The FLGS had a little mini-tourney last night in celebration of the release. Three rounds, 45 minutes each, new ships not required, but encouraged. Unfortunately, the owner had some issues with his attempted advertising of the event, and only seven folks showed up. And only three of us even knew there was going to be an event, ha ha. It was still a good, entertaining evening of casual (tournament) X-Wing. And I personally LOVED the lightning format, even with flying a new ship and new tech, although I would have liked to have had the time to take pictures.

My list:

List Total: 98

Round One:

Opponent Zach, running Lowhhrick with Commandos, Thane with Tailgunner/Overhaul/R2/Protorp(?), Braylen with same. Zach is a younger gentleman, and an inveterate T65 player. This was his second time running this list, and he was actually one of the folk who came to the FLGS not knowing that there was to be a tourney. He had in fact brought along a friend specifically to introduce to the game - what an introduction!

I do not recall this game very well, except that Zach tried to keep his squad in formation, and wanted to joust/chase. I managed to lob bombs into the middle of his formation, and then drop them behind my bombers when he turned to chase. The turrets plinked away for just enough damage to seal the deal, and Zeb just plain stayed away from the fight entirely. Win 100-0

Round Two:

Mitchell, running Blackout with AT/Targeting Synchronizer/title/Primed Thrusters/Adaptabilty(?), Vynder with title/Homing Missile(?)/VI(?)/Chips, and Sabaac with Ailerons/LWF. Again, I don't really recall many details of this game. Lightning rounds don't leave a lot of time to commit anything to memory!

I tried a funkier set-up with Crimson Leader, angling from the corner, and then banked and turned to try for some kind of range control. First engagement saw all of my bombs wasted, so Nym held the Proton Bomb more or less in front of Sabaac. Blackout got to use his pilot ability to strong effect against Nym, and Zeb ran away. I managed to hit Blackout hard in the second engagement with I think both a Proton Bomb and a Bomblet(?), and scared Sabaac over a debris netting him a Console Fire, which, as he was stressed from the debris caused him another damage. Vynder SLAMmed over a debris, but used Blackout's TL to put a four hit Homer into Nym, who was now into hull. Next round, Crimson Leader dropped a Proton Bomb out the back, to continue threatening Sabaac, Nym dropped a bomblet out the back to threaten Vynder and Blackout, and I think I Rattled Blackout to death(!). Sabaac I believe slow-rolled to clear stress and cleared a Console Fire that had already dealt a damage the previous round, but was then left very close to the corner - the Proton Bomb clipped him, but I forgot to Sabine for the kill! Next round he was forced to fly off the board anyhow, but still. Vynder had already taken some bomb damage and some turret-plinking, and a few more bombs and plinks were sufficient to kill him by the end of time - if I hadn't forgotten to Sabine for the kill again! Win 69 - 0 (or something close to that)

Round Three:

Mike, running Kylo with PtL/AdvOpt/FCS(?)/title/AT, Quickdraw with SnapShot/LWF/title/Harpoons/AdvOpt/FCS(?), and a naked Wampa. Mike is a stellar Imperial player, using Vader/QD/Tomax almost exclusively for the last few months. Once again, I don't recall the specifics, but the vignettes stand out a little better.

Turn Two, I put Crimson leader on a rock, and was soundly punished for that - I think he was well into hull by the end of that turn. Nym was Shown the Dark Side, for having the cheek to take a shield off of Kylo. Wampa got into a bad spot and was bombed off, but only after hitting Nym with his pilot ability - so Nym was at one point at four shields and three hull. Crimson Leader got SnapShotted off by QD, but not before he dropped a Proton Bomb that would eventually kill QD after being held by Nym for something like three turns. Kylo, due to asteroid placement and stress from PtL, chased after Zeb for a couple turns - Zeb survived by defending against crits first, cloaking behind a rock and rolling six evade dice for just enough to survive. With time called Kylo was hurting with maybe two or three hull left, and maybe a shield? Nym was at one shield and three hull, and Zeb was on two hull. And QD and Wampa were dead. Win 65-39

My first tournament win, even if under unusual circumstances. I'll take it! And the sweet Ketsu alt art card, thank you very much!

My takeaways: Deflective Plating on the B/SF is absolutely worth the points. Trajectory Simulator is fantastic fun, but really needs Nym around to hold those bombs for area denial. I'm not certain that the Hyperwave Comm Scanner is actually necessary, but I'm not sure what tech would actually be better. All those turrets allowed me have consistent shots, but it was the bombs that killed everyone. With a deal of practice, this sort of list could do some major hurt. But Turn Zero is hugely more important - I tried to place obstacles to create funnels and then clog them with bombs, and it worked. Sort of. With a little more practice, the Silencer is going to be a nightmare.

I really like your list, sounds like lots of fun. I have flown Nymranda alot and ill will 100% try your list.

Gratz on the win

On 12/8/2017 at 10:45 AM, Kleeg005 said:

My takeaways: Deflective Plating on the B/SF is absolutely worth the points. Trajectory Simulator is fantastic fun, but really needs Nym around to hold those bombs for area denial. I'm not certain that the Hyperwave Comm Scanner is actually necessary, but I'm not sure what tech would actually be better . All those turrets allowed me have consistent shots, but it was the bombs that killed everyone. With a deal of practice, this sort of list could do some major hurt. But Turn Zero is hugely more important - I tried to place obstacles to create funnels and then clog them with bombs, and it worked. Sort of. With a little more practice, the Silencer is going to be a nightmare.

I've been thinking of Weapons Guidance for the Tech slot. It gives a really high chance of 2 hits. It was largely passed over on 3 attack dice ships, since you're likely have a focus result, but really shines on 2 attack ships. However, TIE/FO and Quadjumpers are really squishy, and it wasn't worth investing the points for it. This thing has 12 hit points, and doesn't really need the focus for defense. Plus, being turreted you'll almost always have some kind of a shot.

Solid point there, @theBitterFig . Although I've since done a couple tests without HCS, and it actually is very effective to be able to place last. The mindgames that plays cannot be understated, ha ha. On the other hand, both of those games were losses, due to good piloting from my opponents and poor damage output from my list. So. Definitely need to test Weapons Guidance.

Played a couple more games last night at the local gamer's pub. First game switched things up, to see if a bomb-launching Crimson Leader might benefit from a Minefield Mapper to restrict the field even more. My opponent ran Countdown, a light Backdraft, and a *heavy* Vynder. He'd just picked up the gunboat; the packaging was still on the table. And he's not a forum-creeper like me. So he basically built it our with the components from the pack. He prefers to do that the first time he plays a ship, to get a feel for what the designers were trying to achieve, ha ha.

Anyway, lots of large obstacles in a triangle in the center of the board, pointed at him. I Mapped a Cluster and a Proximity on the right half of the board, cutting off his Backdraft and hiding my Sabine-caddy. I wish I had another Cluster, as that would have been much more effective. As it was, Countdown was more than capable of slipping between the rocks and the Prox mines. I dropped Crimson Leader opposite Vynder, and put Nym dead center, opposite Countdown.

Let's see. Nym managed to drop a Cluster directly on top of/in front of Vynder on about turn three, and between his hot dice, Sabine, and a couple of turret shots, Vynder was dead without getting more than one shot off. Nym went down next, helping to whittle Backdraft down in the process. Then Zeb went down to some extremely lopsided dice. And then the Leader just couldn't manage to do a **** thing to Countdown. The Striker's mobility trumps the bombing shenanigans, and its pitiful two-dice turret just couldn't seal the deal.

Second game, I went back to the original list, but swapped the lllicit Cloak for an Ion Bomb. This opponent had not yet purchased any of the new toys, and ran a lean Quickdraw, Omega Ace, and a D Brath. This game was all over in about thirty minutes. I Proton bombed both Brath and QD on turn two, and added a Sabined Bomblet onto QD, then TLT'd and turreted her. Whoops. I then blocked Brath onto another Proton, with Sabine insult and more turreting. Zeb and Sabine turned in and dropped the Ion Bomb just right to catch a k-turning Brath, who died to the Sabine extra point. And Omega Ace ended up in the middle of all three of my ships without a token to his name. In spite of all this, he still almost killed Nym, and tickled Crimson Leader, but it wasn't really that close. This list is just rude, at least to Imperials.