In short; it doesn't have the 1-forward.

And it lacks post dial movement. So.... it not only has the same problems the X-wing has but it also does not have a 1 forward.

As others have said; it's not a bad ship, but there are better options available.

The 1 turns seem to be a fair trade for the 1 straight.

But the illicit instead of an agromech is not...

As more illicits are released, I think that they will be. Cloaking Device on Talonbane looks very promising.

I won a 40+ person store championship with 2 kihraxz black sun aces, toting glitterstim, crackshot, and shield upgrade, alongside 3 black sun soldiers. I went 7-1, and beat all sorts of lists. The only list I lost to was Chirpy and Fel, but I flew 2 ships off the board. The only archetype list I did not face was Brobots. The Aces flew awesome and blasted all competition.

In a mostly generic environment it's genericness is fine... in a non-generic environment it doesn't compare well.

I still believe it to be about 2pts overcosted (same as Scyk) and just like the Scyk (a little better off since it still has title options) it lacks any upgrades to bring it up to useful.

I have run Cobra and Graz with Serrisu and the extra defenses there work but against crafty arc dodgers you just can't keep pace. I'm sure there will be a title fix (hopefully for both special K and Scyk) and some better illicits to fill it out. They also work well in epic and in 25-50pt games; 100pts just isn't their thing.

Astromech slot would have been nice. I could have been a bigger fan of these guys at 22 points with R4 Agromechs....maybe. Maybe native roll or one more HP or something. They're not the worst, but they're just missing that little something special.

If I have a Scum list that ends up with around 20 points remaining, I typically sigh heavily and try to think of ways to free up 4 points for a TLT, rather than gratefully plug in the K-Fighter. I think that speaks volumes (and not just about my poor piloting skill...although, also that).

The Kihiraxz is honestly one of my favorite ships so far. It's not like amazing but I like their damage potential, especially out of the gate. Two black sun aces with crackshot and glitterstim are able to get a nice amount of work done in the first and second rounds of shooting, especially if you go in with a target lock. In a store tournament I plucked the other guy's aces off the board from range 3 at round 2 of the game with that, but eh, a few good experiences on my part and the joy I get from flying the ship are not going to sell anyone on the fighter. I just like them regardless.

I've flown the Kihraxz quite a bit, I ended up buying three and I wouldn't mind a fourth.

The dial is great, I don't care if it doesn't have the 1 straight, I have flown plenty of Ties so I am used to it. Further more, with the 1 banks you can still go slow by weaving like a race car warming up it's tires. It does have a 1 hard which is a great maneuver to have and it has two k-turns so you actually have an option of where you end up when you turn around.

They do feel a little flimsy in play. The most success I've had with the generics is when there is something scarier for my opponent to shoot at while they cruise on in and fire away unmolested. The same could be said about Z95s but here you are getting a better dial and an extra red die, whether it is worth the 8 points is debatable.

Talonbane is great fun, I've run him most successfully with Engine and Predator but that is 35 points for a ship that is pretty easy to take out in one round of shooting. After I'm done with tournaments this month I'm going back to experiment with a few things, one of which is a super cheap Talonbane with Crackshot and maybe Glitterstim.

I've built lists with the BSA and Graz but I haven't gotten them to the table yet.

Ultimately I think the Kihraxz needs Barrel Roll.

If they had barrel roll the generics, while still flimsy, bring something to the table that the Z95s and Y-wings don't. This is also a small boost for the PS5, Graz and Talonbane so that they can get more use out of their PS. I don't think that the Kihraxz would encroach on M3A's because currently, nobody seems to be using naked generic M3A's for anything. I don't think Boost is a good idea because it is arguably better than barrel roll and it lets you use auto thrusters, which would call for a price increase on the Kihraxz.

I don't think adding barrel roll and keeping the price the same would make them too good, they are still pretty easy to kill with focus fire and adding Engine and PTL is an extra seven points on a ship without green hard turns. You still have to be pretty good at maneuvering and guessing your opponent's maneuvers to get a lot out of Barrel Roll.

For me, the dial is what sinks the Khirax. I can handle suboptimal efficiency. I can handle no repositioning actions. I don't like having only 2-4 forward moves. You can't be fast, you cant be slow. ThrowThrow in the lack of hard-3s and it just doesn't do that much for me.

problem with the special K, and generics in general, is that you're fighting an uphill battle against arc-dodgers and dice

unless you sink points into stims, you're looking at mostly barely modified rolls + an arc to manage, not counting the distinct possibility of higher PS shooting before you do

basically, the deck is heavily stacked against you and you need to love playing them to justify going through all those hoops. Personally can't do it anymore, though I never ran K spam (so I'm talking about z-95s; they seem so worthless now)

It's just far easier/less frustrating to play the likes of V.I Xizor w/FCS + thrusters, gunner + bossk slaver and TLT + r4. Everyone one of those ships is incredibly accurate and dice resistant (Xizor's ability and the 1 agi, high health escorts) and are far easier to land shots on aces with (PS 9 w/boost/roll, 180 arc; TLT)

my two cents, anyway. You can certainly overcome problems with enough rolls, but there's nothing more soul crushing than flying the more difficult list and then failing due to **** dice

kirahxs is my go to ship most of the time when i play scum and i have run out of z 95. I like its straight style, not many tricks just sheer ferocity, the 1 turn is a very nice maneuver indeed.

Talonbane is my favourite pilot, if only he didnt run into botching every single 5 dice attack he makes(5 dice with glitterstim and he consistently rolls 3 blanks).

I think the ship is underrated due to our current paper effectivenes above all meta. Believe me real games are nowhere similar theorymachime

The solution to that is called target lock

the problem is he was flying stressed all the time

I ended calling him "Humosvaldo" in honor of a soccer player from an argentinian futbol club(boca juniors) that suppossedly is going to deliver a lot of success but ultimately always misses the target. It was fun and i won anyways because thanks to Humosvaldo and his insane dogging ability everybody ignored N'Dru and his actually uite decent jousting jajajaja

So add distracting to his list of abilities

they really are not that bad if you fly FIVE of them at a time..... just make sure you focus fire on the maneuverable ships first!! 15 RED target locked dice is nice...

I played like 5 different lists for about 4 weeks, all of them included at least 1, most of the times 2 Kihraxz. I ran them along TLT Ys, Zs, HWK. They did ok in all the games, never went down too fast (but almost every game they were shot down). But after each game I was thinking how to enhance the list, and it was always "can I make the Kihraxz better, or do I replace 1 (2, all) with something else?"

I had great successes with Talonbane, but he never survived any game, always went down first. Of course if you count on that he is almost like a remote Biggs, opponent will change the course of his fighters to attack Talonbane, giving your other ships some freedom for a short time.

I will play Talonbane (and generics) again once the Cloaking is out, that might be just enough repositioning to cause real trouble to your opponent. Using cloak to cover your approach will get these guys closer with less damage taken on the way.