targeting Computer (5)

Omicron Group Pilot (32)

Lambda-Class Shuttle (21), Accuracy Corrector (3), Emperor Palpatine (8)

Asteroids ended up in two lanes about range 2 from each “long” edge. He had initiative and deployed his Shuttle in a 45degre angel in a corner. I deployed my thug’s strait on and my IG as a flanking ship being able to commit to the fight turn 3 or turn 2 in the middle. And he deployed Vader and Soontir strait on my IG.

I won’t go in to detail on every turn but in short, he hard turned Soontir towards my thugs, and was able to shoot one down the turn after I k-turned in both thugs behind the shuttle. I succeeded to get focus fire on Soontir with all my tree ships (he had AT on all shots) two turns in a row (minus the dead thug in the second round of shooting), and was able to kill him at the expense of having Vader at range one in m IG’s ass. I sought assistants from my other ship and was able to down the shuttle and lost my other thug. At his point I had 5 hit points left on my IG and he had 4 Points on Vader. And after some bumps and S/K-turns I was able to down him with just 1 remaining hit point.

My thoughts after the match. The IG isn’t an easy ship to fly. I messed up a some S-Turns and had very little se of my AT. I really miss the handbrake on the IG, and a green hard turn. I don’t know, the dial is awesome, but the way you maneuvering it doesn’t feel natural to me.

The R4 on the thugs did nicely. Not stellar, but nice. I must try them out against a stress list before I can from an deeper opinion.

Feel free to comment, judging from that “urk” feeling I hade during the game I’m sure I messed up a lot ;)

Aggressors are hard to fly. But I think the combo of two TLT y-wings + IG88B is a powerful team. I've seen it pop up a few times already on VASSAL being used by some pretty good players.

I'm not an expert on y-wings or aggressors, but I think your basic strategy seems sound. When going up against 2 aces + shuttle (something I've had much experience playing), there's two ways you can beat it: first is a feint----have all your ships go after the shuttle and wait for an opportunity to turn towards the aces before they get behind you and cause a bump. If you set it up right, you can kill the actionless ship, even with the emperor changing one green die to an evade. The second way is to go after the aces first and since interceptors can't k-turn (usually stressed), after the first pass, turn your ships on the shuttle and try to destroy it before the aces get back into the fight. This tactic only works if you can bring the shuttle down fast. If you fail to kill the shuttle, give up on it---if you kill the aces, any one of your ships beats the shuttle one-on-one in an endgame situation.

As for improving with the aggressor, I think it just takes practice. You have to accept that its going to bump into enemy ships at some point, and sometimes its better to just do a slow move and bump then risk a k-turn/s-loop that will get blocked (because these are sometimes predictable). That predictability is why I prefer advanced sensors on the IG88. Being able to threaten a pre-dial boost to drastically change where your s-loop/k-turn can end up adds all kinds of headaches to your opponent's planning.

Edited by blade_mercurial

Have you tried advanced sensors on an ig88? While fcs and sensor jammer are good, the action before your dial makes red maneuvers worth doing. I normally boost before I 4 kturn or 3 loop. I think this adds so much to their manverablity, getting blocked isn't a big deal. In fact I sometimes boost first then reveal a move that bumps so I can then focus and loop behind them.

I run either predator or vi with hlc auto thrusters and advanced sensors on ig88b and pair him with bossk.

Have you tried advanced sensors on an ig88? While fcs and sensor jammer are good, the action before your dial makes red maneuvers worth doing. I normally boost before I 4 kturn or 3 loop. I think this adds so much to their manverablity, getting blocked isn't a big deal. In fact I sometimes boost first then reveal a move that bumps so I can then focus and loop behind them.

I run either predator or vi with hlc auto thrusters and advanced sensors on ig88b and pair him with bossk.

So using Advanced Sensors (perform 1 free action before your dial is revealed) say a boost action then S-loop or K-turn is a great IG maneuver. Add Wired's ability with the stress token gained by the S-loop/K-turn also adds to the ability gained in that one maneuver. Wired (attacking or Defending if stressed reroll 1 or more your focus results) then IG88 B fires with HLC, ouch. I like it!

Hmm I feel that IG88C is a better ship for adv. sensors, and my main concern by dropping FCS is the ability to modify the dice roll. But I think I need to drop the R4 bot on the Y-Wings so unlock some more points to the IG88.

For something like this.

PILOTS

IG88-B (50)
Aggressor (36), Lone Wolf (2), Advanced Sensors (3), Heavy Laser Cannon (7), Autothrusters (2)

Syndicate Thug (25) x 2
Y-Wing (18), Twin Laser Turret (6), Unhinged Astromech (1)

But I’m not really found of making attacks their I can’t modify the dice roll. Maybe Bossk is a better ally to this y-wings. I don’t know, need to find the time and play more X-Wing!