I played my first store tournament in ages last weekend and decided to bring a 6-ship swarm of Scum Z-95 Headhunters all equipped with Feedback Array. I only had 6 feedback array cards and since I only have 4 Black Sun and 4 Binayre Pirate cards I decided to run four Black Suns each with FA and Hull upgrade and two Binayre Pirates with FA.

The thing I hate about swarms with low pilot skill is that it's hard to get enough damage in before higher pilot skill ships (and TLTs) rip the swarm apart. I decided that the unavoidable damage from multiple FAs (particularly since FA is a reusable upgrade) would allow me to keep some ships away from repeated range 1 attacks (denying my opponent extra attack dice) and let me force through damage on tougher ships.

I did okay considering my opponents were tournament regulars: I lost my first match when I foolishly tried to joust a pair of B-wings along with a HWK and a Y-wing both equipped with TLTs. I won my next two matches with relative ease and I "barely" lost my last two matches due to points when the clock ran out.

My favorite part of the day was seeing how opponents with fragile aces would fly crazy maneuvers (sometimes preventing them from being able to attack for multiple rounds) just to stay clear of the unavoidable damage at range 1 from my FAs. In fact, after I stripped the shields from one guy's Whisper he kept barrel rolling and making wide turns until he ultimately did a K-turn right off the board!

Granted, some of the fundamental problems with Z-95 swarms remain: I didn't have enough attack dice to do heavy damage in a single round of concentrated fire unless I got into range 1, and Z-95s aren't the most maneuverable ships. Additionally, the limited hit points on each Z-95 become an even bigger liability when I'm damaging (and ionizing) myself with FA to cause unavoidable damage to enemies.

I was surprised to see that, unlike my old TIE swarms, formation flying usually worked against me. I did better when I divided my Z-95s ... making it hard for multiple enemies to focus on more than one ship at a time and allowing me to "herd" enemies who tried to stay out of my range 1 FA.

Still, it was fun to watch enemy aces like Vader, Juno Eclipse, and Soontir Fel with 3 evade dice and evade tokens get taken off the board after 2 or 3 of my Z-95s popped FA and 1 or 2 other Z-95s landed hits with normal attacks.

I like the sound of the Feedback list better then the Dead Man Switch list I originally want to use.

Maybe combine:

4 x Black Sun Soldiers w/ Feedback Array and Hull upgrade

2 x Binary Pirates w/ Dead Man Switch

I'm afraid the time of the FA swarm have come and gone (if they were ever here). They are just too easily countered by TLTs or any of the shield regenerating pilots/upgrades. I flew against a 7 ship FA swarm with a Horn/Numb/Prototype build. Corran Horn nearly took out the hole swarm by himself. I flew him in, blasted a Z or 2... Took some feedback, then flew him out of there to repair. Rinse repeat.

I'm afraid the time of the FA swarm have come and gone (if they were ever here). They are just too easily countered by TLTs or any of the shield regenerating pilots/upgrades. I flew against a 7 ship FA swarm with a Horn/Numb/Prototype build. Corran Horn nearly took out the hole swarm by himself. I flew him in, blasted a Z or 2... Took some feedback, then flew him out of there to repair. Rinse repeat.

I guess it still depends on how both players fly each round of the match. Yes, the TLTs and B-Wings in the first match took out my entire swarm in just a couple of rounds, but that was because I was stupid and tried to joust 2 B-wings and a pair of TLT-equipped wingmen with my swarm in a tight formation during the opening rounds of that match. I won the next two matches. The fourth match (which I lost by only 2 points when the clock ran out) was against a TLT heavy squadron of Y-wings. If that match had lasted one more round I'm pretty sure I would have won.

Anyway, I'm not saying this is the ultimate squad list ... or even champion material. I'm simply saying I had fun experimenting with a Z-95 swarm loaded with multiple FAs, and I know several of my opponents were both annoyed and simultaneously appreciated the variety/fun of playing against a list that consistently forced unavoidable damage on them at range 1 and forced them to think of different attack strategies.

Variety shouldn't be considered a profanity ... particularly in a forum discussing squad lists.

Been awhile,

I used a Binary Pirate with Feedback to fill out my Dengar and Zuckuss list.

It came in handy, took out and wounded a couple of tie fighters when everyone was out of place or ready to deal some damage.