Deathrain and conner nets in general seem to have been designed with a wave 6 "holy **** it's nothing but 2-ship builds" in mind

the nets especially were a gloriously overpowered card that promised salvation back during those dark days, but now we have TLT + stress doing the work for us

which is, of course, not to say that conners don't still utterly ruin elite/fat ships (pictured), but I do understand why people would gravitate towards TLT instead as it's far easier/more consistent to use. Without bombs, even AC doesn't make an impressive use of 38 points so you really have to coordinate your squad with Deathrain to make the most out of the turns you get a conner's off

I played TLTs prior in the last two SCs here (albeit with Miranda rocking out seismic charges, because hell yeah and because crack swarm) and managed to brick wall against palp aces on both occasions, although one loss was because the remaining jammer shuttle was 2 points more expensive than my remaining tactician warden

so yeah, if you run into tons of palp aces and brobots, Deathrain's your guy (as are Omega L and Vi Vader)

I saw this thread and was like... Oh my god, did I just play against FGD in the shop yesterday and now he is posting pictures of his Decimator gobbling up my poor Bomber?!

But no, I see that it's some other Decimator and some other Bomber. Some other nerds.

No offense FGD but for a second there I thought we had just met each other in real life. I'm uh, not sure why but... I thought you'd be more of a jerk IRL, but uh... you were actually pretty cool, considering it wasn't even you...

... I think.

I don't play decis

High Five!

I want to paint one red and call it Clifford the Big Red Decimator.

That 1 - Straight has seen a LOT of barrel rolls! That's a badge of honor man!

Don't think I've played a list that couldn't boost roll or slam. IMO not as fun

Punishers seem to fall into the "fun, but not competitive" group. I always have a blast with Deathrain and Redline, even with Cutlasses and Prox Mines, but they suck up too many points for a secondary role and are too squishy with 1 Agility to make as a centerpiece. They'll get improved by some of the ordnance fixes, but probably still need some form of title in year or two if they will actually compete.

As for Sabine crew...

SLAMing K-wings with Sabine are going to be a very deadly weapon in the right hands. I've already seen a player proxying her with a couple of autoblaster turret K-wings, and he absolutely dismantled a Palp aces list. It. Was. Brutal.

May I just chime in on the bomb love to say that ...

... this past week I successfully baited an IG-88 into two consecutive Proton Bombs. Both came up Direct Hit. He was fully shielded.

Punishers seem to fall into the "fun, but not competitive" group. I always have a blast with Deathrain and Redline, even with Cutlasses and Prox Mines, but they suck up too many points for a secondary role and are too squishy with 1 Agility to make as a centerpiece. They'll get improved by some of the ordnance fixes, but probably still need some form of title in year or two if they will actually compete.

eh, I believe there's more than enough room for glass cannons in this game

centerpieces like soontir are more competitively consistent due to solid defenses (assuming you don't get blocked stressed...or connered , but these glass cannons are a blast and very effective, provided you can leverage them correctly

for example, if you master the art of blocking for Redline or just acquiring TLs as a lower PS, he will reward you by obliterating Poe before he gets to regenerate. This was before gchips; with gchips he's just far more consistent

as for Deathrain...well, see above

the trick isn't to think of them as aces, they're not. Deathrain's not like anything in this game apart from maybe ASLAM wardens (can't wait for sabine ) and redline is a plowing tank made up of a King Tiger's cannon mounted on a Sherman "zippo" chasis

which obliterates everything and goes up like a box of matches

of the two, imo gchips redline will be easier to leverage consistently because he kills things himself while Deathrain is more of an enabler, and if only because it's easier to align arcs and roll dice than managing the placement of mines. You'll definitely net your own guys in the first few games with them and it is brutal

I do believe the ASLAM Warden is, in a vacuum, the superior bomber as you can give it Autoblaster turrets to augment its offense whereas Deathy only has AC, which is good v low PS TLTs and not much else (though it did put some crucial damage on certain enemies, even a phantom ). I went with Deathrain, though, because rebels don't have power aces like Vader or mini aces such as Omega, two very self sufficient high damage pieces that capitalize off of conners

with sabine coming out, the aslam wander can just capitalize off itself

I love deathrain, even if im not very good with him/her.

I prefer advance sensors though so you can decide if you want to boost before dropping a bomb to slightly alter its podition.

and redline is a plowing tank made up of a King Tiger's cannon mounted on a Sherman "zippo" chasis

which obliterates everything and goes up like a box of matches

that sounds terrifying, want to see that now.

edit:

not a tiger tank turret, but this still works.

yeesh.

I just keep picturing myself in a sweet rebel officer pants with Ficklegreendice stuffed into my backpack yelling at me, "An X winger's strength flows from their build! " And other inspirational things like, "Judge me by my dice, do you?"

Thanks man, you've really helped my game.

A punisher must feel the conners surround him

ionic beings are we, not this crude plastic!

I love Deathrain but always feel just a little short on points when building with him in the squad. I like double Prox + extra Muntions myself (and either AC or Advanced Sensors) on Deathrain. Do you find seismics help out? Sounds like it's worth trying (free damage and free actions!).

Now that we have "budget Aces" in Omega Leader and Inquisitor he's a great third ship but he does the same thing that Omega and VI inquisitors do: Hunt Aces. And, he's worse than both against TLT (but better vs. 2 ship lists...maybe). Both those 2 leave some points left too but not enough to upgrade to loaded whisper. I think the Punishers really need a 0pt titel that gives them extra munitions or at least 1 extra munitions token...anything to make them just a few points cheaper to load out. If you could fit Deathrain + Whisper + Omega Leader with appropriate upgrades I think it would see play but It's 6pts or so too much.

I will run Sabine in rebels! She makes a lot of things a lot of fun. Bwing bombers! Yep. That's fun.

I brought Redline to a very funny tournament yesterday. The rules, only one TLT per list, and it was a team tournament, so each team consisting of two players had to bring two differnet factions. So I brought Impire, my buddy Scum, also you could never meet your own faction, so all day i played against Rebel and Scum and my buddy vice versa. NOW knowing this would be a (for me) lighthearted tournament and that I would only meet max 1 TLT per game I brougt Oicuun with The Emperor, Gunner, predator, Ion Projector and seismic charges. Redline with extra munition, clusters and plasma torps. By no means a competetive list, but I thought it could bring a bit of pain.

Man O man do you have to work hard to get a punisher to work just mediocre. Dice crap out and so often you don't have a focus because you used your action to relocate your target locks or boost to arc dodge, because Punishers go down faster than a bag of bricks.

I had a good time with it, but half my games Redline died with ammo still in the tubes.... And even a small z-swarm with target locks take it down, and Redline always in my games came one/two damage to short to oneshotting a z per turn.

Least the TLT restriction was brilliant, almost everything was on the tables, the only ships I dident see was Scyks, Defenders, E-wings and Tie bombers. The rest was there and it was glorious.

I love Deathrain but always feel just a little short on points when building with him in the squad. I like double Prox + extra Muntions myself (and either AC or Advanced Sensors) on Deathrain. Do you find seismics help out? Sounds like it's worth trying (free damage and free actions!).

Now that we have "budget Aces" in Omega Leader and Inquisitor he's a great third ship but he does the same thing that Omega and VI inquisitors do: Hunt Aces.

it's not really ace hunting as much as completely screwing over the opponent

he's a powerful control piece with conners and a menace to low PS generics with seismic shenanigans

seismics are also great for dodging r3-a2s

I think the, by far, most important thing is that Deathrain doesn't care about dice. Conners and seismics have guaranteed effects and, if they connect, deal guaranteed damage

Man O man do you have to work hard to get a punisher work just mediocre. Dice crap out and so often you don't have a focus because you used your action to relocate your target locks or boost to arc dodge, because Punishers go down faster than a bag of bricks.

Like I said, wait till gchips

I love Deathrain but always feel just a little short on points when building with him in the squad. I like double Prox + extra Muntions myself (and either AC or Advanced Sensors) on Deathrain. Do you find seismics help out? Sounds like it's worth trying (free damage and free actions!).

Now that we have "budget Aces" in Omega Leader and Inquisitor he's a great third ship but he does the same thing that Omega and VI inquisitors do: Hunt Aces. And, he's worse than both against TLT (but better vs. 2 ship lists...maybe). Both those 2 leave some points left too but not enough to upgrade to loaded whisper. I think the Punishers really need a 0pt titel that gives them extra munitions or at least 1 extra munitions token...anything to make them just a few points cheaper to load out. If you could fit Deathrain + Whisper + Omega Leader with appropriate upgrades I think it would see play but It's 6pts or so too much.

I will run Sabine in rebels! She makes a lot of things a lot of fun. Bwing bombers! Yep. That's fun.

You have to build Whisper a bit unorthodox to make it all fit, and then if you can't you can still take Omega leader down to just an Omega pilot with the same upgrades for 22 points. I keep meaning to try this list, Deathrain, Whisper, and Zeta Leader, but I'm pretty hung up on Redline these days.

I consider every game I fire off all four rounds with 'Red before he is killed a small personal victory. The trick is having a scary wingmate. I think a Phantom fills that bill pretty well.

I think the, by far, most important thing is that Deathrain doesn't care about dice. Conners and seismics have guaranteed effects and, if they connect, deal guaranteed damage

That looks like a good situation for you.

Guidance chips are going to help it for sure, but its sooo expensive and so easy to take down, especially when you don't have a focus to help that measly green die or autothursters because of g-chip. I have not played Deathrain for a while, might try that again soon.

another good way to think about Deathrain, and an experience I definitely understood through running him alongside Vader, is this

who has a chance of hurting a soontir that's going to turtle?

is it conner nets or ATC vader?

as for redline, he just throws more dice and requires a different playstyle. I'll be back next season, hopefully, to have a SC thread about him

it's not really ace hunting as much as completely screwing over the opponent

he's a powerful control piece with conners and a menace to low PS generics with seismic shenanigans

seismics are also great for dodging r3-a2s

I think the, by far, most important thing is that Deathrain doesn't care about dice. Conners and seismics have guaranteed effects and, if they connect, deal guaranteed damage

But he really is good at ace hunting if you're going with connor nets over prox mines. Conners shine the most for me because of the size and shape you can cover with them but I prefer Prox mines for most encounters. I'm not sold on spending seismics for a free BR; you're giving up guaranteed damage for some manuevering shenanigans that you probably don't really need. It's a fun trick but I don't know if I'd build around using that trick.

Direct damage is nice but you're spending a lot of points on a ship that can die before firing a second shot or dropping a second bomb (that does damage). It needs to do more than "Just hit people with bombs" to get the points out of it.

The closest I can get for Deathrain + phantom + Ace is:

Deathrain + Seismics + Connors + Extra M.

Echo + Adaptability (+1) + Kallus + SJ + Adv Cloak

Omega Leader + Juke + comms

Both Echo and Deathrain feel light enough that I don't think it's competitive. Echo beats Brobots w/o VI and can choose to Kallus whoever else out bids her and becomes a great blocker; she also just murders generics. OL does the ace hunting with support from Deathrain. Deathrain has four bombs and nothing else and I don't think I could get 34pts of use out of him; he really wants FCS or AC for post bomb usefulness.

proxies are meh

you have to roll dice and watch aggressors laugh at you as they take some shield damage and go on their merry way

conners do guaranteed work and will screw over your opponent, possibly handing you the win. Happened twice against both brobots, as conners force one to essentially **** off for 3-4 turns leading to an incredibly lopsided engagement in your favor

conners are simply far more reliable and far more powerful except in very corner cases (3 naked hits on soontir)

love me some BOMB

Kah-Blams-Wham-BOOM!!!

Take DAT You Dirty F'er!!!

Yeah, I run Redline with a mini crack swarm, and the first thing I learned is that Redline is gonna die pretty fast. I usually have him try do deal as much damage as possible before dying, and thanks to fcs and clusters he usually does that. I also have ion bombs on him, because everyone forgets that he would even carry a bomb. I won a game by ionizing a decimater, made it fly off the map.