How Good is Swarm Leader?

By rafcpl6868, in X-Wing

Imperials definitely seem to have the best and most obvious synergies with Swarm Leader, given the sheer number of pilots with the Evade action available to them (and X7's and TIE/fo Comm Relays).

Vader seems like a good candidate for Swarm Leader given his natural PS9 and action economy; add Advanced Targeting Computer, flank with a couple of x7's. Job done. Or give him Engine Upgrade as well and support him with three Tempests with Accuracy Corrector.

The named Decimator pilots could also get some serious mileage out of it.

On ‎2‎/‎21‎/‎2017 at 4:07 PM, JJFDVORAK said:

I think the trick is to not attemp the range one shot with OA. I know that gives one more CRIT, but it also makes OA a prime target. I usually try to hang back with OA and stay at Range 2-3, while my shuttle goes in for range 1 shots. The shuttle gets 5 shots with Fanatical Devotion (you almost always roll at least 1 eyeball that then can't be dodged) and it can soak up more damage that OA.

I don't really understand how General Hux works in this situation with the shuttle, when you say that you get 5 shots at range 1 w/ Fanatical Devotion. I thought the General dishes out focus tokens and he gives the Devotion condition card to one of the other ships. Not the one that he's a crew member on.

55 minutes ago, Darth Onyx said:

I don't really understand how General Hux works in this situation with the shuttle, when you say that you get 5 shots at range 1 w/ Fanatical Devotion. I thought the General dishes out focus tokens and he gives the Devotion condition card to one of the other ships. Not the one that he's a crew member on.

General Hux give out up to 3 focus tokens to friendly ships at range 1-2 and then one of those ships gets the Fanatical Devotion condition. The Shuttle Hux is on is a friendly ship at range 1-2 of itself, so it is eligible for the Fanatical Devotion condition and the focus token. I give it to the shuttle in this list for two reasons. 1, with 4-5 dice, I am much more likely to not roll 4-5 natural hits/crits and actually need the focus token to turn some to hits,and activate Fanatical Devotion. I used to give it to my Ties, but several times I would roll natural two hits and waste Fanatical Devotion. So that is the first reason. The second, is that Ties get alot more out of a focus on defense than a shuttle does and with Fanatical Devotion, you can't spend your focus on defense.

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On ‎2‎/‎20‎/‎2017 at 10:25 AM, NakedDex said:

On paper, decent if paired with action efficient feeder units that can do without the evade token themselves, or take it on top of another token. X7 Defenders is the obvious option here, but also PTL GSPs and Mindlink Scyks fit the bill nicely.

Anecdotally, I've played against it a half dozen times and can say it's a big old threat to consider all the time - and it does make you consider token stripping shenanigans - but it's not massively hard to play around. I'd be looking at it more as a way of reliably adding one extra die per turn, rather than something that can bring you up to six every time.

I did that the other night with Scum and proxied the lightweight frame card. You can get Zuckuss, FCS, Swarm Leader, Dengar crew + 4 Mindlinked Sycks. They die in a glorious blaze of space dust jettisoning their unused evade tokens into space when your opponent blows them up with anything PS8 or higher. But the few times I could just clog up space and ram people and roll Zuckuss with 6 to 7 reds....good times