I'm trying to create an MC30 list that I would be comfortable playing as second player and would have some objective options as first player. VCXs are a key for that, and I suspect that I want intel w/ escort to keep them mobile. I originally added the Neb-B Escort because it was the cheapest way for the rebels to get two blue anti-squadron dice to help counter TIE swarms, and I chose Yavaris over a turbolaser upgrade because it synergizes nicely with relay. Luke and Wedge give me black bomber die that will benefit from Yavaris while providing escort, and Toryn will help my Neb-B anti-squadron as well as my squadron force. I think that I have a lot of pieces that work nicely together in pairs, but I'm afraid that this list is trying to do too much and doesn't do any one thing well enough to be really successful in a tournament.

I've debated yellow objectives quite a bit, and I'm not sold on Hyperspace Assault. Even with my pair of VCXs, I don't think that Fire Lanes will work too well with my short range dice. Capture the VIP is a possibility for 50 pts; with relay, I can keep one flotilla out of the fight for the most part to carry the token. I've also thought about Planetary Ion Cannon to give me a few more shots at tough targets like ISDs or HMC80s.

That's actually my biggest concern with this list. I don't know if I have enough sustained damage potential versus ISDs and HMC80s. I might be better off dropping the second MC30 and a transport for a pair of TRC90s, or even dropping Yavaris as well for 3 TRC90s and changing my commander to either Mon Mothma or Madine. With some squadron tweaks, I could easily get it to 6 activations at that point.

I'm also slightly concerned that having no bid is a mistake. My first candidates for recovering some points in dropping Toryn or replacing Wedge with a generic X-Wing. Either would give me a pretty reasonable bid.

I know there are people here with a lot more experience running MC30s than I have, so I would greatly appreciate any feedback that you might have. Thanks!

Faction: Rebel Alliance
Points: 400/400

Commander: General Dodonna

Assault Objective: Most Wanted
Defense Objective: Hyperspace Assault
Navigation Objective: Intel Sweep

[ flagship ] MC30c Torpedo Frigate (63 points)
- General Dodonna ( 20 points)
- Admonition ( 8 points)
- Ordnance Experts ( 4 points)
- H9 Turbolasers ( 8 points)
- Assault Proton Torpedoes ( 5 points)
= 108 total ship cost

MC30c Torpedo Frigate (63 points)
- Ordnance Experts ( 4 points)
- H9 Turbolasers ( 8 points)
- Assault Proton Torpedoes ( 5 points)
= 80 total ship cost

Nebulon-B Escort Frigate (57 points)
- Yavaris ( 5 points)
= 62 total ship cost

GR-75 Medium Transports (18 points)
- Toryn Farr ( 7 points)
= 25 total ship cost

GR-75 Medium Transports (18 points)
= 18 total ship cost

2 VCX-100 Freighters ( 30 points)
1 Biggs Darklighter ( 19 points)
1 Jan Ors ( 19 points)
1 Luke Skywalker ( 20 points)
1 Wedge Antilles ( 19 points)

As all your escort fighters have 2braces each you could downgrade Jan to a HWK. Even the VCXs have lots of hull and if they are getting shot then your Biggs ball is gone too. Use the saved points for Lando on the other MC30 and maybe a SFO on Admonition and/or a small bid.

My two cents: I think you are right that you are trying to do too much. I would either: (1) drop a MC-30 to go all in on bombers; or (2) drop Yavaris and go all in with the MC-30s (maybe adjust your squadrons in the process).

As for admirals, you don't need Madine with them. MC-30s are plenty maneuverable, especially at speed 3, which is really their sweet spot. I've been running mine with Mon Mothma and they are fantastic. I highly recommend the Foresight title on the second one with her if you can fit it in. Dodonna loves his APTs, though.

Good luck!

I enjoy playing lists like this (dodonna, 2-3 combat ships + Yvaris & modest fighter wing). At its worst it does feel like it is trying to do too many things but at its best IT IS doing all those things: dominating the squadron fight and the ship battle.

Personally, I don't think you want Yavaris with relay in this type of list - you want Yavaris up in the enemy's face. I run it as a cruise missile carrying strong double-dice bombers along with it. If your opponent brings no squads to counter it you can kill big ships. If they do commit squads to it you can get huge value by fighting under toryn aa fire and Yavaris double tapping into their squads. Either way Yavaris suicidally trades up. I get more success running Yavaris like this - not trying to keep it safe with relay but throwing it right at the enemy ships and forcing them to deal with it.

Your squad setup is really tanky but I don't see it as much of an immediate threat to the enemy.

If you want to run Yavaris missile-style:

Take Out (54)

• - Luke (20)
• - Biggs (19)
• - VCX (15) - you don't need relay as much anymore and you only need 1 strategic for intel sweep anyway

Add In (46)

• + 2 B-Wings (28)
• + Gold Squadron (12)
• + Flight Commander (3), Fighter Coordination Team (3) on Yavaris - these upgrades make setting up Yavaris double taps 10 times easier; I never leave home without them. Also helps slow rebel squads stay with Yvaris as it speeds towards the enemy and lets you keep your squads cautiously tucked behind Yavaris' aa range until you're ready to strike.

That leaves you 8 extra points to play around with too. This is a very different style of playing Yavaris but I've found it really useful in this type of fleet. The Mc30's and Yav all can all threaten huge ship damage at the start of a round. Your fighters won't really be covering your MC30's but ... they don't really need the cover if they get into trouble they can just speed away

First of all, I like the concept. I think the best lists can go both first and second. That said, you've got a lot of working parts here. I'm less concerned that you're trying to do too much. I think the trick is more finding out how exactly you do what you want in this list more efficiently.

If you can get a bid somehow, do so. At 400 points, you concede the choice of first/second entirely to the other player, unless they are also at 400 points, in which case it is a coin flip. Yet, sometimes, you really do want to be first, and at others, you really do want to be second. A small bid for that choice is worth it for the chance to pick against some lists.

I'd be tempted to try an E/A Wing mix in a list like this. MC30s are speedy, which means you really want to support them at the same speeds. Speed-3 squads can just end up really tied up. The extra speed also gives you some flexibility in playing against some lists. For Dodonna, I'd be more inclined to put more stands on the table, but look at generics for that. I think Rieekan makes a better match for Aces.

Jamming Fields is pretty important. In the absence of Gallant Haven, you want to be able to tank an enemy alpha strike, and ideally, you'd want to use Jan/HWK to free up your squads to move outside of Jamming fields for their own attacks, or just take the jamming penalty and Yavaris back. But costing your opponent that extra die on his alpha is pretty important to keeping squads alive longer.

At the moment you cannot kill an ISD as second player. Simple truth.

Any of the below would help tremendously, but not all at once

Add in a bid and you are fine.

Drop the relay for Keyan and Ten and you are fine.

Switch to Sato for long range power.

Take fire lanes (with relay) and a combat retrofit to babysit the tokens.

Swop one Mc30 for Garels honor so you can add keyan and ten without removing relay. Where is lukes bcc btw? Should be with toryn on bright hope.

I think youve stretched yourself just a little too far.

13 hours ago, Ginkapo said:

Where is lukes bcc btw?

So incredibly important- Luke has a nasty habit of crapping out on you when you most need him, even WITH BCC... the other day I double tapped him with Yavaris vs an MC30- 4 rolls, 4 blanks....

Thanks for all of the great advice. I love how genuinely helpful the Armada community is. It looks like there are a few directions that I can push this list in, and I've been playing a bit and I'm not quite sure yet which way that I want to go. Every time that I try to push the list more toward bombers, it starts to feel like Galant Haven at 87 points may be more beneficial than my 88 point MC30, and I'm not sure that I want to fall into that archetype.

Try two MC-30s with both titles and Mon Mothma. Fill the rest of your list with activation padding and a medium fighter screen. If you want strategic objectives, you can go with something like:

* Jan Ors (19)
* 3x X-Wing (39)
* 2x VCX-100 (30)
Total = 88 points.

With your two MC-30s and Mon Mothma you still have a little more than 100 points to fill out the rest of your fleet.

This is basically my tournament fleet currently. It does pretty well and is a lot of fun to play.

After playing with a lot of the advice here, I've made a version 2 of my list that I think adheres mostly to the spirit of the original. That said, perhaps full Motha MSU or GH/Yavaris may be more efficient overall, but I think this will be fun to fly. Once again, thank you all for the help.

I've dropped H9s on Admonition, Wedge, one VCX, and Torryn Farr. Instead, I've added Gold, Scurrg (I like Scurrgs), a BCC, and Jamming Fields. Overall, I sacrifice anti-squadron in favor of anti-ship, but I'm hoping that the jamming field will help tank a bit of damage to make up somewhat for losing Wedge.

I have a hefty bid now, and I'd appreciate any recommended critical additions.

Faction: Rebel Alliance
Points: 389/400

Commander: General Dodonna

Assault Objective: Precision Strike
Defense Objective: Hyperspace Assault
Navigation Objective: Intel Sweep

[ flagship ] MC30c Torpedo Frigate (63 points)
- General Dodonna ( 20 points)
- Admonition ( 8 points)
- Ordnance Experts ( 4 points)
- Assault Proton Torpedoes ( 5 points)
= 100 total ship cost

Nebulon-B Escort Frigate (57 points)
- Yavaris ( 5 points)
= 62 total ship cost

MC30c Torpedo Frigate (63 points)
- Ordnance Experts ( 4 points)
- H9 Turbolasers ( 8 points)
- Assault Proton Torpedoes ( 5 points)
= 80 total ship cost

GR-75 Medium Transports (18 points)
- Bomber Command Center ( 8 points)
= 26 total ship cost

GR-75 Medium Transports (18 points)
- Jamming Field ( 2 points)
= 20 total ship cost

1 VCX-100 Freighter ( 15 points)
1 Biggs Darklighter ( 19 points)
1 Jan Ors ( 19 points)
1 Luke Skywalker ( 20 points)
1 Gold Squadron ( 12 points)
1 Scurrg H-6 Bomber ( 16 points)

On 1/7/2018 at 3:30 AM, Ginkapo said:

At the moment you cannot kill an ISD as second player. Simple truth.

Mostly, but not always, true. Two OE/APT shrimp is enough to kill some ISDs as P2, but you do have to outfly your opponent to do it. Getting lucky with Luke would help a lot, but we all know how wise it is to rely on Luke's competence.

20 minutes ago, Backgild said:

After playing with a lot of the advice here, I've made a version 2 of my list that I think adheres mostly to the spirit of the original.

This list is much better.

However, H9 should go on Admonition. H9 is the ship that dives into the fray first if you're facing lots of flotilla/corvette activations to threaten one-shots out its side arcs--it's what H9 is there for. It needs defenses commensurate with the magnitude of the danger you're sending it into, and Admo provides that.

Whether Dodonna should be on that same ship is a question of how steely-eyed you are.

Personally, I put my admiral (Mothma, in my case) on that ship because 1) I also have Lando on it, so 2) it's the safest place in my whole fleet, despite the dangerous places I put it. If you don't feel comfortable charging directly in with your flagship, you can put Dodonna on the other one. Just be aware that then you're accepting that sometimes the threat environment will be too great to get any use out of that ship at all, which is not a position I like facing.

It's a question of balancing resilience against juiciness. A very vulnerable ship without your admiral on it might not be juicy enough to prioritize attacks against. On the other hand, if your admiral is on a ship that your opponent knows will be very hard to kill, it's entirely conceivable that he will leave it alone entirely--in which case, so much the better for you, since that also means you can swing your big scary H9 around all over his backfield unimpeded.

4 minutes ago, Ardaedhel said:

Mostly, but not always, true. Two OE/APT shrimp is enough to kill some ISDs as P2, but you do have to outfly your opponent to do it.

Yeah yeah. Flyby the tower one more time....

4 minutes ago, Ardaedhel said:

Getting lucky with Luke would help a lot, but we all know how wise it is to rely on Luke's competence.

I was rolled and rerolled 26 blanks in 28 Luke blacks in a game. My list was built entirely on Luke. I only played it the once...

A year later I have a very similar list with Garels and a Cr90 with engine techs too. Much better.

On 1/9/2018 at 6:21 PM, Ardaedhel said:

Mostly, but not always, true. Two OE/APT shrimp is enough to kill some ISDs as P2, but you do have to outfly your opponent to do it. Getting lucky with Luke would help a lot, but we all know how wise it is to rely on Luke's competence.

This list is much better.

However, H9 should go on Admonition. H9 is the ship that dives into the fray first if you're facing lots of flotilla/corvette activations to threaten one-shots out its side arcs--it's what H9 is there for. It needs defenses commensurate with the magnitude of the danger you're sending it into, and Admo provides that.

Whether Dodonna should be on that same ship is a question of how steely-eyed you are.

Personally, I put my admiral (Mothma, in my case) on that ship because 1) I also have Lando on it, so 2) it's the safest place in my whole fleet, despite the dangerous places I put it. If you don't feel comfortable charging directly in with your flagship, you can put Dodonna on the other one. Just be aware that then you're accepting that sometimes the threat environment will be too great to get any use out of that ship at all, which is not a position I like facing.

It's a question of balancing resilience against juiciness. A very vulnerable ship without your admiral on it might not be juicy enough to prioritize attacks against. On the other hand, if your admiral is on a ship that your opponent knows will be very hard to kill, it's entirely conceivable that he will leave it alone entirely--in which case, so much the better for you, since that also means you can swing your big scary H9 around all over his backfield unimpeded.

These are some very good points to consider. My original thought was that against high activation fleets that pad with flotillas or make heavy use of relay, I could use the H9 to try to gain activation advantage, saving Admonition for tougher targets. Alternately, facing GH/Yavaris, if Admonition was the first one in to try to take out Yavaris, one accuracy wouldn't guarantee locking down the double brace, but an accuracy would be pretty valuable on a second MC30 against GH or flotillas. That said, I can certainly see situations that I would want H9 on my toughest ship, so I'll have to give this some thought.

I have to room to add a second H9 and drop to a 3 point bid, but I was leaning toward Lando and a 7 point bid.

58 minutes ago, Backgild said:

These are some very good points to consider. My original thought was that against high activation fleets that pad with flotillas or make heavy use of relay, I could use the H9 to try to gain activation advantage, saving Admonition for tougher targets. Alternately, facing GH/Yavaris, if Admonition was the first one in to try to take out Yavaris, one accuracy wouldn't guarantee locking down the double brace, but an accuracy would be pretty valuable on a second MC30 against GH or flotillas. That said, I can certainly see situations that I would want H9 on my toughest ship, so I'll have to give this some thought.

I have to room to add a second H9 and drop to a 3 point bid, but I was leaning toward Lando and a 7 point bid.

My vote would be Lando on your flagship. And ya, H9’s can be good on either ship, I’ve run it on both flagships and the non titled Torps in a swarm- as you said it depends on what you are targeting. If admo is going after the big stuff you could toss it on the other one as a flotilla hunter, but then you run the risk of encountering an enemy large that’s running around all cheeky without ECM and you’ll wish you had H9’s for the brace... it’s also nice to almost guarantee a kill if an errant flotilla gets too close