So I have been running quite a few tests with the Kimogila over the past few weeks and so far, I have been pleasantly surprised. Note that I say surprised, not awed; the ship has its strengths, but also its weaknesses.
I have found that part of the key of using it well is to have an escort that is a credible threat in the late game should it survive. That way, during the opening rounds of the game, your opponent is tempted to strike them instead of your Kimo (which can fall very quickly otherwise). For my tests, the basic building blocks of my escort were:
- Ventress: minlink + latts
- Inaldra: mindlink + title + mangler + pulse ray shield
Combined together, these units can pose a problem if allowed to survive in the late game, so the opponent tends to target one of them. This gives a fighting chance to the Kimogila.
Dalan Oberos
I first tried him with: Veteran instinct, ion pulse missiles, contraband cybernetics, guidance chip, R5-P8, title. All of which was combined with a 2 point PS bid.
The positive:
In such a configuration, Dalan hits like a ton of bricks. His ability gives him a near natural PTL, allowing him to make full use of his bullseye arc should a barrel roll be preferable. An opponent attacking him must consider that doing so will earn him a stress and that the ion pulse missile will soon follow while R5-P8 can cause some damage. Losing all control and actions can be damning for the following round. Contraband cybernetics is critical to line up the bullseye or dodge an arc after a k-turn or to perform a k-turn even while stressed (which happened to me after bumping on a k-turn the previous round). Ideally, you want him firing every round.
The negative:
The build starts at 34 points and with the PS bid, it might as well be considered 36. Some better builds exist at 36 points and Dalan can become too much of a tempting target. 8 shields/hull is not a lot if focus fired upon. A lot of ships are also PS9, so while Dalan hits hard, he won’t prevent an opponent from firing back even if he does. His ability can also be nullified by PS 10 or 11 pilots, and there are a lot of those out there (Vader, Nym and Quickdraw to name a few).
Conclusion:
While fun to fly, Dalan felt as though he was not giving me the edge that a similar cost unit would provide, like Soontir or Fenn. R5-P8 did help (and won me the game) against enemy aces, but having ordnance seemed to make the ship too costly. The PS9 factory is also worrisome, especially against my local meta. This brought me to my next test: Torani.
Torani
At PS10, a PS bid becomes less critical, so I tried Torani with the following configuration: Veteran Instinct, R5-P8, Contraband cybernetics, Title and long range scanners. No PS bid. With the building blocks of my escort above, this gave me 3 points to move around for different tests. The build stands at 33 points.
The positive:
Flying and attacking at PS10 makes a real difference, especially against PS 9 Poe or other elite pilots. Unlike Dalan, however, her bullseye is more of a bonus feature than something that must be used constantly. With Dalan, I would use the barrel roll to get a better shot, but with Torani, I only used it to dodge enemy firing arcs. Otherwise, the loss of an action negates whatever bonus she might gain from the bullseye.
Her ability felt… more like a nice to have than a necessity. I would attack a target at range 1 outside of the bullseye, knowing that the arc might bother the escort at range 2 behind the intended target. Her ability rarely triggered, but its presence actually “widened” the bullseye firing arc. During one game, an opponent countered Torani’s ability by using target locks instead of focuses, which is not a bad idea. However, by doing so, he had no focus to defend against any of my ships (and Inaldra does have a mangler), so in effect, it was as though all of his ships were now using a bullseye firing arc (no focus or evade token to defend).
So did Torani’s ability ever come into use? Technically, only once, but it did influence the choice of action that my opponent did every round.
The negative:
It is still a 33 point ship and while long range scanner scan help to get a strong initial attack, Torani’s overall offensive capabilities can feel a bit lacking. It is also a 33 point ship that can fall easily due to focus fire. Out of concern for losing her early, I would play carefuly with her, which sometimes meant that she lost the first or even the 2nd round of firing (good thing her escrot had good defensive abilities).
Conclusion:
In my local meta, Torani is a better option to fly. Ordnance seems to be more of trap than an asset, bumping the price of the ship past what is comfortable to use. Again, R5-P8 played its part, causing damage and destroying an enemy ship.
Overall conclusion:
Would I use the Kimogila in a tournament? For a store championship or anything else that is small scale, why not? My meta is largely defined by arc dodgers, Imperials and other scum ships, so she plays well there. Would I use it in a bigger tournament like a regional? Probably not.
Playing in a regional makes the meta more unpredictable and the odds of facing a bad matchup increases. Fighting a Dash with HLC, for example, could be problematic, as would a list with a lot of TLTs. A VCX-100 would laugh in the face of my bullseye. Most of these elements are absent from my local meta, but when reaching for something bigger, they can become more common.
Overall, the Kimogila is a neat little ship and a nice option to use against specific elements of the meta. You just need to play it correctly and bring it out at the right time.