Hi Guys

I'm quite new to the game but I'm becoming really disillusioned with it.

I play Rebels at our local tournament every Friday. I come last every week and have only ever won 1 game there.

I didn't mind at first (I'm a great loser) but after my beating last night I'm beginning to think it's not the game for me as I'm not getting any better.

I have all the Rebel ships and cards and the 3 pilots I want to use are Wes, Asty and Wedge.

Can any one give me any advice as I'm rubbish at list building.

Thanks for any replies

3 minutes ago, burning666 said:

Hi Guys

I'm quite new to the game but I'm becoming really disillusioned with it.

I play Rebels at our local tournament every Friday. I come last every week and have only ever won 1 game there.

I didn't mind at first (I'm a great loser) but after my beating last night I'm beginning to think it's not the game for me as I'm not getting any better.

I have all the Rebel ships and cards and the 3 pilots I want to use are Wes, Asty and Wedge.

Can any one give me any advice as I'm rubbish at list building.

Thanks for any replies

The worst thing about FFG is they love you to spend $$$ on tournaments. This is the way for many people who love STAR WARS to become jaded and hate what you love. The meta-power-listers will kill you because that is how they enjoy their wretched version of this wonderful hobby.

Don't Do It! Play with friends and family or at least don't play with the competitive tournament crowd.

For a start, I'd look to see if there's a casual night anywhere around you. Too much tournament play when you're starting out can just make you feel totally helpless, especially since some of the best tourney lists you can expect your opponents to fly are just unforgiving.

Secondly, you're picking some difficult ships to fly. The T-70 is fine, but the classic x-wing is such a slave to its maneuver dial. When your skills improve, you can more reliably select your maneuver based on what you expect your opponent to do, but starting off, being able to reposition your ships after you've seen your oponents move is invaluable, especially since it's the primary benefit of investing so many points in pilot skill. A-wings, Dash, and the T-70 are the rebellion's most mobile ships, so I'd try flying some combination of those for a bit.

Thirdly, as much fun as it is to run your own list of the ships you want to fly, it's worth playing top lists sometimes. Apart from giving you some wins, it will give you a better idea of why some lists are as good as they are while also exposing their weaknesses.

Finally, the biggest problem with the three ships you want to play is that they are all too expensive to run all together. Triple aces is mostly an Imperial thing since they have a lot of cheap ace builds, but rebels tend to run in either a Biggs Squad or as two decked-out spaceboats.

Thanks for the Advice.

If I was just to run Wes who else should I consider for wingman?

Three X-wings, includes Wes, can make opponents cry:

Jess Pava (27)
T-70 X-Wing (25), R2-D6 (1), Integrated Astromech (0), Draw Their Fire (1)

Captain Rex (16)
Sabine's TIE Fighter (14), Sabine's Masterpiece (1), Black Market Slicer Tools (1), Chopper (0)

Biggs Darklighter (26)
X-Wing (25), R4-D6 (1), Integrated Astromech (0)

Wes Janson (31)
X-Wing (29), R3-A2 (2), Adaptability (0), Integrated Astromech (0)

5 minutes ago, Hawkstrike said:

Three X-wings, includes Wes, can make opponents cry:

Jess Pava (27)
T-70 X-Wing (25), R2-D6 (1), Integrated Astromech (0), Draw Their Fire (1)

Captain Rex (16)
Sabine's TIE Fighter (14), Sabine's Masterpiece (1), Black Market Slicer Tools (1), Chopper (0)

Biggs Darklighter (26)
X-Wing (25), R4-D6 (1), Integrated Astromech (0)

Wes Janson (31)
X-Wing (29), R3-A2 (2), Adaptability (0), Integrated Astromech (0)

Thanks mate how does the synergy between them work?

Biggs protects Wes and Jess, who are your heavy hitters. Captain Rex reduces incoming fire against Biggs, and Jess makes Biggs' R4-D6 work better by pulling off any remaining crits with Draw Their Fire (also allows her to protect other members of the team). Meanwhile jess is getting the offensive and defensive rerolls from her wingmates.

When Wes attacks, he stresses the target, then strips its tokens -- great against lower PS ordnance carriers. Then on the next activation phase Rex can zip up and use BMST against the stressed target to inflict more damage, through the shields (I've killed Inquisitors and Corran Horn quickly with this technique).

12 minutes ago, burning666 said:

Thanks mate how does the synergy between them work?

Biggs keeps the other ships alive by them all flying in formation. Rex penalises ships that don't fire at him, so forcing your opponent to shoot Biggs means Biggs lives longer because of Rex. Biggs astro lets him shed some damage if he takes a big hit, and Jess's EPT lets her pull a crit off of Biggs. Keeping Biggs alive keeps everyone else alive.

Wes and Jess are your main damage dealers and with Wes having R3-A2 he's stressing and stripping tokens from his target, making it easier for Jess to land damage and giving you some control. Biggs can actually shoot things as well... often overlooked ;-)

I don't play Rebels, but my brother is Scum and he only uses the same three ships every time when we play. I'm getting bored with it, and I think he is too, but he won't admit it. So while I can't figure out how to help me and him, I can help you (mainly because I'm so bored).

Try to convince your friends to play. Tell them how to get started. Tell them to play other factions. You will be able to test against other factions, strategies, and players outside of tournament/meta players.

Like @hargleblarg said, find a casual tournament. I live in Atlanta, so a fun mix of people always shows up with really unique lists. A French dude last week beat my Upsilon Swarm Leader with Blount, a B-Wing and Poetensity/BB8. If you can't find one, get some people together and make one!

Finally, have fun! You have every Rebel ship and card (which is more then I can say for my Imp fleet) so you have access to a lot of deadly combinations.

And if you want a more challenging game for you and your friends, Armada is much more difficult (and wallet-hungry) and less people play it, but you can easily jump between the two without confusing rules.

Happy Hunting, @burning666 !

Practice flying in a formation at home. Throw down some random asteroids and fly around them. It's harder than it looks, especially when dialing in banks.

For a good example of how to fly a similar list, here's an example of x-wing nobody Paul Heaver flying a similar list .

1 hour ago, burning666 said:

Hi Guys

I'm quite new to the game but I'm becoming really disillusioned with it.

I play Rebels at our local tournament every Friday. I come last every week and have only ever won 1 game there.

I didn't mind at first (I'm a great loser) but after my beating last night I'm beginning to think it's not the game for me as I'm not getting any better.

I have all the Rebel ships and cards and the 3 pilots I want to use are Wes, Asty and Wedge.

Can any one give me any advice as I'm rubbish at list building.

Thanks for any replies

Are you permitted copy's of the cards or printouts for your squad at your local tournament?
If not, let us know the exact number of expansion you have.
I am sure we will be able to help you build a competitive squad.

Practice, practice, practice. The more you play, the better you'll get. X-Wings - both standard and T-70's - are tricky ships to get the best out of for even an experienced player, so don't be too disheartened by your early results.

Also, you can practice movement, formation flying and test your lists using Ynot's Squad Benchmark site - the AI isn't difficult, but it can really help you get the hang of movement patterns and judging distances.

1 hour ago, burning666 said:

Hi Guys

I'm quite new to the game but I'm becoming really disillusioned with it.

I play Rebels at our local tournament every Friday. I come last every week and have only ever won 1 game there.

I didn't mind at first (I'm a great loser) but after my beating last night I'm beginning to think it's not the game for me as I'm not getting any better.

I have all the Rebel ships and cards and the 3 pilots I want to use are Wes, Asty and Wedge.

Can any one give me any advice as I'm rubbish at list building.

Thanks for any replies

DO NOT THROW IN THE TOWEL!

X-wing is a great game especially when flown casually. My best friend and I have a standing Wednesday night X-Wing game night. Pizza and homemade chocolate chip cookies courtesy of his wife. We fly what we want. Good or bad it's a fun night.

I've entered 4 store tournaments and won a grand total of 3 games and I've been playing for better than 2-1/2 years. I figure my longest consecutive losing streak is 15 games in casual play and I'm still at it.

A couple of hints might help.

1) Know what you're flying very, very well . Nothing will kill you quicker than forgetting how your squad can attack and defend.

2) Know how your opponent's ships move. There are movement cheat sheets available that are tournament legal. There's nothing worse than the "Oh, crap!" moment when your opponent pulls a surprise maneuver and leaves hanging out on a limb.

3) This is the tough one. You need to balance your best move vs what you think your opponent's best move is. If your opponent knows what your best move is and plans accordingly, you could end up taking a close range broadside with no way to retaliate. If you're only throwing green dice you're losing.

Remember that tournament play is not for everyone. I know it's not for me but I'll occasionally enter my flgs competition or another store close by. I don't have any delusions about winning. I do it to learn new techniques and builds, to meet new players and last but not least, have some fun.

2 hours ago, burning666 said:

Hi Guys

I'm quite new to the game but I'm becoming really disillusioned with it.

I play Rebels at our local tournament every Friday. I come last every week and have only ever won 1 game there.

I didn't mind at first (I'm a great loser) but after my beating last night I'm beginning to think it's not the game for me as I'm not getting any better.

I have all the Rebel ships and cards and the 3 pilots I want to use are Wes, Asty and Wedge.

Can any one give me any advice as I'm rubbish at list building.

Thanks for any replies

Increasingly, the game forces players to make the choice, "do you want to win, or do you want to fly whatever you like?", with an ever-growing unspoken "not both" thrown in there.

With that said, don't think that there isn't a lot of flexibility in what CAN win.

You just have to be a bit careful when deciding what to throw on the table.

Have you paid attention to what lists have won your weekly tournaments? Perhaps a good place to start is by taking one such list and flying it, exactly the same, in order to figure out what makes it work well.

If you're new, you've got the hurdle of experience to overcome. People could tell you what to do, sure, but what will make you remember it the most is actually doing it. Do you play any games outside of the weekly tournament?

How many games have you lost?

Seriously suggest downloading vassal. Play and lose as many games as possible.

As far as rebels, a 2 ship list with Rey/Poe or Dash/Poe is the only thing they have that I could consider new player friendly.

The Rey and Dash in those lists are 10000% easier to fly than Wes, Hello Nasty, and Wedge. Poe will still help you learn the basics for flying x-wings you like but he is much more forgiving.

You will be throwing 4 dice consistently and ignoring rocks with Dash and with Rey youll be getting 4 dice shots with 2 built in rerolls, plus the fall back of 3 dice regardless of what your dial did.

Or do what I did and fly Imperial Boba/Whisper like extra gravity training from DBZ. Forces you to learn how to fly a Big Ship that cant get shots 100% of the time with a turret and flying Whisper is fun and teaches you to think ahead since he dies in 1 turn if you dont .

You might need to lose more to win more.

Set small goals and fly a 2 ship list ( one big one small ).

Some of this also depends on what folks are flyng at your store.

If its all Kylo Ren, Kanan, Biggs, Fair Ship, Nym, Jumpmasters, Miranda, TLT etc......then im not sure what to say....since i still havent figured out how to consistently win against those things.

There is a massive difference between tournament play and casual play. People will min/max a lot for a tournament, but they will try out a lot of different things in a casual game that they wouldnt normally try.

1 hour ago, Sparklelord said:

Increasingly, the game forces players to make the choice, "do you want to win, or do you want to fly whatever you like?", with an ever-growing unspoken "not both" thrown in there.

I fly what ever I like and have done quite well over the course of this game being out. While it is easier to play The Meta lists for tournaments, learning your ships does wonders.

1 minute ago, Hujoe Bigs said:

I fly what ever I like and have done quite well over the course of this game being out. While it is easier to play The Meta lists for tournaments, learning your ships does wonders .

People have mentioned it, but those three ships leave you very tight for points, so much so that you're quite restricted in what you can do with them. The Biggs build that's been posted above is a good one, as it gets some very solid defensive bonuses.

Another option is to make use of the high PS that Wes and Wedge have to throw a high PS alpha strike on the table. Ello is replaced in this build, but I've had success with something very similar to this in the past:

Wes Janson (29)
Veteran Instincts (1)
Plasma Torpedoes (3)
BB-8 (2)
Guidance Chips (0)

Wedge Antilles (29)
Adaptability (0)
Proton Torpedoes (4)
R7-T1 (3)
Guidance Chips (0)

Airen Cracken (19)
Veteran Instincts (1)
Cruise Missiles (3)
Vectored Thrusters (2)

Total: 96

The idea is that because they're all PS10, you can manipulate your firing and movement order to maximum effect. For example, against, say, an enemy Dengar, you roll up and TL with Wes and Cracken, focus with Wedge. Wes shoots his plasma first, stripping tokens and shields, allowing Cracken a better shot. Maybe you get lucky, Wes and Cracken both roll like gods, and Dengar goes down: you then use Cracken's free action to let Wedge TL the other ship in the list. If not, Wedge TL's Dengar and has a TL+focus shot with reduced agility. Depending on the damage you did previously, you might not even need the Proton Torp at that point. Incidentally, that's why VT on Cracken matters so much - his contribution to the alpha strike should be through his missiles (which means he uses his action for a TL), but if he has to barrel roll to get a shot, that means he's still contributing via his ability even if his two dice are easily dodged.

The list here has a huge initiative bid, so there's flexibility to go with, say, homing missiles instead of cruise, if your meta has a lot of evade tokens, or to turn one of your droids into a regen droid (though reposition is really useful at PS10). I wouldn't want to totally give up the bid though, as initiative is critical for getting those TLs in this list, and there are suddenly lots of PS10s around after Captain Nym was released.

Here's the thing though - this list punches really hard, and, assuming average dice rolls, against a decent portion of the meta that will be enough to win you games. But it's very much a glass cannon, and it's never going to be a world beater. Sooner or later, you'll come up against something that can weather that initial alpha strike and still punch back hard enough to cause you all sorts of trouble, or alternately, dice variance will get you and that initial alpha will just fizzle. But it sounds like what you need is a few wins on the board, and an alpha strike list can give you those.

I'm a bit overwhelmed with all the advice. Its awesome that you guys have taken the time to help me out.

After reading the posts I feel motivated again.

good luck, man. Flying x-wings is trick due to relative power and complexity creep over the more recent waves

I personally think you could pull off a Poe/Wes/Biggs build with fairly decent results, however

generally, your game group should not be adverse to proxying outside of sanctioned FFG events (regionals, maybe store champs) or them being assholes, and I very much encourage it

http://geordanr.github.io/xwing/?f=Rebel Alliance&d=v4!s!175:18,-1,78,204:-1:15:;4:-1,77:-1:20:;82:27,-1,69:-1:20:&sn=X-wings&obs=

oh hey, I actually used all the astros from the GR-75

Stop playing tourneys, just fly casual.

Wes is really strong and will always be strong. A good pilot to have as a favorite as sticking him in any squad is hardly ever a bad choice. Wedge and Atsy however are not so strong. Wedge will get maybe two shots all game without Biggs. So you want an alpha strike like the one above to get as much as possible from his ability.

One thing to help people starting out is regen. Look at Poe with intensity and r2d2 and comm relay. That ship is HARD AS **** to kill aka Good mov for tournament settings. He is 43-45 pts (or cheaper for ps8 version), so if you can manage to kill 56+ pts of enemy, then its a good chance you will win cause not many ships 1v1 can take out this Poe.

You can team Poe up with Wes and Jess, or just go Dash or Rey.

Dont give up. I got crushed at local tourneys for a long time going 1-2 or 1-3 like every **** week. Within a year I got top8 at regionals. So just keep truckin errr flyin.

Don't give up. Practise is important, but another hugely important thing many people neglect is improving in different ways than just playing. Things to do that will help you improve:

a) Figure out your turn 0. A lot of beginner players don't really know what to do with their obstacles or ships at the beginning. Try to consider very specific openings. Look for maneuvering tricks, such as fortressing. Learn the rule of 11. experiment with formations and read up on existing ones, such as offset box formation.

b) This is slightly controversial, but for competitive events, netlist until you get good enough that you can build solid lists yourself. Meta lists absolutely can be beaten by custom ones, but building squadrons that not only work well together but also have an advantage against meta squadrons is a task that requires experience, knowledge, time (and a little bit of luck- to get that spark of inspiration :P). If you're adamant on bringing your own squadrons, ask more experienced players for help- often a small change such as swapping a single ship or a couple of upgrades can be a huge improvement.

c) Study both the game and the metagame. There are a lot of ways to do this- blogs, podcasts, guides, list juggler, meta analyzer, dice calculators... even talking to your opponent after the game. Ask them about that interaction that wasn't 100% clear for you. Don't understand why one of their cards is in their squadron? They definitely know, and likely won't see an issue in explaining it. Most players are very friendly folk, but they can't answer your questions if you don't ask them.

As for your favourite pilots, Wes is definitely nothing to sneeze at. The other two aren't doing so hot, though I would expect an expansion that will buff the X-wing to be announced before the end of the year.

Here is a squadron that I did pretty well with (2-1, though the loss was my mistake, the squadron was certainly capable of winning it) that includes Wes: http://xwing-builder.co.uk/view/742556/ps10-alpha

The idea is that you wipe the largest threat in the opponent's squadron off the board before they even get to fire. If you manage to pull it off with just the cruise missiles (very possible when that threat is Vessery, for example) you can also leave another ship double stressed. (R3-A2 also helps a lot against expertise)

Look for a casual non-tourney night to play and have fun. Some of us are not destined to be good players (me) but still enjoy different formats and playtime. Once you cross a certain level even losing at tournaments isn't quite so bad since you feel as though your choices matter instead of ant vs boot.

Really though... there are other things beyond tournaments.