Im gonna experiment with this tomorrow.

HH's can sort of deny a prime Raddus location with thier big footprint. Tetsu is there for a suicide mission, jump into big squad balls to speedbump/split them up to give HH speed advantage.

I know its a lot of HH's, but to get good results with red dice you need numbers if not 4 sure manipulation.

Critique welcome.

Sato (400/400)
=============
MC75 Armored Cruiser (104 + 50)
+ Commander Sato (32)
+ Damage Control Officer (5)
+ Ordnance Experts (4)
+ Electronic Countermeasures (7)
+ Wide-Area Barrage (2)
Nebulon-B Escort Frigate (57 + 5)
+ Yavaris (5)
GR-75 Medium Transports (18 + 7)
+ Jamming Field (2)
+ Expanded Hangar Bay (5)
GR-75 Medium Transports (18 + 7)
+ Comms Net (2)
+ Expanded Hangar Bay (5)
Ketsu Onyo (22)
Lieutenant Blount (14)
14 x Z-95 Headhunter Squadron (14 x 7)

I would drop a little Quantity for quality. Swap Ketsu for Jan and 3 X-wings will protect your Z-95s for ages while the enemy chew through anything with escort with Jan's Braces helping out. in your current build Blount will just be targeted first so some escorts are vital. Also means you can control them all and could start to drop expanded hangars maybe for Boosted Comms or Raymus on the Yavaris.

I love a Z swarm, but I agree you will need some escorts, Yt1300's take some killing, but they are sooooo slow.

You could also drop a few z's for a cushy bid. A Sloane Alpha will have Howlrunner + FC shooting as many as 5 six-blue die TIE/i's killing all those z's or stripping your Aces.

Im a little confused on the need to escort Z's. You guys make a nice arguement but arent they expendable?

Why is losing a 13pt Xwing better than losing 2 Z's for 14pts? The X-Wing is more reliable shooting and has Bomber...is it really more expendable?

....especially considering the X's also have to protect Jan if you bring her. Once the Xwings are gone, she is next.

I always thought the only Strength of the Z's was their ezpendability and the ability to put massive amounts of bases and red dice on the board. Even Blount himself is only a point more than an X, not really worth protecting. Its my experience that Blount protects the entire swarm if just a little bit with just his defence tokens. He is nice but not nearly the lynchpin that people think he is. He is expendable too.

So really, why protect them with escort?

If the Z's need protection...

Sato75 (395/400)
===============
MC75 Ordnance Cruiser (100 + 58)
+ Commander Sato (32)
+ Damage Control Officer (5)
+ Ordnance Experts (4)
+ Hardened Bulkheads (5)
+ Electronic Countermeasures (7)
+ Wide-Area Barrage (2)
+ External Racks (3)
Nebulon-B Escort Frigate (57 + 8)
+ Veteran Captain (3)
+ Yavaris (5)
GR-75 Medium Transports (18 + 5)
+ Leia Organa (3)
+ Comms Net (2)
GR-75 Medium Transports (18 + 2)
+ Jamming Field (2)
3 x VCX-100 Freighter (3 x 15)
Lieutenant Blount (14)
10 x Z-95 Headhunter Squadron (10 x 7)

....this looks pretty good.

4 hours ago, Deadshane said:

Im a little confused on the need to escort Z's. You guys make a nice arguement but arent they expendable?

Why is losing a 13pt Xwing better than losing 2 Z's for 14pts? The X-Wing is more reliable shooting and has Bomber...is it really more expendable?

....especially considering the X's also have to protect Jan if you bring her. Once the Xwings are gone, she is next.

I always thought the only Strength of the Z's was their ezpendability and the ability to put massive amounts of bases and red dice on the board. Even Blount himself is only a point more than an X, not really worth protecting. Its my experience that Blount protects the entire swarm if just a little bit with just his defence tokens. He is nice but not nearly the lynchpin that people think he is. He is expendable too.

So really, why protect them with escort?

It's so you don't lose your 14 point investment when Maarek+Jendon roll by, or when Shara comes says hello.

Prevent the alpha strike. X-Wing + Jan is very hard to break efficiently, where as Z-95s can be one shot. Also, your squadron to squadron value is way off. My rule of thumb is to run squads = squad value + squad tokens. But the squad value has to actually be used. I can see Yavaris and the GR-75s pushing squads every round, but not the MC75 which will need to Nav. That gives you 3+4+3 for 10 squads that can be pushed in a single round, or 14 if you do the MC75 as well. But the tokens are one round only, so next round you can push 2+3+2 for 7 squads, which leaves half your squads unactivated, which puts them at a disadvantage.

Taking X-Wings and Jan will lower your squad count to you can efficiently activate all your squads, which will improve the quality of your activations.