1/30 At Ease Games (AEG) Store Championship
I went to the AEG store championship in San Diego, CA. on 1/30. I live about an hour and a half away, but AEG is probably one of my favorite stores. As a side note, they hosted the 2015 Regional Championship (I finished Top 8). Leading up to the SC, I was practicing with a 6-ship Tie Swarm, but I knew there would be lots of ppl attending, and probably be 5 Swiss rounds with a Top 4 cut. I decided to change my list because I didn’t want my head to explode by the end of the day. I changed it to a 4 ship build, but kept some Ties that were in my 6 ship list. The final count ended up being 53 people with 6 Swiss rounds and a Top 8 cut.
Here’s the list I took:
Got You on Lockdown (100 pts)
(11) Darth Vader (31 pts)
- Veteran Instincts
- Title
- Advanced Targeting Computer
(8) Omega Leader (a.k.a. Lockdown) (26 pts)
- Juke
- Comm Relay
(4) Wampa (14 pts)
(2) Omicron Group Pilot (29 pts)
- Emperor Palpatine
This would be the first time I’d ever flown the list, but I’ve had practice with each of those ships. The basic premise of this list is to make your opponent pick his/her poison. Lockdown and Wampa can kill an Ace pretty quickly if left unmarked, and having Vader flanking is no walk in the park either. Palpatine is mainly used to trigger Wampa’s ability (granted it’s very hard to decide when to use Palp). My general setup was to have OGP face my deployment area (right to left as opposed to towards my opponent’s deployment), and have the 2 Ties next to him. Vader would be either on the opposite side of the board or in the middle (depending on where my opponent set up). So the first maneuver for the OGP would be a 1 straight and bump into Lockdown (0 move without the stress). The 2 Ties would stay in formation together, and Vader would go up the other side. From there, you just have to see where your opponent is going, and adjust. I will say most of my opponents went for Wampa first…
Round 1 (David)
Vader
- Predator
- Title
- ATC
- Prockets
- EU
Rear Admiral Chiraneau (RAC)
- VI
- Emperor Palpatine
- Ion Bomb
- EU
I’ve played David in other tournaments in the past. Very easy going and casual guy. Having VI Vader was key to this match up. David deploys his ships in the middle. His Vader got a 5 hit procket on Lockdown, and quickly blew up the Tie in the 2nd round of shooting. The game was an uphill battle from there, but my Vader took his Vader down and I finally was able to chase RAC down. The Ion bomb did affect some of my flying because I was chasing RAC, but when he finally dropped the bomb no one got hit. (100-26)
Round 2 (Arnold)
Super Dash
- PTL
- Kyle Katarn
- HLC
- Title
- EU
Corran Horn
- VI
- FCS
- R2D2
Dash/Corran is a match up that favors me, but HLC can drop a Tie in 1 shot. Lockdown’s ability actually works against him because HLC Crits do not change to Hits if I have Dash target locked. Arnold deploys Dash in the middle, and Corran on the opposite side of Wampa, but my Vader is across Corran. I immediately send Vader, Wampa and Lockdown towards Corran, and he sends Corran down his deployment instead of engaging. I get shots on Corran (with no return fire) and Wampa triggers his ability once. Meanwhile, Dash is focusing on taking down Palp. I manage to finish off a tokenless Horn with a Range 3 shot from Vader, but Palp blows up in return. I then concentrate the rest of my ships to hunt down Dash, and used Wampa to cause bumps rather than using him to shoot. (100-29)
Round 3 (Joe)
Poe
- VI
- R5-P9
- Autothrusters
Miranda
- TLT
Blue Novice
- R2D2
Joe is a fellow Mynock and current SoCal X-wing Champion. We call him Anakin because he’s the Chosen One (and he’s only 16). I think the counter to my list is a regen list because I lack to consistent firepower needed to take down regens (not to mention 3 regens!). Joe rolled hot, but he did fly really well. I wasn’t able to focus fire (which I should’ve done), and Miranda chewed me up with her TLTs. (0-100)
TV Timeout: Sitting at 2-1, I know I have to win out in order to make the Top 8. A 4-2 might make the cut, but it would be the 4-2 with highest MOV. It just added a little more pressure on making sure I fly my build correctly.
Back to regular scheduled programing…
Round 4 (Kristin)
RAC
- VI
- Vader
- Gunner
- EU
Whisper
- VI
- FCS
- ACD
Kristin is flying the Brad Miller 2015 Worlds build, and has another 2 HP ship that has Wampa licking his chops. Kristin flew very aggressive, and had Vader down to 1 HP after the opening round of shooting (Vader crew on Vader pilot twice!) but Wampa got his ability on Whisper. Kristin wasn’t aware that if you reach the hull HP your ship is blown up, so she was surprised when I said 1 more Wampa shot and Whisper’s dead even though Whisper still has shields left. The very next round of shooting had Vader finish off Whisper before RAC finished off Vader (with another Vader crit). Then it was a matter of chasing down RAC (already damaged with 6 self-inflicted wounds). Her last attempt to get half points on Palp fell 1 damage short thanks to a timely evade roll. (100-31)
Round 5 (David)
Vader
- Predator
- Title
- ATC
Commander Alozen
- Title
- Accuracy Corrector
2x Tempest
- Title
- Accuracy Corrector
Another match against a David, and another great guy (I think it’s something all Davids have in common). David brought 4 Advanced and 3 of them with Accuracy Correctors. Thankfully, Accuracy Correctors does not work on Lockdown, but having to evade 2 hits with every other ship can be difficult. David flew in formation going for Vader first, so Wampa and Lockdown was flanking his ships from the side. My Vader manages to survive all 4 ships firing at him, but is badly hurt, and his Vader is down to hull. Next round my Vader gets a crit-crit on his Vader (Stunned Pilot, Direct Hit). Boom, his Vader blows up before he can return fire (which was HUGE). He had to use his other ships to finish off my Vader, which left my other ships un-touched. Here’s the part that’s crazy, each of his ships suffered a Direct Hit which ended the game sooner than usual. Someone can do the math, but I’ve never seen 4 ships each take a Direct Hit. (100-31)
Official’s Timeout: Ok, 4-1, good spot to be in. One more win and I’m in, but I know everyone’s going to be in the same boat as me. There’s only 1 undefeated person after Round 5, and it’s Mynock Squadron founder Dee Yun! I hear he also runs a pretty good podcast…
Back to the action…
Round 6 (Dee Yun)
Whisper
- VI
- Kallus
- FCS
- ACD
Lockdown
- Juke
- Comm Relay
Captain Yorr
- Emperor Palpatine
Did I anger the X-Wing gods somehow? Out of all the possible match-ups I get to play Dee for the make-or-break game. Dee and I go way back, and we constantly have epic matches. This was a back and forth match with lots of positioning and anticipating. He knows to try to take out Wampa first, while trying to avoid Vader while uncloaked. Honestly, I should’ve recorded this match because it was probably the best game I played all day. In the end, I was able to pull out the victory (100-28).
I finish #4 after Swiss, and no 4-2 made the top cut. The #8 was 5-1 with 1 mod win (23 pts)
Top 8 (Jay)
Whisper
- VI
- FCS
- Kallus
- ACD
Oicunn
- Predator
- Mara Jade
- Emperor Palpatine
- Ion Projector
Jay is a new Mynock initiate, and has been playing for about a year. This build is scary good because Oicunn can force bump an enemy off the board, and that ship will never be able to run or shoot back. Basically, Oicunn bumps (1 damage) and if that ship bumps back it triggers Ion Projector. Jay rolls 1 die to see if Ion Projector hits, but can also use Palpatine to guarantee it hits. Once ion’d, that ship will never be able to move away from Oicunn if Oicunn keeps going 1 straight. Death by bumping…
Jay set up Oicunn in the middle and Whisper across from Wampa, Lockdown, and Palpmobile. He wanted to eliminate Wampa as quick as possible, and he was able to get both ships to shoot Wampa in the opening salvo, but Wampa lived and triggered his ability (via Palp) on Whisper. The next round was the key round because Jay had the opportunity to barrel roll Whisper out of Wampa’s arc, but instead took a focus action to try to kill him. Fortunately, Wampa lived and triggered his ability again (via Palp) to destroy Whisper. At this point, Oicunn had Lockdown in his “bump and grind” so Lockdown was effectively dead in 3 more turns. However, I was able to create my own fortress with my Palp bumping Wampa, Wampa bumping Palp, and Vader bumping Palp all right next to Oicunn. With 3 more rounds of “no movement”, I was able to use Vader and Wampa to take down Oicunn. (100-0)
Top 4 (Ryan)
Whisper
- VI
- FCS
- Kallus
- ACD
Lockdown
- Juke
- Comm Relay
- Stealth Device
OGP
- Emperor Palpatine
At this point, the Top 4 consisted of all Mynock Squadron pilots (Dee Yun, Ryan Farmer, Brandon Cating, and myself). Ryan is the other half of the Mynock Podcast, and the Yin to Dee’s Yang. I admit that the long day finally took its toll on me. Ryan placed Palp in the middle and Whisper/Lockdown opposite from my entire fleet. I took the bait and went all out for his Palp. I probably should turned into face Whisper, but I wanted to remove Palp as soon as possible. Ryan played it really well, and he had some timely rolls to take out Wampa fairly early. It was pretty one sided after that since my ships were out of position, and I didn’t kill his Palpatine fast enough. I forgot to trigger Palpatine’s ability which would’ve saved himself, but at that point the game was pretty much over. (29-100)
I learned a lot about this list, and I'll probably stick with it until Wave 8 comes out.
Epilogue: 13 hours later, my day ended. But I stayed around to watch Ryan take on Brandon in the finals. Brandon flew the silver bullet to Ryan's list (PS11 Fat Han and PS10 Poe) and the game was over in 35 minutes.
Edited by Deltmi