Hi,

I'm a relatively new Armada player who sometimes has a chance to fleet these tiny spaceships.

So, I don't have much experience with coming up with fleets and would like to ask the hive mind for some feedback on a commander I really want to get to work: Sato.

The idea is to maximize the possible damage to big spaceships by rolling as many (bomber and/or black) dice as possible.

My main questions being: which objectives are best? Really struggling with a fitting navigational objective.

And: Should I replace Norra and Y-Wings with two regular B-Wings? I mean, with fighter coordination and all fighters follow me, they potentially move the distance of 4, am I right?

Here's the list:

Sato's Pelta and Hammerheads

Faction: Rebel Alliance
Points: 400/400

Commander: Commander Sato

Assault Objective: Precision Strike
Defense Objective: Fighter Ambush
Navigation Objective: Superior Positions

[ flagship ] Modified Pelta-class Command Ship (60 points)
- Commander Sato ( 32 points)
- Phoenix Home ( 3 points)
- Ahsoka Tano ( 2 points)
- Raymus Antilles ( 7 points)
- Fighter Coordination Team ( 3 points)
- Boosted Comms ( 4 points)
- All Fighters, Follow Me! ( 5 points)
= 116 total ship cost

Hammerhead Torpedo Corvette (36 points)
- Task Force Antilles ( 3 points)
- Ordnance Experts ( 4 points)
- External Racks ( 3 points)
= 46 total ship cost

Hammerhead Torpedo Corvette (36 points)
- Task Force Antilles ( 3 points)
- Ordnance Experts ( 4 points)
- External Racks ( 3 points)
= 46 total ship cost

GR-75 Medium Transports (18 points)
- Flight Commander ( 3 points)
- Boosted Comms ( 4 points)
- Bomber Command Center ( 8 points)
= 33 total ship cost

GR-75 Medium Transports (18 points)
- Flight Commander ( 3 points)
- Boosted Comms ( 4 points)
- Bomber Command Center ( 8 points)
= 33 total ship cost

1 Tycho Celchu ( 16 points)
1 Green Squadron ( 12 points)
4 X-Wing Squadrons ( 52 points)
1 Norra Wexley ( 17 points)
1 Y-Wing Squadron ( 10 points)
1 Jan Ors ( 19 points)

Card view link

In my experience, B-Wings won't need Norra, so if you spend the extra points and replace those Y-Wings, you can drop Norra all together. I've also had Sato work with 6 squadrons, so feel free to drop or upgrade one of those X-Wings. If you have Biggs he rolls a black bomber die, and will help your other X-Wings stay alive. I would drop the second BCC Flotilla all together you'll only need one and add Bright Hope to keep the other one around a little longer. Possibly add Dash to tear up enemy squadrons, he also rolls a black bomber die.

For objectives, I'd take Most Wanted, VIP and Superior Positions.

I am just starting the Corellian Campaign for the first time, and one of my lists is a Sato list with a foresight mc30 and 6xHH with task force organa. For squadrons I am rocking Tycho, Shara, Corran, and rogue squadron. Obviously different rule set/list building restrictions, but volume of fire and modification seems important, as well as having squadrons that will let you actually trigger the ability.

Read this to help you get started. http://cannotgetyourshipout.blogspot.com/2017/06/know-your-enemycommanders-corner-jun.html

That was written by @geek19

Ginkapo and I seem to be the most passionate about Sato, so I feel like we tend to understand Sato the best.

First off, Bomber Command Center has been errata'd so you can only have 1 in your fleet. I also think Flight Commander is not doing anything for you, since you normally want to pair that with Fighter Coordination Team so you get the +1 speed before you activate. That right there frees 14 points.

Change the Y-Wing for Gold Squad. 2 blue and no Heavy is amazing.

This is my own build I've been working on:

I know Gink wrote an article, but I'll let him impart any wisdom with it.

In regards to your questions, you definitely want to keep Norra. She is deceptively powerful for her cost. It also makes your X-Wings hit for 2 damage on 3 die faces. I would drop an X-Wing to get Biggs in there. Biggs+Jan is amazing. You could take another Y-Wing by cutting 2 X-Wings.

I like your objectives. Precision Strike works better if you have APT, doubly so with Sato. Hit an ISD with a long range face up and get 15 points. The problem with long range crits is the inconsistency, as well as the amount of Evades you encounter.

Superior Position is also great since you have AFFM and can get your squads in the rear. Just be careful not to over extend your squads and move outside command range.

Fighter Ambush is tricky to use. I think it's a trap to deploy your squads as close to the opponent as possible, because you open them up for free attacks. I like to deploy the squads on my half of the board but in front of my ships. You can wrack up a lot of points with it.

I'm not sold on the Hammerheads. You need to get them up close before they do anything. I also think the Pelta is a huge liability. If it goes down, your fleet is hurting bad. I'd drop Boosted Comms off all your ships. Run the Pelta and GR-75s in tight formation with the squad ball. The HH can run together. If you can get enough points, get another HH in there. 6 activation Sato works very well because you can set your squads up for the next round. I'd drop Pheonix Home and Ahsoka. Put Ahsoka on a GR-75 so it can support the Raymus AFFM combo. Expanded Hanger Bay could go on the Pelta as well. FCT works on 4 squads and you can activate 5.

3 minutes ago, Undeadguy said:

First off, Bomber Command Center has been errata'd so you can only have 1 in your fleet.

Not completely true. You can have as many as you like, but each squad can only use it once per attack. They no longer stack.

19 minutes ago, teeseeuu said:

Not completely true. You can have as many as you like, but each squad can only use it once per attack. They no longer stack.

Oh right. I just translated that into "Never take more than 1". The effect is the same. Since you want your ships to be in range to command, you'll have overlapping BCC which is a waste.

My wisdom is that this fleet matches Undeadguys version of Sato far better than mine.

I agree with keeping Norra and swapping the Y-wing for Gold Squadron.

Would dropping the GR-75s for a 3rd Hammerhead be a good move? I am thinking about doing this for my CC fleet as I haven't found the GR-75 with BCC to be very effective, and I wouldn't mind having 3 Hammerheads with TFA. I feel like Sato is just better with more attack ships.

9 minutes ago, SQUIDwarrior said:

I agree with keeping Norra and swapping the Y-wing for Gold Squadron.

Would dropping the GR-75s for a 3rd Hammerhead be a good move? I am thinking about doing this for my CC fleet as I haven't found the GR-75 with BCC to be very effective, and I wouldn't mind having 3 Hammerheads with TFA. I feel like Sato is just better with more attack ships.

Sato is better with more ships that can attack, but you also need ships that can push squads, while balancing the squad points against ship points. Not to mention the activation order and pre-planning required to make Sato work. Because of this. I think of Sato as the most technically challenging commander to work with. It's hard to run just enough squads and just have enough ships and not lose it all when one thing goes wrong.

So I don't think dropping the GR-75s would be efficient. The Pelta can push 4 of them, but you have another 5 without commands. You could use the HH to push them, but you end up trickling them in 1 at a time. Also, with red bomber dice, you really need the BCC.

If you want to run without BCC, you're better off running a fast and mobile fleet. A-Wings, Paragon, CR90s/HH, MC30s. And since you can spread out more, the natural way to go is with VCXs. Now it makes sense to run 1 command ships, so you can drop the GR-75s. This is my preferred play style with Sato. It also allows me to run 6 ships, 6-8 squads, and as first or second player. With Strategic, it opens up the objective game.

3 hours ago, Undeadguy said:

Read this to help you get started. http://cannotgetyourshipout.blogspot.com/2017/06/know-your-enemycommanders-corner-jun.html

That was written by @geek19

Ginkapo and I seem to be the most passionate about Sato, so I feel like we tend to understand Sato the best.

First off, Bomber Command Center has been errata'd so you can only have 1 in your fleet. I also think Flight Commander is not doing anything for you, since you normally want to pair that with Fighter Coordination Team so you get the +1 speed before you activate. That right there frees 14 points.

Never mind, answered up thread.

2 hours ago, Undeadguy said:

If you want to run without BCC, you're better off running a fast and mobile fleet. A-Wings, Paragon, CR90s/HH, MC30s. And since you can spread out more, the natural way to go is with VCXs. Now it makes sense to run 1 command ships, so you can drop the GR-75s. This is my preferred play style with Sato. It also allows me to run 6 ships, 6-8 squads, and as first or second player. With Strategic, it opens up the objective game.

Yes, this is the concept I had in my head with Sato. I tend to like the durability of X-wings over A-wings and I don't usually use them as bombers, so BCC only makes sense to me if I am taking a fleet of Y-wings or B-wings. I never seem to get my X-wings to do anything other than kill enemy squads, but maybe that's just me.

For this list I think dropping one of the GR-75s and using those points to make your squads have a little more punch since you are a bit light on the activations.

BTW, one of the best things with Sato is seeing the look on your you opponent's face as you start swapping around red dice for black.

Biggs only rolls Red Bomber dice (correction from earlier) .

Wedge and Luke rolls black

In my experience, 3x combat Transport, 1 with tory farr, Jan,Biggs,Tycho,3x Xwings is quite a Solid start for a Sato list, which leaves around 196 Points for combat ships of your choice: Defiance, Salvation, (Paragon), apt hammers, corvettes are all Solid choices. The mentioned base worked me pretty well, x-Wings can hang around for Long periods around ships, while tycho goes wherever he is needed. Their dmg to ships is okay-ish, but can deal with squads too. Toryn boosts their Anti-squad capabilities, and the flak of the 2 other flotillas. And the flotillas fill the role of carries and provide decent flak, but also thanks to Sato, They can punch way above their strenght (once played most Wanted, rolling 3 blacks from a 24 Point ship is Just insane).

wow! Thank you for all of your feedback!

Here is how I have changed the list. Basically I swapped out the Hammerheads and one transport (as I don't have them yet) with a Yavaris and a CR90, Biggs and Gold Squadron. Also I've included Intel Sweep, ideally having the CR90 collecting the objectives.

So, what do you think, especially about the Pelta as I don't have any experience with this ship?

Sato's Pelta and Hammerheads
Author: muellerkp

Faction: Rebel Alliance
Points: 396/400

Commander: Commander Sato

Assault Objective: Precision Strike
Defense Objective: Fighter Ambush
Navigation Objective: Intel Sweep

[ flagship ] Modified Pelta-class Command Ship (60 points)
- Commander Sato ( 32 points)
- Raymus Antilles ( 7 points)
- Boosted Comms ( 4 points)
- All Fighters, Follow Me! ( 5 points)
= 108 total ship cost

Nebulon-B Escort Frigate (57 points)
- Yavaris ( 5 points)
- Toryn Farr ( 7 points)
= 69 total ship cost

GR-75 Medium Transports (18 points)
- Wing Commander ( 6 points)
- Boosted Comms ( 4 points)
- Bomber Command Center ( 8 points)
= 36 total ship cost

CR90 Corvette A (44 points)
- Jainas Light ( 2 points)
- Leia Organa ( 3 points)
= 49 total ship cost

1 Tycho Celchu ( 16 points)
1 Green Squadron ( 12 points)
3 X-Wing Squadrons ( 39 points)
1 Jan Ors ( 19 points)
1 Norra Wexley ( 17 points)
1 Gold Squadron ( 12 points)
1 Biggs Darklighter ( 19 points)

Card view link

2 hours ago, millerlk said:

Here is how I have changed the list. Basically I swapped out the Hammerheads and one transport (as I don't have them yet) with a Yavaris and a CR90, Biggs and Gold Squadron. Also I've included Intel Sweep, ideally having the CR90 collecting the objectives.

So, what do you think, especially about the Pelta as I don't have any experience with this ship?

I don't think this is really a Sato list, but more of a Rieekan Aces variant. I think Sato will do fine for you.

Drop Wing Commander from the GR-75. You should only be running squad commands with it anyway. You have no need for concentrate fire or repair, but Nav might be useful. Since it's command 1, you can make that decision at the start of the round. This let's you add Ahsoka to it, so you can change the token created by Raymus into a squad to trigger AFFM, or to change a Nav token on Yavaris into a squad.

I don't think you need Leia either, simply because you want squad commands on the Pelta and Neb. You don't need dial manipulation unless you're running a 3 command ship.

I'm not sure about Toryn on Yavaris, because I tend to use the AA quite often, and Toryn can't reroll the dice on the ship she is on. You could transfer her to the GR-75 and put Ahsoka on the CR90. If you do that, you will want to drop Boosted Comms from the GR-75 since Toryn and squad command range is the same.

Aside from your fleet build, you'll want to work on formation flying and getting double arcs so you can have Sato working to the best of his ability. Test it out. It's the only way you will be able to improve the list at this point.

TRCs on the corvette is ideal.

@Undeadguy, Leia is great for command flexibility, but she is also used for slicer tools/Cham insurance.

27 minutes ago, anonymousguy said:

TRCs on the corvette is ideal.

@Undeadguy, Leia is great for command flexibility, but she is also used for slicer tools/Cham insurance.

I'm aware of what she does, but Slicer and Cham is not often seen. If it's popular in your area, it can be good to use but it also dictates your activation order which can mess with plan. Also, Leia is on the CR90, which is not the ideal place to put her if you're going to use squad commands. Drop Wing Commander and move her there.

https://archiveofossus.wordpress.com/2017/09/16/uk-nationals-satos-star-destroyers/

I'll throw this in now we have gone far enough that it wont distract from others points too much.

Sort of stated above, only can echo: More aces list than Sato. 9 squads, id stop one since 1 is deployment wise wasted. If you need more Points, you could downgrade your corvette, and upgradig the Transport to combat refit at the pruce of wing commander would be beneficial too.

Ill mention it,up to you whether you agree but if your running B-Wings and so have plans to speed them up, drop a YT1300 in there.

While im a firm believer in the YT1300 being better than a Xwing for the same price (more health, counter 1 and escort) i know not everyone agrees and with sato, A and E wings would be my bet, with a nice intel option.

( will probs be edited when i get free time lol)