Rieekan: is blowing yourself up worth it?

By Blail Blerg, in Star Wars: Armada

So. How's everyone liking rieekan? I'm having trouble wanting to play him because it feels like you have die to win. And I like to win. By a lot.

Is rieekan worth it? If you're killed after you've activated really rieekan adds very little value to you.

In contrast let's say you use the ability twice: you gain what 5 dice off a CR90 double or mc30 single arc. And let's say you do get a double arc from another mc30. Well. Okay actually that might be worth it. Something like 12 dice there for 30 points. However it is also at the cost of having around 120 points of your list die. I don't think you can get better than like 8-2 with the new scoring system with that.

Anyone used the names fighter competitively with rieekan? Any really useful applications?

Also side question: your best double mc30 builds? With or without rieekan.

Oh. And what objectives and first or second? What squadrons? How many?

I think that the key to reiken is using his ability to make difficult decisions for your opponent.

For example:

Ship A has 2 hull left at the beginning of a turn and Ship B has full health. You place both in front of an ISD. Ship A will die to the ISD, but will still shoot back. Ship B might not die to the ISD. Which does the opponent shoot? Waste the full frontal of the ISD on a 2 hull ship? If the ship survives, it will have another turn of survival on just 2 hull.

In other words, it plays mind games. It makes the opponent think about NOT killing your ship that is almost dead. Do things to make them want to shoot at ships with lots of hull.

Unique X-Wings.

Very quickly annoy the hell out of an enemy set of squadrons that way to kill your much-more-important stuff.

I think it should not be used as a sacrificial ability, but more as a "if they die, at least they'll get a shot off" to field large number of support ships (close range with no/low red dice). Usually, you are limited to 1 support ship and having the initiative to make its attack run efficient, then zooming away.

With Riekaan, you can afford to have the initiative, and throwing a second support ship in the fray : the first one does its job then moves away, the second one gets killed but still gets its ability off. Think, for example, of a CR90B with Overload Pulse followed up by a Torpedo Frigate with Rapid Reload and Ordnance Experts, Admonition. Activate the 90B first, burn past the enemy, then have the Torpedo tank the shots as much as it can. If it survives, it can finish up its job and move onto another target. If it dies, well it dies but at least it's going to do its current job. In any case, you'll leave an enemy ship with no defense tokens, probably no shields either, meaning an easy picking for the rest of your fleet.

It's better if it survives and dies on the second target on which you do that trick !

The goal with Riekaan isn't really to let them die, but it's more that they can ensure they support role if they do, at least for the remaining turn.

_______

Regarding the names squadrons, I feel that Riekaan favours more squadrons that are designed to fighter other squadrons, or tie them up long enough. That's because squadrons are, I feel, the most dangerous environment for other squadrons to die, simply due to the large amount of dice they can throw.

In this case, I would say Wedge, Dutch, Dash Rendar, Solo when you're playing him as a Rogue waiting for the enemy to come before you attack. They have the tankiness not to die right off the bat, but they'll benefit more from not dying until they can do their effect.

_______

In terms of initiative, I think that you need to have it with Riekaan just by the amount of support ships you can field it, which allow to make 2 support ships activate (as I've described at the beginning), rather than 1 (because if you don't have the initiative, it will activate even if dead).

Used to like Riekken a lot until they changed the game continues after all ships are destroyed instead of immediately

I think that the key to reiken is using his ability to make difficult decisions for your opponent.

For example:

Ship A has 2 hull left at the beginning of a turn and Ship B has full health. You place both in front of an ISD. Ship A will die to the ISD, but will still shoot back. Ship B might not die to the ISD. Which does the opponent shoot? Waste the full frontal of the ISD on a 2 hull ship? If the ship survives, it will have another turn of survival on just 2 hull.

In other words, it plays mind games. It makes the opponent think about NOT killing your ship that is almost dead. Do things to make them want to shoot at ships with lots of hull.

The most troubling question of this example of course is "Why doesn't the ISD have gunnery teams?"

Used to like Riekken a lot until they changed the game continues after all ships are destroyed instead of immediately

All your ships died. You don't get to declare unilateral victory. Not yours.

Rieekan seems to have the same mindset that Vader does, specifically: Get in there and do as much damage as you can and hope you can win before the enemy does. Vader does this by maximizing firepower, so you can assuredly kill things before you get shot at and die. Rieekan does this by trying to take as many ships with you for the span of the entire turn, creating dead ships not shot at but can still take ships with them.

Not only can zombie Rieekan ships stay put and still shoot, but they also count for the purposes of collisions and blocking movement. So super-sacrificial MC30s can chuck as many of their defense tokens and the like as possible knowing they are still going to be in a guaranteed position to shoot or serve as obstructions when the enemy does.

I've run Rieekan once, and I didn't win the match only because I didn't suicide kamikazie the MC30s like I should have. I wasn't paying attention to his ability.

The Zombie Lord gives you the confidence that, you will survive to shoot. Your enemy has no such luxury.
I should imagine that a tricked out MC30 could take out an ISD in two turns, it just needs to close in knowing it will get that second turn.

i used reeiken in this list, because it gives your named squads more time in the field, and because you will normally loose one MC80, it lets you activate them in the optimal order instead of the one thats about to die, as this list would rather be 2nd player

Suiciding a ship just to use his ability is bad IMO, unless your using a corvet B to road block a big ship for some serious beatdown

spitroast

Author: talism

Faction: Rebel Alliance
Points: 398/400

Commander: General Rieekan

Assault Objective: Advanced Gunnery
Defense Objective: Fire Lanes
Navigation Objective: Intel Sweep

[ flagship ] MC80 Command Cruiser (106 points)
- General Rieekan ( 30 points)
- Boosted Comms ( 4 points)
- Electronic Countermeasures ( 7 points)

MC80 Command Cruiser (106 points)
- Independence ( 8 points)
- Adar Tallon ( 10 points)
- Boosted Comms ( 4 points)
- Electronic Countermeasures ( 7 points)

1 Keyan Farlander ( 20 points)
1 B-Wing Squadron ( 14 points)
2 X-Wing Squadrons ( 26 points)
1 "Dutch" Vander ( 16 points)
1 Jan Ors ( 19 points)
1 Nym ( 21 points)