I'm sorry... I don't do Vassal (yet). From the other thread, is this the kind of tactics discussion, folks want?

Why 2 Intel might be better than 1 Intel?

Rhymer Denger

(assume for simplicity a cloud of Tie Bombers)

X-Wings

Rebel Ship

1. Before the age of Intel, just have your X-Wings between Rhymer (medium range) and your Ship. They can't place Tie Bombers without engaging X-Wings and your ship is safe from RhymerBall (Wave 1).

2a. Send ALL X-Wings to attack RhymerBall. Dengar makes them all Heavy. Rhymer and Bombers move out with Dengar moving last. They just leaped over your fighter screen. (Wave 2)

2b. Send SOME X-Wings to attack RhymerBall. Dengar makes them all Heavy. Rhymer and Bombers move out but then hit some X-Wing (see 1) and can't bomb your ship.

YT-1300 Hwk YT-1300 Hwk

(cloud of Y-Wings)

X-Wings

Rebel Ship

3. This was JJ's innovation at Worlds... since he made a slow-rolling wall of Y's, he could utilize the slower YT-1300 Escort to protect his Intel. By using TWO INTEL... when someone does a 2b tactic... one Hwk moves first to make the X-Wings closest to the ship Heavy and ready for bombing and the other Hwk allows the Y's to move past the X-Wings that have moved to engage them. (Wave 3/4)

4. In Wave 5, perhaps, you will have a wall of E-Wings (or Saber and IG-88) to destroy the Intel squadrons so your bombers are useless.

Someone got the memo. I will digest this and come back.

You're flobbing amazing.

But we really need a bumped, pinned and updated Tactics threads where this can be found in 6-12 months time

Those 1, 2a and 2b engagement choices are amazing to clarify. That's what would help.

Do you ever get away without 2 Intel?

Does a AA squad need Intel? How much? 0-2?

Can you elaborate on the use of Snipe in Wave5?

Also, can you address counterplay as the bomber player?

Perhaps you can file it as, 1-1. 2a-1.

Do you ever use an AA ship with your bomber squadron, like a Raider, or is it just better to use more AA fighters?
I've found I can't put an AA ship forward without it dying horrendously, due to how these engagements play out.
How do you tend to move flotillas to contribute AA shots? Or are they not worth it?

Yes, I think this is the kind of post the community seems to be clamoring for. My sense is to go deeper with the theory-crafting, but that's still pretty hard to do. The problem is time, which is necessary for pictures and diagrams, and even thinking through positions on a board.

The one thought that I had is that maybe this is just a question of local metas and what people have tried. I saw Ginkapo run dual Intel right out the gate of Wave 4 (Vassal win right at the end of August?). I made some adjustments to my own Dodonna Bomber list that I was running right out the gate and won a tournament in San Antonio, beating a previous version of Justin's list in the final round. So I have this sense that dual-intel has been around. Although I don't play Vassal either, I try to follow the results and look at the lists, because it gives a pretty good sense of what ideas are possible.

Here's how I approach dual Intel. At the end of Wave 2, I felt like we were at a place in the meta where we saw a lot of squadrons. To properly counter a ball, I didn't think four squadrons was really enough. If you didn't really want a bomber build, then you were taking at least 6 strong anti-squadrons. Once you hit six squadrons, it is quite easy to tie up a bomber ball at multiple points. A single Intel ship cannot free up the entire ball. If you've got strong anti-squadron, you then trade out for a point advantage. Dual Intel pretty much gives up all hope of tying up a bomber ball, even if you're activating one set of squadrons, then a second and possibly third in small clumps. The trade-off that you have to make with dual-Intel is that you really have to be built to ignore the opposing squadrons entirely and simply go after the enemy ships. That's the Y-wing spam---its a solid bomber die that does consistent damage, is tough to kill (6 hull), and is cheap. Early B-wing lists had a similar concept, though for whatever reason, I didn't see them take much prominence at worlds or through the regional season, despite not taking obvious tournament losses.

Snipe is a really interesting twist on the meta. Since we've got Justin and his GH list down here, that pretty much conditions the Texas meta. The E-wing doesn't help that because it still does 2 damage most of the time that gets braced to one and then GHed to zero. Then the squadrons are close enough to GH long enough for it to matter. I'd think in a non-GH environment that E-wing spam could really put a twist on bomber balls. To me, the long term effect of all the aces, uniques, and new squads in Wave 5 is that there is much more potential to have a balanced squadron force that adapts well to the changing circumstances of a tournament.

Just a few thoughts!

Great post!

So you can go the mauler ig88 saber method to nuke Intel then using your squads to tie up the bombers that theoretically cant hit back as hard... The other way to do it is to just go for the bombers themselves using mauler, howl, valen, 2 -3 more swarmers... Both of these methods work and can be greatly amplified if you 1. Activate them all at the same time, 2. Get back to back activations uninterrupted (list first), 3. Slice off the retaliatory squadron command during the same activation (goz, exp hangars, slicer, flight commander or vet captain, maybe vector)...

This is definitely the kind of post people have been asking for. Thank you IceQube.

Double Intel made most famous by JJs list.

It's really hard to give credit but I absolutely encourage people to write about their lists that were famous at that time.

Ok, let me play around with Vassal and try to draw diagrams. Maybe I'll just draw by hand and contribute to someone's blog as a guest.

Perhaps those winners could link to their batreps? Cross linking.

Again, the main problem is being able to find this thread in 6 months.

Also, those text diagrams are already hugely helpful.

So the big thing to come out of #ClassicBenGate, is that Ben clearly stalks me. #ClassicGinkapo.

Right, the way I see it there are four intel strategies.

Single Intel - usually the named character

Multiple Intel - As aluded to above

No Intel - Anti squadron first and foremost

Chiraneau/Corrupter - No idea, I rarely play imps so cannot comment

Multiple Intel

Oddly, this is the easiest to explain. Back when Intel was first introduced, we used to run single intel in our squadron builds, and would be fustrated when it didnt achieve what we want. Players got proficient at mitigating the single intel unit. Multiple units are used to achieve something of sublime simplicity. To bomb without any reproach. JJ made it famous with his Worlds win, by being able to launch Ywings without reproach, they were going to land their salvos and there is nothing anyone could do about it. Others used it before, I myself used it to keep Bwings free for their bombing runs.

You can use it with or without escort. If you absolutely must have the bomber sailing, then you need escort to slow down whatever alpha strike your opponent has. But remember the aim here is to send an absolutely huge number of black dice at the enemy, so do not be putting many points into anti fighter. Zero would be best.

The downside to this concept, is that you cannot protect your own ships from bombing. You have decided not to bring a defence screen. You must bomb faster than they can bomb you.

Sngle Intel

Well what if you arent as concerned with making 100% sure that your bombers are on target, and are content to claim points by winning the squadron battle? Well this is where single intel comes in to play. It allows you to rearrange your fighters in the brawl for max efficieny, whilst also allowing you to free single bombers for the cruical bombing runs. Think Luke taking out an ISD on 3 hull left with his trademark hit/crit Structural damage combo.

The beauty of this build is that you can be fairly confident that you can keep your ships clear of enemy bombers and let your ships concentrate on dealing damage. This works most effectively with those fragile ships, Raiders, Gladiators, Arquittens, MC30's, corvettes etc. The ships where you cannot afford to tank squadron damage to any degree.

No Intel

My personal favourite quite often. Why bother to free your squadrons from the fight at all? You get points for winning the squadron fight, so make sure that you can win it and use brute force to push your way through. Interceptors, Toryn counter Awings, Xwings, Ewings, the Mauler/Howl/Soontir thing. Choose the initial engagement then clear them out. Or take just a few Awings and hold them in place. If they have double intel you cant stop them anyway so dont bother. Put your points into ships and dont waste effort on this fight. Kill the ships with ship punch, use your squads to buy time.

Edit, this concept could be taken further.

Fighter Coord Teams fits into single intel builds, pushing your squadron mass forward, but keeping them near your ships.

All Fighters Follow Me fits into multiple intel builds, pushing your sqadrons well ahead straight at the enemy.

You're flobbing amazing.

But we really need a bumped, pinned and updated Tactics threads where this can be found in 6-12 months time

Why no likes? Without this it is almost pointless to post things up. I was writing an Imp Squadron Primer but why bother when 2000+ will dissapear in the ether.

Look what happened to the Relay thread. Gone. An important fundemetal addition had 15 posts and poof. Strategic had no thread? But even if it did whats the point. I'm still reading people having revaltions that Strategic can move Firelanes tokens and tokens in general and that it might actually be really useful.

We need a subthread.

So the big thing to come out of #ClassicBenGate, is that Ben clearly stalks me. #ClassicGinkapo.

Ha!

I have enough strategic sense to tell when someone else posting opinions has merely a highly selective and conditioned experience of the game or has captured something more genuinely true of the game itself. And although I'm pretty good at self-generating my own ideas and content, I always like to acknowledge indebtedness to others. It comes with the territory of having been trained as a scholar under "cite everything." I consider it an act of respect and of good character.

You're flobbing amazing.

But we really need a bumped, pinned and updated Tactics threads where this can be found in 6-12 months time

Why no likes? Without this it is almost pointless to post things up. I was writing an Imp Squadron Primer but why bother when 2000+ will dissapear in the ether.

Look what happened to the Relay thread. Gone. An important fundemetal addition had 15 posts and poof. Strategic had no thread? But even if it did whats the point. I'm still reading people having revaltions that Strategic can move Firelanes tokens and tokens in general and that it might actually be really useful.

We need a subthread.

No likes for the OPs post, or no likes for support for a sub forum or a pinned thread?

Personally, I want a pinned thread, not a sub forum, subforms get clobbered and cluttered by small useless threads, instead of large aggregate strategy threads. It involves some curation.

No mod cares about our forum enough to intervene.

No community members seem to be willing to take it on themselves to be a Strategy thread link updater and bumper. Which is what I think we should do.

But I personally probably don't want to be that guy, so I'm not willing to scream at people for their own unwillingnesses.

What we should do is this: One Strategy thread.

On the first two pages, 40 different members should post this:

"

Links updated: Date

Ships/Activations:

add links here

Rule summaries overview:

add links here - description of thread content

Squadrons:

add links here - description of thread content

Combat Strategies:

List building strategies:

Etc tactics:

"

Then, as long as one member keeps refreshing with new links, new players will always be able to find links and references. (Duplicates are no issue).

Past page 3, it can be general discussion and or once every 2 weeks a "bump".

I would be willing to be one of those 20-40 people who would periodically edit/update my post to include new links.