The new Expertise card that came in the U-Wing expansion is absolutely bonkers. I love this card, and it has been making waves in certain metas on the Rey Falcon. Expertise Rey is really good. Like, really good. And I can't have anyone winning stuff. The downfall of Expertise though comes with stress; an all too forgotten tactic in today's Worlds. The biggest problem with stress and stresshogs in particular is that you are spending 26 points on a ship who's damage output is not very good. If only we could up the damage output of the stresshog; but how?
The only way to truly do this is a little upgrade called Black Market Slicer Tools. While this isn't guaranteed to cause a damage, it is critical when it does as the damage passes through shields. For small base aces like Corran Horn and Darth Vader, this can be a really devastating hit. The ship doesn't have to be in arc for BMST to work. Even without the stresshog Y-Wing, having BMST is pretty good for taking down PTL aces.
BMST has it's limits though. Seeing something that can cause damage through shields and can take down an ace in a few rounds more often than not will get chased down quickly. My answer to this comes in the form of the Sabine's TIE Expansion, which has yet to come out. More specifically, the Captured TIE modification. Naturally we want a high pilot skill along with this upgrade so that the TIE doesn't get shot down in one round by a slippery ace, so that means Ahsoka Tano is our girl. Unfortunately for us, PS 9+ is out of the picture for the Captured TIE, they can see through our ruse. For PS 8 and below though, we're good to go. Corran, Miranda, Inquisitor, Omega Leader, and any other pilot that finds themselves below 9 cannot discern, for whatever reason, that a TIE fighter that is painted bright yellow and orange is not a part of their squad.
Ahsoka Tano - TIE Fighter (17 + 6)
Veteran Instincts (1)
Captured TIE (1)
Sabine's Masterpiece (1)
Rey (2)
Black Market Slicer Tools (1)
Total: 23
We put Rey on her to bank a few focuses throughout the early game so that she can get the back and spend them for BMST + evade or extra actions for our aces or Stresshog should they come within range 1. Along with a 26 point Stresshog, this gives us 51 points to play around with. A 48 point Corran gives us enough to put a Hull Upgrade on the Y-Wing. A 39 point PTL + R5-P9 Poe accompanied by a 12 point Bandit Z-95 could also be a nice addition.
What do you think? Is this the home for the Captured TIE or is there another, better build for it? Will this even work? It seems really convoluted to me, but also really fun to play.