Righto mates, the roads have thawed, the snow has (partially) receded up in these northern wastes, and you know what time of year it is: construction season. Which means it's time for regionals! Yeah yeah, normally I don't hang around here, but won't you lend an ear and humour a bothan sympathizer?

Long story short: I'm stuck formulating something that's punchy enough to be an all comers list without meandering too far into any camp. Most of my experiments have been pushing a few paradigms just too far in alternate directions and I'm mulling over finding the right combination. So, this is what we've got 'ere, probably common fare all things considered.

Commander: General Rieekan
Points: 399/400

Objectives: Advanced Gunnery , Fleet Ambush, Dangerous Territory

[ flagship ] MC80 Command Cruiser (106 points)
- General Rieekan ( 30 points)
- Defiance ( 5 points)
- Electronic Countermeasures ( 7 points)
- Heavy Turbolaser Turrets ( 6 points)
- Leading Shots ( 4 points)
= 158 total ship cost
I typically shy away from making the flagship so flashy, but I've found that the MC80 doesn't die that easily so Rieekan is safe-ish aboard the SS Piñata. It's a linchpin but not the only significant damage dealer which has been my Achilles heel. The lack of XI-7 comes from the expense of its Intelligence Officer counterpart which is all but necessary for taking down the Brace of large ships. I will note now that I don't like the interaction of HTT andd TRC as I'm fearing that focus fire will strip off the redirects and the Brace will go straight to the HTT anyway, thus robbing it of a lot of potential unless I'm splitting fire. Are those fears founded?

CR90 Corvette A (44 points)
- Turbolaser Reroute Circuits ( 7 points)
= 51 total ship cost

CR90 Corvette A (44 points)
- Turbolaser Reroute Circuits ( 7 points)
= 51 total ship cost
Pair of TRC90's, 'nough said.

MC30c Torpedo Frigate (63 points)
- Admonition ( 8 points)
- Ordnance Experts ( 4 points)
- Assault Proton Torpedoes ( 5 points)
= 80 total ship cost
I've been using the Escort Nebulon B-aitship with Lando as a flak barge and it's good, but isn't punchy enough to finish off enemy ships. The other choice is a Tantive-B with Lando as a flagship pumping tokens into keeping the MC80 around, but it doesn't contribute anything except for enemy target practice served with Activation au gratin. The 4^th ship feels necessary when half the fleet is corvettes.

1 A-Wing Squadron ( 11 points)
1 Tycho Celchu ( 16 points)
2 YT-2400s ( 32 points)
60 points of squadrons isn't enough for me. This is strictly a picket line to hold for a turn or two against a squadro-centric list while allowing my more punchy ships to deal with the capital threat. It's a fire and forget set of squadrons that allows for the two deployment drops and doesn't need me to fiddle with squadron commands on a ship that needs to stay alive. Though I can't help but consider Jan and the 3 X-musketeers as a replacement CAP group but then I'm stuck with shepherding them around. Thoughts on the danger of getting routed by a Rhymer group? Does it need to be beefed up?

Objective Notes:

Advanced Gunnery:

On an Mc80 it's do or die and I don't have a Nebby around for some last minute bit and switch shenanigans. The point cost for a lost ship is astounding but the amount of pseudo-reliable firepower a Leading Shot Defiance can pump out can be dangerous enough to dissuade most opponents from picking it as an objective.

Fleet Ambush:

Conventional wisdom says 'it's a bad idea' but I haven't tied it in a while. With Rieekan it seems that the real fear is a preemptive ISD-Rhymer activation to mark the start of the funeral. But with the short range of an MC30 and Admonition being able to tank at least one ISD shot coupled with an MC80, I don't feel quite as vulnerable as I did in Wave 1. If worst comes to worst I can try to punch out an enemy high cost ship to recoup some losses, then cut and run with the fast ships.

Dangerous Territory:

There's not enough squadrons there for a good run at Superior Positions, and the danger of obstacles on the papier-mâché menagerie has always been very real. There just doesn't seem like a good opportunity here on the navigation front.

So, what am I decidedly missing or overlooking for an all-comers list? I will state for the record, the locals have traditionally gone token squadrons with an emphasis on ship (Danced with the DeMSU, did the Ackbar TRConga, and tangoed with the Vicky triplets and their big sister last time out. 3 games, 4 squadrons total). Still, I don't want to chance just flinging bombers around in a regional tourney.

Hark, dost thou not hear the chimes? It approacheth midnight and the bloody gambit draws nigh. What say ye, o' companions bold?

Loving the paint job on those well done.

If you want a suggestion though If I were running an MC80 it would be all about fire lanes. Tokens in a stack and then a slow cruise past them with my many dice.

Dangerous territory is the soft option anyway so I'd predict many to go for that.

I'd suggest trying to push your points to the full 400.

Missions:

• Most Wanted
• Hyperspace Assault
• Dangerous Territory

The reasoning being that if you are second player chances are that you'll get to use Defiance's ability on most turns and gives you a better chance of playing one of your own missions.

Most Wanted: Usually you'll pick the other player's most expensive ship and one of your own TRC90. If they are playing Demolisher then pick that as Most Wanted. There's nothing more fun to watch than them realising that the ship they had planned to run straight at you is now worth more points and you'll also get more dice to throw at it. Profit

Hyperspace Assault: This would be for your MC30. As it's the Torpedo version, chances are that it won't be in range for a few turns anyway, but if it's lurking in hyperspace you don't have to worry *too* much about positioning it, and hopefully you force the other player to react and play defensivly.

Dangerous Territory: Yep, agree with you on this one. I think your TRC90s should be able to pick up a few tokens early on and have the speed to grab another one or two later in the game. The thing to bear in mind with this mission is that you can overlap the obstacles for the whole game without suffering any negative effect - not just for grabbing the tokens, so you have much more navigational freedom than the other player.

Disclaimer: I'm on a bit of a buzz about going second at the moment - so ignore the above if that's not your thing

Artfix. Against Defiance I am very tempted to pick second player with iniative.

Hothgary Spring Tourney yesterday:

2 Rebels

5 Imperials

- 4 Serious (100+pt) Rhymer Balls

- 1 ClonISD veriant

At least 2 of those balls are heading up there this weekend.

Thanks mates, I do sincerely appreciate it! And I'm always open to suggestions, for the record

Hmm, I did have Firelanes as a potential objective, Beefcake. But I've been fairly concerned about ISD-II's swooping in and scooping that up. We see a lot of them and as it is right now I'm not entirely sure I have the firepower to contend with them for a static objective. I suppose I only have to worry about 1-2 and then dispatch a token force to the third or hope to harry them in the late-game with more activations. But I certainly can't contend with 'firepower of that magnitude' without banking on XI7/Intel Officer onboard an Assault Cruiser at stand off range. That's the core of my hesitation.

Artifixprime, aye, I'm still trying to figure out how to spend the full 400 rather than 'including' a 1 point bid. But aside from switching from the fighters to a Jan screen, I'm not seeing how to really do that. Hmmm, you know, that is a good point for Most Wanted as Demo has been the number one headache I've had to deal with in the past few games. Getting 132 for even a discount Demo does make trading it for even an MC80 less appealing than it should be. I think I'll go for that to act as a point gap filler if they try to exchange ships. I might come off worse in the trade off, but Demo won't be making it out of there alive and it should leave most of the quicker ships untouched so they can run and gun.

I like the notion for Hyperspace Assault as well. Including the MC30 and maybe Yt's if I'm not pressed at the beginning sounds like a good consideration. And with proper positioning, it will keep Admonition alive for that much longer, taking my mind off not having Lando.

And absolutely agreed on Dangerous Territory. It's been the face ups which were my demise with, you guessed it, Misaligned Projectors in two games last week. The VP are nice, but it's absolutely about not taking the damage while taunting enemy heavy hitters to get up close. And with 3 Speed 4 ships and a large base in the rear, taking tokens shouldn't be too difficult. So, as Beefcake said, I have a feeling that it's going to be the one most selected as it's not all that overtly dangerous. It's a soft objective I wish I could punish my opponent for. .

Aye Dras, thaaaat's what I'm worried about. And it's not just the Calgary lot, I know one local has a very strong Rhymer ball with about 10-11 other squadrons I may have to deal with. This is why I like my Neb B Advanced Gunnery shenanigans: let people think that it's the MC80 I'll stack it on, but add it to the Nebulon B for the double anti-squadron shots or double front against ships. And, naturally, I don't have a Neb here. -sighs a bit- maybe I should rethink a few elements to spring for a tighter fighter screen. YT2400's might hang on for a while but there's just not enough flak spat out to take down even a semi-serious threat. I hate going all in on a concept when I know there's going to be at least 2 heavy hull all ship builds and likely the DeMSU threat from our mutual tournament friend.

I still wish I could tighten up that Nav objective to make the choices harder.

Oh, and Dras, thanks for reminding me there hasn't been even one local Spring tournament in Armada up here! I really did want to get my hands on that Cruiser alt

I'd suggest trying to push your points to the full 400.

Missions:

• Most Wanted
• Hyperspace Assault
• Dangerous Territory

The reasoning being that if you are second player chances are that you'll get to use Defiance's ability on most turns and gives you a better chance of playing one of your own missions.

Most Wanted: Usually you'll pick the other player's most expensive ship and one of your own TRC90. If they are playing Demolisher then pick that as Most Wanted. There's nothing more fun to watch than them realising that the ship they had planned to run straight at you is now worth more points and you'll also get more dice to throw at it. Profit

Hyperspace Assault: This would be for your MC30. As it's the Torpedo version, chances are that it won't be in range for a few turns anyway, but if it's lurking in hyperspace you don't have to worry *too* much about positioning it, and hopefully you force the other player to react and play defensivly.

Dangerous Territory: Yep, agree with you on this one. I think your TRC90s should be able to pick up a few tokens early on and have the speed to grab another one or two later in the game. The thing to bear in mind with this mission is that you can overlap the obstacles for the whole game without suffering any negative effect - not just for grabbing the tokens, so you have much more navigational freedom than the other player.

Disclaimer: I'm on a bit of a buzz about going second at the moment - so ignore the above if that's not your thing

I agree and disagree with you here. I agree that going second maximises defiance which is great but I disgagree that 400pts is the way to get that. If anything 2nd can be just as valued a choice for initiative bids as 1st it just depends if they are running a black dice heavy fleet that benefits from first or a fleet like this that benefits from 2nd.

Thanks mates, I do sincerely appreciate it! And I'm always open to suggestions, for the record

Hmm, I did have Firelanes as a potential objective, Beefcake. But I've been fairly concerned about ISD-II's swooping in and scooping that up. We see a lot of them and as it is right now I'm not entirely sure I have the firepower to contend with them for a static objective. I suppose I only have to worry about 1-2 and then dispatch a token force to the third or hope to harry them in the late-game with more activations. But I certainly can't contend with 'firepower of that magnitude' without banking on XI7/Intel Officer onboard an Assault Cruiser at stand off range. That's the core of my hesitation.b]

If you are really worried about it fit lando onto you're mc80 to save you from that one really horrible volley you can't get away from otherwise... Maybe drop tycho to a normal a wing to fit it? Depends how you expect the list to play.

First off, long time fan of your ship repaints... I have one of them as my desktop background... do you do commission work???

On to the meat... there it's a really good post in the main forum by iceqube discussing the importance of objectives in tourneys... basically it's this 1. Mov wins tournaments 2. Mov comes from objectives... I think your list is cool, but I think objectives need to be better selected... I went with most wanted, outpost, and Intel sweep...

for your list, most wanted could go on your corvette, and his pinata... defiance, plus extra dice, oh boy...

I think conventional wisdom is outpost for imps, lanes for rebs... but admo can have lunch at the station, pick up at least 40 points with his meal, and with being so tanky, along with reiken, get off 1 if not 2 rounds of fire... meanwhile defiance and trcs can pick away at your opponents as they b line for station from afar...

Intel sweep I would just setup the tokens and grab em with the mc80, while using admonition to attempt to knock out his objective ship... 75 points??? SEXY!!!

MOV MOV MOV... you have to score high just to have a chance at winning, so with that in mind, let's talk about your list...

Defiance... first off I don't like having the general in the most expensive ship in the list... your opponent is already well incentivised to blow it up for mov sake, don't give him more incentive and a massive reward for doing so... I would put reiken on a trc90... I think htt are sub optimal, would prefer xI7, or maybe EA... I think I would run the assault variant as well... engine techs please, it will help get double arcs and you will be nav ing most of the game anyway, also it will help you get token on Intel sweep if you pick your 80 as objective ship

Admo good, consider lando, h9's give guaranteed acc (goodbye gladiator)

Trc90's good

Squads... ryhmer is asking the question: do you have an answer for my Intel... and if your answer is no, then ryhmer says: ok, prepare for 20-40 bomber dice over the course of this game... if he goes second and your choices are PS,CO,SP you might as well call it a day... the squads in your list are just no match for ryhmer, I think you would be better off taking a cr90b, that you can use for reiken blocking

Try and add a bid to take away second from bomber lists, but I think if you had a choice, you should just go second all day, reiken seems to work well that way...

Peace!!!

Faction: Rebel Alliance

Points: 395/400

Commander: General Rieekan

Assault Objective: Most Wanted

Defense Objective: Contested Outpost

Navigation Objective: Intel Sweep

MC80 Assault Cruiser (114 points)

- Defiance ( 5 points)

- Engine Techs ( 8 points)

- Electronic Countermeasures ( 7 points)

- XI7 Turbolasers ( 6 points)

- Leading Shots ( 4 points)

= 144 total ship cost

MC30c Torpedo Frigate (63 points)

- Admonition ( 8 points)

- Ordnance Experts ( 4 points)

- Assault Proton Torpedoes ( 5 points)

= 80 total ship cost

[ flagship ] CR90 Corvette A (44 points)

- General Rieekan ( 30 points)

- Turbolaser Reroute Circuits ( 7 points)

= 81 total ship cost

CR90 Corvette A (44 points)

- Turbolaser Reroute Circuits ( 7 points)

= 51 total ship cost

CR90 Corvette B (39 points)

= 39 total ship cost

Card view link

Fleet created with Armada Warlords

Random thought time: Are TRC90's worth it on their own, or do they need to be run in pairs/en masse for any significant effect?

Good point Beefcake. Would this be considered something of a splash damage rather than short black? Aye, the MC80 is a pretty beefy ship for a 1-1 on an ISD, I managed a good showing the other day but quite true. I'll admit I'm a sucker for dramatics in a game! So that is tempting.

Heyas Skycake, Albertan too, eh? If I understood Dras correctly anyway. Oh? I'm quite flattered, mate Which ship, might I ask? Just curious is all. And yeps, commissions are how I feed my terrible Armada addiction, just like Dras

Aye, I agree on MOV being that factor. I'm on board with Most Wanted, if only for the CR90's relative inexpense versus a truly big fish like an ISD or a MC80. Nice way to bag it. Relocating the flag to the TRC90 seems good to me, I just worry about sniping with squadrons or the like. I suppose Lando might be a measure of ablative armour but that would also remove that option from Admonition.

Outpost is alright, but I'm concerned about bombers for the exact reson you mentioned; intel+Rhymer+bombers is a significant threat. I've been trying to formulate an answer for it without crossing too much into the anti-fighter camp and skimping on anti-capital firepower.

Hmm, Intel: I never thought about using Admonition for hunting. I had considered it as the objective ship but figured that 75 points for an 80 point ship out of the fight would be a poor investment. But the MC80 with the Admonition as a hunter, now that is an interesting idea. The Admonition is a danger to almost every ship, so unless they make their objective ship an ISD, Admonition has a decent chance at it. Beyond that, if it is an ISD, then that's a 150 point ship that has to commit its forward arc. Well worth losing even 75 points loss if I can nominally keep it out of the game.

List wise I do agree, I hate putting my admiral on something flashy, (think I alluded to it too) but the CR90's are so flimsy that it's less comfortable for me. I suppose I can 'win' in an MC80 even when it dies, as it tends to die late game, but MOV will punish that later on. Like Advanced Gunnery, it can get swingy. In the past week I managed to get a 9-1 and an 2-8 because of that factor.

The HTT to XI7 thing gets me a lot. I love XI7 but I feel that it needs Intel Officer to actually make it shine by killing that Brace. Otherwise I'm only ever putting half damage on target and most big ships can take that 3-4 on the chin without an issue. HTT forces a choice by either ignoring redirect, or neutering brace. So it's just deluge damage. They aren't optimized for killing CR90's or MC30's. It's a cost saving measure as I'm pretty strapped for points without losing an activation.

I have thought about the Engine Tech Assault version as well, but the price tag is what's making me grimace. The only option to get one is dropping one CR90 to a B, keeping Lando off the Admonition, and giving the CR90B Tantive. That does have a nice benefit of being able to feed Defiance nav tokens to keep its engine tech fueled so it can take time for squadron commands or engineering late-game. That way there's some degree of Rhymer mitigation with a quartet of X-wings (to replace the existing cover).

And then we get to the big ol' issue, Rhymer and heavy squadrons. I usually include a flak barge and the Assault MC80 to allow for a degree of interlocking anti-squadron cover, but I can't manage that without dropping the CR90b, and dropping the MC80 back to a non-tech command cruiser. Even then, air power is still low with just 4 X-wings.

I can certainly do that list, no issues there, but it does seem like the complete lack of fighters would still be a massive issue.

The only real option to improve that is to drop one of the Mon Cals, the Admonition or Defiance, which leaves me with..

'The Director', Flight Controller, Boosted Comms Assault Frigate and enough bodies and dice to make up some of the deficit. The amount of semi-reliable damage that it gives up feels excessive, but it does solve some problems.

SkyCake took out the Spring Tournament in Question

Its one of your ISD's... love the detail on the Windows

-laughs- congrats SkyCake, mate! Always fun to do. I placed well enough at Sullust but since then my tournament record has been poor enough. We'll see if I can crack the top half at this one, always aim for the best right? Just a few more days to iron this one out. I may have to test out Clear Sky as well as it seems effective enough (in theory) at dealing with enemy fighters given the presence of Flight Controllers. Though then I'm tempted to do a bit of clipping to see if Ores would be better than Tycho (gut says survives, but won't achieve as much as a buffer/interceptor would).

Good choice SkyCake, I do like Destroyers. I've painted a fair number of them now -laughs-

But yeah, Most Wanted is good, Fire Lanes can potentially give a larger amount of points per turn and then I can spread the tokens between various points if they only have 2-3 ships which dilutes their firepower or lets me contest more tokens. Of course, the creation of a larger fire zone and mitigating some of the healing potential from the station obstacle can't be under-estimated as well, especially in the case of an Engineering 2 ship like a CR90. Hmm, considering Dangerous Territory or Intel Sweep: minor rules question just to be sure I get it right. With an attacking squadron, distance and the like is determined as normal to the ship token, but line of sight is drawn from the closest point of the squadron base to the yellow LOS point of the ship's defending hull zone for the purposes of determining obstructions. So, would that make Dangerous Territory a good choice to benefit from obstructed hull zones vs. static Rhymer bombers, thus restricting or eliminating enemy bomber attacks on the hull zones without the damage associated with the obstacles? It just seems like a way to use that as a safety net to some degree.

As someone who has run a Rieekan list built around CR90s and an MC80 for a while, I'll chime in.

One of the big keys in a Rieekan list is effective trading. You want cheap units that you can trade effectively for more expensive ones. CR90A's are certainly cheap. They just aren't as cheap as SW-7 Bs. Both of those ships want to be flown very differently. If you need to fly your A's like you would a B in a particular match-up, you're giving away a few more points on the exchange, and those little points can add up. The MC30 can trade up, but you've invested enough into it that you don't really want to lose it. I think you'll find that losing it is often the linchpin between a blow-out score and just a win, or between winning and losing.

Your squadron game is curious. I think you need a bit more. You can get a lot of mileage out of that squadron command. Think of it this way: You have 4 possible commands: Your squadron command potentially gets you 3 black dice against ships for .75 per die. That's as good as your reds and blues (also .75 per die). Your concentrate fire gets you a black die from Defiance that can be rerolled with leading shots (1.25 average). So you're still getting pretty good mileage out of the squadron command. Of course, you won't always be firing at ships, but here are a couple of other considerations: 1. Enemy squadrons are still worth points. 2. Your squadron commands will often let you win a squadron game when equal points are invested. In turn, you can now attack the ships unhindered. 3. If you are completely outgunned in squadron numbers, a couple of squadron commands while you have squadrons will put a bigger dint in enemy squadrons and may help you hold up enemy squadrons for that critical extra turn.

The implication here is that you can just take 2 A wings instead of the YT2400 to save points. That's another 10 points of upgrades. You can dial up squadrons on turns 2 and 3 and you'll probably do enough. That also lets you position one A-wing away without worrying about whether you'll be able to active a full 3 A-wings. From there, you'll just need a sense of how the squadron game is unfolding. It takes skill and lots of practice to get the dials right. I still get them wrong frequently, but with good dial management you can get the best of both worlds between your squadrons and engineering/concentrated fire dials.