I've been "playing" X-wing since the beginning, getting Imp and Rebel ships as they came out. I really started getting into the game this year and was glad that I'd been investing in two factions even though I was just playing casually with friends, but now I'm finding more and more that I want to play some Scum too...

Basically, I want to know what y'all think is best to get first for Scum. I've looked at a lot of suggestions from people but they're suggestions have ending up being more extensive than what I want. I'm looking for more of like a "top 5" kind of thing. Of course "find out what you'd like to fly and get that" would be an acceptable answer to my question. I'd really like to know what people like and what is nesesary.

The obvious answer is first get the scum and villainy pack. Besides the Y-wing and 2 Z-wings, it includes pilots for the HWK and Firespray... and the Scum Firespray pilots are generally considered to be superior to the Imperial ones. So right off the bat you'll have enough to field a scum list. Right now the Kihraxz and Starviper are a little upderpowered for their cost, but the upcoming hired guns pack looks to inject new life into those two. I find the Kihraxz to be a lot of fun as is (though I agree it is too expensive) The Aggressor Can be a really interesting ship, but I have found people either love it or hate it. And FF should have sold that ship as a 2 pack as it is all but required to fly a pair of them. The Shadowcaster is a blast to fly with the rotating firing arc.

Scum has a lot of analogs to the other 2 factions in their ships. For example, if you like TIE fighters or A-Wings, look at a few M-3As. Their ships tend to be a bit weaker, but again, the Hired Guns is going to fix that with the addition of pulse ray shields.

So yeah, you may have to play the ships to figure out if you like them, but your taste in Rebel/Imperial ships can probably guide you to where you should begin if you look at the stat lines of the Scum stuff. What you won't get a real taste of until you actually start using scum is how much fun the illicit upgrades can be.

On 30/06/2017 at 7:43 PM, Xïax said:

Basically, I want to know what y'all think is best to get first for Scum. I've looked at a lot of suggestions from people but they're suggestions have ending up being more extensive than what I want. I'm looking for more of like a "top 5" kind of thing. Of course "find out what you'd like to fly and get that" would be an acceptable answer to my question. I'd really like to know what people like and what is nesesary.

Depends what you've already got on your roster. As xbeaker said, the Most Wanted box set is a good place to start... if you've got a Rebel HWK, an Imperial Firespray, Y-Wings, Z-95's etc. It comes some good upgrades in the box if yu want to fly ships you already own in a different faction, but it's by no means essential to starting out in Scum.

The top 5 ships at the moment for Scum are probably:

Punishing One (Jumpmaster 5000) - all pilot cards are useful - the Contracted Scout, Manaroo, Tel Trevura and Dengar are all powerful and have all had success at the competitive level. You also benefit from equally powerful upgrade cards in Attani Mindlink (x2), Dengar and Guidance Chips.

Protectorate Starfighter - good to go right out of the box (although you might want Autothrusters if you haven't already got them). Old Teroch and Fenn Rau are the star pilots here, and Scum's current top aces.

Shadow Caster (Lancer Pursuit Craft) - the third ship in the terrible trio. Asajj Ventress and Ketsu Onyo are the stand out pilots, with some really nasty abilities, and Latts Razzi is a useful crew card (especially combined with Asajj).

Basically you can grab two JM5K's, two Protectorates and a Shadow Caster and be able to recreate a good percentage of the current competitive Scum lists. After those three it levels out a bit, but there's a couple of expansions which give you some really useful upgrades:

Hound's Tooth - it's a tough old ship. Bossk is a heavy hitter, as is his crew card combined with Gunner. The Trandoshan Slaver is the base for the good old Bounty Hunter Party Bus (a Slaver with Dengar, Zuckuss and 4-LOM crew).

Mist Hunter - the ship itself is pretty much a Scum B-Wing, but Zuckuss and 4-LOM have useful pilot abilities. More importantly, the pack gives you the amazing Zuckuss and 4-LOM crew, plus two copies of Adaptability and the Tractor Beam upgrade.

The IG-2000 works best in pairs and good pilots take really get a lot of mileage out of it, but it's struggled recently in the burst damage meta and doesn't really synergize all that well with other Scum ships. StarVipers give you two copies of Autothrusters (which are great on the Protectorates), but you'll need to wait for Guns For Hire to come out for the ship itself to become really useful. Kihraxz are good filler ships which will again improve with Guns For Hire. Scyks and Quadjumpers are cheap filler ships with niche roles.

What he said ^ Much better and more thorough ship review.

Though it is worth noting that I just read a write up of a store championship in which someone won it all, including a finals game against the reigning UK nationals champ, with a pair of Aggressors. Despite them falling off in the meta a bit, they can definitely hold their own when flown well. It's true they don't really synergize with the other Scum ships, but I have never seen them flown with any other ships.. it is always a nearly identical pair of Aggressors.

Also, The protectorate star fighters are pretty great. They suffer from only 2 drawbacks. 1- to take advantage of them you need to get in really close. in many cases you want to be at range 1 and INSIDE your opponents firing arc. And 2- they are currently in reprints and very, very difficult to find.

Thank you guys for those in depth responses. Exactly what I wanted.