Out-activating the other guy is a good start.

Keep a tight rein on your maneuvers.

Fork.

Dictate the tempo of the engagement.

Discipline yourself to keep a nav token on every ship as often as you possibly can.

Fork.

Don't get prematurely aggressive.

Don't let him force you into an engagement you don't want to be in.

Force him into engagements he doesn't want to be in.

FORK.

Be very familiar with threat zones, both yours and his--squadron threats included.

Focus your fire early to obtain and maintain activation advantage.

Leverage activation advantage to force him into your arcs, preferably double ones.

Hope he didn't bring Demolisher. If he did, dodge it as long as you can, use that MC30T/H9 you brought along to one-shot his Raider/Gozanti activation support, and FORK THEM.

Don't you mean...

What you should do is fork all of this and join the Empire.

(Other than that I totally agree with Ard.)

Fork?

This is a serious question.

Fork?

This is a serious question.

Two or more attacks at the same time.

Make sure you have the weather gauge.

Look for opportunities for raking fire.

Cross the T.

Spoon?

Fork?

This is a serious question.

Two or more attacks at the same time.

To expand, its a chess phrase when one of your pieces threaten two or more of your opponent's high value pieces.

Because they can only move one piece away, you are guaranteed to kill the other.

In armada terms, have two enemy ships in your arcs at the end of the turn so in the next turn they can only move one away before you can shoot the other.

I have been running a squadron-heavy non-Yavaris list. I'd say I've gone second 80% of the time, and I'm doing ok with the list. (Managed to qualify for the Vassal World Cup, if just barely .

One way to compensate for going second is not only to out-activate your opponent, but to out-deploy them. I have always been able to set down my main damage-dealing ship last, taking into account the mission and my opponent's strength and weaknesses. True, my list is extreme at 10 deployments and 5 activations (though that seems standard these days), but it's something to think about.

Out-activating the other guy is a good start.

Keep a tight rein on your maneuvers.

Fork.

Dictate the tempo of the engagement.

Discipline yourself to keep a nav token on every ship as often as you possibly can.

Fork.

Don't get prematurely aggressive.

Don't let him force you into an engagement you don't want to be in.

Force him into engagements he doesn't want to be in.

FORK.

Be very familiar with threat zones, both yours and his--squadron threats included.

Focus your fire early to obtain and maintain activation advantage.

Leverage activation advantage to force him into your arcs, preferably double ones.

Hope he didn't bring Demolisher. If he did, dodge it as long as you can, use that MC30T/H9 you brought along to one-shot his Raider/Gozanti activation support, and FORK THEM.

Alright, I think I've got a solid to-do list.

The real trick is to balance all of this in-game, making split second decisions that will bring the most benefit (e.g. Don't get prematurely aggressive, while still forcing opponent into engagements, while also maintaining activation advantage).

I have been running two lists that are having success as second player. One of which violates just about every piece of advice on here.

1st list is Rieekan on Home One with 3 TR90s. 4 Awings and Dash (or Han) run escort. I try to bait my opponent with the Home One. Usually by deploying it early in a relatively safe spot. I lad the next two deployments with A wings. Then I star dropping the TR90s in spots to hunt whatever has lined up on the Home One. My squad screen either goes bomber hunting or is fed into their screen at the last moment to buy time. Going first helps, but Rieekan allows it to go second. The Home One is tough enough to eat a few rounds of fire and buy time. I use CF if possible, but lean more on navigates to set up double arcs and forks as much as possible.

The second list is two MC80 command with Dodonna and 133 points of Jan+bombers (7 deployments, 2 activations). First is nice, but I make sure not to conga line the MC80s. That way I can activate whichever is injured first. One of my variations of the fleet had the 4point crew discard to reset your stack. So once the punching bag was chosen, I would discard that stack and spam engineering or navigate. Its fun powersliding an MC80 out of arcs.

My takeaway is:

Smart deployments and smart maneuvers buy me more as second player than smart builds.

Cool, thanks for clarifying!