Ok, first off i dont think this ship is bad statswise, though i find it a little odd it doesnt have any defensive retrofits it still has good upgrade slot coverage.

My issue is: its tactics feel like its forcing me to play low squadrons frontal assault rebels, and i always felt like rebels lived and died by squadron shenanigans. The Home One atleast has a high squad value so it can be used as a mothership in addition to the high dice attack, Liberty's squadrons are kinda wasteful even with the title (considering the "only spend 1 defensive token" title is insane).

What are some good ways to get this thing to work? Ive used it about 4-5 times and every time it felt like i was trying to do something rebels shouldnt be doing. If i continue the heavy squadron strats using flotilla activations then the liberty basically doesnt do anything, but if i try to force the liberty to be a threat then i get swamped with fighters i cant fend off.

This is a hard ship to be effective with. I have had success with Ackbar, GTs, Engine Techs, XI7s, and Enhanced Armaments. This makes the sides just much a threat at the front and with ETs you can get away from most fighter swarms.

You need another threat with it. Admo or Yavaris are good for that, and you need support so it doesn't get overwhelmed. 2 flotillas with Comms Net or Repair Crews, if you can fly well, can help keep it running.

When wave 3/4 first came out, I ran it with Raymus, ET, QTC, SA, LS and GT with a Yavaris bomber complement. I even tried Liberty because Raymus lets you get 4 squads off at once. Leia TRC90 let's you be very reactive to your opponent and pairs well with Raymus for a Liberty or ET token.

With wave 5, I'm going to take a crack at it again, but going to try to fly it at speed 3 with Nav Teams and Raymus so I can get that thing moving. Likely support it with Admo and A-Wings.

The main problem I see is when it gets flanked or focused fired. You need to scare your opponent into staying out of the side arcs, which can be very hard to do. Like I said, Yavaris is a good option for that, especially if you deploy on one side of the map so you only expose 1 flank, instead of running it head long into the fray.

Try running it with an MC 80 or 30 to watch the flanks, and a Neb B or 2 to help out forward, with the ubiquitous GR75s in support.

Something like this maybe?

[ REBEL FLEET (398 points)
1 • MC80 Battle Cruiser - General Dodonna - Tactical Expert - Veteran Gunners - Fighter Coordination Team - Dual Turbolaser Turrets - XI7 Turbolasers (148)
2 • Nebulon-B Escort Frigate - Dual Turbolaser Turrets - Yavaris (67)
3 • GR-75 Medium Transports - Repair Crews - Expanded Hangar Bay (27)
4 • MC30c Torpedo Frigate - Ordnance Experts - Assault Concussion Missiles - Foresight (82)
5 • Shara Bey A-wing Squadron (17)
6 • A-wing Squadron (11)
7 • Ten Numb B-wing Squadron (19)
8 • B-wing Squadron (14)
9 • X-wing Squadron (13)

Well the mere presence of an MC30 tends to scare the piss out of my main opponent, ive just yet to run it with the Liberty for some reason (oddly enough every time i bring one it manages to completely 1shot one of his ships lol even though thats not that likely). My last game was the first time i tried Engine Techs on it and after seeing just how bloody fast that is i can totally see a flanking strat with it. It denied him from killing it despite being at completely 0 shields when it passed his ISD, Speed3 + ET is hilarious on a large ship.

Yavaris would be a great idea, never thought about that. Dorsal mod or Quads makes that ship just about as deady as the Liberty if i get lucky enough.

Rhymerball was the main issue i had in my last game. Due to not having a solid squadron play my only way to get rid of them was 3 Awings, the 2 blue from the Assault Frigate and 2black from the Liberty and just hope i didnt wiff - welp, i wiffed. Still cant believe that ability is literally triple attack range with 0 downsides....

Vergilius wrote an excellent exposition on how he was making the Liberty work. He cleverly titled the thread as an after action report so that it would be difficult for me to search. I think it describes very well how to think about developing fleets, with specific application to the Liberty. Go have a read. I've read it three times since he first wrote it, and I expect I'll go back to it many more times as I refine how I make lists. I think it's that good.

https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/237444-houston-regional-aar/

Hope you find it as helpful as I did.

Yea, Libertys die quickly to a Rhymerball. Best way to deal with that is to throw an A-Wing in there to just barely engage the bombers, since the Intel is likely in the middle of the ball waiting to come out and play. Try a force of X-Wing and E-Wings to deal with a Rhymerball. 5 hull is a bit much, and 3-4 of them are nearly impossible for a Rhymerball to deal with, unless they went the hybrid anti-squad Rhymerball path. Even 2 E-Wings can help take out Dengar or killing bombers. You could even be crazy like me and take BCC with X-Wings so you can attack ships when you finish up the bombers.

It is a flagship but thing with flagships is that they take up so many points they easily become the primary target, and Armada's meta is starting to approach the kill heavy meta where games end by tabling your opponent even objectives are being used because they add more damage as if they were read. So flagships are easy primary targets and can get focused down rather quickly.

47 minutes ago, Vineheart01 said:

Ok, first off i dont think this ship is bad statswise, though i find it a little odd it doesnt have any defensive retrofits it still has good upgrade slot coverage.

My issue is: its tactics feel like its forcing me to play low squadrons frontal assault rebels, and i always felt like rebels lived and died by squadron shenanigans. The Home One atleast has a high squad value so it can be used as a mothership in addition to the high dice attack, Liberty's squadrons are kinda wasteful even with the title (considering the "only spend 1 defensive token" title is insane).

What are some good ways to get this thing to work? Ive used it about 4-5 times and every time it felt like i was trying to do something rebels shouldnt be doing. If i continue the heavy squadron strats using flotilla activations then the liberty basically doesnt do anything, but if i try to force the liberty to be a threat then i get swamped with fighters i cant fend off.

Wait are you saying you've never felt the urge actually use the 7 darn attack dice you paid 90 points for??????? Like what.

4 minutes ago, Marinealver said:

It is a flagship but thing with flagships is that they take up so many points they easily become the primary target, and Armada's meta is starting to approach the kill heavy meta where games end by tabling your opponent even objectives are being used because they add more damage as if they were read. So flagships are easy primary targets and can get focused down rather quickly.

I haven't tabled an opponent in months, and I get to play at least once a week. I tend to think 10-1s are far and few between. At the NC regionals, there were only 2 10-1s, and it was the same guy that did it.

Madine, tac experts, gunnery teams, x17s, monkarren

Throw in a neb and some gr75s and bombers, and the liberty can pull mad 90° swings while fighters and the neb soften shields and ships...

I don't know why but I am awful with this ship.

I ran it with 2 MC30s and 2 Flotillas in our first Corellian Campaign. LOVED it. Biggest secrets for it were engine techs and Madine. It can be crazy fast. I would send in the MC30s first to get their broadsides in then have the ships run into the Liberty. I would have a nav token on it and give it a nav command. It would fire, then go from speed 2->3 with the nav command, then get to use engine techs. For this move it would have 3 extra yaw clicks. Many times it would fire, then move and turn to get completely out of a star destroyer's arc. Plus with Madine it could turn on a dime to keep things in it's front arc. In my 2nd game it managed to get completely behind an Imperial Star Destroyer by turn 4 with it's front facing the star destroyer's rear. The only thing that saved that ship was it hyperspacing out that turn.

Also, this was my list by the end of the Campaign:

action: Rebel Alliance
Points: 500/500

Commander: General Madine

Assault Objective: Targeting Beacons
Defense Objective: Fighter Ambush
Navigation Objective: Salvage Run

[ flagship ] MC80 Battle Cruiser (103 points)
- General Madine ( 30 points)
- Chart Officer ( 2 points)
- Gunnery Team ( 7 points)
- Engine Techs ( 8 points)
- Spinal Armament ( 9 points)
- X17 Turbolasers ( 6 points)
- Leading Shots ( 4 points)
= 169 total ship cost

MC30c Torpedo Frigate (63 points)
- Admonition ( 8 points)
- Skilled First Officer ( 1 points)
- Ordnance Experts ( 4 points)
- X17 Turbolasers ( 6 points)
- Assault Proton Torpedoes ( 5 points)
= 87 total ship cost

MC30c Torpedo Frigate (63 points)
- Ordnance Experts ( 4 points)
- X17 Turbolasers ( 6 points)
- Assault Proton Torpedoes ( 5 points)
= 78 total ship cost

GR-75 Medium Transports (18 points)
- Bright Hope ( 2 points)
- Toryn Farr ( 7 points)
- Comms Net ( 2 points)
= 29 total ship cost

GR-75 Medium Transports (18 points)
- Comms Net ( 2 points)
= 20 total ship cost

1 Shara Bey ( 17 points)
1 Green Squadron ( 12 points)
1 Corran Horn ( 22 points)
1 Ketsu Onyo ( 22 points)
2 VCX-100 Freighters ( 30 points)
1 Rogue Squadron ( 14 points)

I've had fun with this

MC80 Star Cruiser (96 points) - Lando Calrissian ( 4 points) - Engine Techs ( 8 points) - H9 Turbolasers ( 8 points) - X17 Turbolasers ( 6 points) - Leading Shots ( 4 points) = 126 total ship cost

Nebulon-B Escort Frigate (57 points) - Yavaris ( 5 points) - Flight Commander ( 3 points) - Fighter Coordination Team ( 3 points) = 68 total ship cost

GR-75 Medium Transports (18 points) - Bright Hope ( 2 points) - Toryn Farr ( 7 points) = 27 total ship cost

[ flagship ] GR-75 Medium Transports (18 points) - General Dodonna ( 20 points) - Quantum Storm ( 1 points) - Adar Tallon ( 10 points) = 49 total ship cost

1 Jan Ors ( 19 points) 1 Luke Skywalker ( 20 points) 1 YT-1300 ( 13 points) 1 "Dutch" Vander ( 16 points) 1 Ten Numb ( 19 points) 1 HWK-290 ( 12 points) 2 VCX-100 Freighters ( 30 points)

If you don't want to lose it, it needs repair commands for the second half of the game. Last night was the first time I had the discipline to set Repair turns 4-6, and was the first time I had kept it alive the full game. This was despite the fact I overextended it on deployment (due to Spynet). Had it been a later round with more than one upgrade I wouldn't have got away with it!

My current working command stack for the Liberty is:

T1-2: Navigate - allows you to get the best attack angle

T3: Concentrate Fire - because an extra dice in the (usually) key engagement turn can be all the difference

T4-6: Repair - to try and keep it alive and not give up the points

I have never used it.... but this is my thoughts on the subject.

Liberty gets to shine for the alpha strike, then hard navs the rest of the game. Intel taken out by flight controlled Ewing alpha strike. Shara Bey ties everyone up. Jobs a good un

Snipe
Author: Ginkapo

Faction: Rebel Alliance
Points: 395/400

Commander: General Madine

Assault Objective: Advanced Gunnery
Defense Objective: Contested Outpost
Navigation Objective: Intel Sweep

[ flagship ] MC80 Battle Cruiser (103 points)
- General Madine ( 30 points)
- Liberty ( 3 points)
- Raymus Antilles ( 7 points)
- Flight Controllers ( 6 points)
- Engine Techs ( 8 points)
- Leading Shots ( 4 points)
= 161 total ship cost

CR90 Corvette B (39 points)
- Tantive IV ( 3 points)
- Engine Techs ( 8 points)
- Reinforced Blast Doors ( 5 points)
= 55 total ship cost

CR90 Corvette B (39 points)
- Jainas Light ( 2 points)
- Engine Techs ( 8 points)
- Reinforced Blast Doors ( 5 points)
= 54 total ship cost

Nebulon-B Support Refit (51 points)
- Salvation ( 7 points)
- Dual Turbolaser Turrets ( 5 points)
= 63 total ship cost

3 E-Wing Squadrons ( 45 points)
1 Shara Bey ( 17 points)

Card view link

18 minutes ago, Ginkapo said:

I have never used it.... but this is my thoughts on the subject.

Liberty gets to shine for the alpha strike, then hard navs the rest of the game. Intel taken out by flight controlled Ewing alpha strike. Shara Bey ties everyone up. Jobs a good un

Snipe
Author: Ginkapo

Faction: Rebel Alliance
Points: 395/400

Commander: General Madine

Assault Objective: Advanced Gunnery
Defense Objective: Contested Outpost
Navigation Objective: Intel Sweep

[ flagship ] MC80 Battle Cruiser (103 points)
- General Madine ( 30 points)
- Liberty ( 3 points)
- Raymus Antilles ( 7 points)
- Flight Controllers ( 6 points)
- Engine Techs ( 8 points)
- Leading Shots ( 4 points)
= 161 total ship cost

CR90 Corvette B (39 points)
- Tantive IV ( 3 points)
- Engine Techs ( 8 points)
- Reinforced Blast Doors ( 5 points)
= 55 total ship cost

CR90 Corvette B (39 points)
- Jainas Light ( 2 points)
- Engine Techs ( 8 points)
- Reinforced Blast Doors ( 5 points)
= 54 total ship cost

Nebulon-B Support Refit (51 points)
- Salvation ( 7 points)
- Dual Turbolaser Turrets ( 5 points)
= 63 total ship cost

3 E-Wing Squadrons ( 45 points)
1 Shara Bey ( 17 points)

Card view link

This is a really unusual fleet. what are those corvette? Pretending they're hammer head ram boats? No SW5 whatever ion cannons? no TRC? Salvation is great.

Also 4 activations? ... Sorry, I've said this before, do you guys have videos of someone playing 4 activations vs 5 or higher at a high level? Against a high level opponent who didn't just accidentally mess up or feed MSUs into the other player?

Also, for flight controllers, you do lose Gunnery Team. Which also helps in using your AA dice. Or Ord experts.

I would have dropped one CR90+upgrades for 2 Transports to help out activations and comms net.

--

That said, I really wanna try those CR90 ram boats. They look super fun!

2 hours ago, Vineheart01 said:

...then the liberty basically doesnt do anything, but if i try to force the liberty to be a threat then i get swamped with fighters i cant fend off.

Not sure why the Liberty doesn't do anything in your setup? I'm curious...

Back in wave three/four I ran a loaded Liberty with 4 transports, and 10 squadrons (mix of Y, X, and HWK). If you place the Liberty last (and with 9 deployments you should be placing it LAST) 5) then you should be able to set it up for an effective attack run, either flanking or duking it out (as you like).

Meanwhile the squadrons go kick butt.

Now the list wasn't perfect, and could use updating for wave 5, but I think it's still very viable.

You are trying to play imperial with rebels. You cannot match an ISD in squadron carrier + heavy firepower. Liberty just dont match with squadrons. Try to use Liberty as flanking ship and fly modest fast screens to follow, A's or YT2400.

4 minutes ago, Maturin said:

Not sure why the Liberty doesn't do anything in your setup? I'm curious...

Back in wave three/four I ran a loaded Liberty with 4 transports, and 10 squadrons (mix of Y, X, and HWK). If you place the Liberty last (and with 9 deployments you should be placing it LAST) 5) then you should be able to set it up for an effective attack run, either flanking or duking it out (as you like).

Meanwhile the squadrons go kick butt.

Now the list wasn't perfect, and could use updating for wave 5, but I think it's still very viable.

9 deployments? arent you suppose to place 1 ship and 2 squads within distance 2 of that ship when you deploy? That'd be 5 deployments. Or is that another "starter scenario" thing thats been stuck in my head and its not mentioned at all in normal game rules/never noticed its missing?

You place a ship or two squads. If you can't place 2 squads down, you must place a ship.

so
1 trans
2 squads
2 squads
2 squads
1 trans
2 squads
2 squads
1 trans
1 trans
Lib.

Or some variation of that.
If he'd had 11 squads, it would always end with 1 squad.

well, thats something we've been doing wrong lol. Always done 1ship 2squad per "deployment"

First, thanks for the shout-out during the course of the thread. Second, a Liberty thread! I cannot resist!

I probably owe a San Antonio regional list where I took another top 4 finish and only lost to Ard's activation list in the last round. There's a lot in the comments to the thread that is good, and quite a bit that needs correcting. My AAR is a pretty good place to start, not only from the standpoint of one option that you can do with the Liberty, but how to approach list-building more generally, how to tweak a list over time, and how to think about match-ups and so forth.

Let me confine some thoughts to the Liberty in this thread. First, the Liberty is a battlecruiser. One of the variants even uses that word. Historically speaking, a Battlecruiser was supposed to be fast enough that it could outrun anything bigger than it, and have enough guns that it could outshoot anything smaller. Using a Liberty well in this game means paying attention to this historical insight. The Liberty is absolutely at its best one-shotting Corvettes, Raiders, possibly one-shotting Gladiators and MC30s, depending upon load-out. You'd have to be pretty lucky to one-shot the medium sized ships, but it also wouldn't take too much assistance from another ship or squadrons to open up that possibility. Finally, you really need some good contributions from other parts of your list to take down anything bigger.

When you place at the start of the game, you should be thinking pretty clearly about your targets. Since you can place your Liberty late in the set-up, you should have eyes on a few good targets from the opponent and you should be able to get into range there.

If you're going to use any unit well, you need to maximize its strengths and minimize its weaknesses. The Liberty has an impressive front arc, and unlike the ISD where the side arcs are serviceable and maybe you could go with a double-arcing build, I think the Liberty really benefits from taking multiple front shots and thus gunnery teams. In fact, I really cannot think of too many load-outs where I wouldn't want Gunnery Teams. If you're going to use that front arc well, you also have to be able to keep it on target. That's where Madine comes in. He not only affects your turning throughout the game, but the angles of approach and so forth. There are lots of secondary ramifications here that are difficult to explain. IN keeping with maximizing the front arc, you've also got to look at load-outs that help that front arc be as effective as possible. More on the Mon Karren title later, but XI7, Spinal, and H9 are favorite turbolaser slots, which you get two of. There's nothing like Spinal to make both of those GT front shots really count and then you get XI7 or H9 depending upon what your token mitigation strategy is. I dislike Intel Officer because you're generally wanting to kill something small often without ECM in a one-shot, though I suppose some kind of XI7/Intel Officer speed-1 with squadrons build could work. Leading Shots on the Battle Cruiser to fix reds, though I'd think SW-7 on the Star is a better fit, and I've even done DT on the Star to fix that one troublesome red. Your side arcs are a weak point, which means you need a little bit of squadron support to tie up and keep enemy squads off of you. You can also fix this with maneuvering and proper placement. In short, he shouldn't be pounding lots of shots into your side arcs.

Liberty Titles:

Mon Karren: I find that people in the community have a love it/hate it reaction. Its 8 points. I've run it, turned away from it, and then run it again. Here's the key, I'd say. Other than shooting flotillas, it does at least something against virtually every other ship in the game. Generally, the MK title works by you attempting to put as much damage through as possible, while simultaneously allowing them to use whatever single token they want. Thus, I prefer it on a SW-7 Star Cruiser where you can conceivably have 6-8 damage. Against the big ships, they can often just brace and it works better than an XI7. Against ECM units, you're allowing the token anyway and are focusing on pumping your damage. Against Peltas and AFIIs, they have to pick only one token. This isn't a great title against MC30s, but there's still the subtle benefit of denying both the evade and redirect, which may be meaningful at long or medium range, or if you expect Mothma in your meta. Think of Mon Karren as being a meta choice in the same way that XI7 or H9 is a meta choice.

Endeavor: I ran this title throughout wave 4 simply because I thought it was meaningful to shut off the crits from bombers. Naturally, you can also shut off default crits from anything else shooting at your Liberty that isn't using ordinance. I'd leave it at home if you plan on running lots of squads. Just recognize that when it comes up, its often big, but it might only come up once every 3 or 4 games.

Liberty: I haven't run this much myself, but there's definitely a place for it in getting your squads into place on the turn you activate your Liberty. In at least some of my regional games, I was looking at a squadron activation on the second turn anyway, and picking up a stronger anti-squadron force and then activating them with a bigger push from the Liberty seems meaningful. You could also always activate two with just the token. I'd probably lean more toward this title in a Garm or Dodonna list rather than a Madine list.

Beyond that, you really need the rest of the list built around it well. I found that the single MC30 mattered a great deal. I couldn't personally get the Corvette Swarm around the BC to work in quite the way that I wanted. There's just enough out there already that can pop a Corvette easily such that it is a bit of a liability to have two or three except for maybe in the pickle+3 Corvette lists with Ackbar/Rieekan, where there is a clear strategy to trade up on the Corvettes and it is pretty easy to fly and keep the pickle alive. That doesn't quite work out as well with the Liberty because it is much more fragile and weaker, so its altogether too easy for the opponent to pick it off while incidentally picking off a Corvette or two. Bring out an Admonition though and either it is getting away or the Liberty is, short of your flying them both very badly.

I can say that what I've found success with is: Liberty, MC30, Corvette-A, Transport(s), A-wings, Madine.

I don't think that's the only thing. There's plenty of detail in the AAR thread, and there's not really much I can add based on recent tournaments in Austin and San Antonio. I've played 4 activations with a bid, which is fine, and I've played 5 activations. Further reflections would put me at leaning toward the 5th activation and a lesser bid, basically conceding the bid against anyone with a super hefty bid, but going ahead and picking it up against anything bidding moderately. I think the bid does matter against some lists. For example, playing Ard's 7 activation list in the finals at San Antonio was probably lost before the game started, simply because I had no way of stopping a last/first sequence, whereas I played a much more direct hard-fought contest against him back in November when I had first player.

Some other ideas that I think have merit:

1. Garm, Dodonna, Rieekan and Sato all have merit. Garm can give you the right tokens. Dodonna/Rieekan for a heavier squadron push and non-aces based or ace-centric squads respectively. Sato/BC/LS/Spinal can give you some really interesting attack options at all range bands, where LS is available at long range and the black dice at all other range bands, rerollable with LS produce reliable and sometimes very spiky high damage.

2. Nav Teams: In a non-Madine list, I'd probably look more at flying right at the enemy and bringing enough threats to wipe out the enemy before Liberty moves up into a really dangerous space. Nav Teams are there to help keep your Liberty on target, and to pick up that odd front arc shot when it is needed.

3. More squads. I've run 3 As and Tycho, then Shara/Tycho/2As, but picking off more enemy squads is always an option. Yavaris and a couple of Bs maybe. As the others have noted, you definitely need another key threat with your Liberty. That could be Admonition, but it could also be Yavaris. Again, if you can pick off enough key enemy squads before you move up, your Liberty stays safe. If you can clean out a key ship or two with those squads, same safety. So squads are likely as good here as anywhere else.

I'm sure there are plenty of more thoughts, but I'm running out of steam for the moment, so I'll leave off at this point and maybe return later.

This is the way!

Total: 395 / 400

MC80 Battle Cruiser
- Intel Officer
- Veteran Gunners
- Engine Techs
- High-Capacity Ion Turbines
- XI7 Turbolasers
- XX-9 Turbolasers
Total: (142)

GR-75 Medium Transports
- General Dodonna
Total: (38)

GR-75 Medium Transports
- Toryn Farr
- Bright Hope
Total: (27)

GR-75 Medium Transports
- Comms Net
Total: (20)

GR-75 Medium Transports
- Comms Net
Total: (20)

GR-75 Medium Transports
Total: (18)

A-wing Squadron x6 (66)
YT-2400 x4 (64)
Total Squadrons: 130

I detest that list