The imperial Raider class corvette.

It has blue dice and black dice, whereas the Gladiator is usually twice as expensive and comes with red.

The gladiators attacks would be wasted against such a cheap target. And your not going to send a Victory or Imperial to deal with something as insignificant as transports!

(yes I am ignoring episode 4's falcon escape from Tatooine *cough* )

Flotillas have a scatter token.

So you will want something like Raider I's with sensor teams to fish for an accuracy or Raider II's with Leading Shots to reroll crap rolls of just hits and crits.

You can torpedo in at high speeds and literally smack the flotilla for free damage with no consequences. Then next turn fire once and accuracy down that scatter and poof! 1 shield damage and 2 more hull damage and the flotilla is dead, and you torpedo into the next one. If they are supporting squadrons, you have your 2 dice AA attack and can prevent them from fleeing by tying them down, or preform a free shot against one, depending on the title.

You also have your 2 evade tokens to use against the angry parent ships that are mad that you popped their transports. You should be at least at blue range, hopefully at red. If your traveling fast enough, you potentially can also be obstructed because of a friendly officer.

Quad Laser Turrets is nice free damage against those bombers you just tied up who will be buzzing mad.

Or Tractor Beams to hinder the flotillas escape options. This is actually a very nice option because it gives you a long range "attack" to harass CR90's, Glad's, and Neb's before/after you strike.

But another aspect is the turn you strike, you drop the flotillas speed. You ram it, and then next turn you don't have to worry about activating your raider before the flotilla activates because generally it won't be able to move far enough to be out of range! (except you Ozzel, your cool). You can then move your important ships first, and the raider can should survive 1 round of bomber activity.

The targets you are going after can't really stop you, and your only 50 points if they decided to give it plenty of attention.

How about a visual example? (yes, I know, I need to update vassal... ... maybe another time though )

(CR90's here are GR75's and the Glad is a Raider, yay proxies)

I foresee 2 general uses of these flotillas;

[B] really cheap flanking bomber activators (up to 3 per ship, at 18-28 points per pop is basement bargain deals) protected by a anti fighter rouge/intel to allow escape from a tie-up/escort to take hits. Thats one option, and they operate on the flanks of the formation. Those are the Raider's Targets.

The other use is to stay in the middle or slightly behind the formation [like A] (to prevent collisions) to either activate intercepting A-wings to halt bombers, be activation toggles, or provide the role of a cheap Tantitive4+Raymus+Projector pocket medic and give buffs to all of your ships. (but that combo can pass 2 tokens to different ships and give another ship 2 shield tokens so obviously not as good as that )

Those are "forbidden fruit" and you should not send in your 50 point raider to kill a 18-28 point transport before being run over itself.

However, those first examples of flanking bomber walkers, yes, those are your targets.

After you pull it off first, your next game will be your opponent trying to keep his bomber walkers within blue range of his big ships, and force them to add another layer of things they need to think about, possibly causing them to make more mistakes or at least sub-optimal positioning simply because you have a raider to pop the 2-3 flotillas that had been planning on walking those generic bombers into your face.

In short, those evade tokens are there to protect you against retaliatory fire from the big ships that you deliberately kept at long range, while you target those pinatas. Previously we had them be useless once you make your attack run on said big ships, which generally we all agreed the little thing was rubish at doing (compared to the champ, Demolisher.)

Who knew the Raider might actually preform a role like its namesake?

Crap they kept their flotilla next to a capital ship. Now you close and the raider explodes..?

Crap they kept their flotilla next to a capital ship. Now you close and the raider explodes..?

Hence why I talked about that in the 3rd and 2nd to last paragraphs. Basically then you have corralled them into a denser ball and more likely that they are then at the disadvantage.

(they have to activate in a loose order or collide, shots are more likely to be obstructed by friendlies, more things to worry about and keep the player (not the ships) stressed)

Lots of new tactical impications to running Flotillas

How fast are they and how well do they turn?

How close do i want them to be in order to be safe (or tempting) and aid ships/squadrons?

Do I care if they die quickly?

Lots of new tactical impications to running Flotillas

How fast are they and how well do they turn?

How close do i want them to be in order to be safe (or tempting) and aid ships/squadrons?

Do I care if they die quickly?

I think it is better to think, "do the ships they were supporting care if they die quickly?"

I know I will be running 3 B's with a GR75 to give rerolls and to walk them around the board.

Now I just need to decide if I would like to escort them, and with what?

A YT-2400?

• I would keep this slightly back to prevent it and the bombers from being tied down, and then move it up when the bombers get engaged to hopefully one-shot the culprit and free the bombers while getting points.

A HWK?

• I would also hold it back until engaged, then sacrificially throw this into the dog pile and give the bombers an escape so they can to the bomb thing that they were meant to do. Buy the bombers time and be remembered a hero.

A YT-1300?

• I would use it to plod along with the bombers and use its escort ability with its high health (and innate counter) to make it so the B-wings can kill what engaged them without taking damage. The ship doesn't necessarily need to fire, it just needs to draw the fire from the B's and deal chip damage to whoever engaged it. Combine the chip damage and the fact that the GR75 has a blue AA dice, it might be able to defeat 3 health ships and the like, and if it is something tanky, the B's themselves have 3 blue attack dice.
• Now that I think of it, the GR75 has a blue attack dice... I hereby state that it is from the hungry hungry whale chasing down and ramming the squadrons, just like the Xwing version does.

If I need more speed or need to reduce cost I could take 3 Y's with an escorting X and have the flotilla walk them around.

Just a recap,

We get 8 cards in each expansion, and 4 of them are for the new upgrade slot. 2 of them are titles, 1 of them is a crew, and it says we get a new commander and with that we fill the 8th's card slot.

Now, knowing FFG, 3 of the brand new upgrade cards will be the same across each expansion. That means each expansion will get one card that the other doesn't have, and you need to buy the other ship to get it. So, it is likely we have 5 support cards, and we already know 3 of them. Bomber Command Center, Comm's Net, and Repair Crews.

We know both of the crew, and can barely see the first of each of the 2 titles, with no hints at each of the commanders.

I say that we have more information on the contents of this wave than the others!

Good deduction of the likely contents!

I suspect I will be getting two of each because the unique upgrade is probably good (but then again.... point defence reroute...)

HWK is probably the go in the scenario you mentioned. Hes fast enough that you can hang him back until you need to come in an intel the enemy fighter screen.

Maybe keep Yavaris close by also? He flak and double tap should also help the B Wings get clear.