1 hour ago, Grey Mage said:

Raiders need to be upgraded and specialized, which limits their effectiveness in an all comes list. If the tools you gave them dont fit the mission profile you have a fragile, close range, gift wrapped point sink.

As a raider player since ffg release them I think you are wrong about it.

Yes, raiders are weak and take some time get some practice on the other hand I think is easier than mc30 but I don't play rebels so maybe I am wrong.

Raiders can be upgraded and specialised in order to be awesome in that role but you don't need too much to have a great anti squadron ship.

Raider+OE works great against squadrons and even against some ships like cr90 or flotillas.

Even a Raider with APT or EL and ST or OE obviously specialised against ships can do a lot of damage to squadrons.

The problem is that people think that a raider can stand against squadrons without cover and it doesn't, but cr90 or nebulons cannot either.

1 hour ago, Snipafist said:

TIE Fighters are the best 8 points you can spend towards killing squadrons. They're quite good at it but they're fragile so you need to focus on using their speed and numbers advantages to make up for their fragility problem. Once you get the hang of them, they're quite proficient at their job .

I never said Ties werent good at their job- I said they were not good at anything else and I stand by that. I also stand by the fact that at 3HP/8pts they are snacks. Even a wounded rebel fighter wing or a CR90 can pot shot some points out of basic Ties pretty quickly.

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They really don't need to be specialized at all, no. Ordnance Experts is the only "must have" upgrade for Raider-Is. Past that I'd consider Flechettes and maybe a title if you want a bit more anti-squadron but they're not strictly necessary. Raiders are extremely helpful in an all-comers list because against squadron-heavier fleets you can prioritize using them against squadrons and against squadron-smaller fleets they become black dice picket ships that focus on beating up other small ships (particularly flotillas) or taking attacks of opportunity against bigger ships. I've written an awful lot about good Raider usage if you want to give it a read but the short version is I completely disagree with your feelings on Raiders.

Thank you, Im always up for more reading. I will post here before reading your article because and only because Im about to head to work. My general problem with raiders is a lack of defenses that works where they want to be- knife fighting range. Evades are just rough that way, and for Imperials theyre my least favorite of the defense tokens. I do acknowledge its probably a playstyle issue- Im one for tight formation flying and mutual support.

But with Ordnance Experts and Instigator were already looking at 52pts. Adding Flechettes and Kallus quickly gets up to 58. With or without a full spread of upgrades thats two Gozantis if I was looking for activations, or an Arquitens if Im looking for a harrier- and one that does not have to be at point blank range to do its job either.

Some people here have noted rebel ships used as anti-squadron, and thats great.... but while black dice hit harder, the sheer size differential between a blue AS die and a black is pretty significant. Once again, I have to be in knife-fight range while being all but defenseless. Fighter cover is great for the AS work, but does nothing against a salvo from an MC30, for example.

I want an anti-squadron tool that is either survivable enough to not give up its points quickly in the furball of ship combat OR is points efficient enough that I dont have to invest as much in dedicated anti-fighter as my opponent did in fighters. Otherwise why not just take more of a survivable fighter screen?

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I agree that Rebel squadrons are less specialized, but they're still specialized. X-Wings are miserable bombers for their points cost, for example. Y-Wings are poor dogfighters. It means it's harder to make an outright bad Rebel squadron group but they're still going to be poor uses of points when they're not doing what they want to do, it's just the problem isn't quite as severe.

If I come up against a squadronless fleet with my 6 TIE Fighters, I content myself with getting 3 deployments for 48 points (which usually results in more deployments than the no-squadron fleet gets, which can make a big difference) and I set them up to catch enemy ships during the squadron phase to get in a few points of damage and then they fly away when they get down to 1 hull or so remaining. I've done it in the past and it works all right. Would I rather have spent those points on another Raider against no-squadrons? Sure. But it still does all right.

I agree that deployments are great. I disagree with claims others have made that the X-wing is a bad bomber for its points. Red dice are only 'fickle' compared to blacks by a single facing, and are almost as likely to do double damage as a black. They may not be as points efficient as other bombers, but that doesnt make them ineffective. I can deal with inefficient, not ineffective.

5 hours ago, Grey Mage said:

I never said Ties werent good at their job- I said they were not good at anything else and I stand by that. I also stand by the fact that at 3HP/8pts they are snacks. Even a wounded rebel fighter wing or a CR90 can pot shot some points out of basic Ties pretty quickly.

They aren't good at anything else, but that's Imperial squadron design philosophy for you. They're extremely good at their job for their cost, so you can get a competent fighter defense for cheaper than the Rebels can.

They are snacks if you don't use them well. If you try shooting at a Rebel ship with a 1 HP TIE Fighter that could've run away and it gets flakked to death, that's on you, not the TIE Fighter. If you move a wounded TIE Fighter into a furball when it could've engaged only one enemy fighter and then it gets killed, that's on you, not the TIE Fighter. If you run TIEs into enemy squadrons and flak when there was no real need to be so reckless... you get the idea. Please give the earlier-linked TIE Fighter article a look for getting more mileage out of your TIE Fighters.

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Thank you, Im always up for more reading. I will post here before reading your article because and only because Im about to head to work. My general problem with raiders is a lack of defenses that works where they want to be- knife fighting range. Evades are just rough that way, and for Imperials theyre my least favorite of the defense tokens. I do acknowledge its probably a playstyle issue- Im one for tight formation flying and mutual support.

Raiders are fine with being used in support of other ships, but if you're using them correctly they should be receiving attacks at long or medium range and then "catching" enemy ships at short range and/or activating after an enemy ship and then getting into short range. Against squadrons you can use very similar methods, which I detail in the article. I find a lot of people use Raiders like baby Gladiators and they're not at all designed to be used so recklessly.

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But with Ordnance Experts and Instigator were already looking at 52pts. Adding Flechettes and Kallus quickly gets up to 58. With or without a full spread of upgrades thats two Gozantis if I was looking for activations, or an Arquitens if Im looking for a harrier- and one that does not have to be at point blank range to do its job either.

All you need is Ordnance Experts and maybe one more upgrade if you want. Nearly nobody else has said you need Ordnance Experts and Instigator and Flechettes and Kallus on a Raider. I've tried that Raider. It's okay but I'd rather invest the points saved by going upgrade-light into another Raider.

Compared to Gozantis they pack a lot more punch. They're not really comparable in their usage and my favored fleet runs 2 of each so I've used them together frequently.

Compared to the Arquitens they're 100% different. The Arquitens operates as a long-range consistent harasser but it's awful at flakking squadrons, it has a poor maneuver chart, and it doesn't do burst damage. The Raider operates as a short-ranged burst damage threat, generally in a fleet support role, it has great maneuverability (especially at speeds 1 and 2) and its flak is incredible.

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Some people here have noted rebel ships used as anti-squadron, and thats great.... but while black dice hit harder, the sheer size differential between a blue AS die and a black is pretty significant.

The range difference between blue and black dice is not as wide as many believe. Blue dice are certainly longer-ranged, but only by about 50%. They also only deal damage to squadrons 50% of the time. Black dice deal damage to squadrons 75% of the time, and that improves to 93.8% of the time with an Ordnance Experts reroll.

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Once again, I have to be in knife-fight range while being all but defenseless. Fighter cover is great for the AS work, but does nothing against a salvo from an MC30, for example.

If you're running your Raiders into the side arcs of an unactivated MC30 just hoping you'll live, you're throwing them away. Again, please read the article. It should help. I've seen a lot of people struggle with Raiders and once you change your perspective on their use I think you'll see big improvement.

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Otherwise why not just take more of a survivable fighter screen?

Raiders need a fighter screen to support them to get their flak to work consistently against enemy fighters, so it's not really an either/or decision. The reason you want to bring Raiders in addition to fighters is because Raiders are substantially more flexible than TIE Fighters - they can be used against squadrons or ships as the situation demands (but you need to be very conscious of what their primary duty is at any given time to use them well this way). In this way, Raiders supporting a modest fighter investment can go to work as anti-squadron resources against squadron-heavy fleets or they can be put to work as anti-ship resources against squadron-light fleets. Simply investing those points in more fighters is going to be overkill unless you're facing the squadron-heavy fleet. Raiders when used well with fighters can help "solve" the Imperial squadron specialization problem you are unhappy with.

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I disagree with claims others have made that the X-wing is a bad bomber for its points. Red dice are only 'fickle' compared to blacks by a single facing, and are almost as likely to do double damage as a black. They may not be as points efficient as other bombers, but that doesnt make them ineffective. I can deal with inefficient, not ineffective.

The X-Wing is a bad bomber for its points. A Y-Wing at 10 points does 1 average damage, has a 2/8 chance of doing nothing with its attack. A 14-point B-Wing does an astounding 1.75 average damage against ships per attack and it has a 1/16 chance of doing nothing when it attacks a ship. An X-Wing at 13 points does 0.75 average damage and has a 3/8 chance of doing nothing with its attack (accuracy or blank). An A-Wing at 11 points also does 0.75 average damage and has a 2/8 chance of doing nothing with its attack, making it a better mixed-role fighter for the points if you just want straight efficiency against ships and squadrons. The X-Wing has the great benefit of having Escort, higher hull, and 1 more anti-squadron dice than the A-Wing so it's not that I'm saying the X-Wing is bad. It's not. It's a great foundational squadron to build around and it supports other squadrons (like Y-Wings and HWK-290s and the like) quite well but it's not a good bomber. Or to put it another way: an X-Wing does 0.058 average damage against ships per point (0.75/13). A TIE Fighter does 0.0625 average damage against ships per point (0.5/8) and yet you're arguing that TIEs are bad against ships (they are!) but that X-Wings aren't (...they are, except they get better with Bomber Command Center for sure).

How do you kit your Aquitans ? Do you give them Turbolasers (Reroute circuits,slaved turrets or enhanced armorment) How do you keep them from costing too much? I can't quite figure out this ship.

4 minutes ago, buckero0 said:

How do you kit your Aquitans ? Do you give them Turbolasers (Reroute circuits,slaved turrets or enhanced armorment) How do you keep them from costing too much? I can't quite figure out this ship.

It depends on the commander, in my experience, but keeping them cheap with just Dual Turbolasers is a super-valid way to kit them out. They can also be fun with Needa+Turbolaser Reroute Circuits, as you'll have two total evades so you don't mind spending one of them so much. TRCs are also fine with Tagge (as he can get the evades back) but it gets a little janky with Tagge overall.

When I'm rolling Vader I sometimes like to go Enhanced Armament + Intel Officer (with concentrate fire that's a 5 dice broadside with the reroll plus Intel Officer) but they get rather pricey. You can run them naked with Vader and he alone is sufficient to keep their damage sufficient.

When I have the spare points, Reinforced Blast Doors can be appealing with Jerjerrod or Vader as both commanders compromise their durability a bit.

2 hours ago, buckero0 said:

How do you kit your Aquitans ? Do you give them Turbolasers (Reroute circuits,slaved turrets or enhanced armorment) How do you keep them from costing too much? I can't quite figure out this ship.

I run my pair with Dual Turbolaser turrets under Jerry, switching between navigate and concentrate fire commands as needed. One is a light cruiser, the other a Command cruiser that I put Hand of Justice on. Flying them in a staggered conga line allowing both to arc into the same ship. Jerry allows them to pull some truly silly maneuvers, as well as set up some nice double arcs against ships that are weak enough to finish off close-in.

The DTTs are great when you only have a couple red dice to throw out of one side, they grant a level of consistency on the cheap.

The list contains Captain Jonus as well, and having a squad token around to fly him in before you start shooting has been quitested helpful.

It depends, can you do 1,000 cuts in 6 turns?

The 6 turn format is a staple of Armada but it is also the largest limitation. Sure it allows for playing the objectives more than pushing for table, but again it is fairly predictable and the turn 5 push followed by the turn 6 flee (if push was unsuccessful) or rush (if push was successful) is the defining meta of Armada.

6 hours ago, Snipafist said:

They're extremely good at their job for their cost, so you can get a competent fighter defense for cheaper than the Rebels can.

Z-95

Moving the topic a bit: has anyone tried z-95 yet? I am imperial but I never see a single one of these in my zone. Most of the rebels players complain about defenders and as response they refused to play the new ones. It is changing as soon as reality is going into their heads but they learn slowly.

5 minutes ago, ovinomanc3r said:

Z-95

Moving the topic a bit: has anyone tried z-95 yet? I am imperial but I never see a single one of these in my zone. Most of the rebels players complain about defenders and as response they refused to play the new ones. It is changing as soon as reality is going into their heads but they learn slowly.

Like the TIE fighter, meant to be used in numbers.

while they are great squadrons for their points..... I'm still waiting till I can fly 19squadrons at the same time

most of the time they either: wiff, do 3+ damage or all Crits and accuracies lol

but they are good in numbers, with my experience being they are better than generic tie fighters one on one

(of course they are overshadowed by other squadrons, but their cost makes up for that)

33 minutes ago, DrakonLord said:

while they are great squadrons for their points..... I'm still waiting till I can fly 19squadrons at the same time

Yeah, it seems to be a "price" problem rather than a "cost" problem

Thanks guys, I'm really new at this, I"ve got all kinds of list ideas on Rebels, but the Imperials don't seem to gel together as well. Or I'm just missing the ship. I've got certain ships and I"m trying to make use of all of them, just to learn what they do.

4 hours ago, ovinomanc3r said:

Z-95

Moving the topic a bit: has anyone tried z-95 yet? I am imperial but I never see a single one of these in my zone. Most of the rebels players complain about defenders and as response they refused to play the new ones. It is changing as soon as reality is going into their heads but they learn slowly.

Z-95s aren't bad in support of other squadrons (particularly X-Wings, where they go very well together) but while their red dice can hit a higher damage, they're less reliable due to the high chances of an individual dice rolling nothing (a 5 in 8 chance!). Speed 3 is also a bit of a problem compared to the TIE Fighter's speed 4 so having an Escort buddy to tank shots for them helps a lot. In short, I haven't seen Z-95s doing well when spammed (like you can with TIE Fighters) but I have seen them do well as a cheap addition to more robust Rebel fighters.

20 minutes ago, Snipafist said:

In short, I haven't seen Z-95s doing well when spammed (like you can with TIE Fighters) but I have seen them do well as a cheap addition to more robust Rebel fighters.

I'll be honest -it might be my dice rolling, but I'm having the total opposite here... 2-4 squads as a cheap addition to more robust rebel fighters is getting me nowhere... I'm feeling like I need to invest in the larger swarm where I'm forcing target priority choices, and still maintaining kick afterwards.

Just now, Drasnighta said:

I'll be honest -it might be my dice rolling, but I'm having the total opposite here... 2-4 squads as a cheap addition to more robust rebel fighters is getting me nowhere... I'm feeling like I need to invest in the larger swarm where I'm forcing target priority choices, and still maintaining kick afterwards.

When I've faced big groups of them the speed 3 and 3 hull hurts them, as they get pounced on and punched. Rebels don't have anything like a Raider to hide near to dissuade attackers from getting in the first punch, either. They seem to be pretty successful as X-Wing "upgrades" though, as an Escorted Z-95 will be doing about as much average anti-squadron damage (2ish, sometimes more) as an X-Wing for nearly half the cost. It just wants a meat shield to hide behind so it doesn't get alpha-struck into oblivion.

Just now, Snipafist said:

When I've faced big groups of them the speed 3 and 3 hull hurts them, as they get pounced on and punched. Rebels don't have anything like a Raider to hide near to dissuade attackers from getting in the first punch, either. They seem to be pretty successful as X-Wing "upgrades" though, as an Escorted Z-95 will be doing about as much average anti-squadron damage (2ish, sometimes more) as an X-Wing for nearly half the cost. It just wants a meat shield to hide behind so it doesn't get alpha-struck into oblivion.

I'm not opposed to leveraging AFFM for the Alpha Strike - hell, I even envision potentially flipping Independance once to enable repositioning afterwards... Either way, like I said, it might just be my luck - but I'm getting drastically less out of 4 than I would 2 X-Wings. More on par with a Single.

2 minutes ago, Drasnighta said:

I'm not opposed to leveraging AFFM for the Alpha Strike - hell, I even envision potentially flipping Independance once to enable repositioning afterwards... Either way, like I said, it might just be my luck - but I'm getting drastically less out of 4 than I would 2 X-Wings. More on par with a Single.

The red anti-squadron dice are extremely swingy and you are @Drasnighta , so it may just be a side effect of your cursed rolling?

I am intrigued by the idea of using AFFM to make them fake TIE Fighters (with Blount, of course) but I am concerned that the extra investment may not be worth just running them with X-Wings. If you try it, let us know how it goes.

15 minutes ago, Snipafist said:

Rebels don't have anything like a Raider to hide near to dissuade attackers from getting in the first punch, either.

I'm not saying you're wrong that speed 3 hurts them, but Gallant Haven is a thing. Whether it's worth the investment for a Z-95 swarm is certainly an open question, but Haven is at least as effective in this role as a Raider is.

Just now, Ardaedhel said:

I'm not saying you're wrong that speed 3 hurts them, but Gallant Haven is a thing. Whether it's worth the investment for a Z-95 swarm is certainly an open question, but Haven is at least as effective in this role as a Raider is.

That's true, and may be one of the few occasions where I'd consider Gallant Haven in a Rebel fleet (with a Z-95 swarm). I generally see it tried with a heavy bomber approach and it means the Rebel squadrons either cower in the Gallant Haven bunker waiting for enemies to foolishly rush at them (which won't happen if the opponent is experienced) or the Gallant Haven follows the bombers into combat (which results in a dead Assault Frigate usually) or the two groups separate early on, making the Gallant Haven title a waste of points. It's usually tough to get the squadrons and the Haven to play nice together to get your points' worth from the title. With a Z-95 swarm, though, it could happen. They're reactive anti-squadron fighters so they don't mind hugging the Gallant Haven and they're miserable bombers so there's no pull to go off and do something with that.

My Sato list will have the Haven and z95s and the paragon and a wings and.... Oh this is hot garbage.

1 minute ago, geek19 said:

My Sato list will have the Haven and z95s and the paragon and a wings and.... Oh this is hot garbage.

Pretty much the sequence of events every time I try to build a Sato list.

3 minutes ago, geek19 said:

My Sato list will have the Haven and z95s and the paragon and a wings and.... Oh this is hot garbage.

Welcome to building fleets with Sato.

"I'm gonna have X, and Y, and Z, and A, and B, and... oh crap, I'm over by 50 points and this is a dumpster fire of a fleet that doesn't have a cohesive plan yet. Womp"

Just you wait, wave 9 is REALLY gonna bring Sato into his own.

Also, life lesson: don't take an untested Sato fleet into Sunday Adepticon. You're gonna have a bad time.

13 hours ago, DrakonLord said:

Like the TIE fighter, meant to be used in numbers.

while they are great squadrons for their points..... I'm still waiting till I can fly 19squadrons at the same time

most of the time they either: wiff, do 3+ damage or all Crits and accuracies lol

but they are good in numbers, with my experience being they are better than generic tie fighters one on one

(of course they are overshadowed by other squadrons, but their cost makes up for that)

My experience is that played in isolation they are crippled by speed three, Imp 3 hull ships are so much faster and can hide in safe zones before jumping in to alpha strike.

unlike ties and interceptors which can be played as a homogenised group without mixed support, Z95s only work as part of a mixed tayored wing. So xwings or YTs to escort and take the hits are a must with jan, add in some great red dice mitigation to give consistent damage, they can be very nasty, with the Blount and flight controllers they pump out 3 red and a blue with 2 re rolls ( up to 3 rerolls possible), you can rack up very consistent damage.

18 hours ago, ovinomanc3r said:

Z-95

Moving the topic a bit: has anyone tried z-95 yet? I am imperial but I never see a single one of these in my zone. Most of the rebels players complain about defenders and as response they refused to play the new ones. It is changing as soon as reality is going into their heads but they learn slowly.

I did fairly well with them at my regionals this year, getting 4th (out of 16? Can't remember exactly). As others have said, they want to be escorted for best results, and of course Blount really maximizes their potential. In my list they served two purposes: 1) protecting my 2 VCX's and 2) extra deployments. The extra deployment over an X-wing doesn't help the squadron fight, but it helps the list as a whole immensely.

For this list my squadron component was 2 VCX, Blount, 3 Z-95's, Dagger Sqn, and a YT-1300. I probably would switch out Dagger Sqn for another YT-1300 now - the Z95's die quickly once shorn of their escort.