I don't mean to bog the forum with another beginner post, but I'm on a very tight budget and could use some advice.

Questions:

1. Do I really need Most Wanted to start out with Scum and Villainy? I know I want Scum and Villainy if I want to fly ships like the Hawk, but could I get away with just the new Wave 8 ships?

2. Similar to question 1, I'm holding off from buying some of the earlier Scum ships because I hear the new ones are generally better. With a small budget, I don't want to waste any money on sub-optimized ships since I live in a competitive area. So, is the Scum and Villainy set, or other older ones, still competitive today?

3. Lastly, will I have to eventually buy from all the factions just to get certain upgrade cards such as TLT's etc? Or are most upgrades included throughout the Scum ships?

everything depends on how open you are to proxying

unless you're going to Store championships and higher, you should be able to proxy unless your group is full of pricks

in which case, just buy the cool ships and proxy the upgrade cards

as for old/new scum ships, there's no actual difference. the Aggressor has been the competitive mainstay for a while, and that launched wave 6. The new potentially competitive mainstay is the generic jumpmaster 5k, due to combination of deadeye + r4 + chips ordnance hitting like a ton of bricks. the misthunter, while cool, doesn't leap off the power scale

I personally would say nothing is a "have to" in the game but options are always nice. The Most wanted set is useful for everything it comes with. The y-wing and z-95's are good support and secondary ships. The newer ships are nice for sure but some old reliables are just that reliable. The scum are a bit more versatile in how you can run them, so do you want swarms, a big hitting mini swarm, or just a couple of powerhouses? Every ship is still competitive may have to be flown well but that is any ship really.

As for question 3 some upgrades are limited to one faction or another but if you just want the upgrades you can either look for outside sources or trades.

You need Most Wanted to fly the firespray scum, and the firespray is the best looking ship in the game, so you need most wanted.

I don't mean to bog the forum with another beginner post, but I'm on a very tight budget and could use some advice.

Questions:

1. Do I really need Most Wanted to start out with Scum and Villainy? I know I want Scum and Villainy if I want to fly ships like the Hawk, but could I get away with just the new Wave 8 ships?

2. Similar to question 1, I'm holding off from buying some of the earlier Scum ships because I hear the new ones are generally better. With a small budget, I don't want to waste any money on sub-optimized ships since I live in a competitive area. So, is the Scum and Villainy set, or other older ones, still competitive today?

3. Lastly, will I have to eventually buy from all the factions just to get certain upgrade cards such as TLT's etc? Or are most upgrades included throughout the Scum ships?

1 - Yes. Not because of the ships, Z-95 and Y-Wing are support ships on a Scum squad and you can do without them on most configurations (also, you want them in numbers). But the upgrade cards contained in MW are the backbone of S&V gameplay. As an alternative, you can get a Hound's Tooth expansion pack, which comes with almost the same crew cards, some fantastic EPT choices for Scum (which are lacking in MW) and the oh-so-needed Engine Upgrade. The trade-off is no astromechs, which are needed, even if you focus solely on Wave 8.

2 - Yes. More specifically, I'll retrace my last sentence from 1. Unless your goal is to fly Brobots, you'll need cards you can only obtain in MW. And, if you decide to fly Brobots, your initial investment won't be softened by the lack of MW. In fact, it might be higher and less focused, since you'll need specific upgrades from Rebel/Imperial ships you won't be using at all.

3 - Yes. Unfortunately, it's a reality you have to come to terms with. Specially, if you decide to pick Brobots as your first competitive squad.

As an exercise in planning, let's trace some of the most competitive Scum lists and the bare minimum to fly them at their top game:

Brobots:

• 2 IG-2000 expansion sets
• 2 Kihraxz expansion sets
• 1 Starviper expansion set
• *2 B-Wing OR 2 E-Wing expansion sets

This bare minimum gives you the following build:

• IG-88B and IG-88C (36)
• Crackshot (1)
• Fire-Control System (2) OR Advanced Sensors (3)
• Mangler Cannon (4)
• Autothrusters (2)
• Glitterstim (2)

Which puts both IG at 48 pts tops. But the Mangler isn't the top choice for a cannon on IG, so there's that.

*Alternative: 2 Lambda Class Shuttle expansion packs, giving you 2 of - Adv. Sensors, Sensor Jammer, Heavy Laser Cannon. This option, albeit more expensive, gives you access to everything you need on a competitive Starviper (along with the rest of the investment on Brobots), which you'll get anyway for the Autothrusters.

Thug Life:

• 2 Most Wanted expansion packs
• 2 Y-Wing expansion packs
• 2 K-Wing expansion packs

This gives you:

• Syndicate Thug (18)
• Twin Laser Turret (6)
• Unhinged Astromech (1)

Replicating 4 Thugs at 25 pts each.

Wolfpack:

• 3 Punishing One expansion packs
• 1 Core Set
• 1 Y-Wing expansion pack
• 2 K-Wing expansion packs
• 2 Most Wanted expansion packs
• 2 A-Wing OR Inquisitor's TIE expansion packs

This lets you field:

• Contracted Scout (25)
• Deadeye (1)
• Plasma Torpedoes (3) OR Proton Torpedoes (4)
• Extra Munitions (2)
• R4 Agromech (2)
• Guidance Chips (0)

Allowing you 3 of those, for 33 pts or 34 pts. Mind you, the option to fly Wolfpack puts you very close to the requirements for flying Thug Life, leaving you with the need to purchase only 1 more Y-Wing expansion pack.

Assuming you want to fly either of those 3 lists, of course. But, on a tight budget and a desire to compete, there you have it.

My advice is: get MW either way. At the very least, you can put up a good squad using whatever MW gives you, along with expansions to complete the experience (i.e. HWK and Slave). Good luck, man.

Great breakdown K Genesis! And, unless you really think flying large based ships is easy and won't cause you problems, the easiest to learn how to fly out of the three lists he just noted are the Thug Life squad. True, it is falling out of favor, but that doesn't mean you can't learn how to fly in and out of formation with a ship that turns inefficiently and find out how range is going to affect your shots. It is more forgiving and is easier to predict where your ships will end up. In time you will learn a lot of styles and be able to predict enemies, but that would be a solid and relatively inexpensive way to go Scum all the way while setting you up for some tools you will need later. Especially if you have someone that will give you one of their old damage decks, some dice and maneuver templates.