I got my ARC a few weeks ago, and I'm itching to try it out. I know that the Braylen Stramm, Tactician R3-A2 combo has been on people's minds for awhile - has anyone put it on the table yet? How does it compare to the classic hog?

Just to be clear, by the way, here are the two builds I'm thinking of, the classic 26 point Gold Squadron Stresshog, and what I think will become the standard 29 point control ARC.

Gold Squadron Pilot (18)
Twin Laser Turret (6)
R3-A2 (2)
BTL-A4 Y-Wing (0)

vs.

Braylen Stramm (25)
Tactician (2)
R3-A2 (2)
Alliance Overhaul (0)

As a rebel player who prefers control to regen, I always liked the stresshog, but I feel like Braylen might just replace it in my lists in future. For me, the big issues with the stresshog have been the same since day 1:

- It almost always gets only one pass, after which it might as well be out of the game

- If anyone gets behind it, there's nothing you can do about it, that hog is going down. This is particularly bad if you and your opponent both only have one ship on the board.

I have tried to mitigate these weaknesses in the past by putting bomb loadout, Seismic charge and Extra Munitions on my hog, but that very quickly makes it pretty pricey - 30 points minimum, 32 if you want to outbid scouts. It's a good ship, but it's also a huge chunk of your list, and the fundamental problems don't go away.

Enter Braylen. With R3-A2 and tactician, he's a stress control piece that can still double stress in lots of circumstances (Range 2 from two arcs isn't too shabby), but who doesn't become useless once he's overshot the battlefield, or die immediately once someone gets behind him. Better yet, with his ability, K turning and actions are going to happen vastly more often than with the hog, and given the much better dial on the ARC, the ridiculous pile of stress definitely won't be a thing for Braylen to worry about. Plus, as a little bonus, his natural PS of 3 means that he'll get to shoot back at Contracted Scouts even if he does take a pile of torps to the face.

I recognize that there are still some serious advantages to the hog. Braylen's three dice primary and 2 dice rear guns are fine, but the TLT, even unmodified, gave the hog decent chances of sneaking damage through here and there, or at the very least stripping tokens for other PS2s to exploit. I worry that Braylen's shots are going to be pretty easy to dodge unless you get him into range 1, which is anti synergistic with Tactician. Plus, losing that huge range three zone where you could guarantee two stress with the Hog is a massive deal.

Those points aside, I'm still really looking forward to trying out Braylen. My current plan is to pair him with Biggs and a stripped down Kanan (FCS, AB Turret and a Rec Spec crew). Flown in tight formation, I'm hoping I'll force aces into tough choices around where they want to position, and keep Biggs alive an annoyingly long time, long enough at least to give Braylen a chance to shine. But I'm really keen to hear from anyone who's actually put him on the board, especially Stresshog players who've made the transition, about how best to fly him and what flies well alongside him.

FGD has a few posts on this. I believe he uses Gunner.

Braylen is pretty awesome overall as the new shiny stress"mule" as fickle will call him. If you can find the points in your lists, try him out with Gunner instead of Tactician. It allows him to push through damage. Especially out of the back arc has a higher potential to miss the first round of shots which then allows a second set of shots and can proc r3a2 again. You might be worried about two or more stress on Braylen, but with his ability, he can shred two stress in one turn. Plus, Tactician is only at range 2 :/

While my initial thoughts were very much towards Tactician for the crew slot, I'm increasingly coming round to spending a few more points and putting a Gunner of Braylen. It gives him a little more reliable damage output (and gives the rear arc a chance of dealing damage at all against Agility 3+ targets), and a good chance at double stress on Imperial Aces.

Yeah, Gunner braylen is nastier, albeit you pay more for it. The gunner effect on its own can strip tokens, and two stress at any range >>>> one stress with a second only at r2.

I like gunner for all range stress and securing some damage on such an expensive ship

it is a lot more expensive than the hog, but it's kinda difficult to calculate just how much more you're actually using him rather than just 2-turning all day hoping against hope to have a target in your single arc

Also with Braylen you can equip a Fletchette Torpedo (plus munition fail safe) to give smaller ships 3 stress in a turn.

The beauty of this beast is that there is no running away from an ARC. Eventually you will have to shoot at it, and good luck chasing it in a way that allows you to dodge its arc and keep it in yours.

EDIT

As a rebel player who prefers control to regen

There are advantages and disadvantages to both and I think it really comes down to play style. I went up against a Stramm gunner stress ship but since all my ships have 1 agility, he never got a double stress, so I took a green continued taking actions. Stress hog no matter what is throwing 2 stress and 3 attacks at you. But Stramm has advantage late game with that rear arc and the unpredictable movement he allows with that. go with your play style and what the points allow with what you are running with him.

I admit, this is a pretty sick addition to the rebel arsenal. I played against a Braylen, R3A2, gunner, with title list this past weekend. I narrowly won the game with my Soontir list because the arc is squishy and blew up on an asteroid, but I feel like this build is less situational. This build can serve it's stress purpose, but also do damage when needed. The ones people are talking about here are tactian, and flechette, with R3A2 are only going to come into play if you have a range 2 in arc shot with a target lock! That is never easy to do against Soontir.

So you use the title when you want to do damage and give/take a stress, and you don't use the title when you want to double stress.

Bitter, stressed Imperial Player

There are advantages and disadvantages to both and I think it really comes down to play style. I went up against a Stramm gunner stress ship but since all my ships have 1 agility, he never got a double stress, so I took a green continued taking actions. Stress hog no matter what is throwing 2 stress and 3 attacks at you. But Stramm has advantage late game with that rear arc and the unpredictable movement he allows with that. go with your play style and what the points allow with what you are running with him.

This reflects my (limited) experience with the R3-A2/Gunner version as well. Against aces he's at least as good if not a fair bit better since gunner will almost always trigger giving them double stress and arc dodging him becomes incredibly difficult. But against lower agi enemies it wasn't uncommon to land a single damage, a single easily cleared stress, and that's it whereas the stress hog would have likely hit with both TLT shots and added 2 stress. Whether the extra 6-8 points are worth it depends a lot of the local meta and what your particular list is giving up to include him. Though largely I think he's kind of at an awkward size for 3 ship Rebels given their lack of pocket aces

I think as of now, most metas will have plenty of x7 defenders/imp aces/palpshuttle type builds along with your dengaroos and others generally mixed in. In that case, Gunner will be worth it. Again, it depends on your local meta.

Something I keep coming back to on the ARCs (although I haven't yet had a chance to put them on the table), is that the extra hit point actually does matter.

Look at it from a U-boat perspective. Let's assume all plasma torps are generating 4 hits. In the worst case scenarion the ARC gets all blanks on greens, and has 1 hp remainng. The Y-wing in that scenario is dead, and probably never shoots unless you paid for the Gray Squadron Pilot. So here, the Scouts have to devote their final shot to killing the ARC, that saves someone else in your squad a torpedo shot this turn, even if a primary weapon was used to finish off the ARC. In a slightly better scenario, the Arc has 2 HP left instead of 1, say because of a sub-par torpedo or a not-blank green die. Now, the 3rd Scout probably has to use a torpedo to finish off the ARC, because I wouldn't trust 2 reds vs 1 green to get 2 damage through. At this point, the ARC is still dead, but it's dealt its stress to a target and has emptied half of the enemy torpedoes. That's a serious advantage.

The ARC has a better dial than the Y-Wing as well as 2 fire arcs. I think that on the whole you will have more luck bringing your guns to bear with an ARC.

Against low agility targets there is a risk of gunner not triggering but it is not all bad. It means you are doing at least one point of damage in addition to Stress and it is easier for you to shift your own stress from R3-A2.

The problem with the perception of "one easily cleared stress" is it ignores how predictable it makes your opponent

In the absolute most basic sense, it basically lets you pass them and fire out the aux arc without fear of reprisal as they won't be able to kturn unless they're defenders, in which case they keep stress unless they're Ryad without ptl

The problem with the perception of "one easily cleared stress" is it ignores how predictable it makes your opponent

In the absolute most basic sense, it basically lets you pass them and fire out the aux arc without fear of reprisal as they won't be able to kturn unless they're defenders, in which case they keep stress unless they're Ryad without ptl

That's a point that people like to forget. "Easily cleared stress" is still valuable if next turn's best move is not one of those easily cleared positions.

FGD has a few posts on this. I believe he uses Gunner.

Yes, and he will tell you about it in every single thread...

As to your original question, OP, I think you've pretty thoroughly identified the strengths and weaknesses of the two stress-bot variants. Whether one prefers a Stresshog Y or Tactician Braylen or Gunner Braylen will be a matter of taste and pairing.

And landing even a single stress will prevent the enemy from PTLing.

I've run Braylen R3-A2 with tail gunner and tactician. I still have to try the more expensive gunner variant, but I don't think that's the best build. Gunner is just too expensive and doesn't help your damage output much because you'll be double stressed and rolling unmodified dice. Choosing between tactician and tail gunner is a personal preference thing. Choose tactician if you must have the double stress threat. Tail gunner works because you can't K-turn unless you skip a turn of using R3-A2.

I'm now thinking I also want to try C-3PO as crew. R3-A2 makes Braylen a target, so extra defense could keep him around longer. 100% of the time I would run Braylen as opposed to the standard stresshog.

As a rebel player who prefers control to regen, I always liked the stresshog, but I feel like Braylen might just replace it in my lists in future. For me, the big issues with the stresshog have been the same since day 1:

- It almost always gets only one pass, after which it might as well be out of the game

- If anyone gets behind it, there's nothing you can do about it, that hog is going down. This is particularly bad if you and your opponent both only have one ship on the board.

Couldn't you just not take BTL-A4?

The big part of the stresshog is the double stress. A double stress is massively more powerful than a single stress.

FGD has a few posts on this. I believe he uses Gunner.

Yes, and he will tell you about it in every single thread...

Can hardly blame a guy for enthusiasm.

I empathize, because if anyone says the word Decimator in any thread, I slide in and feel obligated to clap and bark like a seal.

...don't you guys love Decimators?

So happy to run across this thread today! I have been mulling the numbers and play styles for a couple of days now. I should note that I ran a Kanan/Biggs/stresshog list.

I, too, ran the typical stresshog and tried many techniques to keep him in the fight. I usually ended up frustrated by the overall output from the stresshog as it would throw some dice, stress, and then the scrum would pass by the y-wing which would never be heard from again. I later dropped the BTL title to keep the TLT "in the fight"; there was some improvement for me, but the stress mechanic was largely wasted beyond the initial engagement by being tied to my forward arc.

I am tantalized by the thought of Braylen fitting into my list for many of the above noted reasons: an additional hit point, a better primary, a rear arc that is not easily dodged, the potential to better clear stress and regain actions etc. I ran gunner on Braylen for 2 stress at any range, and to pick up a "2nd attack" against token stackers, Emperor lists, etc.

Downside? He is more expensive.

In my list, I had to sacrifice RecSpec and and Tactical Jammer on Kanan. Sounds silly at first to lose the RecSpec, but I find that I am getting more mileage out of the stress dealer. It's not clear to me how much I miss the second focus token on Kanan after the initial joust.

So, done deal for me then, right? Not so fast.

If I run tactician on Braylen, I can put RecSpec back on Kanan. Thus, for me, the question is:

"Is a more situational second stress outweighed by the need for a second focus on Kanan?" I.e., is gunner more valuable than RecSpec?

The big part of the stresshog is the double stress. A double stress is massively more powerful than a single stress.

Does TLT not do that?

The big part of the stresshog is the double stress. A double stress is massively more powerful than a single stress.

Does TLT not do that?

No, R3-A2 activates on declaring an attack. With TLT you declare only a single attack and then perform it twice. The title allows double stress because the primary weapon attack is separate form the turret attack and so R3-A2 can be activated twice.