I've been getting tired of playing x7 Defenders lately. I don't like games that go to time, and, well, that's just about the hallmark of an x7. I've had good success with TIE/Ds, in the past, but offense is pretty high right now, and to get 2 TIE/Ds I like, there's not really room for anything else. I started wistfully thinking about my beloved HLC Defenders. They hit like a truck early, and often, and they fight better at range than the TIE/Ds do, because it's one big shot vs two smaller shots, which means they are a bit more survivable because they punch harder earlier from a safer position than their TItlE/D brethren.

Unrelatedly, I've been playing with the other largely unloved component of Imperial Veterans, the TIE Shuttle, mostly just because I haven't done it before, and I wanted to give it a shot. I built and tested a few lists with TIE/Ds, and Fleet Officer TIE/Shuttles, when things clicked into place. Jonus Brothers was the prototype version of this list, long, long ago. For those not around in 4th-5th Edition, Jonus Brothers was Captain Jonus (TIE Bomber giving re-rolls to secondary weapons to friendlies at Range 1) with a couple Delta Squadron Pilots packing HLCs. There was 4 points leftover for customization, but it usually didn't amount to much.

Back to the present:

Jonus as a Shuttle carrying a Fleet Officer can provide re-rolls and a Focus to HLC Deltas for 25 points. It's a little high, but with the Focus from their own action, it gives the Deltas a couple of tokens to defend against attacks, while still keeping their offense up. Add in two 37 point Delta Squadron Pilots with HLC and you're at 99. You are pretty much just doing 4 hits, twice, to whatever is in front of you (and the big HLC arc is harder to avoid than you'd like), which cuts through just about any defenses in the game. Throw in Draw Their Fire on Jonus, and you can save them from Kylo's Blinded Pilot long enough to burn the Decimator down, and as each shot typically takes a quarter of its hit points, it shouldn't be all that long. PS1 isn't it a bad place right now, either. It makes you harder to bomb with K-wings, and might let you block Quadjumpers so they can't tractor the crap out of you.

Maybe I'm not getting enough sleep, or something, but a couple of ships throwing 4 hits over and over again seems like it should still do some work in this meta.

For the last point, what would you use?

Adreniline Surge to keep up with defenders? Cool Hand for survivability? Inteligence Agent/trickshot?

Sorry, I wasn't clear. Draw Their Fire probably right now to help agaisnt Kylo, but it's flexible if he ends up being not as common as feared.

I wonder if Operations Specialist might not be a better choice than Fleet Officer. Operations Specialist doesn't stress Jonus, and can be used even if Jonus wouldn't get an action. If Jonus is stuck on green maneuvers he may have trouble keeping near the Deltas. Since Jonus is firing before the Deltas and will miss frequently, he's almost always going to grant that token. Because the token isn't granted until PS6 it is immune from start of the Combat token snatching abilities and high PS HSCP ships.

Jonus with Operations Specialist and a pair of TIE/D Deltas may actually not be too bad.

Delta Squadron Pilot (30)
Ion Cannon (3)
Proton Rockets (3)
Guidance Chips (0)
TIE/D (0)

Delta Squadron Pilot (30)
Ion Cannon (3)
Proton Rockets (3)
Guidance Chips (0)
TIE/D (0)

Captain Jonus (22)
Draw Their Fire (1)
Operations Specialist (3)
Lightweight Frame (2)
TIE Shuttle (0)

Total: 100

Thing with Jonus shuttle which has a limited support range of 1-2 that could be extended out to three still pales in comparison of Emperor Palpatine's Shuttle range of unlimited. Plus 2 red dice rerolls is not the same as a single autocrit/evade. Even if you get more rerolls with Jonus than auto dice with Palp.

Palp is one roll per turn. Jonus brothers need to be affecting multiple rolls to edge out palp.

1 hour ago, Marinealver said:

Thing with Jonus shuttle which has a limited support range of 1-2 that could be extended out to three still pales in comparison of Emperor Palpatine's Shuttle range of unlimited. Plus 2 red dice rerolls is not the same as a single autocrit/evade. Even if you get more rerolls than auto dice.

A Jonus shuttle in this list is providing re-rolls to 4 dice and adding 2 Focus tokens to the mix. That's way more than a single die turn from Palpatine, at the price of a much smaller range. It's also a few points less than the Palpshuttle. It's really a very different sort of thing.

****. Naked Jonus with an HLC Delta and a pair of Scimitar's with Plasma/EM/LRS comes out to 101 points.

So two ps.1 defenders with hlc ..

Jonus with draw their fire, twin ion engine, title and systems officer ..

Or, if you don't use dtf, you could do fleet officer and trick shot instead ..

Kudos to you for continuing to think outside the box when it comes to Defenders Biophysical.

The closest I've come is two juking, x7 stealth Glaives supported by a Fleet Officer shuttle. Dominated one store tourney, folded at another. Fun, though

7 minutes ago, WWHSD said:

****. Naked Jonus with an HLC Delta and a pair of Scimitar's with Plasma/EM/LRS comes out to 101 points.

Have one carry Flechette torps

3 minutes ago, Moneyinvolved said:

Have one carry Flechette torps

If that worth giving up an HLC Defender for though?

How concerned are you about somebody just PS killing Jonus before the defenders get to shoot their HLCs? Do you think 2 HLC deltas could still pull their weight if Jonus gets nuked early?

26 minutes ago, TitaniumChopstick said:

How concerned are you about somebody just PS killing Jonus before the defenders get to shoot their HLCs? Do you think 2 HLC deltas could still pull their weight if Jonus gets nuked early?

I used to play a Jonus Brothers squad quite a bit when I first started playing at tournaments. If my opponent had a lot of firepower, I'd leave Jonus hanging back out of range three.

43 minutes ago, WWHSD said:

If that worth giving up an HLC Defender for though?

That was in response to the 101 points you mentioned. I was just helping you make points. I have no idea if it would be better. Haveing a stress factor is never a bad thing IMO though. And it is still throwing 3 red dice

I mentioned fleet officer earlier, sorry missed it in the op.. I'm sure you have thought about double defenders again as well, threw this together even though I'm sure you already made something like this ..

TIE Defender: · Rexler Brath (37)
Expertise (4)
Heavy Laser Cannon (7)
Engine Upgrade (4)
TIE Defender: · Countess Ryad (34)
Push The Limit (3)
Ion Pulse Missiles (3)
Heavy Laser Cannon (7)
Twin Ion Engine Mk. II (1)
-- TOTAL ------- 100p. --

2 hours ago, Rakaydos said:

Palp is one roll per turn. Jonus brothers need to be affecting multiple rolls to edge out palp.

1 hour ago, Biophysical said:

A Jonus shuttle in this list is providing re-rolls to 4 dice and adding 2 Focus tokens to the mix. That's way more than a single die turn from Palpatine, at the price of a much smaller range. It's also a few points less than the Palpshuttle. It's really a very different sort of thing.

Thank you for proving my point. The auto die is more potent than all those rerolls. Even if you get more rerolls it is nothing compared the versatility of palp and again the range where you can keep palp out of the fight where jonus has to get too close for comfort. Take the focus and evade token, evade on average prevents more damage than focus but because of the versatility of the focus token focus is better. Evades are only prevalent because there are more ways to get free evade actions or free evade tokens.

If Jonus was a better support ship than Palp, you would hear people complaining about Jonus Bros more than Palp Defenders.

1 minute ago, Marinealver said:

Thank you for proving my point. The auto die is more potent than all those rerolls. Even if you get more rerolls it is nothing compared the versatility of palp and again the range where you can keep palp out of the fight where jonus has to get too close for comfort. Take the focus and evade token, evade on average prevents more damage than focus but because of the versatility of the focus token focus is better. Evades are only prevalent because there are more ways to get free evade actions or free evade tokens.

If Jonus was a better support ship than Palp, you would hear people complaining about Jonus Bros more than Palp Defenders.

Palp is good because he works on everything. But Offensively, with cannons only, within his range, Jonus comes out ahead in this list.

4 minutes ago, Rakaydos said:

Palp is good because he works on everything. But Offensively, with cannons only, within his range, Jonus comes out ahead in this list.

Which isn't enough, the situational nature of jonus places him out of the meta. Don't give me the you just have to fly him better. You have to Fly him with the Defenders which means he will also find himself inside firing arc. Without the defense buff that Palp can give himself and 4 less hit points (not to mention no shields) Jonus is way easier to kill than Palp shuttle.

28 minutes ago, Marinealver said:

Which isn't enough, the situational nature of jonus places him out of the meta. Don't give me the you just have to fly him better. You have to Fly him with the Defenders which means he will also find himself inside firing arc. Without the defense buff that Palp can give himself and 4 less hit points (not to mention no shields) Jonus is way easier to kill than Palp shuttle.

The main thing is you just can't fit a couple of HLC Defenders in a list with a Palpshuttle, so it's really impossible to compare what they're doing. Palp is awesome for keeping stuff alive, especially if it's already tough. He doesn't provide the raw offense of Jonus in this very specific niche situation, however. That's all I'm claiming.

4 hours ago, FTS Gecko said:

Kudos to you for continuing to think outside the box when it comes to Defenders Biophysical.

What he said. It's nice to see you continue to push the envelope.

I'm intrigued by the idea of running this myself. I might break it out for a fun game.

I know this is pretty different, but it contains two 4 dice attacks and a tie d vess that I think can get the job done as far as your Jonas Bros list can. A little more fragile,but it will for sure Lay down some heat

TIE Phantom: Sigma Squadron Pilot (25)

Fire Control System (2)

Lightweight Frame (2)

TIE Phantom: Sigma Squadron Pilot (25)

Fire Control System (2)

Lightweight Frame (2)

TIE Defender: · Colonel Vessery (35)

Expertise (4)

Ion Cannon (3)

TIE/D (0)

-- TOTAL ------- 100p. --

Or you could do something like this?

TIE Defender: · Colonel Vessery (35)

Expertise (4)

Ion Cannon (3)

TIE/D (0)

TIE Bomber: Scimitar Squadron Pilot (16)

Flechette Torpedoes (2)

Extra Munitions (2)

Homing Missiles (5)

Conner Net (4)

Long-Range Scanners (0)

TIE Bomber: Scimitar Squadron Pilot (16)

Flechette Torpedoes (2)

Extra Munitions (2)

Homing Missiles (5)

Conner Net (4)

Long-Range Scanners (0)

-- TOTAL ------- 100p. --

Could do Asymmetrical build with defenders. Lets Jonus do a bit more, and gives you control with the list. Something like:

Delta Squadron Pilot (30)
Heavy Laser Cannon (7)

Delta Squadron Pilot (30)
Ion Cannon (3)
TIE/D (0)

Captain Jonus (22)
Veteran Instincts (1)
Rebel Captive (3)
Hotshot Co-pilot (4)
TIE Shuttle (0)

Total: 100

View in Yet Another Squad Builder

Jonus with VI strips focus, rebel captive prevents return fire, and if they do, they lose focus anyways and get stressed and will have an ion coming back. Also like Op Spec in place of HSCP as well.

15 minutes ago, wurms said:

Could do Asymmetrical build with defenders. Lets Jonus do a bit more, and gives you control with the list. Something like:

Delta Squadron Pilot (30)
Heavy Laser Cannon (7)

Delta Squadron Pilot (30)
Ion Cannon (3)
TIE/D (0)

Captain Jonus (22)
Veteran Instincts (1)
Rebel Captive (3)
Hotshot Co-pilot (4)
TIE Shuttle (0)

Total: 100

View in Yet Another Squad Builder

Jonus with VI strips focus, rebel captive prevents return fire, and if they do, they lose focus anyways and get stressed and will have an ion coming back. Also like Op Spec in place of HSCP as well.

I've been trying to figure out a use for Hot Shot Copilot on Bombers, just to see if something makes sense, but I hadn't considered this. If you wanted to keep it a little offensive, you could do Operations Specialist instead of Rebel Captive, so they fire at Jonus, Jonus drains a Focus with HSCP, or Jonus fires first, drains a Focus, and probably misses, generating a Focus for a Delta. Interesting. A little expensive, getting into Palpshuttle price range, so that's tough.