8 hours ago, Parkdaddy said:

Devastator throws 12 fully charged, plus 1 for a modification and 1 for a CF. 14 dice is the most, not counting red objective effects. ISD I can get 4 black (CF), 6 blue (Title), 5 red (spinals) for >12 damage and 2 accs unmodified.

they have almost the same damage potential, but devastator only pulls ahead by 2 blues. And the Vic is more achievable.

Yea forgot about Devastator. I suppose it's possible but don't see it happening too often. Burning all 4 tokens and getting a ship at close range doesn't seem all to easy and staying alive. With my example, you just need your opponent to take the objective.

4 hours ago, BergerFett said:

I am going to regret (ragret) this.

Vic2 in Sloan.

Strip tokens with fighers

Vic2 - Dominator, Disposable Capacitors, SW-7s, needa, TRC. with a CFP command its 3 red/6 blue Thats 6 blue that automatically 100% of the time do damage, add in TRC. you are talking about 8 damage automatically. If your fleet is doing its job, you are one shot-ing medium and small ships. Most ships have 3 defense tokens, there is no way that imperial tie swarm shouldn't be able to strip defenses in 2 activations to have the Vic come out and just hammer it. My buddy calls his TRC salvation the 50cal, well the that Vic build is the howitzer. Capacitors give you one turn of long range firepower.

Look at all the ships in the game, assume no defense tokens, full shields, look at how many get one shot by 8 auto damage (that's still assuming 2 of the red dice roll blank)

If you strip all the defense tokens with the squadrons, you don't need the VSD anymore. You would have done so many damage, that any normal attack for a naked VSD would kill it.

If you talk about a ship with 3 defense tokens, you need 6 accuracy to remove these defense tokens. For this you would have done at least 12 damage to the enemy ship and you need more than 18 Tie Fighter for it .
Unless the opponent is using the defense tokens on his own to redirect the mass of damage he gets.

Yes, 8 auto damage would kill everything that is not medium. Mark II, MC80, MC80L, ISD, VSD, Interdictor are the only that would stand against the 8 auto damage. But they would have taken 8-12 already from the squadrons.

1 minute ago, Tokra said:

If you strip all the defense tokens with the squadrons, you don't need the VSD anymore. You would have done so many damage, that any normal attack for a naked VSD would kill it.

If you talk about a ship with 3 defense tokens, you need 6 accuracy to remove these defense tokens. For this you would have done at least 12 damage to the enemy ship and you need more than 18 Tie Fighter for it .
Unless the opponent is using the defense tokens on his own to redirect the mass of damage he gets.

Yes, 8 auto damage would kill everything that is not medium. Mark II, MC80, MC80L, ISD, VSD, Interdictor are the only that would stand against the 8 auto damage. But they would have taken 8-12 already from the squadrons.

i like redundancy. this also lets me lead with the VIC if needed so they burn tokens for squadrons to go in after the fact. gives me options in how i want to activate my ships. having a stagnant plan that is predictable is terrible in armada.

I'm not sure Quads will have the impact we think they do in big v big combat.

I'm especially leery of them on a pickle. These things only fire if you are going slower than your target, not same speed, slower. This means that if you want to guarantee that long-range hurtage you have to go speed 1 and assume your opponent will not do the same (no guarantee of that at all) and going speed 1 makes an already easy to front-bump MC80 even more predictable.

Vics I already run at speed 1, very rarely at speed 2 and always with a nav token, but that means any big ships at speed one dodge the quad and also you never catch up to them.

I think Quads look like a "big handful of dice all the time" upgrade on paper but in practice it will likely find maximum value in off-arcs as flanker hate.

2 minutes ago, Hastatior said:

I think Quads look like a "big handful of dice all the time" upgrade on paper but in practice it will likely find maximum value in off-arcs as flanker hate.

Obviously haven't played with any of it yet, but I completely agree with this. That being said, flanker hate is REALLY good for VSDs, so this is still a really fantastic upgrade. Adding some teeth in all arcs is what makes this sing!

2 minutes ago, IronNerd said:

Obviously haven't played with any of it yet, but I completely agree with this. That being said, flanker hate is REALLY good for VSDs, so this is still a really fantastic upgrade. Adding some teeth in all arcs is what makes this sing!

Don't disagree with this one bit!

Instantly will replace Spinals on my standard (and much loved) Vic builds, and it's cheaper!

19 hours ago, Hastatior said:

Vics I already run at speed 1, very rarely at speed 2 and always with a nav token, but that means any big ships at speed one dodge the quad and also you never catch up to them.

Why would run Vic I at speed 1? They have black dice so you need to close range on your target. I run Vic II at speed 2 most often and I still struggle to maintain arcs and range despite having JJ.

11 minutes ago, Undeadguy said:

Why would run Vic I at speed 1? They have black dice so you need to close range on your target. I run Vic II at speed 2 most often and I still struggle to maintain arcs and range despite having JJ.

Run Vic I at speed 1 if you primarily use the Vic as a carrier / support ship. Otherwise, I tend to run mine at speed 2, then slow down as I get close. Speed 1 is also useful when playing against MSU lists.

Without a speed boost VSDs are best for taking and holding objectives, or being anvils to the hammers in your list. Being at speed 1 most of the time means you can use those Quads to hit stuff trying to flee, well, Demolisher? Devestator?

QBTs are also a thing if you're closing with a VSD-I and your opponent starts speeding up to avoid the black dice row and whatever you have packed in the torpedo slot... say, Enhanced Armament?

If nothing else this card is going to make people pay attention to how often they are at certain speeds...

1 hour ago, SoonerTed said:

Run Vic I at speed 1 if you primarily use the Vic as a carrier / support ship. Otherwise, I tend to run mine at speed 2, then slow down as I get close. Speed 1 is also useful when playing against MSU lists.

Idk I still don't get the logic of using a black dice ship at speed 1. Do you expect your opponent to come at you? Because I won't be corralled in between 2 Vic Is or a Vic I and an ISD. I'll just run away. Or simply kill it at medium range. Vics tend to die really quickly.

Just now, Undeadguy said:

Idk I still don't get the logic of using a black dice ship at speed 1. Do you expect your opponent to come at you? Because I won't be corralled in between 2 Vic Is or a Vic I and an ISD. I'll just run away. Or simply kill it at medium range. Vics tend to die really quickly.

Keep the Vic-I at long range and with some red dice modification / addition. Let the squads do the work, then speed up to 2 to finish the job.

1 minute ago, SoonerTed said:

Keep the Vic-I at long range and with some red dice modification / addition. Let the squads do the work, then speed up to 2 to finish the job.

But what's stopping your opponent from focusing on the squads? 3-4 reds is not a huge threat from a 70 point ship, likely loaded up with upgrades. Where as the Vic II can do the same thing a Vic I can but at medium range.

Just now, Undeadguy said:

But what's stopping your opponent from focusing on the squads? 3-4 reds is not a huge threat from a 70 point ship, likely loaded up with upgrades. Where as the Vic II can do the same thing a Vic I can but at medium range.

You are likely bringing close to 134 points in squads in this scenario.

Just now, SoonerTed said:

You are likely bringing close to 134 points in squads in this scenario.

Right. I've played max squads and Vic IIs before. You need to bring your full force against a target to be most effective, which is quite obvious. You don't spread all your attacks or squads all over the board right? You focus on 1 or 2. And the Vic II is more likely to do that before wave 6 since you have medium range instead of close.

Post wave 6, Vic II is even better since you can have all your dice at long range for a single round and have a full squadron attack at the same time. The Vic I still can't do that, and the only thing it really gains from this wave is the boarding parties, but that takes up both the weapons team and offensive slot. And still restricted to close range.

If you're taking the slowest and clumsiest ship in the game, why handicap yourself more by taking close range?

2 minutes ago, Undeadguy said:

Right. I've played max squads and Vic IIs before. You need to bring your full force against a target to be most effective, which is quite obvious. You don't spread all your attacks or squads all over the board right? You focus on 1 or 2. And the Vic II is more likely to do that before wave 6 since you have medium range instead of close.

Post wave 6, Vic II is even better since you can have all your dice at long range for a single round and have a full squadron attack at the same time. The Vic I still can't do that, and the only thing it really gains from this wave is the boarding parties, but that takes up both the weapons team and offensive slot. And still restricted to close range.

If you're taking the slowest and clumsiest ship in the game, why handicap yourself more by taking close range?

Because a Vic II is less points effective than a Vic I, and prior to the Quasar was the Vic I was best carrier for the Imps. I'll certainly be re-assessing with the Quasar.

Frankly, I think it's kind of obvious the VSD-II needed the help more. We've all been taking Victories as carriers because we wanted the upgrades you can take with a Fighter-3 ship. Of course you'd take the cheaper of the two if all you want is the fighter rating, the jump to the VSD-II was long touted as not worth it.

Suddenly with one, two cards we're looking at a six-dice strike at long range, and a card that takes a limitation of the VSD and turns it into a benefit. It's also a card the ISD-II cannot take, actually letting a VSD-II out-gun an ISD-II for the first round of shooting!

I don't think this will catapult the VSD into ISD or GSD levels of competitiveness, but it does open up some interesting strategies to use with the ship wheras before it was locked into the carrier role. For instance, VSD-IIs packing QBTs might want to look at Konstantine to increase their speeds to throw them out of position and make them sucepctible to QBTs. Taking Tractor Beams also lets you strip tokens to prevent anyone but Leia or Ozzel from controlling their ships speeds easily.

1 minute ago, Norsehound said:

Frankly, I think it's kind of obvious the VSD-II needed the help more. We've all been taking Victories as carriers because we wanted the upgrades you can take with a Fighter-3 ship. Of course you'd take the cheaper of the two if all you want is the fighter rating, the jump to the VSD-II was long touted as not worth it.

Suddenly with one, two cards we're looking at a six-dice strike at long range, and a card that takes a limitation of the VSD and turns it into a benefit. It's also a card the ISD-II cannot take, actually letting a VSD-II out-gun an ISD-II for the first round of shooting!

I don't think this will catapult the VSD into ISD or GSD levels of competitiveness, but it does open up some interesting strategies to use with the ship wheras before it was locked into the carrier role. For instance, VSD-IIs packing QBTs might want to look at Konstantine to increase their speeds to throw them out of position and make them sucepctible to QBTs. Taking Tractor Beams also lets you strip tokens to prevent anyone but Leia or Ozzel from controlling their ships speeds easily.

Tractor beams is an interesting choice here, but I have had good success with Quad Laser turrets on my VSDs, especially the Warlord with H9's.

1 minute ago, SoonerTed said:

Because a Vic II is less points effective than a Vic I, and prior to the Quasar was the Vic I was best carrier for the Imps. I'll certainly be re-assessing with the Quasar.

It might still end up being a better carrier than the Quasar. I'll know after I've fielded it a few times to judge how... allergic it is to being shot at. The VSD might have holes in its defense, but it's tougher than Hull 6 with two defense tokens. Anything you can do to increase the defense of the Quasar (A special officer, Tua, using Shuttles) you can also do on the Victory. The only thing the VSD can't do over the Quasar is the double slots for Weps teams and offensive retrofit, but you'd need to discover if having those is better than having a tougher ship.

Ugh, the Victory is a poor ship. That every other medium is poorer than it, likely by design to keep the VSD valid, is a sad state of Imperial fleet affairs... because half our selection is mediums and a heavy!

Just now, Norsehound said:

It might still end up being a better carrier than the Quasar. I'll know after I've fielded it a few times to judge how... allergic it is to being shot at. The VSD might have holes in its defense, but it's tougher than Hull 6 with two defense tokens. Anything you can do to increase the defense of the Quasar (A special officer, Tua, using Shuttles) you can also do on the Victory. The only thing the VSD can't do over the Quasar is the double slots for Weps teams and offensive retrofit, but you'd need to discover if having those is better than having a tougher ship.

Ugh, the Victory is a poor ship. That every other medium is poorer than it, likely by design to keep the VSD valid, is a sad state of Imperial fleet affairs... because half our selection is mediums and a heavy!

Hence the "reassessing". I actually enjoy my Victories. I've even run 3 at a time with JJ and close to max squads. Fun times.

Someday I want to return to Victory play... they are my favorite ship, and I'd campaign hard to increase their capabilities if I could. A tangent here, but I really wish Mediums were actual, better mid-line combatants so the full spectrum of starships are all good selections. That the INT and QF are hyper-specialized is fine... I just want the Victory to somehow be a good choice if you want some solid strength in your fleet without shelling out for an ISD. It's far from that point, but getting better.

And the only reason I'm not up in arms about the Assault Frigate is because I'm an Imperial player... but I hear complaints about how it's being relegated to uselessness, and wish the best for that ship too. *shrug*

2 minutes ago, Norsehound said:

Someday I want to return to Victory play... they are my favorite ship, and I'd campaign hard to increase their capabilities if I could. A tangent here, but I really wish Mediums were actual, better mid-line combatants so the full spectrum of starships are all good selections. That the INT and QF are hyper-specialized is fine... I just want the Victory to somehow be a good choice if you want some solid strength in your fleet without shelling out for an ISD. It's far from that point, but getting better.

And the only reason I'm not up in arms about the Assault Frigate is because I'm an Imperial player... but I hear complaints about how it's being relegated to uselessness, and wish the best for that ship too. *shrug*

INT? Not sure what ship you mean there...

5 minutes ago, SoonerTed said:

INT? Not sure what ship you mean there...

Interdictor

On 7/6/2017 at 10:58 AM, Undeadguy said:

Idk I still don't get the logic of using a black dice ship at speed 1. Do you expect your opponent to come at you? Because I won't be corralled in between 2 Vic Is or a Vic I and an ISD. I'll just run away. Or simply kill it at medium range. Vics tend to die really quickly.

Amazingly, not everyone plays exactly the same! I run them at speed 1 as anvils. Usually with spinals and often Nav Nav CF CF CF CF. I threaten with things like a rhymerball, an ISD or Demo. Amazingly, people tend to think "oh I'll just go through that vic" and usually eat 4 reds 4 blacks and possibly at least 1 double arc. I will sometimes start the Vic at speed 2, bank first nav slow down and position with second nav and then its 5 reds at anything that doesn't come at me and reds and blacks at anything that does. Obviously that can change and thats why I bank a nav in case I need to speed up but thats rare. Look at a frrekin range ruler and tell me the difference between blue and black range is worth all those points instead of learning how to deploy and fly?

I took 4th in a recent store champs with 2 spinal vics, a demo and 2 raiders and a goz no squads. Would have done better but I ran into a really good player with Reikaan Aceholes.

14 minutes ago, Hastatior said:

Amazingly, not everyone plays exactly the same! I run them at speed 1 as anvils. Usually with spinals and often Nav Nav CF CF CF CF. I threaten with things like a rhymerball, an ISD or Demo. Amazingly, people tend to think "oh I'll just go through that vic" and usually eat 4 reds 4 blacks and possibly at least 1 double arc. I will sometimes start the Vic at speed 2, bank first nav slow down and position with second nav and then its 5 reds at anything that doesn't come at me and reds and blacks at anything that does. Obviously that can change and thats why I bank a nav in case I need to speed up but thats rare. Look at a frrekin range ruler and tell me the difference between blue and black range is worth all those points instead of learning how to deploy and fly?

I took 4th in a recent store champs with 2 spinal vics, a demo and 2 raiders and a goz no squads. Would have done better but I ran into a really good player with Reikaan Aceholes.

You can get salty all you want about my opinion.

Medium range is quite large actually and it's very easy to get around the front of a Vic I, where as a Vic II has a much larger threat range. Plus it can take LS, which means all my dice is being rerolled, not just blacks off OE. And since I don't have OE, I have GT. You can take Vader to reroll reds, but that means you're not taking JJ which means I know where your Vic I is going to be.

I've played a lot of Vics. I know how to deploy and fly them. The only scenario I've seen a Vic I being better than a Vic II is when you're fighting MC30s because you need extra damage to push through, not Acc.

I'm going to go play in a Store Champ tomorrow with 2 Vic II so we will see what happens.

I got a game in with a Vic II last night, and I am pretty happy with the investment. Quads are a godsend for the ship, and DCaps give it a real nasty bite out at range. I didn't manage to get any value out of Gunnery Teams largely due to my opponent having his fleet very spread out, but Leading Shots seems to be a solid choice for the Ion slot. It played well as an area-denial artillery piece.

I may need to finally bite the bullet and pick up a Victory expansion, because I want to run two of them!