Inspired by @Megatronrex, I decided to try out his 5-Victory SD list.

Here's the list:

• VSD1: Motti, SFO
• VSD1: SFO
• VSD1:External Racks
• VSD1:External Racks
• VSD1: External Racks

Objectives: Opening Salvo, Contested Outpost, Solar Corona

My opponent brought an Akbar MC30 list:

• MC30s: Akbar, Foresight, Lando Calrissian, Gunnery Teams, TRC, External Racks
• MC30s: Admonition, Gunnery Teams, TRC External Racks
• MC30s: Gunnery Teams, TRC, External Racks
• GR-75: Bright Hope, Ahsoka Tano, Comms Net, Expanded Hangars
• Squadrons: Tycho, Shara, 2x A-Wing

We both had 400 points so we rolled off and I won the roll. I chose to go 2nd because I didn't want to face an objective where I had to chase him down. My opponent chose "Opening Salvo" as the objective.

He started deployment with his flotilla toward my right. I knew this meant he would probably put the squads with it. So I began deploying as far left as possible. No reason to make it easy. At the end, I had a wall of VSDs on my left and his MC30s were placed across from my right flank.

This got me thinking that I needed to start wheeling to the right to present a wall to his ships.

He decided to break off two of his ships and headed toward my left. I think my first mistake was committing to this 'wheel' maneuver on turn 1.

Now I had to 'correct' for the error and try to engage the two MC30s with whatever I could on the left. His flying also forced me to split my "bonus" volleys from the objective between several of his ships.

By turn 3 the board had taken the shape that would determine the course of the battle.

My two leftmost ships (with Motti in the far left) are engaging his two MC30s (with obstructed side arc from the middle VSD) while the others deal with Foresight on the right. This lack of concentrated firepower on any target will be an issue.

My right-most VSD comes to a stop (speed 0) to avoid ramming and also to prevent Foresight from looping behind my fleet.

His opening salvos concentrate on Motti, throwing 6 red dice each and doing 8 damage with each salvo. On the right, Foresight throws 6 red dice into a VSD for 9 damage (yikes!). In return, I miss with nearly everything in the opening salvo. Doing about 3 shield damage in total from all attacks.

Motti's ship finally manages to bring down the non-titled MC30 by plowing into both of the enemy ships - forcing him to chose which will be attacked and which will fire and move away. My first lucky batch of dice for the day and the two left ISDs do enough damage to finish off the 'generic' MC30 with a lucky Structural Damage crit and a ram. But Motti's days are numbered as he has suffered serious damage, Admonition still has him in its sights and all 4 a-wings are strafing him.

So, Motti finally went down and the battle drew to a close. On the right flank, Foresight did some fearsome damage (at one point rolling 3 accuracies and 4 damage!), but not enough to kill another VSD.

Fare you well, Motti.

In the end the fight was very close.

Imp Score: 86
Rebel Score: 98

Had my left-most VSD not been my flagship I would have won!

I learned a great deal from this battle. My deployment should have had the admiral in the center, so that a ship attempting to kill it would have to face much more firepower. I also showed my hand too early in maneuvering. The early wheel meant that the speedy MC30s could isolate my flank. If I had drifted to the left I might have not left a gap for this flank. However, at this point he may have just put all 3 ships on my right flank instead. Also, I should have had a VSD with external racks on either end. When I finally got in close with the enemy - the ship didn't have the firepower to close out the deal.

My ships got in each other's way quite a bit. I need to learn how to maneuver them more coherently.

I had a great time, though. It's surprisingly low stress to only have 5 big triangles to manage in a battle.