I have been pondering the upcoming releases for the Empire/First Order and I have come up with something that 'could' be interesting...

Lieutenant Dormitz, electronic baffles, General Hux - 37pts

Duchess, Swarm Leader, Adaptive Ailerons, Lightweight Frame - 28pts

Omega squadron pilot, crack shot - 18pts

Omega squadron pilot - 17pts

The idea is pretty simple, the shuttle deploys first and allows Duchess plus the Ties to deploy further on to the board and thus close the distance to/ pressurise the chosen target.

They fly forward as a single swarm and when they get into range Dormitz give the others a focus plus Fanatical Devotion to Duchess. The Ties evade and Duchess target locks. Ties then pass off their evade tokens to power Duchesses target locked and focused attack. Rinse and repeat as and if the opportunity presents itself again.

I know that it is much more difficult to get all the components in to place on the board than it is in my mind but just imagine if it actually worked! Just a shame about the lack of 1 point to give the last Tie Crack Shot.

What do you reckon? Any changes?

I would drop the Omega's to Epsilons, drop baffles on Dormitz, and throw Comm Relays on them, drop Duchess to Pure Sabacc and throw the Hyperwave Comm Scanner on Dormitz. Now, you can start the Epsilons off with an evade token already banked, and they can barrel roll or TL for a better opening shot. Start PS off with an evade as well, and then you can take another evade as her action to possible dodge multiple shots if you need to prior to your opening shot (hopefully with the pilot ability increase to make it a 6-7 dice attack, with fanatical devotion). Unfortunately, you are going to have to take out Lightweight frame for targeting computer if you want PS to target lock, as it is not native in their action list. You get a nice alpha strike, but I have a feeling PS (or Duchess in your list) would be focused down and only get off one or maybe two shots. Then you are left with Upsilon and 2 TIE/fo's. Not the worst thing, but if the opponent is still at full power, you'll probably find it difficult to overcome without other tools at your disposal. You could always plan on using the Epsilons as blockers to setup range 1 shots for Dormitz with 5 dice, but again, you are essentially battle planning on losing your TIE Striker very early, and how do you maximize the rest of your list to take advantage of one or two big shots from them.

Comm Relay allows for your Epsilons to essentially have 3 actions in a turn if they enter the turn with a banked evade. They can TL (or barrel roll), have the evade, and get a focus from Hux. It makes them action efficient, but at the end of it they are firing at PS1, with a 2 die primary attack, so you are going to need some fancy flying and lucky defense dice to turn the tide in your favor.

I'd like to see how things pan out for it, as it does look like an interesting list. I think right now I'm playing devil's advocate, to hopefully get the list competitive enough to see it in a tournament of some sort.

Thanks Raven, all good points and I forgot that the Strikers don't have a Target Lock on their action bar.

I thought about using Pure Sabacc but my reasons for choosing Duchess were manly that with her ability, plus pilot skill, there is more option for arc dodging and therefore a better chance of surviving for a couple more rounds.

You have hit on my main weakness though, I do love trying to get that one massive attack in and hope that everything works out after that. But with Duchesses attack, plus two Crack Shoting Omegas and a four dice attack from the shuttle you got to hope that what your shooting at is going to explode, right? I know, not when your relying on the dice behaving and your opponent not doing something unexpected...