Cartel Blanche

By Grayfax, in X-Wing Squad Lists

Posted at

I have been trying to work out something with the Kihraxz Fighter and a Black Sun Ace... today is not the day I figure that squad out. In the meantime, I took a harder look at some of the Scum and Villainy ships and realized if I wasn't as focused on the Black Sun Ace, then I might could begin to work with the Cartel.

Cartel Blanche

Cartel Marauder (20) x2
Kihraxz Fighter
XX-23 S-Thread Tracers (1)
Cartel Spacer (14) x4
M3-A Interceptor
Total: 98
I know, I know. That's a helluva lot of Scyks. Something else I realized, if I'm not focused on putting a title on those little guys, they aren't actually all that bad. They get Focus and Evade and can Barrel Roll and Target Lock. Not to mention 3 fickle little green dice. Being able to Evade and roll 3 dice isn't too bad for defense if you need to turtle up. All in all, they move about the same as a Z-95 without a green 1 straight and they have harder turns, so that's actually a plus in my book. They can K-Turn at 3 and 5, so there is some option if necessary but not a lot of green to clear it out.
The choice then was missile boats that can give them all target locks in one fell swoop. Looked at the Z-95 and the Kihraxz. Maybe I just want to love the Kihraxz too much, but there are actually quite a few reasons I went with 2 Kihraxz over 3 Z-95s. 3 Attack is very nice and helps add a little punch to the list. The dial is even closer to the Scyk than it is to the Z-95. The pilot skills are all at 2, which can be very helpful in the furball. A little more hull. Does that make them better? I don't know, but I'll take the chance on 3 red dice and hope they last long enough to whittle down the enemy so the Scyks can finish the job.
Will the tracers provide enough ... well, I wouldn't call it an alpha strike, but the potential is there for fairly heavy damage to punch through and to repeat it if they can be used up quickly enough. Not necessarily a TIE Swarm with support, but I like the potential for Scum better than I do a wall full of Zs. Mostly that is from a defensively modified dice perspective... but maybe the evade combined with the 3 green dice can make a difference. And if you don't have a lot of fancy toys that you want to use focus for it helps to stick with using evades as much as possible.
Posted at

Well, let's ignore the fact that both the Scyk and the Khiraxz are slightly over-costed and not the most 'competitive' of ships.

What you have is 6 ships with 22 'health' and two of those ships have 3 attack guns. So firepower is okay and health is okay. The biggest problem I see is the s-thread tracers are on your 'heavy-hitters', so when you fire them, you are sacrificing their damage output (since the s-thread tracer cancels dice results to apply the target locks). So now, in order for that to be worthwhile, you have to get a lot of value out of those target locks, and I'm not sure sacrificing one of your 3 die attacks to hand out target locks (to ships that could just get TLs on their own) is giving you any meaningful increase in firepower...

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unpronounceable fighters are fairly priced and have a magnificent dial to boot

the Scyks are just buggered

Edited by ficklegreendice
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Yeah, I know. It is a concern, but it should provide the entire swarm a target lock, which really helps the 2-dice attacks on the Scyks and you would only use one of them in the initial joust and the swarm doesn't have to fire on the target they are getting locks on. I guess my main thought on this was that I'll take a chance on the tracer if it looks like I can provide a target lock on a valuable ship even at the cost of one 3 damage shot because modified dice are sooo very important. Especially since the Scyks are going to need to use Evade more than focus for additional survivability against a lot of targets.

Posted at

I'm not convinced the Scyks are buggered... especially bare naked Scyks. It is easy to get caught up in the Title / Payload, but without falling for that points trap, they have practically the same dial as the Kihraxz Fighter which you call "magnificent" and a lot of potential actions. They also have green dice, so I understand why you are less than receptive... lol

I'm also not saying I'm right. This may be a mid-field list that doesn't do well. I just wanted some thoughts before I tried to field it.

Edited by Grayfax
Posted at

I'm not convinced the Scyks are buggered... especially bare naked Scyks. It is easy to get caught up in the Title / Payload, but without falling for that points trap, they have practically the same dial as the Kihraxz Fighter which you call "magnificent" and a lot of potential actions. They also have green dice, so I understand why you are less than receptive... lol

I'm also not saying I'm right. This may be a mid-field list that doesn't do well. I just wanted some thoughts before I tried to field it.

Alright, going for the 'long game' might work out, although the high value enemy ships will die if you can just block 'em and focus fire with multiple ships in R1 (target locks help, but may not be needed for that).

I think the Khiraxz and the Scyk are 'over-costed' by about 1 point each. So you are playing a 94 pt list, essentially. Its a bit of a 'handicap', but that's assuming I'm right about them being 1 point too much (I know some people would disagree with that).