As the title suggests, I recently broke out the upsilon from its plastic and hit the table. as I already forum dwell enough to know Kylo is arguably the best pilot for the ship, I wanted to try to cobble something together with the other pilots, specifically major stridan.

I initally took :

major stridan

Fcs

System officer

and filled the rest of the list with an x/7 delta and intensity, x/7 , mk2 vessery. The idea was the shuttle could hand out target locks so vessery could get his pilot ability off consistently, and the defenders were free to break a loose formation due to stridans pilot ability.

After flying my list and dieing in a spectacular ball of fire to a tie snap swarm, I came to the following conclusions:

coordinate is really good.

Fcs is almost useless on a 4atk primary ship. (Against ties anyway)

Intensity is decent on vessery but ps might still be more important.

This list hates stress.

With this in mind I'm specifically looking for help with building stridan. I was looking at maybe this:

major stridan

Kylo Rens shuttle

General Hux

kylo ren

advanced sensors

(45 points)

idea is that hux gets his ability off before movement, preferably a green to clear stress. Kylo crew and title are there to help deter shooting the ship first. How good is hux? Is the shuttle title worth it? Is Kylo enough of a deterrent without any guaranteed crit results?

I want to be able to pair up the upsilon with vessery again, (vi instead of intensity, probably) so 35-36 points. As for stress I was thinking of flying elipson leader for stress control of the shuttle, but keeping a tie f/o in formation with a shuttle is going to potentially be frustrating. Are there any good tie shuttle stress removal builds out there?

reason I'm asking all of this is there's a local tournament next weekend and I wanted to fly something fun (coordinate action looked really interesting). Also put my beloved defenders on the table (well in this case just one, but still)

Kylo crew puts a big target on him. It's also an action so you'd have to take turns between that and Hux if you stick with him. Hux can be great with the amount of tokens he hands out and one of them is unblockable with the condition card. He has some good uses, but I'm not sure anyone has a very practical list including him just yet. That being said, you definitely want to make sure you're flying at least 3 ships to get the most out of hux, probably 4 if you can fit them, although that would mean cutting vessery most likely.

What do you want the ship to do? Is he going to be a goodie bag of tokens, a stress or control bus? An upsilon is tough to take down, and if you can make your opponent sink a few shots there while the rest of your fleet does its thing, you've already made good use of it. FCS with Targeting Sync make for a pretty nasty way to share your target locks, while experimental interface with Hux and inspiring recruit let you coordinate and hand out 3 tokens, then relieve your stress with your next green move. Having both the title and rebel captive make him a stress threat and a pain in the butt to shoot at.

I could go on, but let's start with that for now. Give us an idea what you'd like your ship to do and we'll see about building a ship worth flying.

2 hours ago, Jimbawa said:

Kylo crew puts a big target on him. It's also an action so you'd have to take turns between that and Hux if you stick with him. Hux can be great with the amount of tokens he hands out and one of them is unblockable with the condition card. He has some good uses, but I'm not sure anyone has a very practical list including him just yet. That being said, you definitely want to make sure you're flying at least 3 ships to get the most out of hux, probably 4 if you can fit them, although that would mean cutting vessery most likely.

What do you want the ship to do? Is he going to be a goodie bag of tokens, a stress or control bus? An upsilon is tough to take down, and if you can make your opponent sink a few shots there while the rest of your fleet does its thing, you've already made good use of it. FCS with Targeting Sync make for a pretty nasty way to share your target locks, while experimental interface with Hux and inspiring recruit let you coordinate and hand out 3 tokens, then relieve your stress with your next green move. Having both the title and rebel captive make him a stress threat and a pain in the butt to shoot at.

I could go on, but let's start with that for now. Give us an idea what you'd like your ship to do and we'll see about building a ship worth flying.

With Major stridan's pilot ability, I think either a token spreader or target lock giver would be better suited with his pilot ability than the others. (stress/control also sounds interesting)

I can't vouch for the viability of these builds, but if you're looking for something semi casual and fun, I think I've got some builds for you.

• Major Stridan (32)
  • Experimental Interface (3)
  • Electronic Baffle (0)
  • General Hux (5)
  • Systems Officer (2)
  • Hyperwave Comm Scanner (1)
  • Pattern Analyzer (2)

Total: 46

This one is here to hand out candy like it's halloween all day e'ryday. His typical turn would be perform a green maneuver, give out a free target lock if you have a friendly in range, use PA to first Coordinate then use General Hux to hand out an action and 3 focus tokens. Use Baffle to trade one shield to remove a stress token, then remove the second one in the check pilot stress step. During setup, hand out focus or evade tokens if you have a means to keep them (comms relay or the speculated advanced optics with the tie silencer) or drop HCS to bring it down to 45 points. This also lets you perform red maneuvers, such as a 0 stop and still get your actions off that round and the following round if you don't mind burning through some of your own health.

• Major Stridan (32)
  • Tactical Jammers (1)
  • FCS (2)
  • Weapons Engineer (3)
  • Darth Vader (3)
  • Targeting Sync (3)
  • Pattern Analyzer (2)

Total: 46

This setup puts you right in the middle of combat. You will want to stay in firing range and arc, screening your shipmates and target lock or coordinate to maximize their action economy. Use PA to get actions on turns when you stop or do 1 and 3 turns and greens the following round. Every round when you get a shot, you get two target locks to share to your shipmates and you never need to worry about using them yourself. If you hit, great! Vader them down. If you miss, great! Vader them down. You have enough shields and hull that you can afford to trade some of your health for guaranteed damage against their aces. He is enough of a threat that your enemies can't really ignore him, but he certainly isn't a closer. Pair him with 2 ships that can push damage early and seal the deal late game.

In both cases, if an ace gets behind you and manages to stay there, there's not much you can do on your own to stop it. If you're pairing him with a defender, you'll have to fly light. Like delta squad /x7 light. A pair of Academy pilots brings both lists up to 70 points, if you can find a good final 30 point ship. At that point, don't expect to have initiative and just focus on something that can move and dodge. Omega Leader would fit and is a fine closer, but doesn't throw enough dice unless you're getting your mileage out of Maj. Stridan, in which case he becomes the lynchpin and the build falls apart once he's gone. You could fill out your squad with bombers if you have a good selection of ordinance, but I think your best bet is going to be using a ``35ish point ace like QD or the Inquisitor, or Vader if you replace or don't run him as crew, and a 20ish point filler ship with some teeth like a striker or interceptor.

On 10/1/2017 at 9:11 PM, Jimbawa said:

I can't vouch for the viability of these builds, but if you're looking for something semi casual and fun, I think I've got some builds for you.

• Major Stridan (32)
  • Experimental Interface (3)
  • Electronic Baffle (0)
  • General Hux (5)
  • Systems Officer (2)
  • Hyperwave Comm Scanner (1)
  • Pattern Analyzer (2)

Total: 46

This one is here to hand out candy like it's halloween all day e'ryday. His typical turn would be perform a green maneuver, give out a free target lock if you have a friendly in range, use PA to first Coordinate then use General Hux to hand out an action and 3 focus tokens. Use Baffle to trade one shield to remove a stress token, then remove the second one in the check pilot stress step. During setup, hand out focus or evade tokens if you have a means to keep them (comms relay or the speculated advanced optics with the tie silencer) or drop HCS to bring it down to 45 points. This also lets you perform red maneuvers, such as a 0 stop and still get your actions off that round and the following round if you don't mind burning through some of your own health.

• Major Stridan (32)
  • Tactical Jammers (1)
  • FCS (2)
  • Weapons Engineer (3)
  • Darth Vader (3)
  • Targeting Sync (3)
  • Pattern Analyzer (2)

Total: 46

This setup puts you right in the middle of combat. You will want to stay in firing range and arc, screening your shipmates and target lock or coordinate to maximize their action economy. Use PA to get actions on turns when you stop or do 1 and 3 turns and greens the following round. Every round when you get a shot, you get two target locks to share to your shipmates and you never need to worry about using them yourself. If you hit, great! Vader them down. If you miss, great! Vader them down. You have enough shields and hull that you can afford to trade some of your health for guaranteed damage against their aces. He is enough of a threat that your enemies can't really ignore him, but he certainly isn't a closer. Pair him with 2 ships that can push damage early and seal the deal late game.

In both cases, if an ace gets behind you and manages to stay there, there's not much you can do on your own to stop it. If you're pairing him with a defender, you'll have to fly light. Like delta squad /x7 light. A pair of Academy pilots brings both lists up to 70 points, if you can find a good final 30 point ship. At that point, don't expect to have initiative and just focus on something that can move and dodge. Omega Leader would fit and is a fine closer, but doesn't throw enough dice unless you're getting your mileage out of Maj. Stridan, in which case he becomes the lynchpin and the build falls apart once he's gone. You could fill out your squad with bombers if you have a good selection of ordinance, but I think your best bet is going to be using a ``35ish point ace like QD or the Inquisitor, or Vader if you replace or don't run him as crew, and a 20ish point filler ship with some teeth like a striker or interceptor.

I really like first one. The second one is definitely interesting, but looks like it takes a little more to fly it since I'll be in combat a lot. Also the deci is still on my list of ships to buy and while tactical jammer isn't going to break that build, it certainly helps whatever ship I'm flying with it.

As for pairings I really like the idea of inky and a striker. Although 3 academy's and a swarm leader tie also come to mind as well, but I'm not sure what kind of results I'd be getting there!

Seriously thank you for your help!

Welcome to Upsilon Club!

The first rule of Upsilon Club is: Fire Control System Sucks on an Upsilon Shuttle

The second rule of Upsilon Club is: Fire Control System Sucks on an Upsilon Shuttle

The other route to consistent damage output is unexpected, but it's Recon Specialist & Weapons Guidance, so you can turn a blank and one focus token to hits (or ASTS and Weapons Guidance if you're Kylo Ren). The problem with that loadout is that it's heavy on your actions to always Focus. Agent Kallus is a decent option that leaves you 'hands free' to Coordinate. I'm a big fan of Electronic Baffle to really open up the shuttle's dial when it matters most and you want the action too.

I'm currently playing:

• Kylo Ren - A Score To Settle, Electronic Baffle, Weapons Guidance, Kylo Ren's Shuttle (39)
• Darth Vader - Veteran Instincts, TIE/x1, Advanced Targeting Computer, Engine Upgrade (35)
• Omega Leader - Juke, Comm Relay (26)

And it's worth noting that the only Upsilon pilot to have ever really achieved anything in a tournament is Kylo. Co-ordinate at range 3 is nice, but an EPT slot and ISYTDS is a lot nicer.

I've been running this which is quite fun to play. I need to practice the list a bit more but I think it has potential:

Have one Trainee as blocker (the one without LWF) and line up the rest, Stridan makes a green move and gives a TL to a Striker. He then fires first and acquires a target lock with FCS that an other striker can use on his attack. With Hux everyone gets a focus. Rinse and repeat

Stridan's strikers (100)
Major Stridan — Upsilon-class Shuttle 32
Fire-Control System 2
General Hux 5
Systems Officer 2
Targeting Synchronizer 3
Tactical Jammer 1
Ship Total: 45

Imperial Trainee — TIE Striker 17
Lightweight Frame 2
Adaptive Ailerons 0
Ship Total: 19

Imperial Trainee — TIE Striker 17
Lightweight Frame 2
Adaptive Ailerons 0
Ship Total: 19

Imperial Trainee — TIE Striker 17
Adaptive Ailerons 0
Ship Total: 17

1 hour ago, Whippoorwills said:

I've been running this which is quite fun to play. I need to practice the list a bit more but I think it has potential:

Have one Trainee as blocker (the one without LWF) and line up the rest, Stridan makes a green move and gives a TL to a Striker. He then fires first and acquires a target lock with FCS that an other striker can use on his attack. With Hux everyone gets a focus. Rinse and repeat

Stridan's strikers (100)
Major Stridan — Upsilon-class Shuttle 32
Fire-Control System 2
General Hux 5
Systems Officer 2
Targeting Synchronizer 3
Tactical Jammer 1
Ship Total: 45

Imperial Trainee — TIE Striker 17
Lightweight Frame 2
Adaptive Ailerons 0
Ship Total: 19

Imperial Trainee — TIE Striker 17
Lightweight Frame 2
Adaptive Ailerons 0
Ship Total: 19

Imperial Trainee — TIE Striker 17
Adaptive Ailerons 0
Ship Total: 17

Given Hux' stress token cost, I would strongly recommend either pattern analyser or advanced sensors - by comparison, Tactical Jammer isn't a great pairing with Strikers; their minimum speed is too slow to easily hang behind a large ship.

Remember that whilst he may have trouble lining up on a target, Stridan is your big gun. I can see Targeting Synchroniser working well; you will have trouble keeping the same target in the shuttle's arc, but if someone else more manouvrable can use it....

For flexibility, a Weapons Engineer might give you more options. The strikers can produce their own focus - I rarely find myself needing to barrel roll with them, so unless you desperately need to evade with them, they can provide their own focus and Stridan can focus on the job of handing out rerolls.

I was running Stridan with Advanced Sensors, Hux, and Systems officer which was pretty neat. Pair with a couple of aces and it was loads of fun. However, you have to strategically bump or figure that Hux will only be effective for Stridan (while still getting shots with Stridan) for 2 turns before it falls apart. My favorite list with the Upsilon so far has been the one I took to Regionals this year (just missed the cut):

Starkiller Base Pilot + Electronic Baffle + Emperor Palpatine + Hyperwave Comm Scanner (40)
“Duchess” + Veteran Instincts + Adaptive Ailerons + Lightweight Frame (26)
Darth Vader + TIE/x1 + Adaptability + Engine Upgrade + Advanced Targeting Computer (34)

I originally had Prockets on Vader instead of the Hyperwave and LWF, but in testing the HyperWave was SOOOOO useful. You can deploy the upsilon at PS12 which is great for creating the first engagement. The other two ships are fast enough that you can place them towards the middle if someone has PS10/11, and still get the engagement you want including the shuttle. For great wins with the list I would coordinate a boost or barrel roll to one of my aces for next turn stuff after dials were down. The Baffle allows you to park on the edge of the rockfield, let the aces duke it out right in front of you, and you can still give the aces actions even if you forever 0-stop! Palp with an extra red die and two more hull is easily worth the upgrade from the old shuttle.

So, I'm writing a blog at the moment about my experiences tinkering with the Upsilon, and I cover FCS in that. It turns out that according the Metawing FCS isn't the best System upgrade for an Upsilon... it's actually the worst!

And the blog...
http://stayontheleader.blogspot.co.uk/2017/10/squadbuilding-trial-and-error-with.html

15 minutes ago, Stay On The Leader said:

And the blog...
http://stayontheleader.blogspot.co.uk/2017/10/squadbuilding-trial-and-error-with.html

Awesome read! Experimenting with the Upsilon has been an absolute blast

Is there really a point to CD? Isn't it for boost/barrel roll only? Which the shuttle doesn't do, right? I feel like people just slap it on there to be cheeky.

*immediately puts collision detector on Upsilon*

I think the craziest Upsilon build I came up with was

Major Stridan

General Hux (crew)

Inspiring Recruit

Advanced Sensors

Experiemental Interface

Kylo Rens Shuttle

Pretty much nuts. With two other aces, Stridan can give all three of your ships (Upsilon included) a focus, plus FD, with experimental you can hux AND coordinate, and remove both stress and do it next turn with Inspiring Recruit. It comes out at a stupid 46 points, but with two other cheap ish aces it was great fun to watch your opponent wither in horror as you dished out focus tokens and a free action before you even moved. At range 1-3 with stridan (hooray). It died stupidly quickly but that may have been because I was playing it badly and forward so it died pretty fast.

1 hour ago, Malabor said:

Is there really a point to CD? Isn't it for boost/barrel roll only? Which the shuttle doesn't do, right? I feel like people just slap it on there to be cheeky.

*immediately puts collision detector on Upsilon*

The 2 sentences apply separately. So even if you just do a normal maneuver over debris, you ignore crits when you're rolling for damage (essentially meaning you take no damage from debris).

Not bad for zero points and importantly means you can fly through debris to keep things in arc free from worry about taking damage.

It also took me a long time to learn it to take FCS.

Here's all I have right now, but I have to drop the systems upgrade. Still trying to find the perfect partners for him; I agree an X/7 Vessery is a perfect match.

Upsilon-class Shuttle: · Major Stridan (32)
· General Hux (5)
Systems officer (2)
TIE Defender: · Colonel Vessery (35)
Veteran Instincts (1)
TIE/x7 (-2)
TIE/fo Fighter: · "Omega Leader" (21)
Juke (2)
Comm Relay (3)
-- TOTAL ------- 99p. --

17 hours ago, Goseki1 said:

The 2 sentences apply separately. So even if you just do a normal maneuver over debris, you ignore crits when you're rolling for damage (essentially meaning you take no damage from debris).

Not bad for zero points and importantly means you can fly through debris to keep things in arc free from worry about taking damage.

It also took me a long time to learn it to take FCS.

Thanks. Once I read the card more carefully, I figured it out. Slapped it on there last night and it actually saved me a couple times! LoL