Is to put Admirals on flotillas. I get it, that flotilla has a scatter counter, and ergo its more survivable than a ship of the line....but doggone it, it feels wrong. I for one always put my commander on the biggest ship, usually an ISD. Just old fashioned I guess.....

Any toughts on this one?

I have found if I have the extra points on the rebel side that the flotilla is the perfect vehicle for protecting my admiral. 18 points to keep him out and about is very helpful. On the imperial side the flotillas are more aggressive fighters in my mind and are not a good vehicle for protecting the admiral.

I am primarily an imperial player and follow the same logic you do. Put him up front in the big ship. But the rebels are cowards and scum

Well, I usually run MSU's. In that particular case, the strategy is to decentralize my points spent as much as possible so that anything I trade doesn't cripple me or cost me the game. Essentially, every ship in my fleet is under threat of dying, I'm just built in such a way that I can weather the loss and gain more advantage out of the exchange than the other guy does.

In a build like that, there is no big, safe, fortified ship for the admiral to ride on. What am I going to do, put Dodonna on Admonition, the shop I'm charging into the middle of the fray?

No, the trade I'm making is to pay those few extra points to put him on a flotilla and hide. It's costing me the 18-20 points to put him on a transport, maybe Bright Hope, and camp out.

This is not always the best choice, imo, even though I do it in most of my fleets, and have been doing so since Wave 1 (with CR90B's). If you have a fortress ship that is the keystone of your fleet and losing it means you've lost the game anyway, may as well put your commander on it since you're focusing on not losing that ship anyway.

Yeah, it feels pretty weird at times. I mean, I suppose if you want to think of it as some Rebel fleet, then some of the transports are probably fairly comfortable and meant as a quick get-away in an inconspicuous vessel. Likewise, even the GR-75's seem to have some pretty good C&C tech on them so it's not a major loss. But as for the Imperials it feels even weirder as the ISD/VSD's are marks of immeasurable status. I can see reasons why an admiral would pick a gozanti/shuttle over an ISD, but they typically revolve around something like observing a test-firing of a new weapon or starfighter prototypes, etc. That doesn't feel like it would be terrifically common.

On a gaming standpoint, I follow Ardaedhel's line of thought: I want to decentralize points to reduce the potential for MOV swings while potentially offering multiple targets of equal importance to an opponent in the hopes of splitting their fire and getting them to make a mistake. I've been able to fight through the loss of a single ISD or an MC80 in a tournament environment, but I don't remember losing a Keystone flagship and winning the match without it going right back into a deep Pyrrhic victory, the 6-5 kinds of territory.

Not a surprise that for Imps I end up with a flagship ISD or INT but my Reb flagship can end up being anything from a Nebulon B, to a GR-75 right to the MC80's.

Fascinating points, and valuable input.

I guess I am old school, it just feels 'wrong' to place the commander in a small flotilla when I have an ISD there. I can relate to minimizing damage in a tourney environment, tough.

As well, any ship I fly I am going to throw in the fray anyway.... I could see doing this in an MSU fleet, but I do not run those.

Yeah, on the imp side it seems a bit less rewarding to do the lifeboat thing. Of course, there's a pretty big difference between sending your admiral into a melee aboard an ISD and aboard an MC30.

I think its very iconic. Sometimes the admural is shutlling around on a transport to give personal progress reports then **** happens mid transfer!

Well thanks to Intel officer token defense doesn't have the effect it used to have. So putting your Commanders on a 1 shield 3 hull ship won't keep them alive for as long as putting them on a Raider or CR-90. You would possibly be better putting them on a Squadron if that was something that was allowed by the game mechanics

But yeah that is a good question. Why can't you put commanders on your squadrons say like a YT-1300 or a Lambda Shuttle? Heck the Emperor was on one.

Well thanks to Intel officer token defense doesn't have the effect it used to have.

I mean... IO has been around since Wave 1. It's pretty good, but it still isn't the be-all-end-all of defense mitigation. An IO shot that's strong enough to make someone discard their scatter is also strong enough to make them discard redirect or brace on a corvette.

Regardless, though... sure they'll live longer under fire on a more expensive ship, but that's kind of ignoring the idea behind the whole lifeboat thing in the first place. You put them way out of position, where it's undesirable for your opponent to even commit the resources to attack them in the first place, while minimizing the impact to your own fleet of losing that ship's utility by making it the cheapest possible ship. If he's getting shot at by anything, you're already doing it wrong.

I would never put the commander on a flotilla. Even if has the scatter defense token it is still easy to take out a small ship like that if a opponent wants. After 2 atacks it may be gone along with the Admiral.

Then you will loose your bonus and a lot of points that may cost you the game.

I will always put him in the safest ship. It can be a smaller one but it need to have survivability or speed to get away from trouble.

Sensor teams people!

I have started putting my admirals on mc80 home ones or interdictors. Bring your spam, my ships dont die.

If you want to change the meta, jump ahead of it.

I would never put the commander on a flotilla. Even if has the scatter defense token it is still easy to take out a small ship like that if a opponent wants. After 2 atacks it may be gone along with the Admiral.

Then you will loose your bonus and a lot of points that may cost you the game.

I will always put him in the safest ship. It can be a smaller one but it need to have survivability or speed to get away from trouble.

But to destroy the flotilla he has to be in range. You are not sending this ship into combat. It will stay in the back and "command" the fleet. And block it with your other ships.

For only 20 or 23 (assuming that you always take the smallest flotilla and Bright Hope titel) you get a safe place for the commander, get an additional ship activation and have an additional squadron carrier, as long as he is range.

The only real danger are really fast ships that can hunt down the commander carrier or squadrons that swarm the flotilla. But in these cases he will have to send way more than the 20-23 + commander to take it down. And this give you more points against the rest of his fleet.

Well thanks to Intel officer token defense doesn't have the effect it used to have. So putting your Commanders on a 1 shield 3 hull ship won't keep them alive fo as long as putting them on a Raider or CR-90. You would possibly be better putting them on a Squadron if that was something that was allowed by the game mechanics

But yeah that is a good question. Why can't you put commanders on your squadrons say like a YT-1300 or a Lambda Shuttle? Heck the Emperor was on one.

Any admiral on Solo's Falcon-"what a hunk of JUNK!"

The issue is that if you even breathe on the flotilla it will die, and Home One is the ultimate counter.

Probably 6/10 of my flotilla deaths came from Home One locking down the scatter.

When I play against people that lifeboat their commander it is 90% of the time completely naked otherwise and it is deployed almost last, in the opposite corner of where combat will happen or behind and perpedndicular. After that it runs away from combat at full speed or sits far away from combat at speed zero.

Its silly to hunt it down while the rest of the enemy fleet takes your fleet on. If your opponent knows how to run a life boat, chances are extremely good you will not table them.

I tend to build lists with one big ship that if it dies I lose anyway. Might as well stash my Admiral onboard.

For the rebels, I always roll a lifeboat and always have Quantum Storm in case someone wants to try and give chase. I used to stick Commanders on CR90s, and most of the time that meant the CR90 wasn't going to contribute meaningfully to the battle, so I'm pleased to have a cheaper option for point mitigation. When I roll Imperials, I almost always throw it on an ISD/Dictor.

Maybe if each general have a bonus if you put it on a large our medium base, none for small base

There is no universal "Better" place to put it.

Until there is a Universally "better" place to put it, there's no need to (re)balance the game by changing, adding, or taking away benefits.

Large vs Medium vs Small (Flotilla or not), all have Positives and Negatives which can be useful, and exploited, respectfully.

I would never put the commander on a flotilla. Even if has the scatter defense token it is still easy to take out a small ship like that if a opponent wants. After 2 atacks it may be gone along with the Admiral.

Then you will loose your bonus and a lot of points that may cost you the game.

I will always put him in the safest ship. It can be a smaller one but it need to have survivability or speed to get away from trouble.

But to destroy the flotilla he has to be in range. You are not sending this ship into combat. It will stay in the back and "command" the fleet. And block it with your other ships.

For only 20 or 23 (assuming that you always take the smallest flotilla and Bright Hope titel) you get a safe place for the commander, get an additional ship activation and have an additional squadron carrier, as long as he is range.

The only real danger are really fast ships that can hunt down the commander carrier or squadrons that swarm the flotilla. But in these cases he will have to send way more than the 20-23 + commander to take it down. And this give you more points against the rest of his fleet.

See that's the thing. To me, any ship that is not firing at the enemy is wasted points. Yeah, reb transports don't shoot...but have useful support abilities. And Gozantis can fire, I don't care if it's only one die. So running around the edge of the field just to keep the commander alive is wasting the points of the ship, IMO.

I want to get every single ship I have shooting at the enemy with everything they have as fast as possible. Getting there the fastest with the mostest!

Ackbar belongs on Home One. If you want him, come through the rest of my fleet to get him. Nothing I'd rather like you to do.

So running around the edge of the field just to keep the commander alive is wasting the points of the ship, IMO.

So prove it, destroy those fools who have admiral limos and change their mind.

I think that both are viable, but this is definitely one to be fought on the table.

So running around the edge of the field just to keep the commander alive is wasting the points of the ship, IMO.

So prove it, destroy those fools who have admiral limos and change their mind.

I think that both are viable, but this is definitely one to be fought on the table.

Oh, I intend to. First I have to keep building the local scene, it's bloody dead down here. I'll post my experiences as I go along.

Is it our jobs to play out the movie??? Ffg has complete control over this btw, if they want the game to look or feel a certain way, they can make a rule, or add upgrades/ship to do just that

As someone who is used to lifeboating his admiral (even in wave 2) I believe it is a solid choice, however it is fleet dependent and strategy dependent. You need to be prepared that the lifeboat sometimes will be lost round 3/4 with you unabling to prevent that. As long as commiting some resources to hunt the admiral instead of killing heavy hitters still harms the opponent more than you even if the hunt is succesful, your strategy is solid.