except not really, because if you havn't learned from the SCURRG I'll just say it straight: it's nigh impossible to make anything as busted as the deadeye scout

but the Gunboat has a configuration that will give the Lok a run for its money, and actually probably outperform it utterly. I've been advertising it constantly since the first glimpse at the boat, but now that we have a clean look you can see its power more explicitly:

11 points of upgrades on a 21 point base, 32 points total

You got a 4 dice + full mods (LRS) + CRACKSHOT alpha (which doesn't need focus to fire ala deadeye)

You get a sustained 4 dice + re-roll attack that never goes away (or a 3 dice primary range 1 with re-roll). And you even out PS SCURRG/scouts!

obviously, I'm not going to herald a 7 health, 2 agi arc-locked ship as the next meta king, but I would say that this is the ideal boat build.

Your list, should you choose to accept it, would be two Rhos and lieutenant Karsabi for 98 points total. Why Karsabi? Because he's the only boat that can "k-turn" (turn into another turn to 180, take stress and fire HLC)

of course, you could always replace Karsabi with your favorite non-boat. VI Quickdraw fits in easily, as would a named x7 pilot for some more late game potential

and there you have it, your "deadeye-scout-but-not-really" 2.0

You cant use HLC with the title. Well you could, but it wouldn't be able to fire with a weapons disabled token

the title's wep disabled bonus is largely irrelevant because you will never do more than 1 damage with it

currently, the boat is the only two cannon small ship. that's the title's true benefit

course, you could always replace linked for T-beams or a flechette. Personally, I'd rather have the mods especially on Karsabi who ditches weps disabled anyway

I think the ability to flank an enemy out the gate (3-straight into a 3-turn) is a big part of its survivability. It should be pretty hard to keep this thing in arc.

For "alpha strike", honestly though, I have to believe ordnance is going to be this ship's bread and butter.

The OS-1 title with PtL allowing you to reload *and* take a focus or TL action to fire off a missile or torpedo you just reloaded...that sounds pretty good.

That would be my 32 point GUNBOAT...

Jumpmaster torp-scouts were deadly for a lot of reasons, not just a potent alpha strike.

The combination of high-to-extreme maneuverability (white sloops, green turns), turret primary, potent alpha strike (that operated without elaborate setup), defensive bulk, and good upgrade slots for combos - those were the reasons that ship prospered, and are many of the reasons it still does today.

Gunboats with your loadout have a more limited suite of advantages. Good maneuverability (with SLAM), decent alpha strike capability (deadeye scouts needed no specific target locks; they were much more flexible in targeting), and good defensive bulk for the base cost. Missing are the flexible upgrade slots for combos and turret access (very useful for SLAM-capable ships).

So, while I do think that these are potentially powerful jousters, I'm skeptical that they are so dangerous as torp scouts. Ultimately, I think that if pure joust-style ships are to make any sort of meta comeback, they will need to be quite powerful, so I'm receptive to the idea.

3 minutes ago, Kieransi said:

That would be my 32 point GUNBOAT...

why? you're much better off with HLC because of modifiers (Both offensive and defensive, as HLC can use the focus defensively and still fire) and no need to fiddle around with TLs. In order for this build to pull more weight, it basically has to be SLAMing constantly

1 minute ago, Babaganoosh said:

Jumpmaster torp-scouts were deadly for a lot of reasons, not just a potent alpha strike.

The combination of high-to-extreme maneuverability (white sloops, green turns), turret primary, potent alpha strike (that operated without elaborate setup), defensive bulk, and good upgrade slots for combos - those were the reasons that ship prospered, and are many of the reasons it still does today.

Gunboats with your loadout have a more limited suite of advantages. Good maneuverability (with SLAM), decent alpha strike capability (deadeye scouts needed no specific target locks; they were much more flexible in targeting), and good defensive bulk for the base cost. Missing are the flexible upgrade slots for combos and turret access (very useful for SLAM-capable ships).

So, while I do think that these are potentially powerful jousters, I'm skeptical that they are so dangerous as torp scouts. Ultimately, I think that if pure joust-style ships are to make any sort of meta comeback, they will need to be quite powerful, so I'm receptive to the idea.

first thing I said in the OP was how it actually wasn't torpscout good (nothing is, nothing should be)

just going full clickbait

6 minutes ago, ficklegreendice said:

why? you're much better off with HLC because of modifiers. In order for this build to pull more weight, it basically has to be SLAMing constantly

I didn’t say I didn’t like your HLC build! I think it’s solid!

Both throw four dice at range 2-3 consistently. The reason I prefer the ordnance version is that you can attack when you SLAM. I personally like that better than a single reroll, since to turn around, you need to SLAM.

Also, to address the target lock issue, Cruise Missiles don’t spend the TL, and we’re in a two-ship meta right now (Denym, Nymiranda, Dashmiranda, Corrandash, RACkylo, etc.) so once you target lock an enemy, it’s likely you’ll keep wanting to attack that same ship.

BS title. It's worse than the Deadeye Scurrgs and Deadeye Scurrgs ain't much.

1 minute ago, Stay On The Leader said:

BS title. It's worse than the Deadeye Scurrgs and Deadeye Scurrgs ain't much.

why is it worse?

it throws the same four dice, with full mods instead of chips (LRS), without the action dependency required to deadeye and it doesn't go away after two shots AND it has crackshot

I'd have to say it's strictly better than Deadeye SCURRG apart from health total and the crew slot for Boba

which isn't saying much competitively (as I have said in the actual post), but it's not nothing

Rho Squadron Veteran - OS-1 Loadout, Homing Missiles, Advanced SLAM, Crackshot - 31

Or switch out Crackshot for Push to SLAM, Reload, Target Lock for 33 points...

I'd dump the 7 point missile and torp combo for Push the Limit and either 1 missile (probably harpoon, maybe cruise), or even two missiles and go cruise and maybe prockets to be able to attack at r1-3 with a 4 dice modded attack).

Slam, PtL focus TL, still fire a missile, and be able to 2 green bank, slam 2 turn, reload and PtL TL next turn.

you're definitely going to want PTL ASLAM on OS-1 boats

firing one missile and then having to peel off to reload is not particularly great, unless you're chasing bombs and have to do that anyway (but even in that case, you want that defensive focus for TLT fire)

5 minutes ago, FTS Gecko said:

Rho Squadron Veteran - OS-1 Loadout, Homing Missiles, Advanced SLAM, Crackshot - 31

Harpoon instead of homing since the number of competitive ships with the evade action is low and the rider effect can be brutal maybe to save a point. Put in PtL instead of crackshot and you can get a 33 point PS 4 missile boat with TL/Focus every attack. You could mix in a way to get crits when you want with a crackshot/mangler cannon boat or just use harpoon because it's a 4 dice keep the TL missile and have the effect be just a random bonus if it happens. At that point you could also use cruise missile though it restricts you to 3 speed moves for the 4 dice fully modded shot with PtL. Brings you down to 32 points though in that case, which is a fairly nice number.

2 minutes ago, ficklegreendice said:

you're definitely going to want PTL ASLAM on OS-1 boats

firing one missile and then having to peel off to reload is not particularly great

Technically, you don’t have to peel off to reload, even if you don’t take PTL! If you take cruise missiles and don’t spend the lock, you can SLAM, reload, and attack the next turn!

2 minutes ago, Kieransi said:

Technically, you don’t have to peel off to reload, even if you don’t take PTL! If you take cruise missiles and don’t spend the lock, you can SLAM, reload, and attack the next turn!

fickle red dice?

EDIT: though not spending the TL if you have PTL to generate a focus for mods...it's a good strategy potentially. You TL once then PTL reload + focus forever, though you have to be going speed 3 to hit HLC levels of damage

Good it is about time Empire now has the OP stuff. Good bye Scum, Good Bye Rebels, Good Bye Rebel Scum you can all go DIE now!!!!

Just follow the example above

You don't want your plan to rely on luck, I think, unless your plan involved the new EPT that has an area effect on a miss. I think that EPT is a trap though, since swarms are going to remain dead for a while with Harpoon missiles. You could use extra munitions, I guess, instead of PtL so that you could attack, SLAM and TL, and still attack. But then you're spending 2 points for something you can already do with reload.

You could maybe get target locks another way, I'm pretty sure despite the article systems officer is a non-starter for a wingman of a SLAM-ing Gunboat with the range 1 restriction. I don't know a lot of crew carriers that are going to get within r1 of a gunboat with a green maneuver after the gunboat has performed a SLAM action.

On note of peeling off, Gunboat can probably do it better than anything else.

Unless someone was dead behind you and predicted you werent doing a turn-turn, gunboat should be able to completely vacate the area with ease.

26 minutes ago, ficklegreendice said:

fickle red dice?

For sure. That’s definitely a best-case scenario. That’s why I far prefer four of these:

+ Extra Munitions

+ Ordnance Title

+ Guidance Chips

(sorry, too lazy to go find pictures again)

My version :

Rho Pilot : 21 pts

Homming Missile : 5 pts

Title : 2 pts

Push the limits : 3 pts

Adv Slam : 2 pts

Total : 33 pts

Slam, do the free action (lock) and reload with push the limit. Repeat !

I'd probably go with Harpoon instead of Cruise for the PS 2s, It's nice not being stuck with a 3 speed move to get the most out of it. I'd also probably go with Harpoon instead of Homing because it's one point cheaper, you could slap on thread tracers for giggles in case you aren't able to TL your preferred target at your low PS, or to just make them 32 points to fit with other things in the list.

Personally i think LRS or Adv Slam are way better than Gchips on these.

Gchips were mainly to make that one shot count. Gunboats dont have one shot, they'd rather have flexibility. LRS lets them have a targetlock long before they need it and AdvSlam can be used for more than just targetlocking (advslam, reload, fire ordnance you just reloaded if you had a targetlock still there)

do agree on the gchips thing

at that point, you might as well just run a TIE bomber if you're not leveraging the unique advantages of the boat. It's not efficiently costed at all so we're going to be crutching on its whacky upgrade slot combos to get the most out of it

2 minutes ago, Vineheart01 said:

Personally i think LRS or Adv Slam are way better than Gchips on these.

Gchips were mainly to make that one shot count. Gunboats dont have one shot, they'd rather have flexibility. LRS lets them have a targetlock long before they need it and AdvSlam can be used for more than just targetlocking (advslam, reload, fire ordnance you just reloaded if you had a targetlock still there)

Yeah, I’m just playing around with the ship because it’s new and the generics are surprisingly affordable. In all seriousness, I expect the AdvSlam cards to be basically stapled to the ship cards...