1 hour ago, iamfanboy said:

I actually think that your list you posted above is okay - four activations is pretty good, the Victory is a fair combat carrier with Jerry around and maybe a Navigate token if you need to speed change, the Gozanti and it together can push almost all your squadrons if they have tokens, and the Arquitens circles the battlefield. My quibbles are mostly about the Raider - it's devilish to use, particularly without External Racks (currently only available in a Rebel boxed set, gosh darnit!) though Ordnance Experts will help get that ACM crit effect off. Basically you have to get really good at zooming in from long range to short range, blasting them, and then GTFO'ing.

TIE Fighters AND Phantoms are also hard to use, and the reason I recommended the Jendon/Marna/Maarek core in my previous post is because it's a tight set of activations that can dish out damage to both squadrons and ships equally, meaning that if you win the squadron mini-game you can go on to the ACTUAL game of killin' ships (and that your opponent can't just ignore your squadrons lest they start tearing up your ships!)

Remember, squadrons don't matter if you don't have any ships around. Killing squadrons is secondary, killing SHIPS is what matters. That's one reason why Sloane is hyped a bit, because she means that regular ol' TIEs can help kill ships by making their ordinarily worthless blue anti-ship die into a token remover - not that I'm endorsing her to you, Motti and Jerjerrod are far better beginning Imperial commanders, if only Motti wasn't in the Victory expansion...

But seriously, if you haven't, read at least the beginner and Imperial relevant parts of the Cannot Get Your Ship Out blog. It's quite good.

I'll check out that Beginners Blog. The Raider was just about the right size to fit the list (no room for a Gladiator). With the squadrons, I'll consider it, but I only want to have to buy one squadron pack so that costs stay low-ish.

Edit: Looked at the squadron core that you suggested and it looks solid. What other Imp II squadrons (or TIEs) to fly with it is the question?

@Npmartian I had a good look at your list, and considering your desired playstyle. Im thinking that you are on the right track, your instincts are quite good in my opinion for an imp starting fleet. there's enough variation in there to help hone your skills in all aspects, and it nice and cheap to boot. What you came up with will allow you to be extremely versatile and give you better insight into the playstyle that will suit you in the future.

Various Types of Grey and Black Triangles
Author: Spaceman71

Faction: Galactic Empire
Points: 397/400

Commander: Moff Jerjerrod

Assault Objective: Most Wanted
Defense Objective: Hyperspace Assault
Navigation Objective: Superior Positions

[ flagship ] Victory II-Class Star Destroyer (85 points)
- Moff Jerjerrod ( 23 points)
- Minister Tua ( 2 points)
- Gunnery Team ( 7 points)
- Expanded Hangar Bay ( 5 points)
- Electronic Countermeasures ( 7 points)
= 129 total ship cost

Raider-I Class Corvette (44 points)
- Ordnance Experts ( 4 points)
- Assault Concussion Missiles ( 7 points)
= 55 total ship cost

Gozanti-class Cruisers (23 points)
- Comms Net ( 2 points)
= 25 total ship cost

Arquitens-class Light Cruiser (54 points)
- Reinforced Blast Doors ( 5 points)
- Dual Turbolaser Turrets ( 5 points)
= 64 total ship cost

1 Maarek Steele ( 21 points)
1 Colonel Jendon ( 20 points)
1 Morna Kee ( 27 points)
5 TIE Fighter Squadrons ( 40 points)
1 TIE Defender Squadron ( 16 points)

Card view link

I made a quick edit to include that Maarek-Jendon-Morna core that @iamfanboy suggested, but everything else stayed essentially the same.

On 10/5/2017 at 9:43 AM, cynanbloodbane said:

Alright, let's not overload the new guy with the Demolisher debate, valid as it may be.

We are hitting on some truths of Armada.

1-If you learn to fly a VSD effectively, you can fly nearly anything.

2-learning to use squadrons & Flotillas is vital. You don't need a ton, but you need to know how to run them.

3-learning to use the entire fleet effectively is more important than being awesome with just one ship. Play a solitaire game with new ships to get a feel for the movement differences.

4-go light on the upgrades early on. While fun, they add complexity, and there is no point buying an upgrade you then forget about all game.

This is totally true. I spent so much time getting my butt kicked with a VSD and it was worth it, because it taught me how to be careful with a capital ship. Then when I finally got an ISD, it was so much easier to fly.

Personally, I have always struggled with trying to balance competitive and fun. I would advise that if you want to just have fun, run alpha-strike carrier lists (You can run a decent one with a Quasar, the Core, and Squadrons 1), pound-them-from-a-distance lists (An ISD-II and a VSD-II with DCaps works well) or AvengerBT lists (Quasar and ISD, guaranteed to cause some fun damage dealing). That's what I've had a lot of fun with before, and they're not that hard to get the stuff for. Even though I lose a lot of games, I enjoy this sort of what-if building. If you want to be competitive though, it's a whole other ball game.

7 hours ago, Npmartian said:

Various Types of Grey and Black Triangles
Author: Spaceman71

Faction: Galactic Empire
Points: 397/400

Commander: Moff Jerjerrod

Assault Objective: Most Wanted
Defense Objective: Hyperspace Assault
Navigation Objective: Superior Positions

[ flagship ] Victory II-Class Star Destroyer (85 points)
- Moff Jerjerrod ( 23 points)
- Minister Tua ( 2 points)
- Gunnery Team ( 7 points)
- Expanded Hangar Bay ( 5 points)
- Electronic Countermeasures ( 7 points)
= 129 total ship cost

Raider-I Class Corvette (44 points)
- Ordnance Experts ( 4 points)
- Assault Concussion Missiles ( 7 points)
= 55 total ship cost

Gozanti-class Cruisers (23 points)
- Comms Net ( 2 points)
= 25 total ship cost

Arquitens-class Light Cruiser (54 points)
- Reinforced Blast Doors ( 5 points)
- Dual Turbolaser Turrets ( 5 points)
= 64 total ship cost

1 Maarek Steele ( 21 points)
1 Colonel Jendon ( 20 points)
1 Morna Kee ( 27 points)
5 TIE Fighter Squadrons ( 40 points)
1 TIE Defender Squadron ( 16 points)

Card view link

I made a quick edit to include that Maarek-Jendon-Morna core that @iamfanboy suggested, but everything else stayed essentially the same.

I'll be honest, moment I saw someone refer to Demo as a crutch i laughed, then cried, then decided I would just skip over the entire ordeal and come right here.

I think this is a really solid learner fleet with a relatively low entrace skill requirememt but as you get better has a lot of tricks you can use to get a lot of mileage out of it.

Couple of things that will really help

-picking up a disposable capacitor card for the victory.

-picking up an external racks or assault proton torpedo card for the raider.

-get a cc expansion for valen rudor, zertic strom, and saber squadron which are incredible replacements for those generic ties.

-change the defense objective to contested outpost.