What do you see most commonly winning? What are the most annoying lists to face against?

If you can explain what's so good about a certain list that helps a lot.

I've got a lot of new Rebel tech I need further clarification on:
What's a Ballet Norra build? <- what are its good wingmates?
Rey ?? With miranda?
Is Heragator easily beatable with high PS?
Kanan Biggs - with EU and R3A2.
Sabine K-wings

I hear for scum that:
Attanni Mindlink is great, what builds abuse it now?
2-3 Jumps with torps are coming back, sometimes with Fenn Rau <- how do these work? Are they a big deal?
Fenn Rau is nuts good, who does he tend to go with?
Shadowcaster is also nuts efficient, but is Paratanni still the main thing?
Is Dengar still a thing?

What are the reliably good Imp builds?
Something with Quickdraw?
A few really good ships: Vessery with x7 is still nuts. Major Stridan is really worth his points.
Feels like most Imp builds are back to wave3 style luck: you gotta arc dodge like hell and one bad mistake means a Ghost chunks your day with his overwhelming dice.

Is the right meta call right now to just take a bunch of TLTs? Say Miranda YYZ?

---

Final question, comes with wine: are we back to a "horrible" meta again that is basically all 2-3 large ship lists with the most cost efficient arc dodgers? (Fenn Rau and turret Miranda?) Are we crazily enough basically back to wave4-6 and wave8 Jumps combined?

Scum is still the dominant force in the meta atm from what I've observed. They're propped up by several of the Scum big ships still being stupidly undercosted (Jump and Shadow); them having arguably the best crew choices (Dengar, K4, Latts, Zuckuss); and Mindlink being an excellent EPT with minimal downside (particularly with all the green hard turns on Scum dials).

Parattanni is still their go to toolbox list, possibly with a scout instead of Manaroo now, which gives them 2pts to experiment with. This list is strong because the target you want to nuke first (the scout) is also one of the best blockers in the game, and hence will be difficult to focus-fire down. Instead I try to block Fenn and nuke him at R2 with all my other ships (easier without Manaroo giving him a second focus), then move on to the scout and hope I have enough left to kill Asajj last.

Scum Alpha-strike lists are fairly popular too. Homing Missile Bossk + Dengar/Ketsu is the one I see the most, and wins by basically annihilating one of your ships in the first pass before it shoots. You then typically don't have enough firepower left to deal with Ketsu and Bossk. It's a list you have to engage correctly to win against, because if you just fly straight in you've probably lost the game.

Miranda is the Queen of the Rebellion. Chances are most Rebel lists will feature her simply because she has several different builds that work (alpha-strike, Bombs, cheap-ish regen ace). Stresshog and Stressmule (Braylenn) have made a comeback too, mostly to (somewhat) counter mindlink. Biggs is still popular too.

Imperial players still seem to be reeling from having their crutches of Palpatine and X7 being kicked out from under them. I myself have been playing a lot of Empire post 'The Great Crutch Purge', and I feel they're in a much healthier place overall. Swarms are competitive again, but they still suffer from the fatigue problems they always had. All the mini-aces are still amazingly good, particularly Omega Leader. Quickdraw is an excellent missile-boat, who everyone hates to shoot at. You're most likely to see a bunch of mini-aces and/or aces (Eg: Quickdraw + Vessery + Sabacc, or Inquisitor + Omega + Whisper). RAClo (a Phat Rear Admiral Chiraneau with Kylo crew) + an ace partner (Vessery, Carnor, Quickdraw, etc) is also popular.

That's what springs to mind at the moment, but I'm talking from the experience of my local meta + the vassal meta, so you might be seeing different things.

Scum remains on top, the empie and rebellion have deceased their disparity and switched spaces.

TIE/sfs are the new imperial hotness and provide their lists with neat tricks at a good durability. The x7 stars are still solid foundations. There is no more all comers list that can truly dominate, though.

Rebels are in roughly the same spot as before the nerfs. Biggs still is their foot in the door of Attanni-lead hyperefficiency and Ghosts are in a good spot with their in-ship synergy.

For scum anything that combines Mindlink and green turns is on top. That can be torpedoe-boats, Fenn Rau, Assaj Ventress an others. Not much beyond exists, though. Quad TLT fights up hill in lots of matchups. The Zuckuss nerf made YVs a lot harder to utilize (though not impossible, this is the one angle where scum can have something really strong that is not compatible with Attanni).

1 hour ago, CRCL said:

Imperial players still seem to be reeling from having their crutches of Palpatine and X7 being kicked out from under them. I myself have been playing a lot of Empire post 'The Great Crutch Purge', and I feel they're in a much healthier place overall. Swarms are competitive again, but they still suffer from the fatigue problems they always had. All the mini-aces are still amazingly good, particularly Omega Leader. Quickdraw is an excellent missile-boat, who everyone hates to shoot at. You're most likely to see a bunch of mini-aces and/or aces (Eg: Quickdraw + Vessery + Sabacc, or Inquisitor + Omega + Whisper). RAClo (a Phat Rear Admiral Chiraneau with Kylo crew) + an ace partner (Vessery, Carnor, Quickdraw, etc) is also popular.

Healthier place? They got old-yellered

If we talk casual, sure, but that's by virtue of playing casual.

If we start to talk about meta there isn't really much to talk about. At the moment, the Empire's strenghts (green dice, repositioning, action economy) have either been:

- Nerfed: no need to expand on this one, there are sufficient topics around

- Repurposed: from soontir to fenn-rau. Sacrificing token stacking/survivability in exchange for red dice bonus.

- Marginalized: low hull/high agility is not in the same place it was a few waves ago. Be it bombs, stress or bypassing. 2 dice attacks have become laughable.

I'm sorry, but if I have to drive a few hours to an event, paying for gas/food/admission fees I'm not going to play an underwhelming empire. I'll play scum (of either flavor) until the pendulum swings back.

47 minutes ago, ImperialPropaganda said:

Healthier place? They got old-yellered

Just to clarify, by healthier I mean there's no longer 2 cards that utterly dominate Imperial list-building.

Whisper is still good, Omega Leader is the best pocket ace in the game, for 22pts Pure Sabacc is incredible, the Upsilon utterly wrecks-face, Deathfire is chronically underrated, Inquisitor, Carnor, Vessery, Soontir, Ryad, RAC, Countdown.... The Empire has a plethora of excellent ships and pilots. I don't just say these things in theory, I've used all these ships on the table (or vassal). Even Palp and X7 are still usable, rightly nerfed down from stupidly good to merely good.

Also a little off topic, but as I've said in other threads; The value of a cheap 2 attack dice ship like an Academy or Prototype is not in it's attack, but it's ability to control where enemy ships can position. On his own he's never going to kill Fenn Rau, but use that Academy to block Fenn so he can't boost into R1, then shoot him at R2 with another ship or two and watch how quickly he evaporates (trust me I've done it plenty of times). Also by blocking you're avoiding return fire on a fragile ship, and possibly getting a R1 shot on another ship in your opponent's squad after spent their tokens. I've had games where my one PS1 blocker literally gets every kill-shot.

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Just to clarify, by healthier I mean there's no longer 2 cards that utterly dominate Imperial list-building.

But that is the thing, without those two Cards you couldn't build a viable Imperial list, that is why we saw them all over the place.

I am an Imperial player mostly and since I don't enjoy flying the Lambda (due to its dial) and I don't enjoy Defender spam (1 is fine), I could not create a viable list for the entirety of the season.

Then I picked up Scum and started winning Again - big time - because they are just that powerful - and while the faction has issues (they all do), I felt that I had not only the tools but also the options to build both fun and competitive lists all of a sudden.

Looking at how Scum has been performing at Premier level events there appears to be a correlation between that and how Imps are doing, particularly post nerf.

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Major Stridan is really worth his points.

He really isn't. Don't get me wrong, he is fun, he is good.

However anyone with fast ships will just close in and K-Turn behind that Piñata and you can't prevent it and won't ever get a shot off after the first (and if you're good/Lucky, the second; Exchange), not at a competitive cost (ie. no Engine Upgrade + pattern analyzer/Adv sensor shenanigans) anyway.

X7 defenders are still stupid good. I've had 2 games against them since the nerf and the nerf had little effect in one game and no effect in the other.

3 minutes ago, markcsoul said:

X7 defenders are still stupid good. I've had 2 games against them since the nerf and the nerf had little effect in one game and no effect in the other.

Did it though?

Or were your opponents flying more carefully, and losing out on good shooting opportunities, for risk of bumping or stress?

I've flown Defenders quite a bit since the nerf and found that it restricted my options quite a lot in the furball, and I was much more inclined to break off, token up, and K-turn for a nother pass than fling myself in headlong and rely on the free evade to keep me safe, as I might have before.

Also, do you have stress imposition in your lists?

I still don't agree with the methodology of the nerf, but I'm past the point of caring enough to complain about it. x/7 Defenders are still very strong, all that has really changed is the legions of bandwagon-jumpers have moved on and the meta is no longer so heavily geared to 'anti-Defender'. The SF is a phenomenal ship that got nowhere near enough attention on release and has only now started to come into the limelight.

Imperial 'Ace' style lists are still entirely viable, you just have to rethink how to build them (and move on from Palpatine).

Complaining that the Empire isn't viable at all right now is misinformed nonsense.

1 minute ago, MalusCalibur said:

Complaining that the Empire isn't viable at all right now is misinformed nonsense.

Well, if actual results so far are "misinformed nonsense," sure.

For background, I'm a Imperial player primarily that hasn't touched Palp in around a year and has played the /sf since release.

I don't disagree, though for the most part, that Empire has some options, but they aren't nearly as varied or "toolsy" as the other factions have access to and they suffer significantly more from matchup problems. So, while I think that the nerf has overall been a good thing and has increased the diversity and options of other factions, I think it's pretty clear from results so far had the opposite effect on Imperials.

Depends where you are.

I don't think enough people pay attention to their local scenes. I went into a tournament last weekend expecting to see a flood of Mindlinked Scum, and various rebel builds involving Biggs and Miranda/Ghost - based on what I had been reading here.

While some of those lists were present, they were balanced by a huge range of other lists. 3 of the top 4 were Imperial, too. These boards are a great reference point, but be mindful of your local scene, it may be quite different.

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Complaining that the Empire isn't viable at all right now is misinformed nonsense.

Interesting.

http://lists.starwarsclubhouse.com/get_tourney_details?tourney_id=2751

2 Imperials in top 8.

http://lists.starwarsclubhouse.com/get_tourney_details?tourney_id=2726

1 Imperial in top 8.

http://lists.starwarsclubhouse.com/get_tourney_details?tourney_id=2723

0 Imperials in top 8.

http://lists.starwarsclubhouse.com/get_tourney_details?tourney_id=2705

1 Imperial in top 8.

There's one event where Imperials did well:

http://lists.starwarsclubhouse.com/get_tourney_details?tourney_id=2722

Sadly list info for the majority of lists isn't there, it would be very interesting to see the matchups.

If you go by Regional events, you'll very often see 1-2 Imp players in the top 8, with Scum all over the place.

Surely the balance has shifted in the favour of Scum?

The thing with mind linked scum lists. Besides the obvious that they are super good for the points, and have amazing action economy, they are also very easy to fly.

Between the great dials and fact that as long as one ship gets an action, you all do, it's just much less stressful to fly those lists.

4 minutes ago, Keffisch said:

Interesting.

http://lists.starwarsclubhouse.com/get_tourney_details?tourney_id=2751

2 Imperials in top 8.

http://lists.starwarsclubhouse.com/get_tourney_details?tourney_id=2726

1 Imperial in top 8.

http://lists.starwarsclubhouse.com/get_tourney_details?tourney_id=2723

0 Imperials in top 8.

http://lists.starwarsclubhouse.com/get_tourney_details?tourney_id=2705

1 Imperial in top 8.

There's one event where Imperials did well:

http://lists.starwarsclubhouse.com/get_tourney_details?tourney_id=2722

Sadly list info for the majority of lists isn't there, it would be very interesting to see the matchups.

If you go by Regional events, you'll very often see 1-2 Imp players in the top 8, with Scum all over the place.

Surely the balance has shifted in the favour of Scum?

The last tourney you mention where Imperials did well is pre-nerf (2/25).

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The last tourney you mention where Imperials did well is pre-nerf (2/25).

Didn't see that, thanks.

PS doesn't matter against heragator with Ahsoka. She intels your dial, Hera blocks you. Then she passes Hera a boost in the combat phase and Hera melts you from range 2 while you have no tokens. You need beef to deal with her.

Indeed the Empire has many great pilots, but the current meta doesn't favor them. Soontir, Jax, and Inquisitor get one-shotted by Cluster Mines, Strikers are a bit too fragile and really susceptible to turrets, Vader still is and always has been bad against turrets, Whisper loses to the plethora of stress mechanics currently in the game, the Upsilon is a bit too expensive for what it does, etc. You'd think we'd see more RAC due to Kylo crew, but Biggs makes his best match ups into poor matchups.

Imperials only have three top tier competitive ships at the moment: x7 Defenders, TIE/sfs, and Omega Leader. Post-FAQ tournament results support this conclusion. It's a bit sad to have Imperial list building constrained to three ships when the FAQ was supposed to do the opposite.

Note that I'm only talking top tier competitive here. As usual, anything goes in casual play or your local meta.

I'm going to unrail this thread and ask it to start anew. These are more general gripes, but I also literally need to know the exact list archetypes listed above, and why that variant is the most powerful. So, let's start with full builds, instead of talking about only one ship at a time, which is 1/3 of the list.

I know QD is good, but I've had a hard time working out obvious wing mates for her.

I wanna see exactly how people are kitting these things out and with what. and how the whole list operates as opposed to a single piece.

I really like the Quickdraw/Vessery/OL list that made Top 4 at Hoth (see video here, includes the full list) . Quickdraw needs a tanky wingman to take some of the heat off of her and that's exactly what Vessery provides (in addition to consistent damage output). OL is always in the background, threatening to take the endgame if your opponent focuses too hard on QD. The best part of the list though is that there's no good target priority.

Empire won the Coruscant Invitational final.

Back on topic, first of the asked for clarification/descriptions:

I think "Ballerina Norra" is a cutesy name for Four-Action-Norra equipped with at least PTL, Kyle Katarn, and BB-8, If the points are there you will see Engine Upgrade for even greater mobility; with this she reveals green, rolls, push for focus/TL, clear stress on maneuver getting focus from Kyle, then take one more action. The strength is she arc dodges and token stacks like Soontir plus she can take a few hits before getting nervous. Popular wingates are Biggs with another Ace, Rey, Dash, or Biggs with a cheapish crew carrier (like Shara) for Jan crew to give Norra the Focus+Evade option.

I'll do more of the ones I'm familiar with later (unless someone beats me to them! )

Just now, Chumbalaya said:

Empire won the Coruscant Invitational final.

Cool, let's all run that list then.

35 minutes ago, defkhan1 said:

I really like the Quickdraw/Vessery/OL list that made Top 4 at Hoth (see video here, includes the full list) . Quickdraw needs a tanky wingman to take some of the heat off of her and that's exactly what Vessery provides (in addition to consistent damage output). OL is always in the background, threatening to take the endgame if your opponent focuses too hard on QD. The best part of the list though is that there's no good target priority.

For those who may not want to open the video:

Quickdraw + Expertise + Fire Control + Spec Ops + Pattern Analyzer + Lightweight Frame
Omega Leader + Juke + Comm Relay
Col. Vessery + Crack Shot + TIE/x7 + Twin Ion Engine Mk 2

10 minutes ago, FTS Gecko said:

Cool, let's all run that list then.

It'd be hell of an initiative bid clocking in at 77 points