Fanboy Three (Manchester UK) had their store champ yesterday with 26 players:

Winner - Chris Zee (Mynock Special - Whisper, OL & Palpshuttle) - #4 in Swiss

Runner Up - Lewis Witham (Dellaboni - Leebo & Miranda) - #3 in Swiss

Top 4:

George Dellapina (LW Dash & BB-8 Intensity Poe) - #2 in Swiss

Rob Gogacz (Asajj, Fenn & Palob) - #1 in Swiss

5 hours ago, MajorJuggler said:

Yeah. I almost never score 0 points on an opponent. I think this is the first time that I haven't scored any points on an opponent in several years .

Did you use your Scout as a blocker or flanker against Biggs?

5 hours ago, MajorJuggler said:

Yeah. I almost never score 0 points on an opponent. I think this is the first time that I haven't scored any points on an opponent in several years .

Good to know data point:

Fair Ship Rebel > Parattani

No one fly Parattani at Gencon, please!! It's already hard enough to find a list that can beat FSR and Nym!!

21 player Store Championship in Ames, IA

Winner: Triple Jumps (One kitted out as bumpmaster, 2 as torpedo boats one with Boba)

2nd place: Quickdraw w/VI Ion Pulse, Title, FCS, LWF, Pattern, Omega w/Juke and Comm, and Vessery with VI, Mk2, X7

Top 4:

Biggs/Low/Jess/Rex (lost to Winner)

Fenn/Inaldra/Dengar (lost to 2nd place)

--

I finished in 2nd and was the only Imperial that was flying three small ships. I cannot oversell the use of a tool like the ion pulse missile in the current meta. It was a key component in three of my wins and had it managed to connect in my loss at the final table things could have turned out very differently.

There were at least 3 RAC+QD and one Double Decimator. There were about 5 versions of Dengar Nym lists, 2 fair ship rebel lists (the other went 2-2), a Low+Norra+Biggs list, one Dash+Nym list, one interesting Fenn+Genesis+ Nym list, Rauboats, a 4 ship Ghost list, a Fenn+Asante+Ndru list and some other stuff I can't really remember. Outside of my list, the rebel Biggs lists, and the three ship scum list everything had at least one big base ship.

10 minutes ago, AlexW said:

21 player Store Championship in Ames, IA

Winner: Triple Jumps (One kitted out as bumpmaster, 2 as torpedo boats one with Boba)

2nd place: Quickdraw w/VI Ion Pulse, Title, FCS, LWF, Pattern, Omega w/Juke and Comm, and Vessery with VI, Tie/D, X7

Top 4:

Biggs/Low/Jess/Rex (lost to Winner)

Fenn/Inaldra/Dengar (lost to 2nd place)

--

I finished in 2nd and was the only Imperial that was flying three small ships. I cannot oversell the use of a tool like the ion pulse missile in a list in the current meta. It was a key component in three of my wins and had it managed to connect in my loss at the final table things could have turned out very differently.

There were at least 3 RAC+QD and one Double Decimator. There were about 5 versions of Dengar Nym lists, 2 fair ship rebel lists (the other went 2-2), a Low+Norra+Biggs list, one Dash+Nym list and one interesting Fenn, Genesis, Nym list, Rauboats, a 4 ship Ghost list, a Fenn, Assaj, Ndru list and some other stuff I can't really remember but outside of my list, the rebel Biggs lists, and the three ship scum list everything had at least one big base ship.

One thing to add is that the Fair Ship list there went 4-0 and beat the winner in Swiss. They had an immediate rematch right after in the cut.

43 minutes ago, AlexW said:

2nd place: Quickdraw w/VI Ion Pulse, Title, FCS, LWF, Pattern, Omega w/Juke and Comm, and Vessery with VI, Tie/D, X7

Vessery had both Titles? Wow!

2 minutes ago, xstormtrooperx said:

Vessery had both Titles? Wow!

lol, no that was an error -- meant the Mk2 Engine!

@AlexW , what cannon did you sport on Vessery?

I took my first ever store championships in Stirling, Scotland (28 players) last week with:

• Dengar - Expertise, GC, Title, Plasma Torps, EM, K4, Unhinged
• Nym - Autoblaster Turret, AC, Title, Genius, Bomblet Generator, VI

The 3 point bid proved extremely important given all the other Nym lists at the tournament

2nd was a Nym, Azameem list.

Top 4 was Dash/Nym and Kanaan/Biggs

4 hours ago, Biophysical said:

Did you use your Scout as a blocker or flanker against Biggs?

The general idea was to surround his formation with all 3 of my ships, and then he has to choose which to attack. The other two ships become the flankers, and the ship getting attacked has to run like heck and pray it doesn't die. Blocking with the scout is basically suicide, you'll stop one attack from incoming, but then you'll have three other ships at range 1. And if the first shot misses, then Ops Spec triggers, so the next one gets focus for attack, and so on, all the way down the line. You might be able to do it once, and then the scout is going to become a focus battery running away the entire game.

I knew going in that the FSR player can mitigate the flanking element by just staying on the edge of the board (which he did), so I set up the rocks in a circular type pattern, all along the board edges, so that it would be difficult for him to eventually turn in. He had the same strategy for his rock placement oddly, not putting any rocks in the center, so I believe I had the ideal rock setup for a 2 hour game. Once he decided he needed to get away from the board edge, he had very limited options on which spot to choose, particularly because of his formation he used. (3 across and Biggs behind). If he had set up in a modified pinwheel then he would have been much tighter and able to navigate the board edge rocks better. In the first stage of the game he was basically forced to keep going straight for a couple rounds and so I was able to use that to my advantage. This would be more difficult to pull off vs an FSR player that had some more experience.

I set up Ventress and Scout bottom right in a Fortress, and Fenn bottom left, and let him decide which to go after. He decided to go after Ventress and Scout, going the long way around the map. About 6 turns later, Fenn was behind his formation getting free shots. I got off several shots for free before the FSR ships could even fire, so I did about 3 shield damage to him before we got to a turn that he could roll any red dice. I split up Asajj up the center of the map and sent the Scout left, and he went after the Scout. Fenn was basically behind his formation the entire time, occasionally getting a little bit of damage through. The problem with playing against FSR even while flanking, is that you really can't be aggressive and shove a flanker into range one of FSR's backside, because if the FSR player suddenly changes target priority and goes after that ship, then you just lost that ship and the game. So I wasn't getting many range 1 shots with Fenn, because if I went all in he could have easily K-turned and used one ship to block me putting the rest of his ships at range 2 of him the following round -- and with Ops spec, those are basically all going to be modified shots.

My one mistake was running Asajj 5 fwd up the center of the map, I should have gone 3 hard right to keep getting shots at the formation, and just hoped that he would continue to go after the scout (which he did), and not Asajj. Asajj could probably have tanked one more round of concerted fire if he had turned into her. My decision to 5 forward was still a mistake, but this idea of "tank a little damage and then fly away" is a trap. With a really good (read: OP) list like Parattanni, its tempting to think that you can weather the storm for one round on a full/nearly full ship, take some damage, and then fly away. But the reality is that's how FSR wins, because it will just grind you down over and over again, and on your "good" turns, you will still only do 0, 1, or maybe 2 damage. Meanwhile they have 11 modified dice getting dumped into whatever ship they latch onto. Parattanni is OP, but FSR is on an entirely different level of OP. If most of the FSR ships have shots each round on anything, even at range 3, then you have almost certainly lost. It's jousting efficiency is just too high, nothing else can come close to touching it.

Also of note, Will had played FSR about 3 times before the Store Championship.

I'm just waiting for the competitive tournament players to figure out the obvious strategy of fortressing their FSR formation to force either final salvo or a joust. There are a couple ways to set up in a fortress that you can also break out of at will into perfect formation. IMO if you want to win a major tournament this is the strategy you should be employing for most of your matches. Krayt podcast has talked about this quite a bit recently, and they are 100% right. The players at our local game store have an unwritten rule that Nobody Shall Play that list even for tournament nights with store credit as prize support. Because it would literally destroy the community if lots of people ran it. It's an absolutely terrible list to fly against in 75 minutes let alone 60 minutes that we use at our tournament nights.

3 hours ago, phild0 said:

Good to know data point:

Fair Ship Rebel > Parattani

No one fly Parattani at Gencon, please!! It's already hard enough to find a list that can beat FSR and Nym!!

Hah, right! Parattanni is still very solid. This was the first time flying against Fair Ship Rebels 2.0, and since I had 2 hours I was taking some extra time to think about how to execute the perfect engagement (anything else and you're going to lose, and lose badly). But I would have to test it more to see if you can really get an honest shot at reliably beating the list in just 75 minutes. I don't think you can against a good player. Fair Ship starts to break down in the end game, but against a good player that might take 15 - 20 rounds. Will flew very well and it never really broke down, even after he had to navigate several rocks and K-turn.

My current list that I'm evaluating for Gencon puts out 5 3-dice shots and final salvos at 12. I'm sure this is not related to the popularity of FSR.

3 minutes ago, Biophysical said:

My current list that I'm evaluating for Gencon puts out 5 3-dice shots and final salvos at 12. I'm sure this is not related to the popularity of FSR.

Sounds like LWF Unguided Rocket Bombers

Oh man, sounds like a meta they could really exist in.

11 minutes ago, phild0 said:

Sounds like LWF Unguided Rocket Bombers

Oh man, sounds like a meta they could really exist in.

More fun than that.

21 hours ago, MajorJuggler said:

I just got back from Rivendell Books and Games in Rehoboth, Massachusetts. 23 players. I came in second overall, and #1 in Swiss. We played 4 rounds and then a cut to Top 4.

Winner: William Dextradeur (#3 Swiss, 3-1)

• Biggs + R4-D6 + IA
• Lowhrick + Selflessness + Operations Specialist + Breach Specialist
• Jess + hero droid + DtF
• Rex

Second place: Bob Randall (#1 Swiss, 4-0)

• Fenn + ML + AT + title
• Asajj + ML + Latts
• Scout + ML + Intel + rigged cargo

Top 4: Peter Gugel (#2 Swiss, 4-0)

• Poe + Intensity + Comm Relay + Black One + R2-D2 (+ maybe something else?)
• Miranda + Sabine + lots of stuff

Top 4: Matt Lenz (#4 Swiss, 3-1)

• Dengar + Expertise + Punishing One + Unhinged + K4 + Extra Munitions + GC
• Nym + VI + Autoblaster Turret + cruise missiles + bomblet generator + accuracy corrector + havock + genius

In any event, that's the first time that I have flown against Fair Ship Rebels. WOW, Operations Specialist is insanely good on that list. Not sure I'll try to math that one out, it's very complicated, but it's REALLY solid against another defensive list. The winner's only other loss was in round 4 of Swiss, 14-0 at time, when Rex finally died, on the last turn, to bombs, vs the #2 player. They rematched in Top 4, which again went to time, (no points had been scored with about 5-10 minutes left) but this time the Biggs squad killed a ship outright and won without needing to salvo. William flew very well all day, and this is his second store championship win this season.

My final table game ended at time after 2 hours, with me losing 32-0. I had put 2 damage cards onto Biggs, and 2 damage cards onto Lowhrick, but Selflessness and DtF were still active. He had removed 3 shields from Ventress, removed 3 shields from the Scout, and put 2 damage cards onto Fenn. Unfortunately for me, those 2 cards were both faceup direct hits. At 75 minutes in, nothing had died yet and no points had been scored, it was still 0-0. Fenn soon after blanked out on a range 1 shot from Jess [blank hit hit crit], I rolled [blank blank blank, eye --> evade w/ focus] +CDT evade. Direct hit, add to your other direct hit, do not pass go, do not collect $200. With all the dice that list throws at you, and generally all of them modified via Ops spec, it's bound to happen eventually. I had made an earlier mistake running Asajj too far away, so she was out of the fight for a while and turned into a 40 point focus battery, as Fenn and the Scout tried mightily to dance with the biggs list and put some damage through. Although if he had turned towards Asajj, it would have saved her bacon.

My top 4 match was kind of crazy. I forgot Nym had cruise missiles, and was just thinking he had accuracy corrector autoblaster... so I ended up in range 2 eating a 5 dice cruise missile. Derp fail. Fenn got one-shot, [blank hit hit hit crit] vs [blank blank evade], and the crit was direct hit. Cya Fenn, he never fired. So it's Asajj and the Scout by themselves against his entire list. Dengar was only down 1 shield and I think I had taken 2 off of Nym. No problem! Asajj and Scout proceeded to eliminate Nym and then Dengar, I don't think I even gave up half on either ship. Those two ships have successfully soloed entire lists for me now almost half a dozen times.

Not a bad run for this season's Store Championships, I only attended two, but went 11-1 overall and won one. I have kept my streak of being undefeated through Swiss at store championships going for a second season, I think, which is cool. 9-0 this season flying Parattanni w/ Intel and chute, 11-0 last season flying Maximum Danger Zone (Stresshog, 2x Wardens + TLT + Tactician, bandit) before the TLT+tactician nerf. The thought of playing against more unkillable Biggs lists is extremely discouraging though. I'm not traveling to Nova Open or any other large events, but man, if I was I would seriously reconsider going at this point. It's just a terrible list to fly against in 75 minutes.

Great playing against you round 3! Sunny and the ZR's had their chance for a bit there. I'd go again just for the top table comfy chairs!

I'm suddenly trying to remember the name of an MtG deck archetype that had as its gameplan one quick win turn one, and then dragging game two out to time to score a 'win'. It was in the late '90s, so a looong time ago. Was it in Planeshift block? I seem to recall Torment cards...

Whatever. "Well played" Fairship Rebels would be something like that. Do every little trick to stretch the game out, make your turns take a little longer to resolve, double-check your dials after placing them to make sure they're 'right'... because if your game breaks down in the end, then you make sure it doesn't GO to the end.

Ah, man, that's so toxic.

1 hour ago, iamfanboy said:

I'm suddenly trying to remember the name of an MtG deck archetype that had as its gameplan one quick win turn one, and then dragging game two out to time to score a 'win'. It was in the late '90s, so a looong time ago. Was it in Planeshift block? I seem to recall Torment cards...

Whatever. "Well played" Fairship Rebels would be something like that. Do every little trick to stretch the game out, make your turns take a little longer to resolve, double-check your dials after placing them to make sure they're 'right'... because if your game breaks down in the end, then you make sure it doesn't GO to the end.

Ah, man, that's so toxic.

We had an SC a week or so ago in Den Haag, Netherlands. For whatever reason, not one person brought Fair Ship Rebels. Whether it was due to pride, integrity or whatever, it was awesome.

Like you said, if you want to play this list optimally, you either castle or play super slow, just on the cusp of legality. Either way, if this list becomes common, it will make tournaments a horrible experience for a lot of people.

23 minutes ago, Bonza said:

We had an SC a week or so ago in Den Haag, Netherlands. For whatever reason, not one person brought Fair Ship Rebels. Whether it was due to pride, integrity or whatever, it was awesome.

Like you said, if you want to play this list optimally, you either castle or play super slow, just on the cusp of legality. Either way, if this list becomes common, it will make tournaments a horrible experience for a lot of people.

I mean, I've played against it once with RAC/Whisper (I'm only invested in Imperials, so no faction switching for me to the new hawtness!) and beat it, but he couldn't predict me for crap, it was his first time playing it, and it STILL took me multiple turns to kill Biggs. When you can throw five dice, fully modded, at a ship and only watch in despair as they're laughed off...

But it's fun to theorize. That's why I think R2-D2 is the optimal solution. It helps cover the list's weakness, makes you tankier versus the mirror match, and increases the "Holy crap this match is no fun I quit, you win" factor.

If the supposition that Lowwrick/Selflessness was developed in response to Deadeye triple Jumps, then the cure really is worse than the disease was. It's not unbeatable, but it's BORING, and that's the ultimate crime any game can commit.

3 hours ago, phild0 said:

Sounds like LWF Unguided Rocket Bombers

Oh man, sounds like a meta they could really exist in.

I don't have any of the other lists, but Iain Hamp just won the 46-player Imperial Outpost Store Championship (Phoenix area) with:

• 3x Scimitar Squadron, Unguided Rockets, LWF, Seismic Charge
• 1x Scimitar Squadron, Unguided Rockets, LWF
• 1x Wampa

he called it TIE Nommers and kept saying "I'm flying 4 Inquisitors!"

1 hour ago, skotothalamos said:

I don't have any of the other lists, but Iain Hamp just won the 46-player Imperial Outpost Store Championship (Phoenix area) with:

• 3x Scimitar Squadron, Unguided Rockets, LWF, Seismic Charge
• 1x Scimitar Squadron, Unguided Rockets, LWF
• 1x Wampa

he called it TIE Nommers and kept saying "I'm flying 4 Inquisitors!"

He beat FSR at least twice on his way to the title as well.

I haven't been in the area for long, but Iain seems to be the best player I have ever encountered in person, so it is very likely he wins because he is crazy good and could make most anything work. But, he could also just be way above me in ship/upgrade analysis and spot why unguided rockets work when I have continued to see them as far too restrictive to work well.

There was another list in top 4 which was also composed of a majority of unguided rocket bombers by another very high level player (Hart I believe is his name). I think their only loses may have been to each other, or at least they both beat each other once.

Other top 8 notables (without specifics as I've been told the tournament venue prefers not to share lists publicly)

a Nym, Mux, Genesis Red list

Triple Scurrgs

Fair Ship Rebel

Dengar Nym

RAC quickdraw (I think?)

6 hours ago, Jike said:

I took my first ever store championships in Stirling, Scotland (28 players) last week with:

• Dengar - Expertise, GC, Title, Plasma Torps, EM, K4
• Nym - Autoblaster Turret, AC, Title, Genius, Bomblet Generator, VI

The 3 point bid proved extremely important given all the other Nym lists at the tournament

I plugged this into YASB, is that a 3 or 4 point inititive bid?

33 minutes ago, Koing907 said:

I plugged this into YASB, is that a 3 or 4 point inititive bid?

3 points IIRC. The original list had Cruise Missiles and Guidance Chips on Nym but it proved a little tricky to get the missiles off effectively and I also figured a decent bid would be very useful, especially against other lists with Dengar or Fenn. In the end I didn't face either of those pilots but the bid was pretty instrumental in most of my games, I think.

3 hours ago, skotothalamos said:

I don't have any of the other lists, but Iain Hamp just won the 46-player Imperial Outpost Store Championship (Phoenix area) with:

• 3x Scimitar Squadron, Unguided Rockets, LWF, Seismic Charge
• 1x Scimitar Squadron, Unguided Rockets, LWF
• 1x Wampa

he called it TIE Nommers and kept saying "I'm flying 4 Inquisitors!"

Nice thinking; incredible flying (obviously)...wow!

2 hours ago, Kdubb said:

He beat FSR at least twice on his way to the title as well. I haven't been in the area for long, but Iain seems to be the best player I have ever encountered in person, so it is very likely he wins because he is crazy good and could make most anything work. But, he could also just be way above me in ship/upgrade analysis and spot why unguided rockets work when I have continued to see them as far too restrictive to work well.

I'm impressed too, thanks for the color @Kdubb ......nice!

3 hours ago, skotothalamos said:

I don't have any of the other lists, but Iain Hamp just won the 46-player Imperial Outpost Store Championship (Phoenix area) with:

• 3x Scimitar Squadron, Unguided Rockets, LWF, Seismic Charge
• 1x Scimitar Squadron, Unguided Rockets, LWF
• 1x Wampa

he called it TIE Nommers and kept saying "I'm flying 4 Inquisitors!"

The first time I had flown against Fair Ship Rebel I had flown the UGR list Blairbunke had built:

3 x Scimitar + Unguided Rockets

1 x Scimitar + TIE Shuttle + Operations Specialist + LWF

1 x PS2 Aggressor + TLT + LWF

And I had won handily, not quite yet understanding why FSR was even good lol. (I later learned when I tried an im-mobile 2 ship ordnance list against FSR.)

Unguided Rockets Scimitars are solid. Bring back the bomber in a big way.

24 player Store Championships at Geek Out Games in Central, SC yesterday.

Most of the details at: http://lists.starwarsclubhouse.com/get_tourney_details?tourney_id=3259

Winner, 1st in Swiss (4-0)

Miranda / Nym (no details on List Juggler, but both had TLT, Nym had VI, Bomblet, and Accuracy Corrector, and Miranda had AdvSlam, Sabine, Cluster Mines and Thermal Detonators plus some more ordnance at least.)

2nd, 3rd in Swiss (3-1)

Fenn with Attani, Concord Dawn, Autothrusters
2x Scout with Attani, R4, Plama, Extra Munitions. 1 with 4-LOM, 1 with Intel Agent

Top 4, 2nd in Swiss (4-0)

Fenn with Fearlessness, Concord Dawn, Autothrusters
Nym with Havoc, Adaptability, Autoblaster, Accuracy Corrector, Bomblet, Genius
Zuvio with VI, Cad Bane, Seismic bomb, Pattern Analyzer, Cloaking Device and Tractor Array

Top 4, 4th in Swiss (3-1)

Rex
Biggs with R4-D6/IA
Rey with Expertise, title, Tactical Jammer, Finn and Kanan

13 hours ago, AlexW said:

21 player Store Championship in Ames, IA

Winner: Triple Jumps (One kitted out as bumpmaster, 2 as torpedo boats one with Boba)

Hey this was me! List in detail:
Contracted scout #1: AML, Proton, EM, Boba, R4 agro, Chimps
Contracted scout #2: AML, Plasma, EM, Intel, R4 agro, Chimps
Contracted scout #3: AML Ion projector, Intel, Rigged Cargo, OCR4

I won a SC down in Houston with it a couple weeks ago as well.

13 hours ago, AlexW said:

One thing to add is that the Fair Ship list there went 4-0 and beat the winner in Swiss. They had an immediate rematch right after in the cut.

First two times flying against 2.0. From Houston so I've been losing to the original braylen FSR since late march.

First match he had initiative so I slowly split up and tried coming in at different angles, lost 100-0 at time with a 1 health low ,1 health biggs, shieldless Jess. It was a close game though and a couple of dice rolls the other way would at list given me points on the board.

Second match I took initiative and so i forced a joust. I started with the trip with pre-nerf defenders, so I eschew shooting torps unless I have a ship blocked. I found myself in the opposite position of @MajorJuggler . By blocking I was forcing him to either split fire or ignore R1 shots on the blocker. He was running tactician rey instead of op spec and flew in a 2x2 block though which may explain the difference. I could bump two of his ships and have them bump in back as well. The list's efficiency drops substantially when you lose focuses and the reinforce token. I kept my guys jammed up with one focusing for the group so I had better action efficiency than him. He eventually tried to split lowrick off but still got blocked which let me dump damage into him until he was dead. Then it's a game of cycling blockers to keep my ships healthy as possible while damaging his.

I definitely flew better in this game, but I also have to say our dice traded places and mine were notably hotter in the second match. The only big mistakes I saw my opponent make were to split lowrick off after i had already shot a torp at him, letting me finish him with primaries, and he popped the droid off biggs for the first hit that came in, which let me use a torp to finish off biggs instead of gambling on getting hits in with primaries.

I'm wondering if action denial is the way to beat this list, selflessness is only once in a game, if you can mod dice and they can't you may be able to whittle faster than they can.