I had the good fortune to play a game against @CyborgNinja yesterday. I wanted to try out some of the new cards and also try out some Dual ISD action, so I went ahead and created a list that allowed for both!
ISD1: Avenger, Tua, Boarding Troopers, ECM, Leading Shots
ISD2: Jerjerrod, Gunnery Teams, Reinforced Blast Doors, XI7, Leading Shots
2x Raider 1: Ordnance Experts, External Racks
Ninja was running the following:
MC80 Assault: Admiral Leia, Defiance, Nav Officer, Engine Tech, H9, Leading Shots, Advanced Projectors, ECM
Nebulon B Support: Salvation, Skilled First Officer, Quad Battery Turrets, Medical Officer
GR75: Boosted Comm
GR75: Quantum Storm, Slicer Tools
2 VCX, 3 Z95, Blount, 2 XWing (it may have been 2 Z95 and Blount, I forget)
He was right at 400, compared to my 398 so I opted for first player, thinking it would be advantageous for the Boarding Trooper / Avenger shenanigans and to avoid being hit by Defiance. I picked his Sensor Net mission since neither of us had played it before (other options were Fire Lanes and Advanced Gunnery).
Our deployment. You can see the objective token placement, I've set up Avenger at speed 3, my other ISD at 1, and the two Raiders at speed 2.
End of turn 1. I'm trying to head off his MC80 with the Raider on the right to pin it down, which will put Avenger in a great position to smash it. I'm thinking to use the left Raiderto hit his Boosted Comm flotilla on my left, and my ISD2 is just going to semi-slow roll the objectives while his small ships come to me.
End of 2. Ninja rolled 10! damage with Salvation on Avenger, using a combination of Leia and a CF command! Now I'm really low on shields. Maybe this wasn't such a good idea, and I should have stuck with the original concept of running the 2 ISDs close together... Still, with some decent rolls, I'm in a good position to wreck Defiance the next turn.
End of 3. Do we notice something missing? Yes, I failed to kill the MC80, and I paid for it. In fact, I only had 6 damage cards on Defiance at the end of the shooting. Defiance wasn't able to kill Avenger alone, needing the help of the Z95s to finish off Avenger (go Blount!).
End of 4. I've set up a shot against Defiance with my Raider, although I've managed to only have 1 arc, and Defiance has repaired several cards of damage. I also have lined up my ISD2 to hopefully destroy Salvation.
End of 5. Short story, I can't kill anything with my dice deciding to mock me during the thunderstorms we were experiencing.
In turn 6, we moved our 2 large ships, neither killed the other, and we called it at that point. What I was able to take away from this: Avenger / Boarding Troopers is a nice gimmick, but you really need to support it with an assistant if you're taking on a large ship. Dual ISD lists look imposing but it's difficult to bring their full firepower to bear. Strategic lists can rack up lots of Victory tokens using the Sensor Net mission.
