Hey everyone!
I've been feeling a bit lately like some ships have been getting pidgeon-holed in my fleet building process- like, I can't run a CR90 without TRC, or I can't run Demo without APT- so I decided that I would throw out the rulebook and just run something weird and crazy that I had never tried without giving even a second thought to optimization. I expected it to be fun to play, but I didn't expect it to do very well. After playing (and winning) two games with the fleet this past weekend, I figured I would share some thoughts here. First the fleet-
Vaders Funky Fleet
Author: Brobafett
Faction: Galactic Empire
Points: 395/400
Commander: Darth Vader
Assault Objective: Most Wanted
Defense Objective: Contested Outpost
Navigation Objective: Salvage Run
Imperial II-Class Star Destroyer (120 points)
- Devastator ( 10 points)
- Gunnery Team ( 7 points)
- Reinforced Blast Doors ( 5 points)
- Spinal Armament ( 9 points)
= 151 total ship cost
[ flagship ] Gladiator II-Class Star Destroyer (62 points)
- Darth Vader ( 36 points)
- Demolisher ( 10 points)
- Minister Tua ( 2 points)
- Sensor Team ( 5 points)
- Engine Techs ( 8 points)
- Electronic Countermeasures ( 7 points)
- Expanded Launchers ( 13 points)
= 143 total ship cost
Gozanti-class Cruisers (23 points)
= 23 total ship cost
Gozanti-class Cruisers (23 points)
- Comms Net ( 2 points)
= 25 total ship cost
Gozanti-class Cruisers (23 points)
= 23 total ship cost
1 Ciena Ree ( 17 points)
1 Valen Rudor ( 13 points)
First off - this isn't really looking for fleet suggestions. After playing a couple games with it, I KNOW there are plenty of ways I could improve this fleet. I'm not really interested in what I could have put on different that would make it more effective, the whole point was to make a fleet using weird stuff and not worry about making it effective before I went out and tried to blow some stuff up. Plus, I won both the games I played with it, so there.
First game I played a VSD-II loaded to bear + JJ, VSD-I, standard Demo, Gozanti, and about a 100pt squad ball featuring a nasty Zertic-Bossk combo. Devastator was in range of a end-of-move Demo shot after he activated turn 2, and had taken a planetary ion cannon shot top of the turn, so most of his tokens were red. After demo shot, I scrapped 3 of the 4 tokens, leaving a redirect only, and proceeded to one shot demo and take the VSD-II flagship down to 4 hull with the first shots of turn 3. Devastator paid the ultimate price as it went down to combined fire that turn. However, it almost lived. It had 4 hull with only the obstructed 2 red dice front arc of the VSD-1 left in the turn, and my opponent rolled two doubles to take off the last 4 hull. Still, even without Devastator, the damage was done and Demo and the Gozanti's mopped up the fleet. In the end only the opponent gozanti limped away to deny the table. I claimed most of the squads in trade for only Ciena, and final tally was a 104pt MOV win to me. Not too bad for the first time flying, and there were DEFINITELY flaws with the way I flew it (most notably the fact that in this game I had Vader on the ISD, not Demo, and I lost him turn 3 leaving Demo with 3 rounds of re-rolless fighting to slog through. Vader on Demo in game 2 worked much better.)
Second game I played a Sato fleet with an Admonition Torp-30, AFMKII with Ordnance, Salvation, Combat GR75, and a big mixed squad ball with flexible Sato triggers like Tycho mixed in with double HWK intel, VCX's for token shuffling (MW, Fire Lanes, Sensor Net - UGH), and some bombers notably Gold Squad. I had played this fleet before and knew it was tough, and in the hands of a skillful player (our own @Maturin, who regularly beats me and was also, completely unrelatedly, the first person I ever played a vassal game with - I am ever grateful for him as a friend and incredible opponent!) Anyway, we played Fire Lanes, and the Rebels deployed well, running parallel to the deploy line to farm tokens. Devastator deployed in the rear-arc pincer position while demo streaked in from the front. Offensively, Demo's pass across the nose of the Assault Frigate and side of Salvation was pretty good, pushing enough damage on the Assault Frigate that he kept it out of the fight in order to repair it rather than risking it to re-engaging against Devastator turn 4 or 5 which was crucial in keeping Devastator alive. Demo tanked a ton of black dice Sato damage from the assault frigate and Salvation side arcs and came out on the other side with no shields, no def tokens, and 2 hull and flew straight on to safety while Devastator screamed in from the rear and started popping the weakened ships. I didn't get the Assault Frigate, or many of the squads, but in this game I also didn't take any losses. I will say that Devastator throwing 5 red 8 blue at mid range was- well in a word -- devastating. In the end the Assault Frigate readied it's side arc for the ISD to wander into, but I was narrowly able to avoid it, meaning that Devastator finished the game with 4 hull, no shields, and no def tokens. I had managed to overrun the Fire Lanes tokens, so the net gain from the objective was mitigated to +45 to my opponent, which did not offset the losses enough to bother counting up MOV. There was about 175 points left on the board for Maturin, which meant it was probably roughly a 175pt MOV in my favor, but could have EASILY gone hard against me if Demo and Devastator had been blown up instead of limping tokenless, shieldless, and on their last hull points to the end of the game.
All this to say - I played two awesome and incredibly fun games of Armada and I got a little outside the box. I know this is nothing super revolutionary, it's not like I am sitting here saying hey I found the next anti-meta meta-crusher. I know I am not the first to run any of these ships. But I can say, Expanded Launcher/Sensor Team demo is scary fun. 4 black, 5 with CF, and a guaranteed accuracy out the front only to repeat it at the top of the next turn is nothing to sneeze at. Is it worth the points over ordnance and APT? Eh, totally depends on if that accuracy is the difference between winning and losing isn't it? Devastator is a fun ship too, if for nothing other than being able to say, "Ok, so I will be rolling 5 red and 7 blue," to your opponent and watching their eyes. Also, there is nothing that makes me happier than CF'ing with a Gozanti for 2 blue, and then rerolling accs with Vader. With 3 of them, it's a super annoying stream of consistent 2-3 plink damage that the opponent laughs at until it starts to pile up.
I guess the only reason why I felt like this was worth the read (as opposed to most of the stuff I write, where immediately after typing it all up I go, "Ok, but who the **** cares" and delete the whole thing.) is because I felt maybe someone else might also be feeling like they could only fly ships one way and might read it and take a risk and fly something totally new to them. Maybe even have some fun and learn some things in the process.
