So I went to the Regionals in Dublin yesterday and managed to come second

Admittedly it wasn't a huge affair with only 8 players, but I'm pleased none the less.

There were 5 Imperial fleets with Motti being the Admiral of choice - lots of ISDs and the ubiquitous Demolisher.

There were 3 Rebel fleets (including mine) with Dodonna, Ackbar and Rieekan

The player with the Rieekan fleet was the overall winner. I think he had an MC80, MC30, Nebulon (Yavaris) and a whole heap of aces.

Interestingly this fleet and mine had easily the most squadrons there and so they were able to operate with relative impunity.

If anyone who was there reads this - my apologies, but I'm useless with names, so I haven't included any here.

My fleet was as follows:

Rebels Fleet (380 of 400 pts)
Commander: General Dodonna (20 pts)
Flagship: (88 pts)

• Assault Frigate Mark II A(81 pts)
• Electronic Counter Measures (7 pts)

Fleet Ship 1: (51 pts)

• CR90 Corvette A(44 pts)
• Turbolaser Reroute Circuits (7 pts)

Fleet Ship 2: (71 pts)

• Nebulon-B Support Refit(51 pts)
• Salvation (7 pts)
• Intel Officer (7 pts)
• Slaved Turrets (6 pts)

Fleet Ship 3: (69 pts)

• Nebulon-B Escort Frigate(57 pts)
• Yavaris (5 pts)
• Ray Antilles (7 pts)

Squadrons (101 of 134 pts):

• 1x Dutch Vander Y-Wing Squadron (16 pts)
• 1x Wedge Antilles X-Wing Squadron (19 pts)
• 1x Y-Wing Squadron (10 pts)
• 2x YT-2400 (32 pts)
• 1x Outrider - Dash Rendar (24 pts)

Objectives: Most Wanted , Hyperspace Assault , Dangerous Territory

I decided not to go for a bid and rely on going second with a view to playing my own missions. By and large this worked out well - in two og the games both myself and the other player had 400 points. I elected to go second when I won the toss for initiative.

Game 1

The first game was against another Rebel fleet lead by Ackbar with an AF2(b), 3x MC30 Scout Frigates (TRCs and ordnance experts) and a Nebulon.

I was second player and the mission was Most Wanted (I chose ACkbar's AF2 and my CR90) - so my plan was to go all out and kill Ackbar. The opposing fleet all started at either speed 3 or 4 and closed very quickly. I swung wide with my AF2 and CR90 along with the YT-2400s to try to gun down the opposing AF2 with Ackbar.

Salvation got the opening volley - managing to roll 6 red dice (3 + Slaved turrets + Concentrate Fire + Most Wanted). I stripped off a large number of shields and removed his Brace token with the intel officer. My AF2 took took a round of incoming fire but was able to finish it off over the next two turns.

Elsewhere my CR90 went down to a brutal broadside from an MC30 and Salvation also paid the price for putting itself in harm's way to get shots at Ackbar. Yavaris and the bombers were brutalised by the end of the game, but managed to account for two MC30s.

8-2 Victory for me.

What worked here for me was Salvation lining up on Ackbar warly in the game, I knew I'd lose the ship, but it was a chance to do a lot of damage and set it up for a kill later in the game.

A recurring theme was how sturdy Nebulons are *if* you can keep the front pointing towards the other guy!! This saved Yavaris from certain death due to an Ackbar enhanced (black/red) broadside from an MC30 around midgame.

Deployment:

Turn 1

Turn 5

Game 2

This game was against Motti with an ISD(2), two Raider(1)s and Demolisher along with 2x Firesprays and Rhymer

I was second player and the mission was Hyperspace Assault.

I deployed my AF2 early in this game with a view to drawing out the ISD (which it did). The plan then was to RUN AWAY and lead the ISD and anything else into the guns of the rest of my fleet piecemeal. There was a lot of cat and mouse maneuvering for the first few turns. I brought Yavaris in from Hyperspace on Turn3 to the side of Demolisher (to the left of where my opponent's finger is in the pic!). This sort of worked as I was able to Damage Demolisher and force it to commit to attacking, but I did lose Yavaris about a turn later - although I was able to use the Dutch/Wedge combo to double tap the firesprays and take them out too.

In the end I took out a Raider, Demolisher and all the squadrons to get a 7-3 victory (mainly as I didn't lose very much)

What worked here I think was choosing when not to fight. My AF2 would have died in short order against the ISD had I done anything but run for it. Salvation did well again and limped away from a full round of ISD shooting thanks to it's front shields and double brace

Yavaris was a bit of a let down - the dice rolls just weren't there this time.

Deployment:

Turn 2:

Turn 4:

Turn 6:

Game 3

This game was against another Motti list with two ISD(2)s this time - both with Gunnery Teams, Demolisher and two Agressors.

The mission was Dangerous Territory so I placed my obstacles where I could grab to tokens handily enough.

The ISDs came at my at full speed - I would have preferred to avoid them for a while longer, but against Motti and ISDs I wasn't sure how many points I'd get for ships, so I needed to get the tokens. As it happened Salvation (again!!) did a phenomenal amount of damage to Motti's ship as it closed and both it and my AF2 survived a close range volley (thank you ECMs!). This allowed my to get another round in with Salvation, a double arc from the AF2 and Yavaris got the double tap the bombers. Even with all of that and Dodonna choosing the nastiest criticals, the ISD only went down on the last dice roll.

The second ISD ploughed through the wreckage, blasting Salvation in the side and then ran for it - I got it down to 9 of 11 hull before the game ended.

Final score was 7-3 to me.

The stand out thing here was the toughness of the Nebulons if you can keep them pointing the right way.

Deployment:

Turn 1:

Turn 3:

Turn 4:

Turn 6:

Nice AAR, congrats on the 2nd place finish!

More importantly, beautiful paint job on those ships!

Agreed, great AAR and pictures! Congratulations!

Thanks for the report - great detail, painting and pictures!

Congratulations on all your wins too. May I ask what your toughest opponent was and why?

May I ask what your toughest opponent was and why?

I think it was probably the Rebel fleet with the MC30 Scouts and Ackbar. The reason being that it was easily the fastest fleet there and I didn't have enough time to get my fleet into position quite in the way I'd have liked it - i.e. to bring as much firepower to bear at one side of the opposing fleet (ideally a single ship) rather than a general engagement.

This fleet was on top of me on Turn 2 and was able to hit my Nebulons in the weaker sides. The MC30s stayed at speed 3-4 for most of the game, so once I weathered the storm of the first pass and was able to take out Ackbar, they didn't have the maneuverability or firepower anymore to inflict much more damage, but the first few turns were hairy.

The second imperial fleet was a threat for similar reasons (2x raiders and Demolisher with Engine Techs) but I think the guy playing them may have been a little too cautious. Had he charged in with Demolisher earlier with the raiders in support on he could have scattered my fleet in response and likely have done for a Nebulon in one pass, but (I think) he was waiting to see where Yavaris would emerge from Hyperspace.

Good job, I had been thinking of getting a dodonna fleet, this looks like it would be relatively cheap for me to pick up and effective too... grats... only two questions, why no Luke, and how much does dodonna's ability come up with this list??? Thanks

Ands one more... why no Jan?? Thanks again

There's no Luke as originally I wanted to have 4 ships *and* loads of squadrons for bombing runs and air (space?) superiority

As the points started to add up, Wedge was a compromise as he could tag-team with Dutch in a pinch to work through a squadron ball but was still a bomber with a black dice against ships.

I was skeptical about the number of times I'd get to use Dodonna too as most of the local guys here run smaller ships where you may only ever get to use one critical. But with the number of Motti ISDs I faced I got to use it a surprising amount of times with both Imperial players I faced working their way through more than half of their damage decks. Bombing runs were particularly nasty as I could trigger multiple criticals in a turn.

Jan - Oh Jan! She was originally in my list where I had an AF2(B) rather than the Type A and had given it Expanded Hanger Bays to control 3x A-Wings and Jan.

In the end I swapped this for Dash and the YT-2400s. In game terms I think the A-Wings may have done more damage on the whole, but having the freedom not to have to issue Squadron orders (I ended up spamming Nav/Eng orders) kept the AF2 quite agile - and alive!! It never died all day.