So these are the upgrade cards I'd never use, ever.

Worst:

1. Independence

2. NK-7 Ion Cannons

3. Overload Pulse

4. Cluster Bombs

5. Redemption

6. Heavy Turbolaser Turrets

7. Point-Defence Reroute

I'd love the see some errata issued for some of these! For example, if the attacker chose the defence token for NKs that would be a start.

And these are my creme de la creme:

Best:

1. Gunnery Team

2. Demolisher

3. Yavaris

4. Intel Orificer

5. ECMs

I always find it hard not to take ECMs, Gunnery Teams and Intel Orificer, though there are at least some new cards in these slots putting pressure on which is nice. Demo and Yavaris are likely to be dominant for a long while yet as Insidious offers little competition and Yavaris (and Salvation) are the only reasons you'd take a Neb B in the first place. I'd like to see some alternatives to Yavaris for making rebel squads competitive.

VSD title card Dominator. Too expensive.

Well in general the officer slot is super competitive which makes many officers unplayable just for the fact that there are better options. Most of the generic wave 1 and 2 officers are obsolete.

Others I never take,

Repair Crews; proximity and often a telegraphed activation order make this difficult to pull off and not worth it.

Sensor Teams or Veteran Gunners: too many better options.

Quad Turbo Laser Cannons: too expensive at 10 and if you don't roll a red accuracy it does nothing, better options here for sure.

Some I have a hard time not taking:

Comms Net

X17: really helps push that damage through.

External Racks: Nice cheap way to push out some damage quickly on the cheap.

Bizarre, ....

The following cards were listed above as being the worst, and I have found them to be incredible. Even more strange, the 3 of them in conjunction were instrumental in winning a local tournament recently:

• Overload Pulse
• Dominator
• Quad Turbo Laser Cannons

These cards do not get the love they deserve. Extremely powerful and very under-rated, especially since Wave 6 & 7.

3 hours ago, Jambo75 said:

4. Intel Orificer

I always find it hard not to take...Intel Orificer,

You did it twice so it was intentional?

2 hours ago, Thraug said:

Bizarre, ....

The following cards were listed above as being the worst, and I have found them to be incredible. Even more strange, the 3 of them in conjunction were instrumental in winning a local tournament recently:

• Overload Pulse
• Dominator
• Quad Turbo Laser Cannons

These cards do not get the love they deserve. Extremely powerful and very under-rated, especially since Wave 6 & 7.

How?

Overload pulse is a bit janky, bit it can work.

Redemtion is not bad, but salv and yavaris are better and cheaper. So unless I'm fielding 3 nebulons, it won't be used.

Quad turbolaser cannons are ok for the liberty if you got the points.

23 hours ago, Green Knight said:

How?

Hmmm ...

Victory-II Dominator burns 2 shields, rolls 5 blue for a 76% chance that the defender exhausts all defense tokens. Con Fire token or dial increases this to 82% (if I did the token math correctly), dial has the advantage of adding damage or an accuracy if it doesn't get a crit. Dial+token is 87% chance? That's pretty good against an ISD, say. Add D-Caps for extra fun. (We know they're great for Vic-IIs generally.)

QTC has a 29% chance of one accuracy+one accuracy from reds, 4% 2+1, and 0.2% ( ) 3+1 , just from the reds. So, a 33% chance of at least two accuracies.

Rerolls from Vader or some other source for best effect?

Alternately, Engineer non-stop to get your shields back, or have Repair Crew around. Thrawn might be a really good commander, to allow you to both engineer constantly and CF. CF tokens from Gozantis ... A CF token from one Goz and an engineering from another each turn?

I think the point is that this is a (relatively) cheap way of rolling lots of blue dice to try to get Overload Pulse to go off. Even if it fails, you have some chance of getting at least two accuracies, which neutralizes a whole bunch of defense tokens, less ECM, of course. You're also rolling enough dice that, if the defender doesn't burn a Brace and/or Redirect, you're probably knocking down his shield and doing some hull damage (8 or 9 dice being rolled).

Disadvantage relative to IO is that you can't herd the defender to particular defense tokens. Advantage is that it doesn't matter which token they spend, it's burned. Oh, and the possibility of extra accuracies from QTC means that you do have some herding ability.

Probably, none of this is at all new.

The issue is though, with Overload pulse happening after tokens are spent and thus, relying on double arcs, and Dominator + D-Caps not combining together... its a stack of upgrades that are... basically... all kind of useful, but don't exactly gel together to enhance each other.

Especially with QTC only applying to Reds, but Dominator adding Blues... etc.

I’ve made QTC’s work(ish) on a battlecruiser with Home One. Pretty much guaranteed to blow out flotes at long range. I think this could work on a cymoon in conjunction with Jonus.

As for QTC...

Vic II/Intel officer/Gunnery Teams/DispCaps/QTC/Warlord

Pair with Jonus or Vader and you have incredibly reliable firepower, 5-8 hits long range with the caps and an accuracy. Intel is optional and can be traded for Tua/ECM. The standard Vic II/Intel/GT/DipCap/QBT is probably still better as it's cheaper but Warlord/QTC does work.

Now cluster bombs... that's an irredeemable card.

49 minutes ago, Teh HOBO said:

Now cluster bombs... that's an irredeemable card.

Saves as much damage over the course of a game as RBD.

3 minutes ago, Drasnighta said:

Saves as much damage over the course of a game as RBD.

Only if your opponent brought a meaningful squadron ball though... for 5pts and a Def Retro slot, it's pretty bad, not as bad a Tagge(the champ) but top5 for sure.

1 minute ago, Teh HOBO said:

Only if your opponent brought a meaningful squadron ball though... for 5pts and a Def Retro slot, it's pretty bad, not as bad a Tagge(the champ) but top5 for sure.

Not even a meaningful squadron ball.

If its presence stops one black die squadron from shooting at you for 1-2 turns... Or heaven forbid, it kills a squadron on the 3rd Turn (in conjunction with flak if needed)... it has saved you, on average, as much health as Reinforced Blast Doors .

And in fact, all Defensive Retrofits that are not ECM or EWS.

Yet, Reinfoced Blast Doors are not considered an "Irredeemable" Card.

Cluster Bombs get a hard time.

30 minutes ago, Drasnighta said:

Not even a meaningful squadron ball.

If its presence stops one black die squadron from shooting at you for 1-2 turns... Or heaven forbid, it kills a squadron on the 3rd Turn (in conjunction with flak if needed)... it has saved you, on average, as much health as Reinforced Blast Doors .

And in fact, all Defensive Retrofits that are not ECM or EWS.

Yet, Reinfoced Blast Doors are not considered an "Irredeemable" Card.

Cluster Bombs get a hard time.

Huh. You know, when you put it like that, you're right. I think the issue a lot of people have is that once in a lifetime roll where you get 4 accs. I know ID throw the card, dice, and maybe even ship away after that. I don't think it's a card worth having in singles, but (say) @Ardaedhel 's style of 4 mc30s.... Hmmm.... I'm just crazy enough to try something like this soon.

15 minutes ago, geek19 said:

Huh. You know, when you put it like that, you're right. I think the issue a lot of people have is that once in a lifetime roll where you get 4 accs. I know ID throw the card, dice, and maybe even ship away after that. I don't think it's a card worth having in singles, but (say) @Ardaedhel 's style of 4 mc30s.... Hmmm.... I'm just crazy enough to try something like this soon.

@rasproteus played an absolutely insanely punishing cr90 swarm with cluster bombs on each cr90. You simply could not score against it with a squadron heavy build effectively.

6 hours ago, elbmc1969 said:

Hmmm ...

Victory-II Dominator burns 2 shields, rolls 5 blue for a 76% chance that the defender exhausts all defense tokens. Con Fire token or dial increases this to 82% (if I did the token math correctly), dial has the advantage of adding damage or an accuracy if it doesn't get a crit. Dial+token is 87% chance? That's pretty good against an ISD, say. Add D-Caps for extra fun. (We know they're great for Vic-IIs generally.)

QTC has a 29% chance of one accuracy+one accuracy from reds, 4% 2+1, and 0.2% ( ) 3+1 , just from the reds. So, a 33% chance of at least two accuracies.

Rerolls from Vader or some other source for best effect?

Alternately, Engineer non-stop to get your shields back, or have Repair Crew around. Thrawn might be a really good commander, to allow you to both engineer constantly and CF. CF tokens from Gozantis ... A CF token from one Goz and an engineering from another each turn?

I think the point is that this is a (relatively) cheap way of rolling lots of blue dice to try to get Overload Pulse to go off. Even if it fails, you have some chance of getting at least two accuracies, which neutralizes a whole bunch of defense tokens, less ECM, of course. You're also rolling enough dice that, if the defender doesn't burn a Brace and/or Redirect, you're probably knocking down his shield and doing some hull damage (8 or 9 dice being rolled).

Disadvantage relative to IO is that you can't herd the defender to particular defense tokens. Advantage is that it doesn't matter which token they spend, it's burned. Oh, and the possibility of extra accuracies from QTC means that you do have some herding ability.

Probably, none of this is at all new.

Mmm I don’t know if you do, but dcaps cannot use dominator dice at long range.

6 hours ago, elbmc1969 said:

Hmmm ...

Victory-II Dominator burns 2 shields, rolls 5 blue for a 76% chance that the defender exhausts all defense tokens. Con Fire token or dial increases this to 82% (if I did the token math correctly), dial has the advantage of adding damage or an accuracy if it doesn't get a crit. Dial+token is 87% chance? That's pretty good against an ISD, say. Add D-Caps for extra fun. (We know they're great for Vic-IIs generally.)

QTC has a 29% chance of one accuracy+one accuracy from reds, 4% 2+1, and 0.2% ( ) 3+1 , just from the reds. So, a 33% chance of at least two accuracies.

Rerolls from Vader or some other source for best effect?

Alternately, Engineer non-stop to get your shields back, or have Repair Crew around. Thrawn might be a really good commander, to allow you to both engineer constantly and CF. CF tokens from Gozantis ... A CF token from one Goz and an engineering from another each turn?

I think the point is that this is a (relatively) cheap way of rolling lots of blue dice to try to get Overload Pulse to go off. Even if it fails, you have some chance of getting at least two accuracies, which neutralizes a whole bunch of defense tokens, less ECM, of course. You're also rolling enough dice that, if the defender doesn't burn a Brace and/or Redirect, you're probably knocking down his shield and doing some hull damage (8 or 9 dice being rolled).

Disadvantage relative to IO is that you can't herd the defender to particular defense tokens. Advantage is that it doesn't matter which token they spend, it's burned. Oh, and the possibility of extra accuracies from QTC means that you do have some herding ability.

Probably, none of this is at all new.

But this cost about half your list ?

Plus the timing of crits make overload pulse relatively irrelevant, unless trying for an avenger-like 2-ship setup.

Which is fun, but unwieldy.

5 hours ago, BrobaFett said:

@rasproteus played an absolutely insanely punishing cr90 swarm with cluster bombs on each cr90. You simply could not score against it with a squadron heavy build effectively.

List?

How did it fare against massive ship based attacks, say Ackbars at long and med?

I assume Mothma to help with this.

2 hours ago, Green Knight said:

But this cost about half your list ?

Plus the timing of crits make overload pulse relatively irrelevant, unless trying for an avenger-like 2-ship setup.

Which is fun, but unwieldy.

Yeah it’s the timing of crits which renders OP rather redundant. The defender will just spend its tokens before the pulse. I guess in combo with HTTs it could cause some angst if it’s a big hit?

Since I'm a "glass-half-full" kinda guy, let's start with

The Best:

Officer Slot:

1 Skilled First Officer (Rarely a bad call)

7 Intel Officer (Gonna need him)

Weapons Team:

4 Ordnance Experts (So good. Seriously might be my favorite upgrade. Four points of black-die love.)

Support Team:

8 Engine Techs (Have you ever flown CR90s with Engine Techs? You should. I always miss them on Demo when I can't fit them in.)

Offensive Retrofit:

3 Disposable Capacitors (Kaboom goes the flotilla at long range)

Defense Slot:

7 ECM (Still the best. When you absolutely positively need to survive a brutal shot, oh yeah, you almost always do.)

Ions:

4 Leading Shots (The best kind of shots other than blue milk or scotch)

Ordnance :

5 APT (So good)

3 External Racks (So good)

Turbolaser:

6 XI7 (You want them to redirect? No, you want them to die.)

And...

The Worst:

Officer Slot:

3 Director Isard (I've got 3 points burning a hole in my pocket that I want to use on this super important slot. About as situational as it gets. I'm a little **** the Rebels do not have a **** equivalent worst officer card.)

6 Tactical Officer (Okay maybe now some play with Intensify Firepower? Nah.)

Weapons Team:

5 Sensor Team (Not even a flotilla-happy meta or @Ginkapo could bring this card to life)

Support Team:

5 Engineering Team (Not a horrible card, but WHY DO I HAVE SO MANY OF THESE FFG?! )

Offensive Retrofit:

5 Point Defense Reroute (Should have gotten a boost from the Rhymer nerf. Didn't)

Defense Slot:

8 Redundant Shields (Go ahead and repair that little single shield, baby.)

Ions:

10 NK Ion Cannons (For 10 points they should be came changers. Every ship I care about losing has a token I'd choose to throw away that isn't a game changer)

Ordnance :

8 Rapid Reload (Just do a CF command and save yourself the 8 points)

Turbolaser:

6 Slaved Turrets (Okay, not a horrendous card, but in a really great set of cards, Slaved Turrets always seems like the worst choice.)

So in my humble opinion, here we have the most worst ISD2 in Armada right now:

Imperial II (120)
• General Tagge (25)
• Director Isard (3)
• Sensor Team (5)
• Point-Defense Reroute (5)
• Redundant Shields (8)
• NK-7 Ion Cannons (10)
• Slaved Turrets (6)
= 182 Points

(It is also illegal due to double modifications, but...whatever, I'll let you play it.)

10 hours ago, BrobaFett said:

@rasproteus played an absolutely insanely punishing cr90 swarm with cluster bombs on each cr90. You simply could not score against it with a squadron heavy build effectively.

One-shotting Dengar is a wonderful feeling. Then you realize that you are essentially trading a 50-point ship for him, and that feeling starts to fade away.

Honestly, they work great until you spend them. The threat of doing 4 damage to an attacking squadron is actually much more valuable than the damage itself. Do a point or two of damage to Maarek and those CBs will keep him away all game.

5 hours ago, CaribbeanNinja said:

Imperial II (120)
• General Tagge (25)
• Director Isard (3)
• Sensor Team (5)
• Point-Defense Reroute (5)
• Redundant Shields (8)
• NK-7 Ion Cannons (10)
• Slaved Turrets (6)
= 182 Points

No worries, I can make it legal by just subbing in Cluster Bombs instead of Redundant Shields.

PS, General Tagge is a strange way to spell Admiral Konstantine.

10 hours ago, Sharego said:

Mmm I don’t know if you do, but dcaps cannot use dominator dice at long range.

Ah, yes. Was trying to figure out math for it, wasn't playing close enough attention.

7 hours ago, CaribbeanNinja said:

The Worst:

Officer Slot:

3 Director Isard (I've got 3 points burning a hole in my pocket that I want to use on this super important slot. About as situational as it gets. I'm a little **** the Rebels do not have a **** equivalent worst officer card.)

Turbolaser:

6 Slaved Turrets (Okay, not a horrendous card, but in a really great set of cards, Slaved Turrets always seems like the worst choice.)

Ok, I have some issues with these two.

After playing her in a tournament, Isard is a nightmare option when combined with abilities like Slicer Tools or Raid tokens. While some ships like to spam identical commands, others need an early setup combo such as Raddus'd MC75s. Isard lets you plan which ships and which turns need disruption, so you can choose between multiple targets. Since she has no range limitation, she can trigger on your first turn from across the board, giving you 2-3 turns advance warning on approaching ships. One of her most useful functions on a Slicer Gozanti: Activate the Gozanti where you have multiple potential targets, and choose the potential target you are least certain of for commands. For example, you know Demolisher will have a Navigate command, but what about the Star Destroyer next to it? Then slice the one that is more likely to be a threat in the ensuing turn.

Slaved Turrets is an excellent choice on ships that are designed to make only one attack from one hull zone, such as Arquitens cruisers and certain Nebulon-B builds. A frequent indicator of a good Slaved Turrets ship is that it has one major firing arc and no weapons team slot.