I think part of the problem/resolution for all of this is asking how and when you can deliver damage at what distance from your ship.

Yavaris can effectively project the three fighter attacks out to long range in spite of not having boosted comms or any movers. One of them has to be in position already, but FCTs allows that move from where two fighters started at medium range from the ship, to long range from where Yavaris began. If you try to intercept and pin fighters down, whatever you're using to pin those squads is either overhwlemed by Yavaris' activation or ignored by Intel.

What this means is any strategy used to hurt Yavaris has to be effective through a combination of timing and distance to overcome it.

In my experience, Yavaris works well because it can go at the end of the turn and fling attacks for maximum damage at long range with this combination. It delays you into oblivion with all those other activations, then goes last for cleanup. With Rieekan it doesn't matter if Yavaris is the first ship destroyed, because Rieekan preserves it long enough to still hurt something that tried to kill Yavaris- whether it's an ISD of some kind or Demo.

I feel my ARQ battery was a possible solution because it also maximizes possible damage at long range... from multiple sources. Even if Yavaris' B-Wings take apart one of my ARQs, I still have two more jamming fire downrange into a target of my choosing. In the latest iteration of my list I also have some Rogues- spread them out far enough and Jan can't cover all of them.

Altight alright. I assumed I would be slaughtered for pointing this out so refrained.

Yes, Konstantine and grav shift is a very good counter to tight formation flyers. As discussed many times before you pay a high cost for this.

Mauler Saber Jendon is also a very good combo for peeling apart an aceball, which becomes a whole lot easier when gallant haven is racing at speed 3 across the board.

There are some new versions I am working on, but this is the best I have so far. Very very difficult to beat, but not going to 10-1 often.

ISD Konstantine
Author: Ginkapo

Faction: Galactic Empire
Points: 397/400

Commander: Admiral Konstantine

Assault Objective: Station Assault
Defense Objective: Contested Outpost
Navigation Objective: Salvage Run

Gozanti-class Cruisers (23 points)
- Slicer Tools ( 7 points)
= 30 total ship cost

Interdictor-class Suppression Refit (90 points)
- Minister Tua ( 2 points)
- Phylon Q7 Tractor Beams ( 6 points)
- Reinforced Blast Doors ( 5 points)
- Grav Shift Reroute ( 2 points)
- G7-X Grav Well Projector ( 2 points)
= 107 total ship cost

[ flagship ] Imperial I-Class Star Destroyer(110 points)
- Admiral Konstantine ( 23 points)
- Relentless ( 3 points)
- Skilled First Officer ( 1 points)
- Phylon Q7 Tractor Beams ( 6 points)
= 143 total ship cost

Gozanti-class Cruisers (23 points)
- Suppressor ( 4 points)
- Slicer Tools ( 7 points)
= 34 total ship cost

1 "Mauler" Mithel ( 15 points)
1 Colonel Jendon ( 20 points)
1 Zertik Strom ( 15 points)
1 Maarek Steele ( 21 points)
1 Saber Squadron ( 12 points)

Card view link

Interestingly, YV666s are also pretty darn good against aces....

15 minutes ago, Ginkapo said:

YV666s are also pretty darn good against aces....

...To a point. Heavy does them in because they won't screen your capital ships or pin anything down. Against aces? Their lack of blue dice for acc against defense tokens doesn't count against them? They bring hull 7 but it's a shame you can't force your opponent to shoot at them.

2 minutes ago, Norsehound said:

...To a point. Heavy does them in because they won't screen your capital ships or pin anything down. Against aces? Their lack of blue dice for acc against defense tokens doesn't count against them? They bring hull 7 but it's a shame you can't force your opponent to shoot at them.

This is why Valen Rudor exists. To make things that suck because they’re slow and heavy suck less because they’re just slow now.

@Ginkapo I find it interesting that you put Tua on the Interdictor over the flagship ISD. Have your opponents tended to prioritize it a lot?

1 minute ago, Norsehound said:

...To a point. Heavy does them in because they won't screen your capital ships or pin anything down. Against aces? Their lack of blue dice for acc against defense tokens doesn't count against them? They bring hull 7 but it's a shame you can't force your opponent to shoot at them.

They HAVE blue dice. Although with rebel aces its easier to just roll 3 damage as Jan is going to brace anyway.

Exactly, dont screen your ships and they will leave the cover of Gallant.

#TradeUp

3 minutes ago, Norsehound said:

They bring hull 7 but it's a shame you can't force your opponent to shoot at them.

I would hate to be perceived as supporting the notion that YV-666's aren't trash...

But in his defense, if you ignore a bunch of YV-666's dumping pew-pews into you, they're going to kill you eventually. That's an awful lot of pew-pews. Also, keep in mind that while they don't prevent normal movement, they do shut down the Yavaris FC/FCT, which is in itself a pretty big deal.

4 minutes ago, The Jabbawookie said:

@Ginkapo I find it interesting that you put Tua on the Interdictor over the flagship ISD. Have your opponents tended to prioritize it a lot?

The interdictor hits the fight first, cant turn, cant accelerate, cant repair forever. It gets targetted more as a result, whereas the ISD goes slow then ramps it up to 3 and wrecks everything whilst your opponent has realised that commiting to the Interdictor was a bad idea.

6 minutes ago, Ardaedhel said:

Also, keep in mind that while they don't prevent normal movement, they do shut down the Yavaris FC/FCT, which is in itself a pretty big deal.

Ah! I didn't know this.

So hold up... if you take Valen (who is sans heavy) and partner him with YV-666s... the opponent is forced to shoot the YV-666s because Valen pins them down, and they can't shoot Valen?

If so, I may need to consider YV-666s again. I was leaning on Firesprays or Aggressors for fighter defense of an ARQ battery permutation, but if YVs can do the job I'd like to give them a try.

7 minutes ago, Ginkapo said:

They HAVE blue dice. Although with rebel aces its easier to just roll 3 damage as Jan is going to brace anyway.

True, but my experience with TIE/Ds vs Interceptors shows that Interceptors tear through Aces pretty easily while the TIE/Ds struggle. Against generics it works, but if I want to remove Norra Wexly from the table I'm not going to rely on the blue/black fighters. If you come across all-aces lists from the Rebels, is raw damage going to cut it?

7 minutes ago, Norsehound said:

Ah! I didn't know this.

So hold up... if you take Valen (who is sans heavy) and partner him with YV-666s... the opponent is forced to shoot the YV-666s because Valen pins them down, and they can't shoot Valen?

Indeed - that's what Valen does: makes you shoot at everything else.

12 minutes ago, Norsehound said:

So hold up... if you take Valen (who is sans heavy) and partner him with YV-666s... the opponent is forced to shoot the YV-666s because Valen pins them down, and they can't shoot Valen?

Yes... with the caveat that, if they manage to get an Intel onto that one single Valen, all bets are off and they can just swoosh off and still do their thing. It's the weakness of just using Valen plus a bunch of Heavies, and is likely one of the reasons there hasn't been a huge proliferation of this kind of thing.

3 minutes ago, Ardaedhel said:

Yes... with the caveat that, if they manage to get an Intel onto that one single Valen, all bets are off and they can just swoosh off and still do their thing. It's the weakness of just using Valen plus a bunch of Heavies, and is likely one of the reasons there hasn't been a huge proliferation of this kind of thing.

Although, if you put in a bulky, non-heavy squad (Morna, Maarek, Zertik) or a mix of cheap TIEs, they’ll have to target all of them down to break free. Or use intel, but that’s always been a problem anyway.

5 minutes ago, The Jabbawookie said:

Or use intel, but that’s always been a problem anyway.

True, but relying mostly on Heavy squads with a small group of non-Heavys makes Intel much easier to use, because your opponent only needs to cover a small number of squads with the bubble. You can certainly spread your non-Heavys out to make this more difficult, but the fact remains it's still easier for Intel to deal with than just using all non-Heavys for your fighter duties.

4 hours ago, geek19 said:

...or Ozzel running 6-7 Raiders in from out of range to close, activating and flakking/blowing up the Gallant Haven, and then scooting off to NOT HERE town right after?

Lots of Ozzel Raider-Is with Ordnance Experts - that sounds like a pretty strong thing to take into a fight against the GH/Yav+3 list.

What's the catch?

It seems to me that Gallant Haven is one if the major problems, so, how about the new Boarding Vader?

5 minutes ago, Mikael Hasselstein said:

Lots of Ozzel Raider-Is with Ordnance Experts - that sounds like a pretty strong thing to take into a fight against the GH/Yav+3 list.

What's the catch?

The catch is that Raiders are highly flammable. Especially with Norra nearby, bombers will eat them for lunch. If you have no activation padding, Rieekan will just activate the flotillas to draw your Raiders in and then pummel them with fighters.

4 hours ago, PT106 said:

At some point I ran a (surprise) 2ISD list with 2 slicer gozantis and a mix of defenders and interceptors (essentially a copycat of a winning 2ISD+2Gz+Defenders archetype that John Kwak was running but tilted for Konstantine). It was surprisingly good.

The lack of slicers in the meta is a giant question mark to me. Wanna shut down yavaris? Done easy peazy that's all it takes.

Just now, Jabby said:

It seems to me that Gallant Haven is one if the major problems, so, how about the new Boarding Vader?

@GiledPallaeon and I were discussing this a day or so ago and my main concern is there isn't really a good delivery mechanism. You could slap him on a Raider-I, but you're giving up Ordnance Experts for a one-shot suicidal run into the Gallant Haven beehive. You'll strip Gallant Haven, but you won't do a lot to the Assault Frigate itself and your flak won't be amazing and then your best hope is running like crazy at speed 4 to hopefully not die from all the pissed-off bees you just riled up.

It could maybe have some merit if you were running a more strongly squadron-based fleet (where Gallant Haven gives you trouble), but slapping a Raider in there that's specialized against one specific type of fleet but otherwise "meh" isn't likely to be easy or a good idea.

Plus it means no Vader TIE Advanced. I don't see him a whole bunch with Sloane, but every now and again he pops up. As part of a Flight-Controllers-aided alpha strike, he gets it done. Being able to do a maximum of 6 damage to enemy squadrons and regularly doing 4-5 (when activated with Flight Controllers, usually doing 3-4 otherwise) is no joke. He's a half-decent (but not as good as Morna or Maarek) Jendon target too.

3 minutes ago, Tirion said:

The lack of slicers in the meta is a giant question mark to me. Wanna shut down yavaris? Done easy peazy that's all it takes.

Were it not for officer Leia, I would agree with you. But she’s not too uncommon already, and if slicers rise in popularity, she will too.

2 minutes ago, Tirion said:

The lack of slicers in the meta is a giant question mark to me. Wanna shut down yavaris? Done easy peazy that's all it takes.

Against fleets that are running without Leia on a GR-75, I think you're absolutely right.

The issue is that once there's a wiff of Slicer Tools in the meta, officer Leia can be included for a very reasonable cost and basically hard-counters Slicer Tools unless you're willing to outfit two flotillas with them and use them on the same turn (either to ensure one ship is really Slicered, both pre- and post-Leia or to Slice two different ships, of which she can only fix one).

Late-turn Slicer on Yavaris can buy you the time you need to either kill squadrons or move, even without a follow-up. Late-turn Slicer to Yavaris after she's activated, then wait for Leia to fix it and Slice it again will buy you one turn of no Yavaris, which is all you really need. Also keep in mind that you can outfit your Slicer flotilla as a carrier in its own right, giving you the option of holding off the Yavaris opener by one activation to buy your squadrons some killing time.

All that said, I've always maintained that Slicer Tools are best used in pairs in most circumstances. Hard counter Leia right back, totally black out a fleet's squadron activations, shut out repairs on a tank fleet--gives you lots of options that can really overwhelm built-in redundancies with **** commands.

Of course, this is a moot point. With the advent of fsck Slicer Tools and also you tech like Pursuant and Thrawn, it's really a pretty poor decision to bring them anymore. :/

15 minutes ago, Snipafist said:

You'll strip Gallant Haven, but you won't do a lot to the Assault Frigate itself and your flak won't be amazing and then your best hope is running like crazy at speed 4 to hopefully not die from all the pissed-off bees you just riled up.

The AF2 stops mattering after the title is gone, just like Yavaris does. Not literally, of course, but once the Gallant Haven is a haven no longer, you can actually meaningfully alpha strike them. Particularly if we're assuming you got a Raider in there that lived long enough to get Vader off in the first place, that means you probably got a Raider in there that's about to take double-black shots at a whole mess of brace aces that are suddenly going to take 1 damage each instead of 0, and are about to eat your alpha strike. That's a very big deal.

The trick, of course, is getting Vader actually delivered before the Raider dies. Which is likely to be very hard. On an ISD, on the other hand... I mean, you're giving that sweet GT/OE/FC/BT, but you've got the trump card that'll take care of this build right quick. And, hey, gonna kill GH anyway? Pff, strip Yavaris instead. It's not like it's a bad choice either way.

1 hour ago, Ardaedhel said:

The AF2 stops mattering after the title is gone, just like Yavaris does. Not literally, of course, but once the Gallant Haven is a haven no longer, you can actually meaningfully alpha strike them. Particularly if we're assuming you got a Raider in there that lived long enough to get Vader off in the first place, that means you probably got a Raider in there that's about to take double-black shots at a whole mess of brace aces that are suddenly going to take 1 damage each instead of 0, and are about to eat your alpha strike. That's a very big deal.

The trick, of course, is getting Vader actually delivered before the Raider dies. Which is likely to be very hard. On an ISD, on the other hand... I mean, you're giving that sweet GT/OE/FC/BT, but you've got the trump card that'll take care of this build right quick. And, hey, gonna kill GH anyway? Pff, strip Yavaris instead. It's not like it's a bad choice either way.

The mere existence of the new Vader card is likely to have some impact many builds that rely on 1 or more key upgrades to make 'em go round. How much of an impact will depend, as @Ardaedhel says, on the ease of delivery - and what other upgrades you're not taking to make room for Vader.

Against this kind of build it would be a good trade to strip Yavaris, GH, Toryn, even the now lone BCC.

2 hours ago, Norsehound said:

The catch is that Raiders are highly flammable. Especially with Norra nearby, bombers will eat them for lunch. If you have no activation padding, Rieekan will just activate the flotillas to draw your Raiders in and then pummel them with fighters.

Yes, indeed, they could. I imagine that you would not want to point the Raiders at Gallant Haven, so that if the squadrons did decide to have one of my Raiders for lunch, they'd have to come out of their GH-zone and into the range of the other Raiders' AA guns.

8 hours ago, Norsehound said:

Offensively It's really Norra that's the strength of this fighter ball.

I believe only two of the lists brought Norra.

Double ISD with Instigator, strong Bomber Squadron compliment, and bid for first.

Ideally, all you need is one round to lock down the ball with Instigator, and cram both ISDs into medium range of GH/Yavaaris. The squadrons will stay in protective range of GH (even if the Frigate is flying at speed 3, a skilled player will keep them in range), but they won’t be able to focus down your ISDs. Sure, Yavaaris will pop instigator and any nearby squad cover, but that leaves you with 2 untouched ISDs and a first activation the next round... heck, even going second could work out, as long as you ensure that whichever ISD they target first is able to fly out of the GH bubble.

it probably won’t work well at all for anyone at first, but play it long enough to learn how to time and position the raider just right with just enough squad cover that the ball becomes locked in place for a turn, which is when you capitalize on sending in everything else to destroy either lynchpin of the list. Or both.

And where does that leave you with competing against other lists? You have two ISDs and a strong bomber compliment with a method for tying down squadrons for at least 1 solid turn. Figure it out.

MTF on the intricacies of squad play.