Today I played 2 games against my area's most experienced player. He was flying that most notorious of lists, triple jumpmaster 5000s. Against him I was flying a fun list intended to test an A-wing concept.
Opponent's List :
JM5K (25)
Proton Torpedoes (4)
Extra Munitions (2)
Deadeye (1)
Overclocked R4 (1)
Boba Fett (1)
Guidance Chips (0)
JM5K (25)
Plasma Torpedoes (3)
Extra Munitions (2)
Deadeye (1)
Overclocked R4 (1)
Outlaw Tech (2)
Guidance Chips (0)
JM5K (25)
Plasma Torpedoes (3)
Extra Munitions (2)
Deadeye (1)
Overclocked R4 (1)
Guidance Chips (0)
Total: 100 points.
My List:
Miranda Doni (29)
Twin Laser Turret (6)
Conner Net (4)
Extra Munitions (2)
Advanced SLAM (2)
Intelligence Agent (1)
2 x Green Squadron Pilot (19)
Homing Missiles (5)
Push The Limit (3)
Crack Shot (1)
A-wing Test Pilot (0)
Guidance Chips (0)
Total: 100 points.
Setup:
I won the initiative roll and chose to take initiative, so I could block my opponent's ships with my nice little A-wings. The asteroids were placed in the center of the map with a good deal of space between them. I set up with my A-wings on the bottom left (from my point of view) facing towards the right, and Miranda pointed straight through the middle. My opponent started in the top left, ready to slow-play with his ships.
Turn 1: I gun the A-wings 5 straight to avoid any turn 1 torpedoes and boost left to point in the right direction. He does 2 hard turns with all ships and Miranda does a 3 straight followed by another 3 straight.
Turn 2: The A-wings do 2 straights and focus+evade, as they couldn't target lock. My opponent attempts to do a 1 hard with one ship and hards with the others, only for the middle one to bump. This left it without its torpedo shot as Miranda does a lazy 2 bank towards the enemy ships. Miranda knocks off 1 shield with TLT despite having a focus, and then loses all of her shields and takes a damage in the return fire. This was expected, but the problem was that the A-wings had no shot!
Turn 3: The A-wings move up with 4 straights (One of which bumped Miranda, so no target lock) and the JM5Ks move into range 1, so no missiles. Miranda gets out of dodge, and my opponent fires his sole torpedo of the turn and gets 3 hits + 1 crit on an A-wig through the rock. I roll... 4 natural evades. Yay. My return fire pings off some shields and Miranda can't shoot due to slamming out of the way of torps.
Turn 4: I block with the A-wings and take my target locks. The block works, and 2 JM5Ks bump, so no torpedoes this turn. Miranda takes a 3 ban, bringing her into range 1 of the only JM5K with a shot on her. Her shots regenerate her a shield and take two off of a Jumpmaster, while my opponent's return fire manages to remove all shields from one A-wing and deal a damage to the other. The A-wings get some solid rolls and reduce the KM5K I've been focusing on to 4 hull remaining.
Turn 5: I K-turn an A-wing through debris in order to get my first missile of the game off, and manage to roll a crit on the rock, reducing my PS to 0. The other A continues the blocking game and causes the same two JM5Ks to bump again. My homing missile doesn't destroy the JM5K (I forgot the crack shot), so the other one follows it up and makes the kill shot.
Turn 6: I move in for a bump that misses due to my opponent's fumbling of the maneuver template (no his fault, but before it was bumped he would have landed on a rock). So he had some nice range 1 shots on a double-stressed A-wing, leading to its death. He also managed to kill Miranda with a torpedo shot even though she had 5 health, via a direct hit. This left me with 1 A-wing on 1 health against 2 nearly full health Jumpmasters, and the rest is history.
Lessons learned: Don't fly fun lists against tournament staples, as there's only 1 outcome possible. My opponent did outfly me, due to my rustiness (I hadn't played in 2 weeks) and his experience with the list, but I feel as if a few dice rolls could have dramatically changed the game, as I blanked out on A-wing defense rolls at least three times.
I feel as though my list lacks teeth after the missiles are gone, and I only managed to launch one of them unfortunately, so half my strategy was lost.
What are your thoughts on what I could do differently?