My scum flight:
Opposing Rebel flight:
This is my first time writing something like this but I felt like I should after the match. This was my first test run with my painted Kihiraxz pair and my YV-666. After toying around with some ideas I decided to go with two generic PS 5 fighters and Bossk, cause Bossk. My opponent brought in his very solid Dash and Poe list, loaded up with the works. I had seen builds like it in the store a couple weeks ago and it was alarmingly scary, I even fought one like it twice in a league series. Mean stuff.
My opponent deployed his ships together in the back left corner, Dash being farther to the edge and Poe being more towards the middle. I set up my two fighters back in my middle and slightly to the right, both of them sitting about three fourths of a base apart from each other. Bossk was in the back right corner facing straight ahead. We both started with some slow rolling forward, both my fighters going forward two and Bossk going one to try to keep things even. He did the same with his stuff.
Next turn we started picking up the pace, it was either here or the round after that when we inched into firing position. My fighters were about in the middle of the board when Dash and Poe swooped in. I anticipated that this would be the turn when Bossk would be needed, so he curved around an asteroid with one of his turns to get into position. No one could focus fire on anyone. Only Dash and a single fighter were in range to shoot one another. Poe was out of the fight by a quarter of an inch and Bossk was at least two small bases away from being able to shoot Poe. Dash took a shot at the Kihraxz with the HLC, but because he spent both his actions on repositioning he didn’t have a target lock to fix his blanks. He got a single hit through on my fighter, and I think I did about the same to him.
Now it gets messy. My fighters are pretty much in the thick of it facing a Dash and a Poe and Bossk is nearly out of position. My leftmost and closest fighter to Dash does a hard one turn, and the one next to him does a two bank. I am hoping that I am going to be able to split my arcs and get a shot in on Dash at range one if I get lucky. Dash moves into position, but the closest fighter is inside the donut hole. I have a shot at him with both fighters so I am feeling pretty happy. But then I am not sure what to make of this, or what my opponent thought I was going to do. I think he figured I was going to try to K turn maybe, because Poe takes a right talon roll and lands right next to Poe facing away from my fighters. Stressed, Poe can’t use his ability and turns into a sitting duck. Bossk swoops in and gets a position overlooking the fight, using his green to lock onto Poe and focusing as his action. I activate both glitterstims.
Bossk shoots first with his high PS. He manages to knock two shields off Poe with his first shot, the autothrusters stopped the full damage from going through. Poe can’t shoot facing away from the fight, but Dash fires, the Kihraxz farthest from him dodges the attack. I decide to direct both my Kihraxz fighters at Poe instead of at Dash, Poe has R2-D2 and I know he is going to be a problem if he gets away. Both fighters rip through him with the help of glitterstim, rolling a lot of crits and eyes on each of them somehow. Crackshot is not needed. Poe explodes,
Ok so now we have a Dash looking pretty mad that we just dusted his ace escort. But I figure his movements are limited, he is stressed, and he is stuck with two fighters in front of him and to his left kinda. Both my fighters are stressed too. Instead of trying to clear it I decide to try to block him. My first fighter does a hard turn to park a few spaces in front of Dash, while my other does a two forward to clear the stress and just crash into Dash. Dash tries to move and somehow barely manages to fit between my forward Kihraxz and an asteroid. I dunno how my opponent judged that move but he deserves some credit for flying like that. Unfortunately for him I don’t think he cleared the stress here, otherwise he would have moved again. Bossk does his zero speed stop.
Bossk fires first, and a crit lands on Dash, Bossk doubles it to two hits and blasts his shields more. Dash is mad now. He fires at the only Kihraxz he has a shot on and the HLC rolls hits all over the place. The Kihraxz only rolls one evade and he is now down to one HP. The Kihraxz fires back and Dash loses his shields.
I know Dash is getting out of the jam next turn, but I don’t know where he is going to go just yet. We are inching towards the board edge now too, the left one closest to me. I move my unhurt fighter just a bit with a turn towards my right, hoping to block him again. The injured one does a bank towards the right side of the board as well, hoping to get at least one ship with a shot on Dash. Dash moves, swooping down and to the right, boosting and barrel rolling to get a shot ( I think at least, his moves at this point are slipping my mind ) Bossk comes in from up top, moving over an asteroid with his hard three to get a shot. Bossk fires, landing only one hit I think. He has been at range three of the combat every round of shooting so far. Dash tries to finish off the Kihraxz but his dice only yield him two results, which are somehow dodged. The damaged Kihrax fires back and pops crackshot, taking Dash down to three hull with some crits on him. The last fighter fires at Dash from range one and rolls all hits and eyeballs, which are focused up to four hits. Dash rolls an evade and spends his focus to get two evades. Used crackshot, Dash dies.
I the end result of the match was from a lot of luck, some good positioning, and a couple mistakes on his part, but it was an exciting match for sure. If Poe had survived that initial volley, or if he had been in range for the first engagement I think I would have lost. I think a weakness here is that I had to rely on my fighters for blocking Dash, but I wasn’t sure how else to deal with him. Thankfully the Kihraxz and their damage output were able to pull their weight with glitterstim and crackshot, I am sure if Bossk had been a target he wouldn’t have lasted against Dash. I guess the fighters were a juicier target, threatening that donut hole with four red dice crackshots?
I will switch Tactician out of this; he never had a chance to activate. Mercenary co-pilot is my next choice because Bossk was just at range three all the time. Would make him a good sniper.
