Greetings, all.

Recently, there has been an on going debate about the viability of Imperial Aces in the current meta. Some say that they have no place in the meta while others say they just need a skillful player to get them working. I would like to try to put this debate to bed. As both sides of the debate expect some level of failure, I believe the primary data to collect is of Imp Ace wins rather then losses. I am specifically looking for data on Soontir Fel and Carnor Jax.

So, if you believe the likes of Fel and Jax are still good, I would like to issue you a challenge to provide evidence of such. With Store Championship season starting, there are gonna be plenty of opportunities out there to test and refine an Ace build against meta builds and random jank alike. The big data point I would like is a Fel and/or Jax list making it to top 8 in the next season of Regionals (or similar or higher tiered event).

Criteria to follow if you would like to participate:

1) The Imp Aces must have gone up against some meta lists and/or lists featuring things people believe are keeping Aces down (K-Wing Bombers, Sabine crew, autoblasters, stress control, Black Market Slicer tools, Darth Vader crew, token negating pilots and tech, "red dice creep", double tap Ghosts, etc).

2) A quick, honest opinion of the skill of your opponent in crucial matches.

3) Data will be given more credence if lists involved can be corroborated with MajorJuggler's attempts to record Store Championship data or other results sharing mediums. Providing your own links will be appreciated.

4) The only prerequisite for lists is that Fel and/or Jax is a part of it.

If you have any previous stories of success/failure with Imp Aces that fit the above criteria from between the Nerfing of the Big Four and now, they will be welcomed as well. Changes to meta like a FAQ or wave release will be evaluated for impact on challenge and revisions may be instituted.

Thank you all for your time and attention. Good luck and good game out there. If there are any questions, please ask.

Amendments and Additions:

Addition 1; if you attempt this challenge but don't come up with positive results, a post saying so would also be greatly appreciated.

And here I thought the challenge would be "just fly Soontir Fel." That used to be viable for a good pilot. 65-point initiative bid!

1 minute ago, Hawkstrike said:

And here I thought the challenge would be "just fly Soontir Fel." That used to be viable for a good pilot. 65-point initiative bid!

Hey, if someone can make it work, I'll take the data.

The gauntlet has been thrown. Challenge accepted...

27 minutes ago, Hawkstrike said:

And here I thought the challenge would be "just fly Soontir Fel." That used to be viable for a good pilot. 65-point initiative bid!

Legend has it that this was actually done as a 'joke' list at tournaments at least once.

... The dude actually won a couple games, too.

34 minutes ago, SabineKey said:

If you have any previous stories of success/failure with Imp Aces that fit the above criteria from between the Nerfing of the Big Four and now, they will be welcomed as well.

As I mention in the other thread, I got a local tournament win (16 player kit). The final was Fel/Quickdraw/Backdraft vs Bossk/Dengar. Bossk had Homing Missiles and 4-LOM for token denial. The player is someone I've played before and seen play more. He has at least a number lot local tournament wins and has beaten me the previous time I played him. I had a bid, and so all of my ships moved after all of his. The SFs set up to joust Bossk, and Fel flanked wide, so it would either be Fel vs Dengar, or Fel flanking Dengar as Dengar moved to engaged the SFs. Fel put some early damage on Dengar (2-3 shields) as Dengar moved to support Bossk against the SFs. Backdraft took a big punch early, but he and Quickdraw mauled Bossk. I got lucky when Dengar made a torpedo attack against Backdraft and did minimal damage. I made up for it by throwing Fel into range 2 of Bossk completely unnecessarily, and used a move that allowed no arc dodging to occur. Fel got one-shotted in a rookie mistake, but Quickdraw cleaned up Dengar while Backdraft tried to stay alive.

This isn't much of a data point, but it intrigued me and made me want to explore the build further.

49 minutes ago, Reiver said:

Legend has it that this was actually done as a 'joke' list at tournaments at least once.

... The dude actually won a couple games, too.

The story I heard was that it was less of a joke list and more that a new player to tournaments miss-read/understood the format.

Went 2/3 or 2/4 I heard.

Why limit this to just Fel and Carnor? Surely Vader, Whsiper, Omega Leader, Inquisitor, and all the other aces that are equally underplayed should be included.

6 minutes ago, CRCL said:

Why limit this to just Fel and Carnor ? Surely Vader , Whsiper, Omega Leader , Inquisitor , and all the other aces that are equally underplayed should be included.

Actually Whisper, OL and Inquisitor are seeing play a lot in my local scene, though again it is an #Outerrimmeta. Soontir & Jax on the other hand are nowhere to be seen.

As for Vader, I recall @nigeltastic once said that Predator ATC EU Vader is 37 pts of choke me harder daddy in his local meta.

8 minutes ago, CRCL said:

Why limit this to just Fel and Carnor? Surely Vader, Whsiper, Omega Leader, Inquisitor, and all the other aces that are equally underplayed should be included.

No. I haven't seen a single Interceptor in any competitive list for ages now. All the others are quite good compared (even Vader). It might have something to do with shields...

4 minutes ago, Grivoire said:

Actually Whisper, OL and Inquisitor are seeing play a lot in my local scene, though again it is an #Outerrimmeta. Soontir & Jax on the other hand are nowhere to be seen.

As for Vader, I recall @nigeltastic once said that Predator ATC EU Vader is 37 pts of choke me harder daddy in his local meta.

Whisper made it to top16 in Worlds. QD/BD-OL-Vessery was a thing in Worlds. Vader is nice with RAC-Kylo(crew) aka "Grandfather! I'll finish what you started..."

Played Carnor, Omega Leader, Inquisitor at worlds. Went 4-3, missing day 2 by 31 MoV (any one ship either way in any game played on day 1). Opponents included Miranda (scrapped her and her pals), Paratanni (got smashed), Quickdraw + Chiraneau (Gunner, Vader, Hotshot - lost 1 ace to Chiraneau, wiped them in exchange).

Hangar Bays over the weekend involved killing another Gunner/Vader/Captive Chiraneau and another Miranda. Also Smoked Kanan Biggs 100-0 (Carnor is ridiculous against that list).

Overall, I feel like my opponents were a pretty fair match for me in skill (a couple were much better, a couple were a little worse, most were good matches). I consider myself competent, but not great. Probably worth noting: I hadn't played Imperial at all (let alone a dedicated aces list) until the morning of my Worlds flight... I feel like I definitely made a couple of mistakes over the weekend, but I think I flew decently well.

Not sure what kind of links you would want for data, but I played in flight 1a at Worlds, and my user name is my name, so it should be easy to find me from the standings, I guess?

I plan on flying the same archetype (may change up an upgrade slot or two) at local Store Championships coming soon.

Well I will most likely be taking the following to any future tournaments over the next few months.

Quickdraw - Draw Their Fire, FCS, Targeting Sync, LWF, Title (37pts)

Tomax Bren - Crack Shot, EM, GC, Proton Torps (31pts)

Carnor "The Biggest Jerk the Imperial Have" Jax - PTL, Autothrusters (31pts)

I've already played 1 kit tourney where I went 4-0 all 100-0 victories. The last game was against an anti Ace list with Miranda, Warden and Ahsoka. My opponent looked at me funny when I said he could have iniative but I firmly believe that Advanced Slam is harder to prevent if you have to move first. This way you get to choose when you will be giving up your ships and you will know the risk reward scenario. In this particular game I feinted toward Miranda and then turned on the Warden and smoked it. Ahsoka dropped Clusters in front of a K-Turned Tomax who cleared one of them so QD could turn through them safely. Destroyed Miranda who got well out of position because alpha strike Firepower is what Miranda hates and Ahsoka was pretty easy from there.

I wouldn't count this as a datapoint. There should have been a final between myself and our local Parattanni player. I personally think the matchup is mine to lose but we didn't have time to play the match. But I will definitely run the list more to try and get data for you.

I've run a lot of simulations with it. I would say Calen's Pride, which I haven't managed to get a game or sim against yet, would be the biggest weakness and everything else can probably be beaten with good piloting. Fangs do not this list. Jax can ruin their tokens if they get too close which can often put them in no mans land of range 2. Range 2 of Tomax Bren is just the worst for Fenn.

I would say that from the data that you want to collect, I expect that if success with Jax or Fel is achieved it will be all Jax. He is by far the best option in the current meta and one of the very few Imperial "Jerk" options. Jerk options being things that just mess with your opponent's list in negative ways. Rebels have Biggs, Bombs/Sabine/Slam, Stresshog and Scum have Palob and Assaj.

Imperials have for a long time now been about synergy, efficiency and placement. The meta has revolved around griefing them, because the Imperials don't grief back. Jax can do that and because of it is actually an important Imperial tool. I would actually be surprised if there is a lot of Imperial success going forward that doesn't include Jax.

The exception being that Imperials can so easily field triple 9s right now and with really great ships. Vader, Backdraft, Quickdraw, Fel and Maarek Stele can all hit 9 at a price point where you can run 3 of them. Only Fel is super susecptible to both bombs and stress. No other faction can do that. In fact no other faction can get 10 and 11 like Imperials can if you really want to up the anti.

Final thought. I really want a propaganda poster style t-shirt that says "embrace the variance, fly Imperials today". Or something like that.

Happy hunting Imperial Aces. Everyone still really hates flying against you.

I'm running Quickdraw/Backdraft/Vessery and it would be in my gift to switch one of those guys out for Carnor or Soontir... but I don't think it would help in any of the matchups that are difficult. They aren't bringing what I need to win the tough games, and instead are bringing a weakness I need to protect in a bunch of other games.

I will give it another go @SabineKey , for they are my favorite ships; but I've had a rough stint competitively (good on pint nights though ?) post FAQ 4.3.0. Guess I just need to man up and fly into the heat once again....I hope my black boxes survive to tell the tale, there's a lot of talented Ks/Hogs around here.

Fel is actually good right now. He shuts down Mindlink and R4 Agromech. Pair him with a Shuttle like Yorr or an Upsilon with Inspiring Recruit and you don't gotta worry about stress. I Pair him with a VI Kylo so I can Adv Sensor Coordinate Jax at PS8 and people with bombs have no idea where I'll end up.

Edit: meant to say Jax of course

7 hours ago, Grivoire said:

Actually Whisper, OL and Inquisitor are seeing play a lot in my local scene, though again it is an #Outerrimmeta. Soontir & Jax on the other hand are nowhere to be seen.

As for Vader, I recall @nigeltastic once said that Predator ATC EU Vader is 37 pts of choke me harder daddy in his local meta.

Those were my exact words yeah. The guy who flies Vader most frequently flies predator atc eu Vader, Quickdraw with expertise and baffle, and palp shuttle with collision detector. He took it to worlds and made day 2, ending in the top 100 somewhere. I haven't had a chance to find out what gave him trouble day 2 but the list is very good and definitely reminiscent of the 'good ole days' of palp aces.

7 hours ago, CRCL said:

Why limit this to just Fel and Carnor? Surely Vader, Whsiper, Omega Leader, Inquisitor, and all the other aces that are equally underplayed should be included.

Better focus for data retrieval.

All of the other options are tougher than Interceptors. Vader has his own problems with TLTs, Whisper was part of a top 16 list at Worlds, Omega Leader is a pocket ace, and the Inquisitor should theoretically be able to survive anything an Interceptor can.

3 hours ago, SOTL said:

I'm running Quickdraw/Backdraft/Vessery and it would be in my gift to switch one of those guys out for Carnor or Soontir... but I don't think it would help in any of the matchups that are difficult. They aren't bringing what I need to win the tough games, and instead are bringing a weakness I need to protect in a bunch of other games.

And that's part of what this challenge is about. Determining if Fel and Jax can give enough value to be worth it.

35 minutes ago, Tbetts94 said:

Fel is actually good right now. He shuts down Mindlink and R4 Agromech. Pair him with a Shuttle like Yorr or an Upsilon with Inspiring Recruit and you don't gotta worry about stress. I Pair him with a VI Kylo so I can Adv Sensor Coordinate Jax at PS8 and people with bombs have no idea where I'll end up.

That's fair, but I'm looking for less theorizing or antidotal evidence and more hard data on performance. This is all leading up to the crowning data point of making top 8 at a regionals or like event, versus all the usual suspects.

4 hours ago, Aaron Foss said:

Not sure what kind of links you would want for data, but I played in flight 1a at Worlds, and my user name is my name, so it should be easy to find me from the standings, I guess?

@Aaron Foss Sorry for the quote with nothing under it. The post started freaking out on me. Alright, to answer your question, a link to list juggler or like site is what I'm hoping for. Name and event, like you gave, should also work just fine. Thanks!

Being a "die hard" Imperial this makes me happy. I accept the challenge.

12 hours ago, SabineKey said:

Greetings, all.

Recently, there has been an on going debate about the viability of Imperial Aces in the current meta. Some say that they have no place in the meta while others say they just need a skillful player to get them working. I would like to try to put this debate to bed. As both sides of the debate expect some level of failure, I believe the primary data to collect is of Imp Ace wins rather then losses. I am specifically looking for data on Soontir Fel and Carnor Jax.

So, if you believe the likes of Fel and Jax are still good, I would like to issue you a challenge to provide evidence of such. With Store Championship season starting, there are gonna be plenty of opportunities out there to test and refine an Ace build against meta builds and random jank alike. The big data point I would like is a Fel and/or Jax list making it to top 8 in the next season of Regionals (or similar or higher tiered event).

Criteria to follow if you would like to participate:

1) The Imp Aces must have gone up against some meta lists and/or lists featuring things people believe are keeping Aces down (K-Wing Bombers, Sabine crew, autoblasters, stress control, Black Market Slicer tools, Darth Vader crew, token negating pilots and tech, "red dice creep", double tap Ghosts, etc).

2) A quick, honest opinion of the skill of your opponent in crucial matches.

3) Data will be given more credence if lists involved can be corroborated with MajorJuggler's attempts to record Store Championship data or other results sharing mediums. Providing your own links will be appreciated.

4) The only prerequisite for lists is that Fel and/or Jax is a part of it.

If you have any previous stories of success/failure with Imp Aces that fit the above criteria from between the Nerfing of the Big Four and now, they will be welcomed as well. Changes to meta like a FAQ or wave release will be evaluated for impact on challenge and revisions may be instituted.

Thank you all for your time and attention. Good luck and good game out there. If there are any questions, please ask.

Hmmmm....you making me consider switching my list;)

I think that they aren't nearly as easy to stick in a list anymore but still take advantage of some aspects of the meta. It used to be that Fel (and even Jax) could be tossed into a list and what you put around them was less important. Now, as some above mention, you need to really balance out their weaknesses in the rest of the list.

My triple interceptors stand by, ready to blast any rebel scum out of the sky if the emperor sees fit to deploy us

Played in an FLGS tournament Saturday. Played 4 rounds. 3 involved me facing off against RauBoats, Dengar/Fenn, and Dengar/Assaj. In that order. My other game, the only one in which I scored a win, was against Norra, Sharra, and a Z95.

Not because I am a superstar XWinger (I am not), but I don't see how a Fel list would do well in those 3 games. The JM5K dial is insanely good. Even if Fel has the initiative and moves last, it's a really tough matchup I feel.

1 minute ago, Scopes said:

Played in an FLGS tournament Saturday. Played 4 rounds. 3 involved me facing off against RauBoats, Dengar/Fenn, and Dengar/Assaj. In that order. My other game, the only one in which I scored a win, was against Norra, Sharra, and a Z95.

Not because I am a superstar XWinger (I am not), but I don't see how a Fel list would do well in those 3 games. The JM5K dial is insanely good. Even if Fel has the initiative and moves last, it's a really tough matchup I feel.

Agreed those can be tough match ups. What were the particulars of your list?