So, I bought my raider today and got to have an epic game with it.

fore:

Gunnery Team

Quad Laser Cannons

Aft:

Tarkin

Shield Tech

Single Turbolaser

Ion Cannon Battery

I flew Jonus in close escort, used Vessery to bait Farlander and Wedge into an asteroid corridor, used the single turbolasers as support for Vessery, Backstabber and Dark Curse. My opponent didn't bring much in the way of Ion ships, and the ones that he had were tied up dealing with some other ships. I killed one ship per round. In order, it was one of the new T-70 pilots (the one who treats red maneuvers as white ones if not stressed), then Farlander, then Wedge, then Corran Horn. Luke and his turret friends along with Jake Farrel were taking longer to eliminate Alozen and some particularly lucky Black Squadron guys. I lost only Jonus and Alozen by the time my opponent conceded.

Even in the 130+ points range, good god does the Raider pull its weight.

Anyone else get to try this bad boy out yet?

Yeah it is good, and looking forward to adding the Gon-Zillah into the fray!

What was your build?

Really Jonus is like an upgrade on the raider.

Really Jonus is like an upgrade on the raider.

Well he also put Plasma Torps into the T-70, and he soaked up a lot of shots that would otherwise have gone into the Raider. If not for the torps, the t-70 would have survived into the second turn of combat, changing the game drastically. His evade dice were very good that turn, i needed every attack I had to take it down. But yeah, he was fun. Between him and Gunnery team, almost every attack was 3-4 hits before evades.

So far the Raider has done me well. Perhaps too well. My friend and I are swapping sides after a particularly bad curb stomp.

Serves those upstart terrorists right. Heh.

What was your build?

Well with the new Ordnance Tubes... that should prolly be on every Huge Ship with two or more Hard-points, pretty much from now on.

What do you think?

Huge Ships definitely seem to be where they should be right now

I'm in the process of trying to set up a friendly Epic league at my LGS - I had originally stipulated a house rule of 1 Huge ship per side to keep things balanced, which unfortunately ruled out Scum, now I'm not so sure that rule is necessary.

You could just have a rule that SCUM brings two Large Ships...

You could just have a rule that SCUM brings two Large Ships...

IG-2000 is the Scum huge ship.

You could just have a rule that SCUM brings two Large Ships...

IG-2000 is the Scum huge ship.

YUP...

Right after GenCon I had one game with my Darth Raider, Palpmobile + Fel + Jax, Howlrunner mini-swarm list. My buddy brought a bunch of Ys under Horton, Biggs + Luke + Wedge, fully-loaded Miranda, and a sprinkling of Z-95s. Even with a few rules snafus - like using the old defense bonus for long ranges *and* giving range defensive bonuses versus secondary weapons in the Raider - I cleaned house and the Raider was a huge contributor. I really enjoyed the more strategic considerations that come with the large Epics, and the variety of upgrade and rules combinations that make building epic ships so interesting.

Man, today my luck was terrible. Couldn't hit anything. You could stick my dice in the back of the freezer for a week and they wouldn't be as cold as today. Had one turn where every single secondary rolled all blanks and focuses, even after Jonus rerolls. Had 5 TIE fighters deal a total of 1 damage for the entire game (about 6 rounds of firing), and Dark Curse rolled 6 blanks against a Turbolaser. He had one hull, and only needed to evade 1 damage. Go figure. I consistently lost 1-2 ships a turn, or at the very least took about 1-2 ships worth of damage per turn. Just couldn't really hit anything all game. had 3 separate TIE fighters all killed by a Direct Hit! when they'd have otherwise lived. Raider was kitted the same as before.

So now I've had one good luck game and one rotten luck game. So I suppose all that's left to see how the ship performs is to get a game where both players rolls are just alright.

However, I did have one good showing. Jonus was on Rear Guard for the Raider, and the opponent's K-Wing came up behind. Thinking the Raider to be the bigger threat, my opponent ignored Jonus… and his Cluster Mines. And his Extra Munitions. I managed to force him to hit 4 of the 6 mines (he missed the leftmost mine both times) and ate a shitload of damage. If I hadn't conceded at the end of that round (we were both hungry) he'd have been killed by the Quad Lasers easily. I also managed to kill Poe Dameron in round 2 of combat, but it took every single secondary weapon (except the Quads) plus the primary weapon firing twice on the raider, and that 1 damage i mentioned earlier from the 5 TIEs.

The one time I've played with the Raider I was able to simply delete a ship with all of its guns.

Then the blob of 8 TLT ships and a handful of B-Wings got close and killed the Raider very, very quickly.

The one time I've played with the Raider I was able to simply delete a ship with all of its guns.

Then the blob of 8 TLT ships and a handful of B-Wings got close and killed the Raider very, very quickly.

Do you remember what you had on the Raider?

I had 2 Turbolaser Hardpoints, Tibana Gas, and Jonus flying nearby. Unlike with the game's standard cards and ships where I can recall pretty much everything by memory, I can't recall all the epic upgrade cards so I'm sure I had another upgrade or two on it. I tried to keep the price reasonable because I paid for Jonus solely to buff the Raider and when you treat Jonus as part of the Epic ship it gets quite pricey. I know there is an epic cre or team that gives you extra energy for doing a straight, probably had that one. I see that one as an auto include on epic ships.

It was pretty much just, "Turbolaser, Turbolaser, Primary, Primary." If you're a B-Wing there is nothing you can do.

So I was able to take out 2-3 of their ships like this but then the blob of 8 ******* TLT's I made the mistake of saying I owned creeped forward and due to massive stupidity on my part my own Raider was in between the TLT death cloud and my own group of Black Squadron TIE Fighters and prevented them from actually helping until the Raider was dead, haha.

I quite liked having Vader and Palpatine around for when I needed just one more hit or evade result to really screw up my opponent's plan. Howlrunner was nice too.

I quite liked having Vader and Palpatine around for when I needed just one more hit or evade result to really screw up my opponent's plan. Howlrunner was nice too.

Hmm. Now that I think about it, if you include Vader then the Raider's Primary Weapon attacks can really spread his ability over a large field. Might think of including Backup Generator or some other easy regeneration item to mitigate the damage you deal yourself from Vader. I'll have to think about this.

Problem with Vader is your opponent decides which side of the Raider to apply damage. Not bad early on but you gotta hold back if you've taken some fire.

If you are going to use the Raider with the new cards, might I suggest the Raider title Instigator with Automated Protocols? If you do an action that isn't a re-inforce or a restore, you get 2 free shields back. If you are taking heavy fire, you don't want to do that, but if you aren't, it's a good way to get your shields back up.

Moff Jerjerrod is really good in Epic as he can get rid of one of those nasty, nasty epic crits.

Ion Torpedoes are great against enemies that are close together. You can hit a bunch and let your escort take them out or you can hit some and head the other way to avoid some extra shots for a round.

I've found I generally like Sensor Team to give the TL boost. That way your main guns can destroy something at R4. That can be one small ship per round, usually. Also not bad if you take one Single Turbo Laser. I've seen X-wings crap out on green dice. This is especially good if your opponent likes to take special ships that give bonuses. You know, the key enemy ship that you need to take out fast? Give them a TL and hit them with 2 main gun attacks and a Single Turbo Laser before they get close. Howlrunner can die before she helps at all.

If you want to go with Ordnance Tubes, you can go with Weapons Engineer, Impetous title, and Homing Missiles. No energy to fire. You get 2 TL per turn. If you kill a ship, you get more TL's.

I do need more practice with the Raider. I've played more with the CR-90, but prefer the Raider. I was able to get a CR-90 to try a close range broadside. It didn't go well for the CR-90.

You could just have a rule that SCUM brings two Large Ships...

IG-2000 is the Scum huge ship.

YUP...

IG-8000 to the rescue!

Scum does have the Firespray, Houndstooth, and IG-88.