Hey, folks!

I had a blast at regionals, despite getting completely owned in most of my games. I brought 1 ISD , 2x Raider II, and 2x Raider I. Having never flown Raiders, I learned over and over that they are built to die quickly. Every game I lost at least 1 Raider before Round 2 activation. Even with good showings from my Overload Pulse/Avenger combo, by round 3 I was inevitably left with just my ISD and devastating activation/MoV disadvantage. With the ISD being the only thing left to shoot at, it went down in a couple games for a total route.

I learned a lot, though, and the OP/Avenger combo dealt some really fast death to a few ships. I'm thinking that swapping the Raider I's for a Vic II would give me a bit more of a robust fleet with enough staying power to kick the Overload Pulse/Avenger combo in rounds 3 and possibly 4, rather than the "everyone's dead by round 3" I was experiencing.

Screed's Black and Blue Bruisers

400 Fleet Points

ISD II - Screed

Avenger

Gunnery Team

Electronic Countermeasures

SW-7 Ion Batteries

XX-9 Turbolasers

[175 points]

VSD II

Intel Officer

Gunnery Team

Overload Pulse

XI7 Turbolasers

[113 points]

and two of:

Raider II

Overload Pulse

[56 points each]

Objectives:

Red - Advanced Gunnery

Yellow - Hyperspace Assault

Blue - Minefields

Here's the play:

Round 1: scream out the gate with the raiders and the ISD to cover ground quickly and limit rounds of bomber fire

Round 2: tag as many ships as possible with the Raiders/Overload Pulse to exhaust defense tokens. Screed guarantees a blue crit. Raiders blow up. Activate the Victory 3rd and wait for Overload Pulsed ships to close on Avenger. Deal 6-9 damage each on two hull zones that have to eat it because of Avenger. Slam on the brakes with Avenger to maintain arc.

Round 3:

Activate Victory (which is finally in range of something) to Overload Pulse as many ships as possible. Intel officer for good measure (the Avenger follow-up encourages spending the token anyway).

Round 4, 5, 6:

Repeat, as appropriate and possible.

As a side note, I love playing Hyperspace Assault with the raiders. People usually pick it because staring at an Advanced Gunnery or a Mine Funnel going straight into the teeth of an ISD are both horrifying, and letting me drop a raider doesn't seem so bad. Then, round 2 or 3, I drop the raider double-arcing the rear of something that hasn't taken much fire. Side arc exhausts all the defense tokens, then front arc hits with 3 Blue, 2 Black (CF) and lands 5 or 6 damage +crit. Ram for good measure. Avenger to polish off.

Why would you drop the Raiders when you can drop a victory on top of them?

Well, I haven't played Hyperspace Assault with a VSD in the list, but the Raider fits nicely in the rear arc of most ships without being double-arc'd. It also doesn't pose as much of a threat, so people don't maneuver as carefully to avoid the drop. Once it is situated neatly in a rear arc, it's a tough choice to waste shots on it when there are bigger targets in more promising arcs coming at them from the front, so it has a relatively high chance of sticking around for a couple rounds and getting in ram damage/overload pulse shots.

We'll see, though. With the prospect of an ISD Advanced Gunnery or a Victory Hyperspace Assault, people might just pick Minefields every time.

The problem is when I see hyperspace assault and a victory I assume the victory is going to be dropped on me because that can potentially kill everything but a MC 80 in one attack especially on a rear hull zone.

Trying to set up an OLP hit while being player two, is not a good fleet design.

You have multiple issues to deal with, Raiders firing the OLP, means one of them starting in red/blue dice range, then the ship in question moving into your ISD best fire zone, to capitalize on the exhausted defense tokens. it is very easy for your opponent to evade.

The only real success I've had with OLP+Avenger is the following kind of build :

ISD : ECM : OLP : XX-9 TL : Avenger

Raider I : Ordnance Experts : APT

Raider I : Ordnance Experts : APT

Raider I : Ordnance Experts : APT

Raider I : Admiral Vader

Comes in at 384pts, you want player one, and you need ship activations to allow you to move the ISD last one round, and first the next round, allowing it to set up a double arc, side arc to trigger the OLP, then front arc to dish the pain.

The other way is picking your opponents Advanced Gunnery, this allows you to fire your front arc twice at the same ship, so long as you hit different hull zones, and again, you want player one / high ship activations to get the most from it.

Fair points, TheEasternKing. Thanks for the reply.

I managed to trigger multiple OP's with my 4-raider fleet, but the losses each round to being 2nd player were definitely the weak point of the fleet. Really what this list needs is some Gozantis....

I'm going to try this list with setting the raiders back a bit and letting the opposing fleet move into blue range after 2nd round movement.

Sounds interesting, and it is certainly one of the trickier combos to get working.

But looking at wave 3/4 stuff, getting combos to work seems to be the order of the day, so certainly not wasted time practicing it with OLP/Avenger.

Avenger by itself can be a real threat, without needing OLP, just having to decide when to spend tokens knowing that Avenger has yet to fire can cause real headaches for your opponent.

Advanced gunnery doesn't do you much good. The FAQ says that if you use advanced gunnery on a ship with gunnery teams, the gunnery teams override and you don't get your benefit. You'd end up choosing a raider, unless you just want to make one of your big ships worth double points.

You want most wanted as your red.

Hey, folks!

I had a blast at regionals, despite getting completely owned in most of my games. I brought 1 ISD , 2x Raider II, and 2x Raider I. Having never flown Raiders, I learned over and over that they are built to die quickly. Every game I lost at least 1 Raider before Round 2 activation. Even with good showings from my Overload Pulse/Avenger combo, by round 3 I was inevitably left with just my ISD and devastating activation/MoV disadvantage. With the ISD being the only thing left to shoot at, it went down in a couple games for a total route.

I learned a lot, though, and the OP/Avenger combo dealt some really fast death to a few ships. I'm thinking that swapping the Raider I's for a Vic II would give me a bit more of a robust fleet with enough staying power to kick the Overload Pulse/Avenger combo in rounds 3 and possibly 4, rather than the "everyone's dead by round 3" I was experiencing.

Screed's Black and Blue Bruisers

400 Fleet Points

ISD II - Screed

Avenger

Gunnery Team

Electronic Countermeasures

SW-7 Ion Batteries

XX-9 Turbolasers

[175 points]

VSD II

Intel Officer

Gunnery Team

Overload Pulse

XI7 Turbolasers

[113 points]

and two of:

Raider II

Overload Pulse

[56 points each]

Objectives:

Red - Advanced Gunnery

Yellow - Hyperspace Assault

Blue - Minefields

Here's the play:

Round 1: scream out the gate with the raiders and the ISD to cover ground quickly and limit rounds of bomber fire

Round 2: tag as many ships as possible with the Raiders/Overload Pulse to exhaust defense tokens. Screed guarantees a blue crit. Raiders blow up. Activate the Victory 3rd and wait for Overload Pulsed ships to close on Avenger. Deal 6-9 damage each on two hull zones that have to eat it because of Avenger. Slam on the brakes with Avenger to maintain arc.

Round 3:

Activate Victory (which is finally in range of something) to Overload Pulse as many ships as possible. Intel officer for good measure (the Avenger follow-up encourages spending the token anyway).

Round 4, 5, 6:

Repeat, as appropriate and possible.

As a side note, I love playing Hyperspace Assault with the raiders. People usually pick it because staring at an Advanced Gunnery or a Mine Funnel going straight into the teeth of an ISD are both horrifying, and letting me drop a raider doesn't seem so bad. Then, round 2 or 3, I drop the raider double-arcing the rear of something that hasn't taken much fire. Side arc exhausts all the defense tokens, then front arc hits with 3 Blue, 2 Black (CF) and lands 5 or 6 damage +crit. Ram for good measure. Avenger to polish off.

I know old post but like to learn as much as I can.

Round 1 you are going full speed taking I guess nav tokens with your raiders and ISD turning into your foe?

Round 2 ISD goes first but use nav to slow down. raiders go last so they can attack.

Round 3 Raiders hurting or gone now. VSD, ISD, Raider attack using CA dial

4.5.6 repeat.