Two Evils (400/400)

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MC30c Frigate: MC30c Torpedo Frigate (63 + 25)

+ Ordnance Experts (4)

+ Assault Proton Torpedoes (5)

+ H9 Turbolasers (8)

+ Admonition (8)

MC30c Frigate: MC30c Torpedo Frigate (63 + 21)

+ Lando Calrissian (4)

+ Ordnance Experts (4)

+ Assault Proton Torpedoes (5)

+ H9 Turbolasers (8)

Nebulon-B Frigate: Nebulon-B Escort Frigate (57 + 15)

+ Veteran Captain (3)

+ Turbolaser Reroute Circuits (7)

+ Yavaris (5)

Nebulon-B Frigate: Nebulon-B Support Refit (51 + 34)

+ General Dodonna (20)

+ Turbolaser Reroute Circuits (7)

+ Salvation (7)

Squadrons: "Dutch" Vander (16)

Squadrons: Wedge Antilles (19)

Squadrons: Luke Skywalker (20)

Squadrons: Tycho Celchu (16)

Objectives Assault: Precision Strike (0)

Objectives Defense: Hyperspace assault (0)

Objectives Navigation: Dangerous Territory (0)

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Okay, so I've been tinkering with this list for the past couple of weeks, and I'm liking it pretty well so far. It gives me very good layered-threats capability, good flexibility, decent deployments (6) and activations (4), good speed, and pretty good squadron defenses.

A couple of my unconventional choices:

H9 on the torpedo shrimps. These have been serving me surprisingly well. With the blue dice, that's a guaranteed accuracy on every shot. If I double arc, even with ECM, one of those accuracies is getting through unmitigated every time. It gets much much worse if I can set up shots from both shrimp, or if my APT/Dodonna crits start fishing up defense token mitigators like Injured Crew or Faulty Countermeasures.

TRC on Yavaris. This upgrade transforms Yav from a one-dimensional to a multi-dimensional threat. That reliable damage from TRC gives you even more hitting power with Yav, and expands her threat range from "wherever there are bombers" to everywhere within long range. A big, punchy follow-up immediately after clearing out shields with Dutch, Wedge, and Luke/Tycho is a huge deal, especially with the option to threaten a Dodonna crit on there. And don't forget, you can do it out the side or rear arcs too.

Yavaris in a not-heavy-bomber fleet. Yavaris in this list is my anti-squadron enabler, not primary offense as she is in most cases. She is there to push Dutch and Wedge to threaten bombers, and clear out TIE swarms with AA. That's not to say she doesn't still threaten the double-tapping bomber combo if I do win the squadron fight or face an all-ship build, but that's not her primary role. I chose the four squadrons to maximize their anti-squadron threat while still retaining a secondary, reasonably potent bomber capability.

Hyperspace Assault. I have no idea why people seem to think HA is a poor objective. If I'm facing a squadron-heavy list, Admonition goes into hyperspace; if it's heavy-hitting ISD's or MC80's, it'll be Lando; if there is no squadron screen, it'll be Yavaris. You don't hyper in behind the adversary, but on top of him. If you deploy the tokens right, it's extremely difficult to pass them by without granting a position that will either give the MC30 a fork (two close-range threatened targets) or a head-on double side arc block. Yavaris is a bit harder to get the fork, but also much more forgiving of not quite getting it, since she can hit at range. The key to HA, though, is layered threats: you have to have the rest of your fleet in position to intercept the rats that your objective ship is flushing out, giving them nothing but terrible choices in activation order. Run away from this double-arcing MC30 into the jaws of Salvation and another MC30? Please do!

Overall game plan: the shrimps pick a target and kill it quick. Salvation and Yavaris from behind keep it from escaping. Tycho ties up squadrons long enough to position the X-wings/Dutch to double-tap them to death. If you have to choose, put Lando in the big-ship danger zone, and Admonition among the squadrons.

I like it

95 points in upgrades + 25 points in named squadron upgrades is a lot. Not saying it doesn't work or that they aren't good choices, but when I look at the fact that you have 30% of your points in upgrades it makes me nervous.

95 points in upgrades + 25 points in named squadron upgrades is a lot. Not saying it doesn't work or that they aren't good choices, but when I look at the fact that you have 30% of your points in upgrades it makes me nervous.

Solid point. It does feel very... tenuous on the table, but I couldn't quite put my finger on why. That explains it.

The H9s on the shrimp contribute quite a bit to that ratio, and are more nice-to-have than critical to the build, but I haven't really been able to figure out what else to do with those points. I'm pretty comfortable as either first or second with the list, so I feel like a large bid is just throwing points away. I'd like to be able to fit another ship in, but really can't find room for even a CR90. If I dropped the H9s (16), TRC from Yavaris (7), Tycho and Luke to generics (12), it would still only give me 35. I feel like that's really cutting deep for not much gain. Maybe if I downgraded Salv to a CR90, too... But then I feel like I'm losing quite a bit of ship punch, and a lot of squadron survivability, especially on Tycho.

If you have specific suggestions, I'm open to them.

I looked for some suggestions, but didn't have any off the top of my head. The upgrade points just stood out to me. I don't see a 5th ship as being the way to go.

The one thing I could suggest would be re-purposing some of those upgrade points into a pair of YT-2400s. It would give you another deployment. I've found Rogue to be great in MC-30 fleets. The single black die for anti-ship can be fairly useful as well.

My only suggestion would be to drop H-9s for Advanced Projectors. I know a lot of people will claim that everyone brings Xi7s but my experience and watching the latest Regionals I would say its closer to 50% at the most. And the times when they dont have them makes those lil shrimpies so tough to kill and even if they do have them you can still move 1 damage where you want.

I would agree with shmitty on the Rogues. YT-2400s are amazing with his build. With the 4 points you would save from dropping H-9s and if you drop Luke and Tycho you could put in Dash and another YT-2400.

He never went away! He's been oppressing people in the Pacific Northwest for a while now :-D

I like H9's on the torps. Thats a lot of damage going unbraced...

He never went away! He's been oppressing people in the Pacific Northwest for a while now :-D

MWUHAHAHAHAHAHA. A valuable effort it has been.

I like H9's on the torps. Thats a lot of damage going unbraced...

No argument there but I guess from my experience the Torp frigates tend to get the accuracy's a lot it feels like a wasted upgrade. I usually have a concentrate fire command and I roll my dice and if I get an accuracy I add a black dice if I dont I add a blue dice.

I like H9's on the torps. Thats a lot of damage going unbraced...

No argument there but I guess from my experience the Torp frigates tend to get the accuracy's a lot it feels like a wasted upgrade. I usually have a concentrate fire command and I roll my dice and if I get an accuracy I add a black dice if I dont I add a blue dice.

I've only run with the H9 on these a couple of times, so can hardly say they're great in every situation, but I am really liking them so far.

I also don't CF on these guys very often, so I'm sure that contributes to my dearth of natural accuracies too. Often a nav command is the difference between getting a follow-up shot or not, and sometimes five more damage tomorrow is better than two more today.

I like H9's on the torps. Thats a lot of damage going unbraced...

No argument there but I guess from my experience the Torp frigates tend to get the accuracy's a lot it feels like a wasted upgrade. I usually have a concentrate fire command and I roll my dice and if I get an accuracy I add a black dice if I dont I add a blue dice.

Just a personal experiences thing, but I never, ever seem get those accuracies on the torpedo frigates! But in seriousness, it is very rare that I don't want one of those blues to pop up an accuracy, and even out the sides you're looking at less than 50% chance of rolling one.

I've only run with the H9 on these a couple of times, so can hardly say they're great in every situation, but I am really liking them so far.

I also don't CF on these guys very often, so I'm sure that contributes to my death of accuracies too. Often a nav command is the difference between getting a follow-up shot or not, and sometimes five more damage tomorrow is better than two more today.

A nav command can also be the difference between ending up in the front of an ISD or it's side (vice versa for MC80).

I generally don't CF on my MC80's until turn 4 (if at all); that's when I can be sure I'm behind my enemy's fleet.

I'll do it for the opening salvo sometimes depending on the situation. If it's super important that the ship die fast--such that I'd be willing to trade a shrimp for it--I might do it. Our of I'm sure I can jump over it and still circle back. Or if I have a nav token and am at speed 3. Or if I plan to ram anyway. Or if I know I'll be dead this turn.

But yeah, most of the time a nav will net you more total damage dealt than a CF will.

I've said that a Nav is like a CF and an Engineering order wrapped in one.

Hang on, where is the intel officer on Salvation?

Build 1/10

Hang on, where is the intel officer on Salvation?

Build 1/10

Yeah, I do really like the IO on Salv, but I think I get more out of Luke and the TRC on Yavaris... one of which I would have to downgrade/drop (respectively) to get it. Tried downgrading Luke last night, and losing him hurt way more than gaining the IO helped.

That said, I am looking for a way to get that on there. Between the H9's and the IO, that's a lot of pressure on defense tokens, even against duplicates.

I agree with the others on the total skepticism toward the H9 and possibly total points devoted to upgrades. My thought on the H9 is that they tend to synthesize more with scout frigate, where accuracies are really hard to come by on red dice. You're right that you're not getting one over half the time, but that's still almost half the time (44%) that you're paying for the H9 but don't actually need it. Your ships also do a lot of shots in the 4-5 damage range, so to some extent, it doesn't matter whether he braces this shot or the next shot, he's going to get to brace. In short, the H9 might be worth a bit more on this shot, but it might not actually present a net gain of damage on the whole. Intel Officer might, however, just eliminate that brace, especially if you've got an above average black dice roll.

I'd be tempted to try Rapid Reload/XX9 on one of them instead of APT/H9. You've still got a 44% of rolling that accuracy. You mention sometimes being able to double arc out of your sides, so you're adding to that. You're also right on the cusp where if you do fail to get the accuracy, you're going to drop from 7 to 4 on many of your rolls. If he's going to burn that accuracy on a shot from a later ship anyway, that's a good damage improvement that you've got as compensation. Anything that gets through then allows Dodonna to trigger twice.

Just dropping the H9 for defensive upgrades might compensate for the fragility you noted earlier and which others highlighted. I love my defensive upgrades.

I wonder if trading Tycho and an H9 for Dash might work as well. From what I can tell, Tycho zooms in on the squadron phase a round before you're really intending the Dutch/Wedge/Luke combo to activate off Yavaris. Dash rushes in with Rogue and then hits harder, with a solid increase in durability as well. If I'm not activating off a ship, I love having a Rogue squadron or two handy.

I agree with the others on the total skepticism toward the H9 and possibly total points devoted to upgrades.

My thought on the H9 is that they tend to synthesize more with scout frigate, where accuracies are really hard to come by on red dice. You're right that you're not getting one over half the time, but that's still almost half the time (44%) that you're paying for the H9 but don't actually need it.

Your ships also do a lot of shots in the 4-5 damage range, so to some extent, it doesn't matter whether he braces this shot or the next shot, he's going to get to brace. In short, the H9 might be worth a bit more on this shot, but it might not actually present a net gain of damage on the whole. Intel Officer might, however, just eliminate that brace, especially if you've got an above average black dice roll.

In conjunction with the APT and Dodonna to fish for Structural Damage or Shield Failure, the MC30's can extremely reliably push through the 6 total damage to one-shot both corvettes, which is one of the strengths of this list. IO contributes nothing to that ability. That sounds trivial, but the ability to take out two in one activation is pretty crucial to this list's ability to counter two popular archetypes: the Clonisher swarm and the Ackbar/CR90As.

As for scout vs torpedo, remember H9's only trigger if you already have a hit or crit, meaning they make the scout only a bit more reliable than the torp's natural accuracies... And they do nothing to mitigate blanks, which is what the scout really needs. I can't see ever taking H9 over TRC on the scout.

I'd be tempted to try Rapid Reload/XX9 on one of them instead of APT/H9. You've still got a 44% of rolling that accuracy. You mention sometimes being able to double arc out of your sides, so you're adding to that. You're also right on the cusp where if you do fail to get the accuracy, you're going to drop from 7 to 4 on many of your rolls. If he's going to burn that accuracy on a shot from a later ship anyway, that's a good damage improvement that you've got as compensation. Anything that gets through then allows Dodonna to trigger twice.

Just dropping the H9 for defensive upgrades might compensate for the fragility you noted earlier and which others highlighted. I love my defensive upgrades.

I wonder if trading Tycho and an H9 for Dash might work as well. From what I can tell, Tycho zooms in on the squadron phase a round before you're really intending the Dutch/Wedge/Luke combo to activate off Yavaris. Dash rushes in with Rogue and then hits harder, with a solid increase in durability as well. If I'm not activating off a ship, I love having a Rogue squadron or two handy.

I know I spent a lot of time laying out why I disagree with you, but I want to emphasize that I really do appreciate the criticism and the thought you pout into my list. You make some good points that I'll definitely be watching for in my next few games!

That's all good. I appreciate taking the time to lay out the arguments well. For most of it, I'm tossing out ideas and seeing what sticks over the long run. Those were very good points on H9s versus IOs.

You did ask about my train of thought on the XX9/Rapid Reload. The key point was that with Rapid Reload, especially with OE, you'll either be at 6 damage and the accuracy or 7 damage reliably. Since Brace halves damage, 7 halved becomes 4, which means Rapid really does add something. If it were 7 damage becoming 8, your extra point is just getting braced away. I was thinking more of the longer hitting power against an ISD in making the suggestion, where having a couple of face-up cards (from XX9) early could make a dint in how quickly it gets taken down. APT are nice because the crit gets applied early and the right crit paves the way for destroying the ship, which as you say, is going to help with those Corvettes and Raiders. Notice, I only said on one of them, and that I'd be tempted to try it. It is for flexibility. Anyway, I meant it more as something to experiment with.

I'm not sure Rapid Reload is strictly speaking worse. Sure, I use APT far more than Rapid Reload, but part of the game moving forward is someone trying some different ideas, whether those be H9 or Rapid Reload. Sometimes, we don't realize how good something is till someone wins with it. And that is one of the key things I appreciate about a thread like this: the willingness to try new ideas. I did a bit of math earlier on APT versus Rapid Reload, and it isn't quite as straight-forward as your numbers above indicate because there's a delicate interaction between black dice, the rerolls from OE, and how good APT or Rapid Reload is. We get 1.25 by taking the base 1.00 of a black die, and then adding .25, or 25% of the outcomes as blanks that can be rerolled at the 1.00 base value. But when you write .82 and .69, you're using OE to reroll the hits (or at least that's the only way I can get the math to work), and not merely the blanks. So that affects overall expected average damage. More on that another time when I have the energy.

Has anyone tried a Raymus torp frigate as the rebels version of engine tech glads?

Has anyone tried a Raymus torp frigate as the rebels version of engine tech glads?

It's good, but it's far from the same thing. The third attack back-to-back is a very big deal, especially with Intel Officer in the mix. It also takes MUCH more effort to set up than the ET Demo, being dramatically less maneuverable at speed 4, which limits its threat area even with a nav dial and token.