For our local Spring Tournament I chose not to take one of the meta-lists, but instead something fun, that might surprise some of the opponents, even if it wouldn’t get me all the way to the top. There’s been a list that I’ve been toying around since wave 7:

Talonbane Cobra (28)

Crack Shot (1)

Homing Missiles (5)

Glitterstim (2)

N'Dru Suhlak (17)

Crack Shot (1)

Cluster Missiles (4)

Glitterstim (2)

Bossk (35)

Crack Shot (1)

"Mangler" Cannon (4)

Total: 100

View in Yet Another Squad Builder

The idea of the list was to put Talonbane and Bossk on one side and for obvious reasons NDru apart from the two on the other side. Talonbane should go for an Ace. His Alpha Strike with Glitterstim, Missiles and Crackshot is almost guaranteed to get at least a hit on Soontir or any other Ace. I’ve even managed to one-shoot Soontir once. NDru meanwhile is a killer for anything with low agility. B-Wings, Stresshogs, Lambdas are excellent targets. Bossk should shoot last and finish one of the two targets, if the Alpha Strike didn’t get the job quite done.

Although I’ve had a 100% success rate with this list in a couple of casual matches, I’ve never taken it to a tournament because I knew its weakness: Talonbane and NDru with Glitterstim can take some beating, but after the initial onslaught, they can be taken down pretty quickly. If I’m left with only Bossk and the opponent gets in his back, that’s pretty much the end of it.

Now with the release of wave 8, i thought I could take the list out again. The obvious upgrade for the squad was guidance chips. And I liked the idea of Boba on the YV to eject an Emperor or an R5-P9, but still feared aces getting behind Bossk. Because I wanted to try out the Jumpmaster, I found the perfect replacement: a fully loaded Tel Trevura. Tel with Proton Torpedoes compared to Bossk

• has the same PS
• similar damage output in the opening salvo
• similar good use of Boba
• the better late game
• is tougher than Bossk (9 + 1 HP with 2 Agility vs. 12 HP with 1 Agility)
• far better dial
• repositioning ability to get in range 1/out of firing arc

So that’s the list I decided to take to our tournament:

Thugs on Drugs

Talonbane Cobra (28)

Crack Shot (1)

Homing Missiles (5)

Glitterstim (2)

Guidance Chips (0)

N'Dru Suhlak (17)

Crack Shot (1)

Cluster Missiles (4)

Glitterstim (2)

Guidance Chips (0)

Tel Trevura (30)

Deadeye (1)

Proton Torpedoes (4)

Extra Munitions (2)

Boba Fett (1)

R4 Agromech (2)

Guidance Chips (0)

Total: 100

View in Yet Another Squad Builder

I tested the list twice and won both games, so I felt pretty good. I guessed that this list was completely under the radar and that I could take some opponents by surprise. I thought the list would be good for a 2-2 or even a 3-1.

24 people showed up for our tournament and this is how it went:

Round 1: Ueli - Brobots BC with PtL, AS, AT, HLC/Mangler, Title and Dampeners on C

Ugh... a tough list to begin with. I never played against Ueli, but he was a pleasant guy. I don’t remember all the details of this match. Ueli placed his Bots on my right side. I deployed Talonbane and Tel to face them and NDru left of the middle. The bots engaged C behind B and i tried to slow roll a bit to get some time for NDru to get in flanking position. In the opening salvo Talonbane and Tel both unloaded their ordnance on C, stripping his shields while NDru and B had no shots. Talonbane took some damage. Talonbane and Tel continued to get some work done on C, while NDru unloaded his rocket on B. Unfortunately he was too close to Tel thus not getting the extra die. Nevertheless I think he stripped some shields from B. C went down, so did Talonbane. The next round had a damaged NDru face a shieldless B while Tel was in position to unload his second Torpedo. That was the moment, I thought. I needed to get the crit through to use Boba! I shot the Torpedo: Eye, Blank, Blank, Blank. Bah! I rerolled the blanks: Eye, Eye, Eye, Eye. So after all modifications I only got a hit and a crit. That wouldn’t do it against a Bot with an Evade Token… But my opponent rolled as bad as I did, totally blanking and so I got the crit: Direct Hit! Boba stole the HLC, because I hoped that would save my NDru, but he got shot nevertheless. The next couple of rounds saw Tel and B trade a couple of shots and me barrel rolling in good positions until i finally got a good modified range 1 shot, finally finishing the second Brobot.

WIN 100 – 60

Round 2 – Jonathan with Poe + R5-P9 + IA + Predator, Ello Asty + R5 + IA + VI, Red Squadron Veteran + BB-8 + IA + Predator

Jonathan is a nice guy that I have seen quite regularly in the shop. I never played against him, but I was looking forward to this match. Jonathan deployed his T70s a bit apart from one another all in the middle, I had NDru on my right, facing Red Squadron Vet, Talonbane and Tel on the left. He charged at NDru with all the ships so I came in fast to get into range 1-2 for the rockets. That’s when my squad showed its power. Talonbane and Tel shot at Poes back, getting a ton of damage. I planned to use Boba Fett to get rid of R5-P9, but Jonathan had to use Integrated Astromech himself in order to barely survive the onslaught. NDru shot at RSV, getting 4 hits in the first shot (against 1 Evade) and 3 in the second. Integrated Astromech saved the X-Wing for a round on his last hull. That’s when I realized my mistake! I forgot to use Crack Shot! He shot back and hurt NDru badly. I don’t remember if he died this or the next round, but basically my Z95 should and could have one-shot the T70 despite the IA! Next round I finished Poe and RSV, the rest was just cleaning up. Jonathan got Tel down to 4 Hull, but no more.

WIN 100 – 44. Now I was at 2-0, my minimal goal.

Round 3 – Patrick with Gray Squadron Pilot + TLT, Nera Dantels + Sensor Jammer + Proton Torpedoes + EM + Deadeye + GC, Poe + R5-P9 + IA + Predator

Patrick was new to our local X-Wing community. He was a nice guy to chat and play with. He deployed his Y in the middle, Nera a bit to the left and Poe on the left edge (from my PoV). I put NDru on the left to go after Nera, Talonbane and Tel on the right to go for the Gray. I totally misjudged a 3 bank from Tel in the first round, clipping a rock and screwing up my approach (I wanted to barrel roll to get in better position for next turn). Patrick approached slowly with Poe and Nera wanted to go for NDru. The Gray made a hard 2 to stay away from my guys. Round 2 Talonbane could only shoot at the Gray, while NDru and Tel had no shots (stupid rock :-( ). So I chose to save the Missile for later and didn’t do much damage, getting 2 hits from the TLT. Next round Tel and Talonbane quickly dispatched the Y-Wing and NDru did what he does best: 4 hits on Nera vs. 1 Evade. This time I didn’t forget Crack Shot. And the second shot got again 4 hits. Nera rolled an Eye and had to use the focus to survive. ****! Another ship surviving on the last hull, but at least that meant Nera couldn’t shoot a Torpedo. Next turn Nera surprisingly made a straight 3, thereby passing NDru who made a green 1 forward. Poe and Tel were aligned side by side. While moving his ships, my opponent touched Talonbane, moving him a little. He put him back, but now when Tel did a hard 1 to the left he bumped into Talonbane just by a millimeter. I was pretty sure, that originally I could do the move without bumping and started arguing that I should have been able to clear the maneuver. But I immediately stopped. First of all I wanted to fly casual and not make an argument about such a small thing, second I was the TO of the tournament so I chose to rule such things in my disadvantage in order to not get people suspicious about me playing in the tournament. So Tel didn’t get an action which meant no Torpedo this turn. Then Poe turned hard to the right and Talonbane hard to the left facing each other. As Nera didn’t have any shots this turn, all my guys shot at Poe getting a bit of damage. Only then did I realise my mistake: Nera shot the Torpedo out her back at Talonbane, knocking him out. Ouch! I completely forgot about that ability. So next turn I quickly went after Nera and did the last point of damage. Then my guys went for Poe who tried to fly away to get into better position. I didn’t do much damage because I reminded my opponent to use his Focus token on R5-P9. Poe stayed on 1 shield, 3 hull. But then I saw my chance: Tel shot his second Torpedo. With a normal shot I should do 1 damage to the shield and a crit to the hull, thereby enabling Boba to get rid of that nasty Astromech. I even got an additional damage and a Direct Hit. Patrick was about to pack his Poe when I reminded him of Integrated Astromech. He ejected R5-P9 himself, but that prolonged the match for only another round.

WIN 100 – 36. That left me at 3-0 for the last round. I was very happy to have come this far. But I feared that was the end of the line as it looked like I had to face a BBBBZ list.

Round 4 – Marco with BBBBZ. Yes, he won his last round and now I had to chew through 36 shields/hull. I didn’t like my chances here. But as Marco is a great guy I was looking forward to a fun match.

Marco deployed his team in a cluster in the middle of his edge. I put NDru on my left and the other ships on the right. Marco turned his team towards NDru. As Talonbane didn’t get any return shots I saved Glitterstim for later. He shot his Missiles at a B -> 4 hits/crits -> Evade from the B -> Crackshot -> 4 Shields gone. Then NDru on Glitterstim shot at another B with his Missiles -> 4 hits -> Evade -> Crackshot -> 4 Shields gone -> second Shot: 3 hits and a crit -> Another Evade from the B. And the crit was… NOT a direct hit… Blinded Pilot. Well, I guess that’s pretty good too. Then Tel could shoot at any of the enemy ships. I chose to let the B on the last hull live for another round as he wouldn’t return fire and try to finish the first. Torpedo -> 3 hits and a crit -> ANOTHER Evade from the B. And the crit was… NOT a direct hit, but rather something completely irrelevant. I think it was the one that gives stress. So having shot a torpedo and 2 missiles getting 16 hits/crits and using 2 crack shots, 2 B-Wings were still alive on their last hull because my opponent rolled 4 Evades out of 4. While I would have liked to get at least one B from the board, I was still pretty pleased with the damage output from my list. Now it was my opponents turn to shoot back. NDru faced a Z95 at R1, 3 Bs at R2 (one blinded) and another B at R3. Glitterstim totally proved its worth and my Z survived with only the shields gone. Next turn Marco made a hard 2 with all his guys moving away from NDru and towards Talonbane. I was a bit surprised by this move but he didn’t want to get in a bad position for the following turn. I guess he showed pretty good foresight there, but I was still really glad NDru who bumped in the back could shoot unopposed. Talonbane got in range 1 of the front B and used Glitterstim. He shot his 5-die-primary and got 5 hits/crits on an undamaged B who of course got another Evade. Then Tel and NDru easily dispatched both B-Wings on their last hull. Thanks to Glitterstim Talonbane got to live for another couple of rounds and we continued in a knife fight. I didn’t take Talonbane out of the fight but rather used hard 1s (leaving him stressed) to get another couple of range 1 shots before he bit the dust. When he did, he left 2 heavily damaged Bs vs a full health Tel and NDru. In the final turn NDru made a K-Turn to get away from Tel for a 3-die shot an a B on his last hull and Tel made a Segnor to shoot his second Torpedo at the other B on 3 hull. Both shots connected, finishing a fun game.

WIN 100 – 36 and I won the whole tournament.

I’m very pleased with how the list performed and don’t see anything that I would change at the moment. The list can dish out a ton of damage on the initial pass and can take out almost anything: Even Ghosts and Decimators can be destroyed in one turn. The question is rather if you can take on the rest of the list with the missiles gone.

I hoped you liked my report. If anyone of you guys would like to test the list, I would be glad to hear how it went.

Great write up, and it sounds like you had a lot of fun. Sounds like a scary squad. Talonbane is great because a lot of Ordnance carriers can be dealt with by jumping into their range 1, but Talonbane does even better there. Nice squad.

Did Tel's ability ever activate? Sounds like a "No."

No, Tel's ability never got uses - fortunately. As I anticipated, my opponents always pursued N'Dru and Talonbane first, they're much easier targets. One opponent got Tel down to 4 Hull, but I think the other opponents didn't even shoot at Tel.

Excellent report with an interesting squad, thanks for sharing! Well done for your 'fly casual' approach too

Great report. It seems you didn't have occasion to use Tel Trevura's ability so it made me think how you could trade him up to Dengar, but still retain Fett.

So here's what I came up with for the same 40pts:

Dengar

Deadeye+Plasma Torps+Boba Fett+R4 Agromech+Guidance Chips

You loose out on extra munitions and trade out Proton Torps for Plasma Torps, but gain 2 PS, and the ability to attack twice on the initial joust, so attack 1st with plasma torps to strip shields then attack again with Primary Weapon hopefully with the TL gained from the initial attack. I think having Talonbane and Dengar at the same PS will help prevent accidental 'self bumps' as they are more likely to be operating in close proximity together compared to N'dru.

No idea which would be more effective in practise though!

Wow crack shot. So meta.

But really awesome write up, sounds like a really fun list!

Great report. It seems you didn't have occasion to use Tel Trevura's ability so it made me think how you could trade him up to Dengar, but still retain Fett.

So here's what I came up with for the same 40pts:

Dengar

Deadeye+Plasma Torps+Boba Fett+R4 Agromech+Guidance Chips

You loose out on extra munitions and trade out Proton Torps for Plasma Torps, but gain 2 PS, and the ability to attack twice on the initial joust, so attack 1st with plasma torps to strip shields then attack again with Primary Weapon hopefully with the TL gained from the initial attack. I think having Talonbane and Dengar at the same PS will help prevent accidental 'self bumps' as they are more likely to be operating in close proximity together compared to N'dru.

No idea which would be more effective in practise though!

Funny Thing: I also thought about me never getting to use Tel's ability but rather thought about going lower:

Manaroo with Feedback Array and 1 Point for initiative. Both help the list against Soontir and co.

However I came to realize that U-Boats is probably one of the toughest matchups and I don't know what I could do to increase my chances.

Wow crack shot. So meta.

You got me there

(Pssst: Don't mention Guidance Chips)

Very nice list and write up! I just tried something very similar this weekend. I like non-meta lists as well and love to surprise my enemy with something different. I found Manaroo to be the perfect candidate for that. This is what I flew:

Zuckuss (28)

Veteran Instincts (1)

Outlaw Tech (2)

Advanced Sensors (3)

Misthunter title (1)

Tractor Beam (0)

N'Dru Suhlak (17)

Veteran Instincts (1)

Concussion Missiles (4)

Cloaking Device (2)

Guidance Chips (0)

Manaroo (27)

Deadeye (1)

Plasma Torpedoes (3)

Extra Munitions (2)

Recon Specialist (3)

R4 Agromech (2)

Feedback Array (2)

Guidance Chips (0)

Total: 99

All three ships were surprising my opponents at one time or another and it was a lot of fun I went 2:2 after a very near loss (echo with one hull left) due to my stupid mistake of not going for time but trying to fight the phantom head on with my PS 9's and one loss against double ghosts with FCS, torpedoes, EM, ABT and 4 filled crew slots... Man those 2 ghosts are harder to approach than the wolfpack

But I really like how the meta is turning out with so many different viable scum options. It's a good time for fun lists

I've thought a few times about using N'dru with Cluster and GC. I'm glad to see he is good!

Glad to see Talonbane getting played well, too. I've only used him in a game or two before. I should try it again.

I might think Manaroo would do well as you can shift off your tokens to those other ships that might need it that turn. Well, not sure how often that would happen, but you would have the PS above U-boats still.

Thanks for the write up. It was a good read.

Zuckuss (28)

Veteran Instincts (1)

Outlaw Tech (2)

Advanced Sensors (3)

Misthunter title (1)

Tractor Beam (0)

Really, REALLY digging this loadout for Zuckuss. I think I'll have to give that one a try!

Thanks for taking the time to write up that report cybu, was a great read and I certainly love the damage output of your list.

Congratulations on the result.

Inspired by this list, I've tried it twice now against a 4-bomber list (win), and a double bomber + Vessery list, and won both matches despite mis-handling (forgetting) to crackshot Jonus and Vessery, and forgetting to use the rule of 11 to control range on the joust.

Fun and scary at the same time! Woot! Great list, thank you!

Inspired by this list, I've tried it twice now against a 4-bomber list (win), and a double bomber + Vessery list, and won both matches despite mis-handling (forgetting) to crackshot Jonus and Vessery, and forgetting to use the rule of 11 to control range on the joust.

Fun and scary at the same time! Woot! Great list, thank you!

Game 9 was against 3 A-Wings and Lt. Blount with Ion Pulse Missile. I think all the A-Wings had PTL, Crackshot, AT. 2 had Proton Rockets and 1 Chardaan. Again the opponent went for Manaroo first. The Ion Missile hit but didn't hurt me much as I put Manaroo in a position where a 1 straight wouldn't put me in a bad spot. I managed range pretty well and didn't let my opponent get to shoot his Rockets. And when he had a range 1 shot my firepower forced him to use the focus on defense in order to survive. Manaroo never used Feedback Array. Once I just simply forgot when I could have finished an A-Wing on last hull and for the rest of the game my opponent desperately tried to stay out of range 1 which forced him to make some bad maneuvers and he missed some shots. When time was over I had my whole squad on the board and my opponent had 2 A-Wings on the last hull. WIN, Total 9:0

Played your original Tel version a third time against my regular opponent yesterday. Owned his two defenders and cheap friend list pretty handily. Second game though... He flew Palp Aces for the first time and I got wrecked. Made the mistake of half way attacking the shuttle with just Talonbane, feinting with Tel and N'dru against the Inquisitor and Soontir, who just flew away. Meanwhile the **** shuttle just wrecked me, doing way way more damage than he should have. Soontir never fired a shot, just ran on me, while the Inquisitor eventually got in on me with prockets.

I need to try that again, and this time finish the stupid shuttle early, those stinking aces are almost unhittable with him alive.

For the record I did manage to Boba the Emporer before I bit the dust.

My plan against Palp Aces was to go with NDru for the Shuttle, Talonbane for an Ace, preferably Soontir, and Tel/Manaroo would help out one way or the other. People always say to not go for the Shuttle first. But the Cluster Missiles have a realistic damage output of 6 or 7 hits vs a shuttle. 1 or 2 more attacks and Palp is gone. I think that's worth it. Talonbane is almost guaranteed to get a crit against Soontir. With Glitterstim he WILL get 4 hits/crits with at least one crit. Whatever Soontir rolls, he will not get more than 4 Evades (no more than 4 green dice, Homing Missiles will not let him use the Evade Token) and Crack Shot will force the crit through. A good crit may just finish Soontir on the spot: a second stress or hard turns red may wreck his next turn. But the Stealth Device is gone anyway.

So far so good in theory. A good player will dance around with Soontir and mess up the plans (sound like what your opponent did). But that's how I would try to play it...

cybu: thanks... You just gave me inspiration to tackle the Aces again. I had been having such an easy time if it so far generally, that I was it thinning through all my options.

In my first three games, Tel did most of the heavily lifting, sometimes within Protons, but often with just blocking and letting Talonbane and N'dru do their alpha.

After our aces match, both my opponent and myself were kind of discouraged, thinking that perhaps aces was just a hard counter to this list, and that was that. True, it's going to require some more clever play, but perhaps there is a way through the minefield. I'll report back when we try it.

From my experience with similar list N'Dru should have VI instead of Crack Shot. He's really dependant on TL, and with VI you'll move after Inquistor and Omega Leader (not to mention Wampa) which gives you small advantage over Palp Aces.

You could also try Manaroo instead of Tel Trevura to have an access to some shenanigans with dice modification for Talonbane Cobra after 5 k-turn.

Overall very nice list. No top tier, but can deliver some real pain to meta lists if flown well.

So... What's new with this list since the most recent FAQ?

Is there a place for vector thrusters anywhere here anywhere?

Yeah! Also intrigued

So... What's new with this list since the most recent FAQ?

Is there a place for vector thrusters anywhere here anywhere?

I thought about this myself. The most recent FAQ hurts Tel Trevura as it does other Jumpmasters that rely on a Deadeye/R4 Agromech attack. The obvious choice now is Overclocked R4 and we're good to go. 1 Point for initiative is also nice. On the other hand Overclocked is worse than Agromech as we can already change one Eye result to a crit with the Proton Torpedo. So one option would be to change Proton Torpedoes to Plasma and add Feedback Array. That helps against aces.

However I don't see any use for Vector Thrusters. I think VT is a really good option for Talonbane in general. But it doesn't do much in this setup. This squad wants to make a deadly alpha strike. So Talonbane needs to target lock as an action in the initial engagement and he needs the Guidance Chips in the Modification slot to modify his attack. With VT you have a completely different Talonbane. It could work, but then the squad plays very differently. I would probably do something like this: