Last Saturday I went to a store tournament of 8 people (which, as I have mentioned before, is a lot of people for Greek X-Wing standards) so we play a total of 3 rounds. Anyway, I decided to run Rey to try her out. So I settled on the following list:
Rey, VI, Finn, Kannan, Sloop title.
Jake Farrell, VI, PTL, PRockets, ATs, title.
Bandit Z-95
Round 1 vs Imperial mini swarm
My opponent's list:
Backdraft, VI, FCS, Sensor Cluster, title.
Omega specialist, VI, FC, Sensor Cluster, title.
Omega Leader, Juke ,Comm Relay.
Academy TIE.
I won the initiative roll and passed it to my opponent so that Jake could arc dodge Backdraft if he needed to. My opponent set everything up on my left side in a box formation. I placed the Z-95 along with Rey on my right while Jake was placed directly across his mini swarm, facing right, to maybe bait. My opponent opens up with 2 and 3 forwards while I go full speed with all my ships. Next turn I go slow with the Z and Rey to have time to react to his moves while Jake also goes slow with a 1-turn left so that he could either go from the back and flank or turn again next round to dodge. My opponent however turns in towards Rey and the Z to go fro the joust. Next round Jake goes fast to flank, the Z turns away to try and block later while Rey goes for the joust with the swarm. So we are finally sitting with Jake with F+TL at R1 of Omega Spec, the Z at R3 of everything and Rey at R2-3 of the swarm. Rey fires at OL and takes his shield, forcing him to use his evade. Then Backdraft does a double attack, scoring nothing at Rey and 2 hits on Jake to which I roll triple focus, forcing my to spend my token to not lose my shields. I though it was worth keeping them, since being behind a TIE/sf is not at all guaranteed to not get shot. Jake then attack the Omega Spec taking 2 shields. Next turn my opponent moves his swarm forward but the Z messed his formation up a bit, causing basically everything to bump and OL getting stressed because of a failed Sloop. Rey does a Sloop of her own lading behind everything while Jake bumps the last ship in the formation, which is thankfully for me Backdraft so I don't get shot really hard. Rey attacks OL and after rolling 5 hits, thanks to Finn and her ability, wipes OL off the board. Jake and the Z did nothing that turn while my opponent's TIEs put some hurt into Rey causing her to lose all of her shields. Next round the swarm keeps moving forward with the TIE k-turning to get a shot. Jake goes as slow as possible so as not to bump while Rey Sloops again thanks to Kannan. Rey and Jake both attack Backdraft dealing 4 damage total to him while the Z attacks the Academy TIE dealing 2 damage to it. Then all of my opponent's ships attack Rey putting her at 4 hull. Next turn I decide it is time to run with Rey so as not to lose her. The Z keeps chasing the TIE while Jake keeps chasing Backdraft. Finally Jake kills Backdraft, but not before he puts 3 more damage into Rey, leaving her at 1 hull. Unfortunately for me the Z does not kill the Academy TIE, but it cannot do the final point of damage on Rey, and the Omega Spec does not have a shot at her, so she lives. After that it is just a matter of cleanup. Rey does a 4K putting the pursuing Academy TIE in arc while Jake goes after the Omega Spec. Rey manages to kill the TIE with the help of Finn and Jake, still having his PRockets, kills off the Omega Spec.
28-100 victory for me.
Round 2 vs TIE Swarm
My opponent's list:
Howlrunner, Crackshot.
3 Black Squadron TIEs, Crackshot.
3 Academy TIEs.
A classic TIE swarm. I have never faced a TIE swarm before, so I was not really sure how to approach it. My opponent won the initiative roll, but is does not really have any impact since we don't have similar PS. So he sets everything up centrally while I put the Z on my right going for the flank and Jake with Rey on my left. My opponent opens with 1-turn right on all his ships maintaining formation while I go fast with all my ships and boost with Jake. Next turn my opponent does a 1-turn right again on everything while Howlrunner goes 2 forward. My Z keep going fast with a 3-bank, Jake does a 3-bank right plus BR to set up for the flank and Rey does a 1-bank right to force the R3 engagement, which I know I can win with basically 3 defense dice plus blank re-rolls. Indeed, I put 2 damage on a Black TIE while Jake plinks the same TIE for not damage. My opponent's swarm attacks Rey back but only manages to take 2 shields after spending a few Crackshots. Next turn the swarm breaks formation with the Academy pilots going forward for Rey and the Blacks turning in for Jake. Unfortunatelly for my opponent 1 of the Black TIEs hits an asteroid and has no shots this turn. Meanwhile my Z closes in and my opponent does a questionable move with Howlrunner going for a 2-bank facing Jake. Jake goes 3-forward and lands right in front of Howlrunner and the three Black TIEs. I choose to take Focus and BR our of arc of one of the Black TIEs and also grab TL on Howrunner. Rey bumps a TIE so she has no action. I try to kill the Black TIE that has a shot on Jake instead of going for the damaged one but inly manage one crit on it, which is a direct hit at least. After hat Jake fires a fully modded PRocket at Howlrunner and one shots her off the board. Jake has to take the return fire from two Black TIEs however and loses his shields after my opponent spends his remaining Crackshots. I still have 6 TIEs to go, this is gonna take a long time. Next turn I press on the all my ships trying to pick off TIEs. My opponent goes for some great blocks, blocking both Rey and Jake. However Rey manages to kill the wounded Black TIE since she is not dependent on actions to get damage off, and the Z kills the other wounded Black TIE. My opponent attacks back and does a lot of damage on Rey, putting her at 5 hull. Next round I turn away with Rey instead of Slooping and Jake tries to leave by doing a 5-forward. Unfortunately my opponent block me again, so Rey moves only a bit and Jake cannot escape at all, so he remains in place. Thankfully my opponent does not have any shots at Jake, so he is pretty safe for now. Rey manages to kill an Academy TIE after a great out of arc shot with no mods and takes a lot of return damage, putting her at 1 hull. 3 TIEs left, this is looking tough and the clock is running out. Next turn Rey Sloops barely staying on the board while Jake has to circle around to avoid asteroids and the Z closes in. Rey manages to do 1 damage to the last Black TIE before finally going down. So, there are only a few minutes left in the round and I still have 3 TIEs to kill. I am currently winning on points, but I cannot run with the Z. So there is only one thing I can do: Kill a TIE. Indeed that is what I try to do. I turn the Z into all three of his TIEs, going for a suicide attempt to take a TIE down with me. The Black TIE attacks me doing 2 hits to which I roll double focus. Of course, I elect not to use the token so that I have a better shot. Indeed, I manage to roil 3 hits on the Black TIE and take it down before dying to the other two Academy TIEs. So now with only a couple minutes left in the round, Jake can easily survive, as he is also pretty far away.
67 - 76 victory for me.
Round 3 vs TIE/sf aces
My opponent's list:
Quickdraw, Predator, Electronic Baffle, MK2 Engine, Pattern Analyzer, title.
Backdraft, VI, FCS, MK2 Engine, Pattern Analyzer, title.
Turr Phennir, VI, ATs, Hull Upgrade, title.
Full PS 9 squadron, well this is gonna be tough. My opponent wins the initiative roll and elects to keep it so as he could maybe pull off a tricky Quickdraw shot on Jake before he has moved. My opponent sets everything up on my left while I go for the Flank with Jake and the Z and the joust with Rey. We meet up in the middle of the board with Rey at R1 of Quickdraw, at R2 of Backdraft and Turr while Jake is flanking and the Z is next to Rey. Rey attacks Quikdraw and manages to do 4 damage on her with a direct hit crit for a total of 5 damage. Well, that is a lot of damage Rey can put out. However, after Quickdraw's return shot and all of my opponent's attacks, Rey ends up at 4 hull remaining after she saves literarily 0 hits by rolling either all focus or re-rolling blanks into more blanks. Anyway, I am not complaining since Quickdraw is basically out of the fight. Indeed, next turn the Z does an awesome block and messes up my opponent's moves really bad, with everything bumping and Turr even getting stressed after trying to perform a k-turn. Rey Sloops and Jake turns in and grabs Focus + TL on Turr. Rey finishes Quickdraw and Jake throws a Procket at Turr, doing 3 damage to him, leaving him on his hull upgrade. Then Backdraft puts a lot of damage onto Rey, taking all the way down to 2 hull and puts Blinded Pilot crit on her. Finally the Z attacks Turr killing him. Next turn all of my ships chase Backdraft who does a weird move and does not have arc on Rey, but he does have arc on the Z. Rey plus Jake take all of Backdraft's shield while he one-shots the Z after a direct hit crit. Next round I keep chasing Backdraft. With Rey at PS 0, Backdraft manages to kill her before she attacks but Jake is at R1 with focus + TL and rolls 3 hits to which my opponent rolls blanks, and that seals the fate of Backdraft.
67 - 100 victory for me.
So with 3 wins, I take first place in the tournament. Congratulations to all of my opponents for the great games, with all of them being really close at some points.
As a final thought on the list, I have to say that Rey really does a ton of damage and everyone focuses her a lot. I mean, its not like they can do anything else, because if Rey is left alone, she will maul pretty much any ship that comes into her arc. The only weak-ish point of the list is Jake, who after he fires his PRockets he is just an A-wing with only 2/3 attack dice so he can only plink ships at best. But he is also a pretty solid piece since he can dodge really well and costs a fair share of points which can give you victory in a close game (as evident at my game 2).
I have also tried the list with regen Poe loaded with toys, but I am not sure if a 2 ships build is better than a 3 ships build.
Anyway, I hope you enjoyed the report!