Anyone ever tried this?

People have tried it. If you have 4 StarVipers, I say go for it... you may not be top tier competitive, but if you learn how to make them work together, I can almost guarantee that you will be the only one at the table that does and you can probably have people scratching their heads on fighting them. It is a good exercise to fly as many generics as you can of any list and see what they do together. It will really help you understand the ship.

Does the StarViper cost a little too much? Sure. Do we want to be able to run System and Illicit on all of them? Sure, but it wouldn't matter to 4 Black Sun Enforcers, just like upgrades don't matter to 5 Cartel Marauders. I would like to say I have run this list, but I still need a few StarVipers to practice the list.

You could play 4 of them, and while I haven't tried it, I've seen a good player make the attempt....and gave up on them...

If they were 23 points (so you could take all 4 with autothrusters) then I'd say they would have potential, but the fact is, without autothrusters, they really struggle in certain matchups.

Their strengths include: boost/barrel roll; s-loop; 3 attack/3 agility and access to all 1 speed moves (white) for excellent maneuvering through asteroids and getting blocks.

Weaknesses: 4 hull (means susceptible to crits) and Pilot Skill 1 (only good for blocking).

The best way to fly them is to try to draw the opponent into a densely packed asteroid field. Even b-wings cannot outfly a star viper with such limited movement options. Use your PS 1 to block ships and spread your own ships out so they cannot be shot at multiple times. This is important: 3 agility is strong vs 1 attack per turn; but not against multiple attacks, so avoid being shot multiple times! (on the same ship) If one ship gets heavily damaged, run it the eff away and bring it back only if your opponent has gotten into a position where he cannot easily engage it.

Bad matchups (i.e. fights where you need to fly substantially better than your opponent to even have a hope of winning):

-Vader/Gunner crew on decimator

-BBBBZ

-crack swarm

-triple torpedo scouts

-Dash Rendar, or Han Solo or Chiraneau (because no autothrusters )

In other words quite a few popular meta lists. Palp Aces is actually not terrible, since the star vipers are quite good at rushing the shuttle and destroying it quickly (the aces cannot really stop you since they have to be careful or else you can turn on them, block them and destroy them with range 1 shots on actionless ace). And if you get an end-game scenario where its 2 star vipers left against 1 ace, you actually can win that easily (one viper blocks to deny actions, the other one deals damage)

We have a StarViper/Kihraxz specialist at my FLGS, and while I don't see 4 StarVipers too often I see 2 or 3 regularly. The base one is an amazing blocker (and can take autothrusters), even better than the A-wing Prototype pilot, but probably not 10 points better.

If you compare Alpha Squadron TIE interceptors to Acadamy Pilot TIE fighters, you can generally see that the extra points aren't often worth it. The StarViper is one more step in that direction. They get an extra hull, one shield, and target lock at the cost of the evade action and about 7 more points.

That being said, it is fun. And four of them block like mad! If only there was a free small base anti-pursuit laser...