I'm excited about the buff for the Imps with Sloane and the Quasar- I've long complained about the lack of good carrier support in the Imperial fleet, and the uselessness of the basic TIE. Shuttles started fixing this problem, this wave answers all my complaints.

I think that Sloane also does a great job of bringing the generic squadrons back into the game. Generic X-wings in particular get almost as much of a buff as TIEs here- their escort lets them protect your other aces from Sloaning, and in conjunction with flak they can really shred the squadrons of a player who pushes their TIEs out to go for defense token stripping before engaging and tying up those firing arcs.

The boarding parties are less exciting for me- as an imp who usually plays black-die heavy lists, they're nice because they give an option for a cheap but effective raider (those two upgrade slots can really add up when you're trying to build a good hitter, particularly given how fragile raiders are when their evades are useless at black range), but i need the OE unless I'm making a suicide run. On glads/torp boats there are better things for those spots, and/or the squadron/engineering doesn't add up.

That said, it's important to note that boarding parties go off when you flip a dial- so you can't, say, overload pulse and then boarding party away defense tokens with the same ship, or ACM damage cards on and then boarding engineer them faceup.

As pointed out in the other thread, Hyperspace Assault just became potentially TERRIFYING with boarding actions.

So...if i have all this right, the quasar can end up with a 2 red for antifighter.

This involves Slaved Turrets and how Antifighter works, please correct me if im wrong.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"To perform an attack with a squadron or ship, proceed through the following steps:"

1.Declare Target:

2.Roll Attack Dice:

3.Resolve Attack Effects:

4.Spend Defense Tokens:

5.Resolve Damage:

6.Declare Additional Squadron Target:

"If the attacker is a ship and the defender was a squadron, the attacker can declare another enemy squadron that is within the firing arc and at attack range of the attacking hull zone as the new defender. Repeat steps 2 through 6 against the new defender. Each enemy squadron can be targeted once per attack"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Step 6 seems to imply that using anti-squadron is treated as one attack, especially considering you never leave the original attack step.

So if forming an attack pool and rolling vs every squad in an arc counts as one attack, slaved turrets works with shooting at each squad in an arc.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Seems really good, a half decent antifighter all game long, while being able to push 4+ bombers

3 hours ago, Grujav said:

I agree we haven't got her in hand to play with yet, but actually that 25% is a significant boost to TIEs since that was 25% of the time where they were doing nothing. So you've now increased a TIE fighter's effectiveness in anti-ship by 25% 33% (I need to do the maths better), boosting them from 50% to a 75% chance of affecting ships, which for an 8 point model is nice.

Will TIE fighters still die to concentrated anti-squadron fire, other squadrons, sure but she takes cheap TIE fighters and gives them the same chance of having an effect on a ship as a TIE-Bomber (though the type of effect is different). So now your TIE ball can be made of fighters and be better at killing squadrons and as likely to hit though with slightly different outcomes as TIE Bombers for cheaper.

You can take and use other ships to help TIE fighters avoid, bypass or kill that fighter screen as well. Not all opponents will have the perfect stop for a Rhymer, Dengar, TIE ball.

I don't think she breaks the game but she does seem really, really good for her points.

Take three that is a 50% increase not 33%

6 hours ago, FourDogsInaHorseSuit said:

A cr90 is only 15

I'm assuming someone already answered this but no it's not.

All of this freak out over Sloan's cost and leia being a little spendy.... Welcome to Armada outside of dodonna the rebels pay a premium for commanders and overall the imperials have a discount

Oh, I also see Hera's papa, Cham Syndulla. Sweet!

4 hours ago, Grujav said:

It is clear the Imperial stuff is the new hotness and for good reason. Sloane seems too good, Red AS die is amazing and everything else.

Also, Sloane makes Mon Mothma weaker since the close effect of Evade tokens now chances are will be exhausted or discarded before being used.

The Hammerhead we still need to learn more about it, as right now it is an undergunned, under shielded, one more hull, CR90.

So let me focus on Leia, if she uses it on Nav commands she is helping movement shenanigans, which we already have Madine, but yeah, she is like Ozzel for more. Use her for Engineering and... I just don't see that being great, but hey, it now means a CR90 can discard a damage card when it needs to, so that is a thing. Spend it on shooting and you are doing it much better. Squadrons and your squadron game gets much better. The real advantage is that she boosts every possible thing, movement, shooting, squadrons and engineering but... it doesn't really come off as 38 points worth. If you are running lots of squadrons than you will be spamming primarily those commands and she doesn't help a Pelta's "All Fighters, Follow Me!"

She makes whatever you run better but her cost is just too much, but I guess FFG sees her as the Rebellion version of Tarkin which she obviously is. So she is a Rebel leader on par with Tarkin and priced to match. Unfortunately the Rebels have many amazing leaders so I doubt she will see that much use, though maybe in non-Rieekan Ace carrier based lists, though then you still might want to go with Cracken or Dodonna.

I think you're wrong about the H-Head hull value. I think it's 3 (on the zoom it looks more curved, like the top of a semi-blocky 3), and will be dirt cheap (like 25-30).

As a rebel MSU player, I LOVE this Leia commander. I'll no longer need to hold that move token, my firepower on my 5 or 6 CR90's just went way up, and my transports can push more fighters (without having to give them Antilles or Exp. Hangers). She's going to see a lot of use from me, and players like me, I think.

4 minutes ago, Admiral Theia said:

I think you're wrong about the H-Head hull value. I think it's 3 (on the zoom it looks more curved, like the top of a semi-blocky 3), and will be dirt cheap (like 25-30).

As a rebel MSU player, I LOVE this Leia commander. I'll no longer need to hold that move token, my firepower on my 5 or 6 CR90's just went way up, and my transports can push more fighters (without having to give them Antilles or Exp. Hangers). She's going to see a lot of use from me, and players like me, I think.

Tarkin is also very fun. Just underpowered compared to the others for his cost. If you take this in well-meaning, it means we hope Leia will be totally worth taking, even at a competitive level, cuz Leia is cool.

I finally looked at the ship cardboard, yeah, five hull. Darn. I wanted something cheaper than a 90. Oh well, two of them and 4 90's will still make a fun list :-D

2 minutes ago, Admiral Theia said:

I think you're wrong about the H-Head hull value. I think it's 3 (on the zoom it looks more curved, like the top of a semi-blocky 3), and will be dirt cheap (like 25-30).

As a rebel MSU player, I LOVE this Leia commander. I'll no longer need to hold that move token, my firepower on my 5 or 6 CR90's just went way up, and my transports can push more fighters (without having to give them Antilles or Exp. Hangers). She's going to see a lot of use from me, and players like me, I think.

If 3, then yeah they have to be really cheap, probably in the point range you are stating. For me the rear Hammer Head looks very much like a 5 to me but in time we will lean.

Its interesting, a Gozanti can be as much as 28 for significantly less firepower and one less shield, but with the advantages and disadvantages of flotilla. At 3 Hull they would be worse by pretty much ever metric from a CR90 with what little we know and the cheapest of those is 39. So the pricing of both of these Wave VI ships will be interesting to see.

Thank you for your take on General Leia. I can certainly see how she would be advantageous to your fleet build. She is a somewhat more flexible Tarkin and I can see now how she is especially good for Command 1 ships and MSUs.

Clearly after 15 pages it must have been said already:

I had a look at the Wave 6 Predictions...

Very first post from November 2016 and the lines are:

"The next wave must be the Quasar and Hammerhead"...

Amazing!!! That user deserves a special No-Prize. Well worth the effort I must say.

Good call.

I think the H-Head with the black dice will be more useful (especially for ramming). Take Dodonna, APT them twice, then ram them (since I doubt they'll be able to take ET's, just the one ram) for a face up again. Three Dodonna face ups from multiple ships in a swarm would be pretty killer. However, if priced comparably to a CR90, then maybe a Cracken APT list littered with these guys, perhaps running cover for one or two MC30's, could really own the close range game.

At one hand, nothing special. Meh... We knew exactly what ships will be in this expansion. On the other, whoop, we get 2 Hammerheads in one package!

Seriously I think with Wave 6 Armada turned towards the way of X-Wing namely that ships from previous waves become useless. Heck that Quasar Fire is more durable than a Gladiator and by turn 2 it can strip literally any ship from its defense tokens. Who needs Demolisher any more? Especially that it's weaker and has worse defense tokens than the QF?

And he Hammerhead? Seems like it can bring down an ISD single-handedly if its shields are down...

I wonder, if The Hammerhead has turbolasers. If it has, Ackbar has gotten new friends!

This wave makes imperials what they should have been from the get go. Swamp the enemy in wave after wave of disposable fighters, followed by a mop up with the heavy hitters

Leia seems very powerful, Tarkin gives everyone the same type of command token regardless of whether they can take it, or even use it, Leia lets you get the exact token that matches your C-Dial, on the turn you want it. not sure why people are seem so unimpressed.

And the new Imperial Admiral, on paper seems strong! but Tie fighters/Interceptors are very easy to kill, very easy. Of the two versions, I'm going to say, the everyone but Rogue version is the correct one, wouldn't want to see 7 Firesprays combined with her, that is for sure.

The ships look interesting, quite happy with the new stuff over all, well done FFG.

Prediction: second of the QF unique titles makes it Rebel.

3 hours ago, SkyCake said:

even if you can keep flipping structs, which i believe is the case, you still have to get facedowns on you opponents ship... in most cases f you are doing that, your opponents ship isnt long for this world anyways, and giving up 2 juicy slots may not be worth it in that case... however, dodonna, hammerhead, faceup ram title can get you that struct onto the ship with a ram, then activate next turn and flip it 3(im guessing hammerhead has 3 eng) times, netting 8 damage onto the hull... Raddus is getting tons of ideas here!!!!

But then structural is flipped face down, and is no longer selectable?

Seems the logical interpretation.

With Sloane, it might be time to staple Walex to your MC80. Quad laser turrets too.

Some interesting combos for rebels;

1. Luke and Boarding Engineers. Luke shoots, AF rams, next turn Luke shoots and then trigger the Engineers on the AF's activation. Easy 3 crits

2. Double ramming CR-90B Reeikan followed by AF + Boarding Engineers

3. Hammerhead + OE + CF and Sato; 3 black dice to trigger long range torps, with OE rerolls

4. Hammerhead + OE+ external racks + CF and Sato; 6x black dice from front arc with re-rolls

5. Leia and entrapment formation; entrapment fixes the problem of not being able to change speed while using Leia's ability

6. Reeikan HomeOne + Hammerhead swarm + external racks + OE + CF; 4 back, 1 blue, 1 red with black rerolls and guaranteed accuracy

22 minutes ago, TheEasternKing said:

Leia seems very powerful, Tarkin gives everyone the same type of command token regardless of whether they can take it, or even use it, Leia lets you get the exact token that matches your C-Dial, on the turn you want it. not sure why people are seem so unimpressed.

And the new Imperial Admiral, on paper seems strong! but Tie fighters/Interceptors are very easy to kill, very easy. Of the two versions, I'm going to say, the everyone but Rogue version is the correct one, wouldn't want to see 7 Firesprays combined with her, that is for sure.

The ships look interesting, quite happy with the new stuff over all, well done FFG.

Jump Master swarm ftw!

Admiral Sloane look insane.

Unique Squadrons? Dead in no time. And suddenly you are not unhappy about the 4 rolled accuracy anymore. You just spend the 4 and discard both defense tokens from the oppenent unique squadron.
She just give no bonus against non unique squadrons. So her use is a bit limited in the squadron fight.

Enemy ships? Without any defense tokens within one round. It is the first time you might start to reroll your hits to accuracy with bomber command center .

I really love her already. I am a full time squadron fighter, and i will for sure use her.

1 minute ago, Tokra said:

Admiral Sloane look insane.

Unique Squadrons? Dead in no time. And suddenly you are not unhappy about the 4 rolled accuracy anymore. You just spend the 4 and discard both defense tokens from the oppenent unique squadron.
She just give no bonus against non unique squadrons. So her use is a bit limited in the squadron fight.

Enemy ships? Without any defense tokens within one round. It is the first time you might start to reroll your hits to accuracy with bomber command center .

I really love her already. I am a full time squadron fighter, and i will for sure use her.

You cannot spend more than 1 per attack I think.

2 minutes ago, ovinomanc3r said:

You cannot spend more than 1 per attack I think.

The DEFENDER cannot spend more than one per attack.

The attacker can do what he want (at least for the defense marker)

Edit: at least by the current rules. Maybe they change it for her.

Am I wrong if I think we can use Leia+token for extra boost?

I read her as well so I could and I didn't see she gave tokens. So in fact you could spend a dial and a token with the bonus of Leia. MC80 super-super-carrier activating 7 squadrons.