I went to my first store championship yesterday and placed 4th with a Victory list. Each game taught me more about the game, but I found myself wanting more out of my fleet. I wanted to move faster and work the flanks, because outside of the front arcs star destroyers tend to suffer badly. A friend suggested I try my hand at the rebels and after looking at my sorry neglected alliance fleet...I may take him up on that offer (plus the local meta is imperial heavy!)

So right now I'm sitting on the core set, a nebulon b blister, the dreaded (for me at least) Assault Frigate MK 2, MC80 Home One, and 2 fighter squadron packs.

Considering a cool stuff order to grab another CR90, fighter squadron (sucker for the a-wings), and the shrimp....plus I need more dice.

What I want to know is what people think of the rebels, how do they work in the current meta..tactics that work (outside of the calamari conga line...)

I can't give you meta advice. Your meta is different than my own.

When playing Rebels, I find that each style of build can work but it all depends on the pilot. Skill will be needed by you to bring out the best of each ship.

Experience will be your best bet on what tactics, objectives, speeds, etc to use against each different list.

The rebels are really flexible with the ships they have and what they can do with them. While there is that danger of building a list that is too watered down with everything, everything that the rebels have can be built into some kind of list or another. It also helps that the Rebels have one more ship than the Empire does.

The Assault frigate is the most flexible craft the Rebels have, for starters. It can be built into a gunship or a carrier and work well in either role. It's a decently priced medium with a lot of flexibility. You can use it as the center, mainstay, or entirety of a rebel list and it will work really well. Any Admiral you take can also benefit this ship.

The trickiest ship to use for the Rebels might be the Nebulon-B because of those really vulnerable side-arcs, but as long as you're not treating your Nebulon like a MC30 and charging into danger, it'll work just fine. Nebulons are best either as long-range snipers or (In the case of Yavaris or Salvation) traveling with friends, so that they don't draw the entire attention of your opponent.

I was considering a rebel build with an MC80, Assault Frigate and a Nebulon Salvation with Leia to dish out commands the other ships need...

Oh yeah and A-wings...

I like the AF more than the MC80. But you can build a fleet with those ships that will work. The worst part of it will be learning how to run the Neb B and dealing with two ships limited by single arc shots.

You probably could run the MC80 as a carrier or something.

I was considering a rebel build with an MC80, Assault Frigate and a Nebulon Salvation with Leia to dish out commands the other ships need...

Oh yeah and A-wings...

Drop the Ruthless strategist and switch Y's for A's and you are good to go:

Command MC80 (150)

Dodonna

Boosted Comms

ECM

Engine Tech

Defiance

AF MK II A (98)

Ruthless Strategists

ECM

Phylon Tractor Beams

CR90B (49)

Raymus

Taintive

10x YWings

Rebels are awesome ! They work the best when spreading the force around, while Imperials want to concentrate it. All ships are pretty good !

Regarding your comment about the AFMK2 : don't build it either as a gunship or a carrier. Both variants do both, with the big changes being the range of engagements (the AFMK2 A wants to be in medium range a tad more than the AFMK2 B but not by much) and what you use your fighters for (the AFMK2 B wants to send the fighters in front and use Sq 3 to deal damage to enemy fighters and ships, while the AFMK2 A will be a tad faster and probably keep the fighters closer for interception and damage support against ships).

In terms of upgrades, I never engage an AFMK2 without ECM. The Brace is just so valuable because you want to keep your shields alive so your hull doesn't melt down (consider that you have twice as many shield points as hull points). For the A, the next mandatory upgrade for me is Gunnery Team so I don't have to choose between anti-ship and anti-squadron in its generous side arc.

Regarding the titles, I like the Gallant Haven on an A variant because I kind of want it in the middle of the fight with a low amount of very damaging and very tanky aces. I like flying it with Wedge and Farlander as escorts with Adar Tallon on board of it and they will present a serious threat to any interception force, and between the Gallant Haven and a double Brace, they will not die.

Imagine a TIE Interceptor boosted by Howlrunner and Flight Controllers throwing 6 dice, with a decent roll of 4 damage after Swarms (not outside the realm of possibilities). Braced down to 2, taking only 1 damage thanks to Gallant Haven. 4 of them are not going to kill Wedge, and that's assuming a very decent build with a dedicated anti-fighter force. That's how good the Gallant Haven is Regular squadrons stand no chance unless they have auto-damage. It's a bit on the pricey side, but it does its job, especially when you can double tap wedge's attack and throw a comfortable 2 blue dice AS barrage : things are going to melt.

For Paragon, I like to have it on a B variant because it also happens at long range and it's much easier I found to set up double arcs at long range with the way the MK2 arcs are defined. Plus, you're already throwing 3 fighters worth of damage every turn, adding and extra black dice means you'll be throwing roughly 9 anti-ship dice at your target down range. Baby's got teeth !

One ship that I don't see often anymore but that I find absolutely awesome is the humble Neb B. I like to look at it as the longer range variant of the Gladiator. Wait, how can I compare both ? Well, outside of the dice they throw, they have similar profiles : same arc types, similar maneuvers, same hull, similar shields, similar defense tokens (except the redirect on the Glad affords it to go in close), similar upgrade slots, similar command, squadron and engineering values. Except the Neb absolutely wants to stay at range and the Glad wants to get in close. But both have decent tank and crazy damage in their comfort zone.

Example : Salvation with Slaved Turrets is downright mad damage dealing when you throw a CF command with 5 red dice each averaging 1 damage each but with more chances to do a double damage than a single one... at long range. This ship puts ISDs to shame when it comes to long range firepower and with an Intel Officer you're pretty sure to be able to melt down the shield zone you want.

The Escort Frigate is great to manage a small elite fighter/bomber wing. I like Yavaris but I don't find it particularily useful when it comes to attacking ships early game. Where it shines though is if your fighters are intercepted, that small little ship allows X-Wings to throw 8 blue dice in 2 attacks, followed up by an anti-fighter barrage. I've seen it clear quite a few TIE fighters and even other rebel ships. The trick is to engage the enemy squadrons in the squadron phase, and make sure that your list has a very threatening bearing on anything that isn't the enemy carrier, so you can kill that ship if it doesn't activate.