Triple ISD?

By LazerJamez, in Star Wars: Armada Fleet Builds

I didn't think of it as viable for a while, but there might actually be enough raw power there to work.

Motti's Wedge

399/400

Admiral Motti

3xISD-I

Leading Shots

Tractor Beams

Quad Laser Turrets

QTLs to help with bombers. Tractor beams to slow things down and keep them in range.

Obvious weakness is bomber wings. And $$, haha. But 44 hull pts is a lot to cut through.

I didn't think of it as viable for a while, but there might actually be enough raw power there to work.

Motti's Wedge

399/400

Admiral Motti

3xISD-I

Leading Shots

Tractor Beams

Quad Laser Turrets

QTLs to help with bombers. Tractor beams to slow things down and keep them in range.

Obvious weakness is bomber wings. And $$, haha. But 44 hull pts is a lot to cut through.

I wish you well if you try this, it sounds like a hoot, and your chucking dice for days.

It would probably be alot of fun and I would be curious to see how it performs

I didn't think of it as viable for a while, but there might actually be enough raw power there to work.

Motti's Wedge

399/400

Admiral Motti

3xISD-I

Leading Shots

Tractor Beams

Quad Laser Turrets

QTLs to help with bombers. Tractor beams to slow things down and keep them in range.

Obvious weakness is bomber wings. And $$, haha. But 44 hull pts is a lot to cut through.

42 hull to be exact :)

You'll have a problem with any kind of bomber setup, especially against anything with Rhymer in it - it will attack from beyond range 1, making your black AS dice worthless and your QLTs ineffective. Given how popular the "Fireball" is right now, that's a huge problem there. Vs. rebel bombers you'll have trouble with anything shooting multiples of blue+black against you. Killing Angry Bees or Silly Bombers takes time.

You could add in a few fighters.

With three naked ISDs and motti you can squeeze in 46 points of squadrons. Thats 4 interceptors which is actually not that bad for a small fighter screen.

Hmmm good point. I think I'm gonna do this. Small fighter screen would help some. Going to a gaming event in beginning of Feb and will try it there. I will report back on this silliness next month. Thanks everyone!

I ran this of sorts Wednesday. It's disgustingly brutal and did surprisingly well. My build was a lil different

3x isd with motti naked (the ships..not motti) :)

3 ties and an interceptor

11 pt bid for first

Drove them abreast right at a mc30 / corvette/ yavaris build. Spammed nav commands. Used my ties to create disparate engagement bubbles to lock down his yavaris squadrons supported by a hawk. Sprayed anti squadron dice from the isds and drove right for slow poke yavaris.

Blasted past his mc30s and absorbed the damage. Plowed into the fighters and killed them all with mine and ships. Killed yavaris and then "turned and burned" away from the returning mc30s

14 hull per and 7-10ish shields to get thru is disgusting. Even with double arcs from multiple ships it's hard to bring one down. In ONE of my ships I had as much hull as almost all his fleet. ;) .

I am considering dropping the interceptor and grabbing two upgrades - 2 counter battery ;) . Isds wreck masses of fighters. I had three spraying multi arcs and wiping out squadron hull points left and right :)

Fun list and surprisingly good

Awesome. So the ties essentially held the fighters in place so you could get in range.

I wonder what would be better, a handful of TIEs, or IG-88 with Dengar. I was thinking they could just zoom in and nuke Rhymer or other threatening heroes with IG-88's ability to ignore escort, and Dengar's Intel. Plus IG-88 would have counter 3...

I think cheap and more works. It's pretty simple to lock down bombers with several cheap squadrons if they only have one intel ship. The expensive ones would get one shot and likely wiped as they are overwhelmed.

I could've done better but didn't figure out how to lock them down until he thwacked an isd with double tap bwings.

Essentially you split the Intel ship on max distance engagement. That way one of your ships WILL be engaging his bombers whichever way the Intel ship goes. It's surprisingly easy once you figure out the geometry. It will definitely mean people will need to start to bring two Intel ships....

The Fireball will burn this list down pretty quickly, but if you draw the right straw I can see it being really powerful against certain builds. No ship can outrun these many ISDs with beams.

Ah, I see. So my squads would want to be spaced at max engage distance the whole game, I imagine. That way he can't use his ability on more than one TIE at a time.

So how did you array the ISD's? Close to one another, or spread out?

Hero - heh... Not really. Four fighters can easily hold up a fireball. Especially with just one intel ship. Not hard at all. A couple shots from a fire spray or two will not even phase a motti isd. ;) . Try it....

Exactly Lazer. Spread out to use their engagement of enemy bombers...not trying to be the damage dealers. The isd blaze out anti squadron dice.

The isd were abreast but then changed speed to echelon left to right slowing down. Far left speed 3 then 2 then one on the right. Motti took the safe far left hugging the board edge.

The intent is not to wipe the board or kill everything. But rather to vomit death on squadrons passing thru their ship picket. Aim for their rear slow support ship. Kill it, then move out round five and six.

The isds can survive the pass thru....kill a ship and squadrons and you walk away at 100+ points to maybe a couple ties lost (I lost an isd but made up for it with the outpost capture). You win the match in the 8 ish range....

It's about balancing the mov in yer favor by not losing capital ships. Even killing half the opponents fighters pits you in the win bracket

I dont know how I feel about this list. . . You have to get in really close to do the same level of damage that an ISD2 can deal and you will only have 2 blue dice for leading shots to play off of. . .

Hero - heh... Not really. Four fighters can easily hold up a fireball. Especially with just one intel ship. Not hard at all. A couple shots from a fire spray or two will not even phase a motti isd. ;) . Try it....

I have tried it, and utterly destroy people. 4 fighters, unless they're packing like 5+ HP with Jan or 6 HP YTs, do not hold up a Fireball unless the person piloting it is brain dead or doesn't have squadron commands on his dial.

Heheh.... Clearly you have spoken ;)

Well im an ISD short to try this. Ill have to use 1 VSD instead.. IIV opens up alot of upgrade options though.

Me too, oddeye. I like the idea of flying them in a line and marching them through a turn. You could always put the VSD in the middle to protect its flanks. Just leave it at speed 2. I might consider still running them pretty naked and getting more squad fodder.

Also, totally gonna paint one of the ISDs black and call it the Anakin Solo.

To be honest I think I would be more worried about duel ISD II well kitted out with good support. I tend to run fast, ship focused ( high activation) high damage output rebel fleets. I would be hoping ( spamming nav) to focus on one side of you fleet, use activation advantage to take down one ISD and leg it.

I ran a similar triple ISD list at a tournament. It has a huge amount of firepower but really struggles against Home One Akbar lists. The denial of the brace token without an ECM upgrade to answer quickly evened the odds. I am now more in favour of the ISD2 with upgrades after playing the list.

Saying that though it was a really fun list to run

The other day at the store champion we had two different triple ISD fleets. It was interesting watching them go at each other. One with three I's and some fighters, the other with three II's. It came down in the end to less than a single Tie (5pts) between them.