I've been messing around with the Kimogila. I think I've found a build that allows the ship to dish out some serious punishment

The OCR4+Concussion+Chips+Deadeye combo lands 4 hits about 98% of the time. If you don't want the stress you still have around 80%ish chance of 4 hits.

What are your thoughts on using it as a heavy bomber?

Why Concussion? Use Harpoon so you can spend the focus on the attack, and equip Unhinged astros instead.

1 minute ago, MegaSilver said:

Why Concussion? Use Harpoon so you can spend the focus on the attack, and equip Unhinged astros instead.

Harpoons have a slightly lower chance of 4 hits (94%). I came up with the build for Dalan as part of a list with Fenn and Genesis Red. Firing harpoons last wasn't great (and Genesis had HLC). In the list in my post, harpoons may be the way to go.

i thought ocr4 didn't work in that combo, being one of the nerfbat attempts on the jm5k ( i do have to find it again).

Edit: my bad, was thinking of r4 and not the overclocked......

Trouble is Scurrgs and KFighters are both better at the missile boat role. Scurrgs for Outlaw Tech to fire off reds, and Ks because they're cheaper.

It's...not bad; as noted, missing getting 4 hits requires 3+ blanks, which will only occur about 5% of the time, and you've got deadeye so there are no issues acquiring a target lock.

However

• Using it as a heavy bomber with deadeye means you're going to be spending your focus whenever you fire a missile, which you can immediately recover with Overclocked R4, but:
  • You'll be stressed
  • Since you have Overclocked, not Unhinged, you're limiting the ships' pretty darn awful dial for dealing with stress
• It has 1 agility and 8 hit points. Unlike a TIE bomber, you probably shouldn't lose one before it shoots but the possibility is there - especially when facing, say, a 3-ship PS9+ alpha strike squad.
  • Two missiles back might be enough to bring down an ace in return, but 2v2 is not going to go your way
  • Extra munitions on reload feel likes wasted points.
• As noted, the Scurrg gets more toys - but still fits 3-to-a-squad, whilst Khiraxz are cheaper and with Vaksai their upgrades are cheaper too, meaning they can turn up 4-to-a-squad if you're frugal.

I'm genuinely wondering if they might not work better on a spartan fit-out;

• 4 Cartel Brutes can fit in a squad, each with 3 points worth of gear.
• They can pack Long Range Scanners for free by default, which for a generic means no need to stress over either high pilot skill or more expensive elite versions which can equip Deadeye
• Even the Kaijugodzilla's primary weapon is pretty threatening with a bullseye lined up - more generics makes it harder to avoid the crossfire
• One of the best upgrades for punch might be R4 Agromech; yes, spending focus then target lock rerolling the blanks is 'the wrong way round'.
  • It's still better than just a focus
  • It's not as good as focus/target lock, but it's within a hair as good as focus/predator
  • It's a point cheaper than predator and available to a non-elite generic
  • It works on the first attack on a new target, which Fire Control System doesn't.
  • You have about a 42% chance of coming out of an attack with a 'free' target lock on the target even if you spend the lock on a single blank

3 minutes ago, thespaceinvader said:

Trouble is Scurrgs and KFighters are both better at the missile boat role. Scurrgs for Outlaw Tech to fire off reds, and Ks because they're cheaper.

Let's take a look at that comparison

26 minutes ago, Magnus Grendel said:

It's...not bad; as noted, missing getting 4 hits requires 3+ blanks, which will only occur about 5% of the time, and you've got deadeye so there are no issues acquiring a target lock.

However

• Using it as a heavy bomber with deadeye means you're going to be spending your focus whenever you fire a missile, which you can immediately recover with Overclocked R4, but:
  • You'll be stressed
  • Since you have Overclocked, not Unhinged, you're limiting the ships' pretty darn awful dial for dealing with stress
• It has 1 agility and 8 hit points. Unlike a TIE bomber, you probably shouldn't lose one before it shoots but the possibility is there - especially when facing, say, a 3-ship PS9+ alpha strike squad.
  • Two missiles back might be enough to bring down an ace in return, but 2v2 is not going to go your way
  • Extra munitions on reload feel likes wasted points.
• As noted, the Scurrg gets more toys - but still fits 3-to-a-squad, whilst Khiraxz are cheaper and with Vaksai their upgrades are cheaper too, meaning they can turn up 4-to-a-squad if you're frugal.

I'm genuinely wondering if they might not work better on a spartan fit-out;

• 4 Cartel Brutes can fit in a squad, each with 3 points worth of gear.
• They can pack Long Range Scanners for free by default, which for a generic means no need to stress over either high pilot skill or more expensive elite versions which can equip Deadeye
• Even the Kaijugodzilla's primary weapon is pretty threatening with a bullseye lined up - more generics makes it harder to avoid the crossfire
• One of the best upgrades for punch might be R4 Agromech; yes, spending focus then target lock rerolling the blanks is 'the wrong way round'.
  • It's still better than just a focus
  • It's not as good as focus/target lock, but it's within a hair as good as focus/predator
  • It's a point cheaper than predator and available to a non-elite generic
  • It works on the first attack on a new target, which Fire Control System doesn't.
  • You have about a 42% chance of coming out of an attack with a 'free' target lock on the target even if you spend the lock on a single blank

Of note, if using concussion missiles, you can choose not to use OCR4 and still have a decent shot at 4 hits (the EV is hit-hit-focus-blank which converts to 4 with chips+concussion I'm not sure in how to get the exact math on this, but it should be in the neighborhood of 75%)

EM is there to extend ammo for the first engagement. This is really good if the Kimogila is wandering into a fight where the enemy is chasing an ace ( like that Fenn Rau they don't want to let behind them) You can drop the em to save points or swap for seismic torps.

4 hours ago, Magnus Grendel said:

• One of the best upgrades for punch might be R4 Agromech; yes, spending focus then target lock rerolling the blanks is 'the wrong way round'.
  • It's still better than just a focus
  • It's not as good as focus/target lock, but it's within a hair as good as focus/predator
  • It's a point cheaper than predator and available to a non-elite generic
  • It works on the first attack on a new target, which Fire Control System doesn't.
  • You have about a 42% chance of coming out of an attack with a 'free' target lock on the target even if you spend the lock on a single blank

Cant use the TL on that attack thanks to the faq

4 minutes ago, Ralgon said:

Cant use the TL on that attack thanks to the faq

You can't if you use it with Deadeye. You can if you use it when you spend a focus token during the Modify Dice step.

But the best way to use it is during the Mod Dice step, then NOT spend the resulting lock. Then you get double modded shots for the rest of that target's life, and it works like FCS. If you spend on the first attack, you get 1.5x modded shots which sucks.

23 minutes ago, Ralgon said:

Cant use the TL on that attack thanks to the faq

18 minutes ago, thespaceinvader said:

You can't if you use it with Deadeye. You can if you use it when you spend a focus token during the Modify Dice step.

Ninja-ed by @thespaceinvader

But yes, the FAQ only applies to spending focus before a target is the defender. Once red dice start hitting the table, that no longer applies. It's not that you can't use the free lock on that attack (that's R5-K6) but that if you spend the focus before your target becomes the defender, you don't get a free lock in the first place.

18 minutes ago, thespaceinvader said:

But the best way to use it is during the Mod Dice step, then NOT spend the resulting lock. Then you get double modded shots for the rest of that target's life, and it works like FCS. If you spend on the first attack, you get 1.5x modded shots which sucks.

I agree with you; sustained double-modified attacks are in theory better, and what you ideally want.

But focus-and-reroll-any-number-of-blanks is hardly bad - it's within a hair as good as Predator (there's maybe a twentieth of a hit result separating the average results), because whilst your rerolls are unmodified dice, you get any number of them (whilst predator can reroll before spending focus, but only rerolls one die).

There's an argument I'd rather get three hits now (or at least burn a lock in the hopes of doing so), if:

• I don't know if I'm going to have a shot on the same target next turn or at least I may have a better shot on someone else
• I think I have a realistic chance of killing the target if I expend the lock now (because I have two-to-three other guys who plan on shooting him after me) so he won't be around next turn to shoot at an the lock will fizzle.
• (specific to the Killergorilla) The target is in my bullseye arc now and won't be after it moves again.

There have been enough times I've thought Fire Control System is amazing (it is) but been really annoyed that I never get a shot on the same target, or can't use it to up the firepower in the opening pass, that the alternative use of R4 Agromech is pleasing flexibility.

If you don't need to spend the lock (because it's a zero agility target, so you don't need 3 hits to be confident of connecting), or you know you have a shot on the same target next turn (and don't expect to be destroyed in the next combat phase before shooting again), then by all means hang onto it. But you have the option to spend it if you need to.

I feel like if you are going for Missiles that don't spend the TL when firing, you wanna go with the Deadeye+R4+guidance chips combo, but if you for some reason want to use missiles that do spend TL or Torpedoes you wanna go for LRS and something like Unhinged/R4, and crackshot/VI/mindlink etc.

Also slightly off topic, how hard do you think it'd be to get Torani to work with snap shot?

2 minutes ago, Mediocrevan said:

Also slightly off topic, how hard do you think it'd be to get Torani to work with snap shot?

Insanely difficult due to the PS, snapshot wants to be a low PS. Rhymer is the only higher than PS5 that can reliably get it off but thats because of the R2 aspect he adds on it.

Also wouldnt even do anything unless they faq it to not let you opt to "discard all tokens" when you have none anyway. Which im assuming will happen because that just makes no sense and im not even playing it that way locally lol

3 minutes ago, Mediocrevan said:

I feel like if you are going for Missiles that don't spend the TL when firing, you wanna go with the Deadeye+R4+guidance chips combo, but if you for some reason want to use missiles that do spend TL or Torpedoes you wanna go for LRS and something like Unhinged/R4, and crackshot/VI/mindlink etc.

Also slightly off topic, how hard do you think it'd be to get Torani to work with snap shot?

Pretty hard, given he's PS8, you'd only be catching 9-12s. And you'd be catching them before they had tokens for the most part, so his ability wouldn't work.

Just now, Vineheart01 said:

Insanely difficult due to the PS, snapshot wants to be a low PS. Rhymer is the only higher than PS5 that can reliably get it off but thats because of the R2 aspect he adds on it.

Also wouldnt even do anything unless they faq it to not let you opt to "discard all tokens" when you have none anyway. Which im assuming will happen because that just makes no sense and im not even playing it that way locally lol

It's a cost to keep your tokens, not the other way round.

I was hoping that R5-TK could proc it, but the way snapshot is worded it would not. If it did, I would use stuff to fly in front of him to strip tokens from other ships.

Thoguh yeah, it does proc his ability against things in the bullseye that already moved and took tokens (or had them from previous rounds with Optics/Relay), which is a thing.

Probably not a good thing, but still.

9 hours ago, Magnus Grendel said:

• It has 1 agility and 8 hit points. Unlike a TIE bomber, you probably shouldn't lose one before it shoots but the possibility is there - especially when facing, say, a 3-ship PS9+ alpha strike squad.

I think this is the same problem as the Punisher - unless your green dice are complete rubbish or you're facing stuff with like 5-dice attacks (both of which can happen), 8 hit points behind 1 agility isn't really that much more survivable than 6 hit points behind 2 agility. That's why the Bomber is so much better than the Punisher. Just to benchmark it, compare any Kimogila squad to one of my favorite ordnance squads (which is kinda mediocre, by the way):

Gamma Squadron Veteran (25) - TIE Bomber
Deadeye (1), Cruise Missiles (3), Extra Munitions (2), Guidance Chips (0)

Gamma Squadron Veteran (25) - TIE Bomber
Deadeye (1), Cruise Missiles (3), Extra Munitions (2), Guidance Chips (0)

Gamma Squadron Veteran (25) - TIE Bomber
Deadeye (1), Cruise Missiles (3), Extra Munitions (2), Guidance Chips (0)

Gamma Squadron Veteran (25) - TIE Bomber
Deadeye (1), Cruise Missiles (3), Extra Munitions (2), Guidance Chips (0)

Which is my same problem with ordnance GUNBOATS - if you can't be more efficient than the lowly TIE Bomber, you probably shouldn't be running this kind of ordnance loadout. That's why I agree that if you really want to win with the Kimogila, you want a cheap build that takes advantage of the primary weapon (like a Scum quad-Wookiee or something).

9 hours ago, Magnus Grendel said:

I'm genuinely wondering if they might not work better on a spartan fit-out;

• 4 Cartel Brutes can fit in a squad, each with 3 points worth of gear.
• They can pack Long Range Scanners for free by default, which for a generic means no need to stress over either high pilot skill or more expensive elite versions which can equip Deadeye
• Even the Kaijugodzilla's primary weapon is pretty threatening with a bullseye lined up - more generics makes it harder to avoid the crossfire
• One of the best upgrades for punch might be R4 Agromech; yes, spending focus then target lock rerolling the blanks is 'the wrong way round'.
  • It's still better than just a focus
  • It's not as good as focus/target lock, but it's within a hair as good as focus/predator
  • It's a point cheaper than predator and available to a non-elite generic
  • It works on the first attack on a new target, which Fire Control System doesn't.
  • You have about a 42% chance of coming out of an attack with a 'free' target lock on the target even if you spend the lock on a single blank

I really like this idea. You just make a 4-lane freeway of bullseye arcs.

Yeah the Punisher has 9hp 1agi and it melted routinely before it could do anything.

Granted, large portion of that is contributed to no barrelroll, but fact still remains.

LWF is the only way they can stay alive at all (and surprisingly well...ive noticed)

Only reason the Kimo i faced a couple days ago didnt go pop instantly was because i literally ignored it due to the Starvipers being too agile for my list to take out if i didnt have a numbers advantage. Spoiler: still won, kimo only got bullseye on me once and like i said i flatout ignored it most of the game.

You could save the 2 points on extra munitions because of reload.

1 hour ago, Dwing said:

You could save the 2 points on extra munitions because of reload.

Extra Munitions lets the ship put off using reload for a round allowing for a follow up shot if the ship is in position to and has lock/focus.

38 minutes ago, Dwing said:

You could save the 2 points on extra munitions because of reload.

Very much true. If I had to scrape for points, EM is what I would cut.

I've had enough times where I wanted the second missile immediately rather than waiting for a reload. And EM is cheaper than buying another torpedo.

13 hours ago, Vineheart01 said:

LWF is the only way they can stay alive at all (and surprisingly well...ive noticed)

Which, in turn, really messes with its potential as an ordnance carrier rather than a bomber (Deathrain is fine and dandy).

14 hours ago, Kieransi said:

I think this is the same problem as the Punisher - unless your green dice are complete rubbish or you're facing stuff with like 5-dice attacks (both of which can happen), 8 hit points behind 1 agility isn't really that much more survivable than 6 hit points behind 2 agility. That's why the Bomber is so much better than the Punisher. Just to benchmark it, compare any Kimogila squad to one of my favorite ordnance squads (which is kinda mediocre, by the way):

Gamma Squadron Veteran (25) - TIE Bomber
Deadeye (1), Cruise Missiles (3), Extra Munitions (2), Guidance Chips (0)

Gamma Squadron Veteran (25) - TIE Bomber
Deadeye (1), Cruise Missiles (3), Extra Munitions (2), Guidance Chips (0)

Gamma Squadron Veteran (25) - TIE Bomber
Deadeye (1), Cruise Missiles (3), Extra Munitions (2), Guidance Chips (0)

Gamma Squadron Veteran (25) - TIE Bomber
Deadeye (1), Cruise Missiles (3), Extra Munitions (2), Guidance Chips (0)

Which is my same problem with ordnance GUNBOATS - if you can't be more efficient than the lowly TIE Bomber, you probably shouldn't be running this kind of ordnance loadout. That's why I agree that if you really want to win with the Kimogila, you want a cheap build that takes advantage of the primary weapon (like a Scum quad-Wookiee or something).

You can make a comparable squad, to be fair, which is better in some roles and worse in others:

• Cartel Brute x 4
  • Cruise Missiles
  • Long Range Scanners

It's a game of trade-offs:

• No guidance chips BUT should have target lock/focus for the missile shot
• Only agility 1 BUT 8 hit points rather than 6
• No Extra Munitions BUT the Reload action
• No Deadeye focus-firing BUT the ability to lock a higher PS target from long range
• Lower PS BUT a better primary weapon and bullseye

In a fight between the two, I'd probably expect the TIE bombers to win, but in a fight between one or the other and a randomly matched third squad, I'd expect the Kimi Raikonnens to do at least as well.

13 hours ago, Biophysical said:

I really like this idea. You just make a 4-lane freeway of bullseye arcs.

That's more or less my thought - or a 'crossfire' web with two pairs coming in at right angles.

Bullseye is not something worth dying in a ditch over because it's so finicky (a barrel roll often easily carries the arc clear past your target and off the other side), and using an action to line it up is probably counterproductive - because yes you leave the green dice unmodified but only by also accepting unmodified red dice.

Where it's likely to really matter is:

• Vs a large based ship (much easier to line up) - the 'big-ships-which-have-the-evade-action-for-no-good-reason' (Millenium Falcon, Ghost, Issard Decimator) are going to hate the bullseye arc.
• When you have a higher pilot skill and you're at medium range (hence why everyone seems to want to pump a million points into PS10 Torani Kulda)
• When you can lay a grid of multiple boresight arcs so it's hard to dodge all of them.
• As a 'get lost' technique - an arc dodger ace caught boresight on cannot turtle up behind a wall of green tokens. Yes, any boost or barrel roll will get him or her clear, but then that's an action-token they won't have, and they're still going to be in the rest of your arc and able to be shot at normally.

4 hours ago, Magnus Grendel said:

• As a 'get lost' technique - an arc dodger ace caught boresight on cannot turtle up behind a wall of green tokens. Yes, any boost or barrel roll will get him or her clear, but then that's an action-token they won't have, and they're still going to be in the rest of your arc and able to be shot at normally.

This is kind of how I assumed the bullseye arc would be from a practical perspective. It kind of acts as a blocker by denying defensive actions one way or another.