Avenger vs. Salvation: Piles o' Bombers!

By Democratus, in Star Wars: Armada Battle Reports

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Played a game last night against someone new. Always great to make new friends through a game.

I played an imperial fleet centered on the ISD Avenger (another shout out to @Darth Sanguis who authored this list):

397/400 points
Objectives: Most Wanted, Contested Outpost, Superior Positions
ISD 2 (Avenger, General Tagge , Needa, Gunnery Team, TRC, SW-7, ECM)
Gozanti Cruisers (Tua, ECM, Bomber Command)
Gozanti Cruisers (Jamming Field)
Gozanti Cruisers (Jamming Field)
Maarek Steele
Col. Jendon
2x JumpMaster
Tempest Squad
2x TIE Advanced
3x TIE Bomber

My opponent, William, played a Dodonna squadron-heavy list with Salvation and Foresight:

400/400 points (though I think it might have been 401 points)
Nebulon B Escort (Salvation, Spinal Armament)
CR90 B Corvette ( General Dodonna , Jania's Light, RBD, Heavy Turbolaser Turrets) - Yes, I now realize that HTT are not legal on the CR90B . :)
MC30 Torpedo Frigate (Foresight, Raymus Antilles, Ordnance Experts, XI7, ACM)
GR-75 Combat Retrofit (Bright Hope, Major Durlin, Comms Net, Boosted Comms)
4x X-Wing
2x A-Wing
2x B-Wing
2x Y-Wing

I haven't played many bomber-heavy lists before. I was surprised that both myself and my opponent brought 10(!) squadrons to the table.
I took 2nd player (I was afraid of what his objectives might be given all the bombers) and he chose Superior Positions.
Here's our initial setup:
Turn 1 was spent closing the distance. The initial placement of Salvation left it out in the cold. It sped up and turned in to get into the battle. We both moved our squadrons up in preparation for the oncoming clash.
Turn 2 and we were closed enough to fire on each other. The CR90 activated first to get out of the ISD front arc, but it still took a TRC blast from the side. I moved half my squadrons left to try and intercept the corvette. The rest I moved right and started bombing Foresight, stripping shields and defense tokens. Avenger decided to trust the bombers to take care of the corvette and turned in to face the rest of the Rebel fleet. Foresight moved up and rammed the closest Gozanti.
Turn 3: The corvette revealed a [Concentrate Firepower] order which let it do good damage with it's rear/side arcs. However, it was going speed 4 and without a Nav command it flew right off the table. This is not an uncommon occurrence with new players and William and I talked about how a Nav command was more important than the improved firepower. Foresight destroyed the rammed Gozanti before being destroyed by bombers and close-range fire from the second Gozanti. The squadrons were truly stuck in at this point. Again experience was my ally as I used the JumpMasters to free up critical squadrons. Rebel squadrons did begin killing my TIE Advanced squadrons during this turn. The Rebel lack of Intel would be a problem for it during the battle. The GR-75, on the other hand, flew right through my fleet and managed to survive thanks to the evil combo of Bright Hope and Major Derlin.
Turn 4: Salvation is finally starting to arrive on the scene. Still not close enough for a shot. It's placement on the far side of the board was, I think, the critical mistake for the Rebel player. After the game William told me he thought I was going to deploy in the center of my side. But Superior Positions allowed me to deploy much more favorably. Rebel bombers begin to start scoring tokens against me as they make bombing runs on the aft hulls of my ships. I try to use my squadrons to tie up the Rebels for one more turn. I end up losing about 1/2 my squadrons by the end of the battle. The Jamming Fields help a bit. But I'm not convinced they are worth the points.
Turn 5: Salvation finally gets to fire on the ISD. It throws a massive volley of 5 red dice at the ISD, but thanks to Needa's evade token (recovered this turn with Tagge) and a brace the damage is mitigated and redirected. Squadrons continue to kill each other and seek bombing opportunities. I try one last hail mary to bomb the flotilla that is running away. I do damage (token, yay!) but Major Derlin again denies me my prize! The ISD finally manages to get a couple of squadron kills with AS fire.
Turn 6: Salvation is right there on top of the ISD. It does a pile of damage, putting damage cards into the ISD. But it is too little, too late. The ISD survives with 1/2 of its hull left, executes an Engineering order to shore up shields against bombers, and moves out of range from all but 1 of the bombers (who have no Squadron commands to push them). The Gozantis throw out some AS attacks and land one last squadron kill. In the end, I got more points in ships and William scored more victory tokens.

Losses:

Rebel - MC30 Torpedo Frigate, CR90B Corvette, Y-Wing, X-Wing, B-Wing, 3 tokens = 249 Imperial Points

Imperial - Gozanti Flotilla, 2x Jumpmaster, 1x Tempest Squadron, 1x TIE Bomber, 1x TIE Advanced, 5 tokens = 138 Rebel Points

The score doesn't tell the whole story. Had the Corvette not gotten trapped into flying off the board, Salvation not been so badly out of place, and the squadron battle gone slightly different, the ISD would have been toast. All of these are things that will be improved as William gains more experience with the game.

The whole experience was great. William was so much fun to play against. We had a nice chat about the battle afterward to cover some of the missed opportunities and talk about what can be different next time.

It was exactly the kind of game you hope to have on a Friday night: friendly, fun, and relaxing.

Edited by Democratus
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Oh, yeah! @Vergilius was also there for our game night. He took on our local group's best Imperial player and taught him a few things about squadron play.

Classic Ben. :D

I feel so lucky that we have a great bunch of Armada players here in Austin!

Edited by Democratus
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Awesome to see new people playing armada!

Sounds like a fun game, and really close given the things that could be corrected.

Dodonna Salvation is a fun ship to run :)

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Haha Bad Choices is a fun fleet, good idea using Tagge, definitely an improvement!

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It's the first fleet I've ever used where Tagge seemed like a natural fit.

Was able to go crazy with TRCs on turns 2 and 4. And recovering discarded scatters on flotillas is just funny. :)