How would you do it?

I'm thinking 2-3 Arquitens would help.

And a heavy hitting ship with the Arquitens on the flanks to protect it from the Hammerheads getting into position.

TIE Fighters in numbers seem good as well.

If you consider Task Force Antilles to work like a defense token (better against single attacks instead of an ongoing bombardment), which I admit is only partially true, I would think the big requirement is credibly threatening more than one at a time. Gunnery Teams on high-output ships (ISDs, VSDs, Ackbar AF2s) can start to lay down damage that others can follow up on for kills. Flanking them is good, though not necessarily easy to achieve against a swarm without one of your own. Finishing those kills is critical . Accuracies to lock down the single Redirect I think are less important than normal, since they will normally only redirect one damage away, which with SW-7s or a good reroll may as well be the same thing. One thing to remember is that they are going to try to get in close anyway, so flying conservatively to allow them to enter range instead of the other way around will help greatly. The alternative is of course balls to the wall Cracken/Ozzel style play where you race at them, with the intent of blowing through the dangerous arcs and making them no more threatening than the Gozanti s most will be worth two of. Bombers are also an option, but need to be wary of the Torpedo Frigate as the first serious FT carrier on the Rebel side. This is obviously all speculation, but I'd like to think I'm barking up the right tree.

Gunnery teams will destroy them. They are just as fragile as a raider

7 minutes ago, TerrorScream said:

Gunnery teams will destroy them. They are just as fragile as a raider

To kill a Raider in one shot you still need six damage and an accuracy, seven with Motti. I expect these little buggers to be surprisingly durable, since they are at the same point as a Motti Raider , and while small, the improvement is noticeable.

49 minutes ago, TerrorScream said:

Gunnery teams will destroy them. They are just as fragile as a raider

More fragile, you mean? Without accuracy 7 or 8 damage is enough to pop them. Not so for the raider.

48 minutes ago, TerrorScream said:

Gunnery teams will destroy them. They are just as fragile as a raider

I'll agree with this in the general sense of "Task Forces need to be fairly clustered to work and Gunnery Teams love buffing a ship's damage output by allowing it to use its best arc twice against clustered targets." I don't think you'll be one-shotting healthy Hammerheads in most cases (you'd need to inflict 8 damage or 7 damage while locking down the redirect in most cases) but with a little bit of help (the turn of or due to some red dice shots the turn before) you should be wracking up kills fairly quickly.

The optimal swarmy hammerhead build is the torpedo hammerhead with external racks and boarding engineers. As they will have to charge at you in numbers, this makes their movement predictable. I think that simply having a reasonably decent bomber swarm handy should suffice, especially if Rhymer is involved.

2 minutes ago, PT106 said:

More fragile, you mean? Without accuracy 7 or 8 damage is enough to pop them. Not so for the raider.

A good point and as a big fan of the Raider (people tag me now when Raider discussions come up, I'm so honored!) that is absolutely true but it's been my experience that most big ships have enough blue dice to reliably get that accuracy icon, which can cause big trouble for the Raider closer in. The Hammerhead seems less vulnerable to accuracy locking down a super-crucial defense token but conversely its token-modified defensive capacity is worse than a Raider's. I've seen Raiders survive an ISD-I's front arc when an accuracy doesn't get rolled. I doubt that will happen too frequently with Hammerheads.

In short, versus Raiders you want that accuracy and with Hammerheads you want more raw damage. If Hammerheads get popular enough, we could see some upgrades shift to prioritize that.

3 minutes ago, D503 said:

The optimal swarmy hammerhead build is the torpedo hammerhead with external racks and boarding engineers. As they will have to charge at you in numbers, this makes their movement predictable. I think that simply having a reasonably decent bomber swarm handy should suffice, especially if Rhymer is involved.

"Optimal" seems like a strong word for a ship no one has gotten on the table yet. (For the record, I agree with you, I just want to raise that point.) I'm still concerned about the ability of a single or even a pair to shoot ahead of the pack with OE and FT and lock down the bomber ball. I'm very curious to see what if any success that tactic ends up seeing. Of course it can be countered as can any other maneuver, but it's still my leading concern about just throwing bombers at the problem.

5 minutes ago, Snipafist said:

In short, versus Raiders you want that accuracy and with Hammerheads you want more raw damage. If Hammerheads get popular enough, we could see some upgrades shift to prioritize that.

To that end, I note (as I'm sure someone else has elsewhere I can't find) XI7s are worthless against Hammerhead s unless you have a flanking shot. I doubt that will make much of a dent in that card's appearances, but it bears noting.

2 minutes ago, GiledPallaeon said:

"Optimal" seems like a strong word for a ship no one has gotten on the table yet. (For the record, I agree with you, I just want to raise that point.) I'm still concerned about the ability of a single or even a pair to shoot ahead of the pack with OE and FT and lock down the bomber ball. I'm very curious to see what if any success that tactic ends up seeing. Of course it can be countered as can any other maneuver, but it's still my leading concern about just throwing bombers at the problem.

Provided you reroll any black die that's not a hit+crit in the hopes of being able to use the Flechettes, then each Hammerhead will have a 7/16 chance per squadron of triggering the Flechettes. That's not bad at all but neither is it reliable. Against a group of squadrons it will certainly make some of them sleepy but reliably making the important ones sleepy is going to be a crapshoot. I've found with Flechette Raiders that the double-black dice makes them much more reliable and being able to concentrate fire up to 3 against a crucial squadron (often the punchiest ace or a crucial Intel squadron) with the Ordnance Experts reroll makes it pretty reliable for targeted sleepy times.

For Imps, exact same way you murder anything else: Rhymerballs and/or a 1st Player Demo will make easy work of Hammerheads.

Just now, AllWingsStandyingBy said:

For Imps, exact same way you murder anything else: Rhymerballs and/or a 1st Player Demo will make easy work of Hammerheads.

I'm concerned by the fact that the HHs are going to give you the same issue most Cracken TRCR90 lists give you: jump one, even two, you might get them. Killing one is definitely a probably. The issue is that you often will have a very hard time then escaping their optimal arcs. It's certainly easier against the Hammerhead 's pathetic side and nonexistent rear arcs than against the range of a TRCR90, but I wouldn't underestimate their blocking ability, and if they have External Racks, whatever they catch is in for a world of hurt.

Just now, GiledPallaeon said:

I'm concerned by the fact that the HHs are going to give you the same issue most Cracken TRCR90 lists give you: jump one, even two, you might get them. Killing one is definitely a probably. The issue is that you often will have a very hard time then escaping their optimal arcs. It's certainly easier against the Hammerhead 's pathetic side and nonexistent rear arcs than against the range of a TRCR90, but I wouldn't underestimate their blocking ability, and if they have External Racks, whatever they catch is in for a world of hurt.

That's the thing, if you can kill one HH and then blow past the rest of them (not hard for the Demo ), they'll never put any damage on you. They are only Speed 3, not terribly maneuverable, and only threatening to enemies in their front arc at close range. A 1st Player Demo can always zip away form that pretty easily, whereas against a long-ranged TRC 90 corvette, they are always plinking you for reliable damage. There is the risk of getting boxed in and trapped by them, but a smart and cautious Demo should be able to avoid this. Even then, a Demo can pretty easily tank two close range HH front-arc shots, even if they have External Racks, so you've got a lot of leeway.

Color me skeptical, but I expect HHs to have about the same effect on the meta as CR90bs. That being said, the models are glorious and I may be underestimating their upgrade suite (e.g. boarding parties).

Just now, AllWingsStandyingBy said:

That's the thing, if you can kill one HH and then blow past the rest of them (not hard for the Demo ), they'll never put any damage on you. They are only Speed 3, not terribly maneuverable, and only threatening to enemies in their front arc at close range. A 1st Player Demo can always zip away form that pretty easily, whereas against a long-ranged TRC 90 corvette, they are always plinking you for reliable damage. There is the risk of getting boxed in and trapped by them, but a smart and cautious Demo should be able to avoid this. Even then, a Demo can pretty easily tank two close range HH front-arc shots, even if they have External Racks, so you've got a lot of leeway.

Color me skeptical, but I expect HHs to have about the same effect on the meta as CR90bs. That being said, the models are glorious and I may be underestimating their upgrade suite (e.g. boarding parties).

Demolisher can do that. Relentless or Interdictor or Hand of Justice will all have a much harder time. I hear what you're saying, and they're definitely going to need work to be tactically deceiving with their course given the maneuver chart. I just will default to overestimating them until I've destroyed them at medium range with a single ISD shot consistently.

Plus if Demolisher is threatening 3 and killing one HH, that's an entire other quarter of my list that isn't being threatened by Demo.

2 minutes ago, geek19 said:

Plus if Demolisher is threatening 3 and killing one HH, that's an entire other three quarters of my list that isn't being threatened by Demo.

FTFY

Just now, GiledPallaeon said:

FTFY

Stupid math, why'd i major in you!

Just now, geek19 said:

Stupid math, why'd i major in you!

So you could have engineers correcting the writing you didn't sign up to do

Just now, GiledPallaeon said:

So you could have engineers correcting the writing you didn't sign up to do

But i'm also an engineer! Who likes writing! I'm a travesty in like 3 different areas!

Just now, geek19 said:

But i'm also an engineer! Who likes writing! I'm a travesty in like 3 different areas!

Then you're beyond my help.

2 minutes ago, GiledPallaeon said:

Then you're beyond my help.

(Pretending to get this back on topic) I don't need your help! I'll use Hammerheads to clear me a path!

Just now, geek19 said:

(Pretending to get this back on topic) I don't need your help! I'll use Hammerheads to clear me a path!

I do think a key to fighting them will be denying them them their optimal range attacks. I don't think it will be hard to kill them; I think it will be hard to kill them before they unleash their shots. Rhymer and ace bomber builds can both bleed them, but I really doubt it will be enough against a veteran HH player (once there is such a thing).

2 minutes ago, GiledPallaeon said:

I do think a key to fighting them will be denying them them their optimal range attacks. I don't think it will be hard to kill them; I think it will be hard to kill them before they unleash their shots. Rhymer and ace bomber builds can both bleed them, but I really doubt it will be enough against a veteran HH player (once there is such a thing).

I think using them with Mothma is going to make Bombers more impotent (as she normally does, of course). Even assuming you shoot them in the rear, that's still 1-2 redirected attacks/damage, the evade token used twice, and the contain when things start getting REALLY bad. If you can guarantee the BCC hit and crit every time, sure, that's a problem, but how many BCCs are you using? And are they commanding 2 squadrons a turn each and i'm not moving for some reason? And let's not even talk Task Force Antilles!

Depending on activation and location and blah blah blah, it (much like a lot of ships with Mothma versus bombers, of course) is not going to be easy to take them out. Maybe with Sloan? Maybe? Of course, if I'm just repeatedly letting you attack my ships with bombers and either not flakking them or attacking them back, i've misplayed badly and have my squadrons out of position. Or i'm playing @GhostOfArdaedhel 's list, of course.

7 minutes ago, geek19 said:

I think using them with Mothma is going to make Bombers more impotent (as she normally does, of course). Even assuming you shoot them in the rear, that's still 1-2 redirected attacks/damage, the evade token used twice, and the contain when things start getting REALLY bad. If you can guarantee the BCC hit and crit every time, sure, that's a problem, but how many BCCs are you using? And are they commanding 2 squadrons a turn each and i'm not moving for some reason? And let's not even talk Task Force Antilles!

Depending on activation and location and blah blah blah, it (much like a lot of ships with Mothma versus bombers, of course) is not going to be easy to take them out. Maybe with Sloan? Maybe? Of course, if I'm just repeatedly letting you attack my ships with bombers and either not flakking them or attacking them back, i've misplayed badly and have my squadrons out of position. Or i'm playing @GhostOfArdaedhel 's list, of course.

Exactly, which leaves you with ship-based firepower, which is not necessarily and more than probably not at all a better option. I'm sure I'll figure out how to fight the little buggers, but I'm not looking forward to the bloody noses between here and there.