"The other problem is that it requires investment. Youngster is essentially a support unit, as is howlrunner. Take both of them with elite pilot talents and you're talking 40 points. Spending 40% of your squad on support units rather than primary fighters doesn't seem a great plan - even the Emperor in his shuttle is only 30% - because no matter how well supported, you're then fighting a 100 point squad with a 60 point squad, even if the latter has some free bonuses."

This is simply not true. Howlrunner and Youngster aren't support ships their EPTs may qualify as "support" but Howl is still a PS8 TIE and as such is likely worth at least 16-17 pts simply based on ship and PS. Your "waste" would be 1-2 pts for unique pilot ability plus EPT (if used). Same with Youngster but with him you are getting his unique skill basically for free since a Black TIE at PS4 is 14 pts and Youngster is 15 pts. His "waste" would be the 4 pts for Expose. Not much of the actual value of Howl and Youngster is support.

TIE Fighters are wastes of points without Crackshot. So yes, Youngster with Expose is a waste of 19 points. This is no longer wave 3, if you waste 19 points on Youngster with Expose (even after Rage has been released! At least you can field 8 TIEs with Rage Youngster) you will automatically lose against Palp Aces flown by a non-idiot.

You want to know a half decent squad with Expose in it? 5x Autothruster Alpha Squadron Interceptor. I get 3 attack dice and I get to actually modifiy them. And that's still not enough to punch through Palp Aces.

PGS you miss the point, again, as usual. This thread isn't, how to make TIE swarm list tier 1 that's an auto win vs Palp Aces. The point is which EPT is best for Youngster (if any). And making loud mouth dumb statements like, "auto lose against Palp Aces flown by a non-idiot" just causes you to lose credibility. Furthermore you can run 5 Cracshot TIEs with Expose Youngster. Youngster and Howlrunner are not mutually exclusive with Crack TIEs.

True, but you can still break locks from 'generic' bombers, or 'opportunistic' locks by someone out of arc setting up a shot for next turn.

No, it's not that great; against a high PS opponent it'll just make them spend an action to reacquire the lock.

But on the other hand, you're only paying 5 points to give your entire squad the ability.

Problem is that expert handling is really paying a lot for little value.

... Are my copies of expert handling wrong? Mine say two points... Which doesn't seem like "paying a lot", and definitely isn't "paying 5 points" (Unless you're comparing a PS6 EPT carrying TIE fighter to an Academy...).

Don't get me wrong, I've yet to find a proper use for youngster with the available Action:EPTs (and I really, really want to), but these two posts have confused me.

Has anyone tried Rage on youngster?

Seems like that could give a swarm more teeth for an initial engagement. Maybe with Black Crack/Epsilon Leader, or with just a bunch of Academy's?

Youngster with Rage + 7 Academy's = 100 pts

or

97 pts

Youngster with Rage

Epsilon Leader with Weapons Guidance

Black Crack X 4

I haven't flown that list in a while. I may tweak it a bit and try flying it again. I have quite a few more games under my belt now, but flying a TIE swarm is grueling work, especially in a tournament setting. Marksmanship is very situational at best, but can come in handy at a critical moment.

Crazy theory:

The Snap Shot card in Heroes says something like

Action: Perform an attack. If you do so, skip your perform attack step in the Combat Phase.

Attack as soon as you get into position, before aces get to dodge you. For best results, pair with experimental Interface so that you can take an action first and modify the attack.

Experimental Interface is unique.

There is also the question about where the upgrade the EI would activate can be located. I believe it needs to be on the ship using EI which Youngster does NOT provide even if it provides access to the Action on HIS upgrade card.

Since it came out, I've used Rage quite a lot. Youngster with Rage definitely does work.

Essentially, if you'd have considered flying eight TIE fighters, you now have two options - either you can upgrade four to Obsidian Squadron Pilots (giving you PS3 for half the squad) or you can upgrade one to Youngster with Rage.

Either way you have the same number of ships, but with Youngster you have the reroll/focus option in your back pocket. Don't use it on every TIE at every opportunity, but if you use it two or three times in the entire game it's probably paid for itself - you are not (unlike Howlrunner) getting less TIE fighters as a result of fielding him.

Essentially, there are two proper TIE fighter 'swarms' which work well in my experience.

Crack Shot/Howlrunner based swarms work well because they have a decent PS and insane firepower in a head-on joust. However, most of that firepower is tied up in the 'combo' of Howlrunner's reroll and Crack Shot - once expended, a TIE fighter is just a TIE fighter, and you have two less than an academy pilot eight-ship swarm. Equally, Howrunner needs to still be alive at the point the other TIE fires to give any benefit (which is why I'd never use her with academy pilots), and tends to confetti during the first pass.

Rage/Youngster swarms have lower PS, but two extra ships to make up for it. And whilst triggering Rage causes problems in the following turn, because it's an action, killing Youngster at PS7+ (not at all impossible for 2-3 aces ganging up) doesn't take the benefit away from the squad.

Other than that.... TIE fighters are useful, but most of the other named TIE fighters work as solo ships or supporting pairs as 'filler' in a squad. TIE fighters are great to slot in with 'spare' points because you can often get two named TIE fighters instead of a single 'normal' ace, and many of them can cause your opponent huge amounts of stress - from Dark Curse (who can absorb an ungodly amount of fire for a 16 point ship) to Wampa, who turns Palpatine from annoying to terrifying against a lot of opponents.

Hell, even Night Beast and Chaser can form an effective tag team for not many points.

I would consider expose or marksmanship on Youngster, but not in a normal game. In an Epic game, it's a different kettle of fish; marksmanship on a 12-ship TIE fighter squadron for 1/4 of a point per ship is definitely a very affordable buy, and when you've got <100 points of TIE fighters to support, buying Howlrunner and Youngster as support craft becomes affordable.

A squad of 10 Black Squadron Pilots with Crack Shot, Howlrunner and Marksmanship Youngster is something terrifying to behold and nigh impossible to live in front of.

Has anyone tried Rage on youngster?

Seems like that could give a swarm more teeth for an initial engagement. Maybe with Black Crack/Epsilon Leader, or with just a bunch of Academy's?

Youngster with Rage + 7 Academy's = 100 pts

or

97 pts

Youngster with Rage

Epsilon Leader with Weapons Guidance

Black Crack X 4

The Youngster Rage list is pretty **** bad. You're double-stressing your TIEs. And on top of that, you're tethering your entire swarm to not one ship like with Howlrunner, but to two ships. And then you rage, pull a stress off with epsilon...and then your opponent knows exactly where you're going if you want to take actions.

It makes your list highly predictable for little actual gain.

Youngster plus academies isn't actually a 'tether' - range 1-3 means you can afford to 'fly loose', and it works well. The problem is that people insist on:

a) trying to use it with the entire swarm (messing with your ability to fly and fight effectively the next turn) ,

b) trying to mitigate the stress with Epsilon leader (which undoes all the good work of having a range 1-3 'chain' with Youngster)

c) trying to use it with elite pilots who have the pilot skill to pair better with howlrunner.

Youngster with rage is not a powerful ability, not because it's not good, but because you don't use it very often.

If you have a range 1 shot, take it.

If you know a TIE is going to be stressed to hell from R3-A2 or tacticians, you're never getting actions again anyway.

If you can see immediately that one TIE in particular is about to be shot to hell and die, he might as well have a better chance of taking someone with him.

Any other time....just focus. If you never use Youngster's ability, it's not that big a deal. He's only a 4-point upgrade on an academy pilot, including making him PS5.

You've still got as many TIE fighters as you could possibly have in a squad and the advantage those numbers bring you; you're really not losing anything by including him. All it costs you is the PS3 of four obsidian pilots of the other classic 8-ship squad (4 academy pilots/4 obsidian pilots), and that can be a downside as often as an advantage - forcing a specific movement order to ships in a swarm and still not being a high enough PS to shoot before the better generic pilots.

While it doesn't work with his Ability, the best EPT for him at this time, is, wait for it..

Crack Shot.

Boom, there it is.

Crazy theory:

The Snap Shot card in Heroes says something like

Action: Perform an attack. If you do so, skip your perform attack step in the Combat Phase.

Attack as soon as you get into position, before aces get to dodge you. For best results, pair with experimental Interface so that you can take an action first and modify the attack.

Experimental Interface is unique.

There is also the question about where the upgrade the EI would activate can be located. I believe it needs to be on the ship using EI which Youngster does NOT provide even if it provides access to the Action on HIS upgrade card.

Oh I know. But your most powerful ship can equip it and become more beastly.

Also, crazy off the wall theory. Might be a bit too powerful lol.

No mention of rage? Have the entire flight suffer an anyurism from sheer anger!