Putting Konstantine back to work

By LeatherPants, in Star Wars: Armada Fleet Builds

Below is a list I've put together to try and get some decent mileage from Konstantine. The basic idea is to slow roll in, using Konstantines ability to help ensure that enemy ships remain at a higher speed than the Victory's to keep the Quad Battery Turrets humming. The fighter screen is pretty light, and the Victory chassis anti-squadron isn't great, so there is a fair amount of susceptibility to heavy fighter/bomber lists. The 7th fleet titles, combined with the Victory's keeping in relatively tight formation, should ideally keep most attacks in the front arcs and therefore reduce able. The lack of a bid does put the fleet at the mercy of the opponent for initiative, though that can likely be mitigated somewhat by choice of objectives (which I haven't done yet). Any thoughts?

SHIP POINT COST
Victory II-Class Star Destroyer 85
title-icon-black.png 7th Fleet Star Destroyer : "Star Destroyer" only.

While defending against an attack that targets your front hull zone, before you suffer damage, you may choose and exhaust a copy of this card on another friendly ship at distance 1-4 to reduce the total damage by 1.
5
officer-icon-black.png Hondo Ohnaka : At the start of the ship phase, you may discard this card to choose 2 different command tokens and place them on 2 different ships. Then your opponent chooses 2 different command tokens you did not choose and places them on 2 different ships. 2
weapons-team-icon-black.png Gunnery Team : You can attack from the same hull zone more than once per activation. The hull zone cannot target the same ship or squadron more than once during that activation. 7
offensive-retrofit-icon-black.png Disposable Capacitors : Small or medium ship only
When you activate, you may discard this card. If you do, the blue dice in your battery armament can be used while attacking ships at close-long range until the end of the round.
3
turbolasers-icon-black.png Quad Battery Turrets : While attacking a ship with higher speed than yours, you may add 1 blue die to your attack pool. 5
ion-cannons-icon-black.png Leading Shots : While attacking, you may spend 1 blue die to reroll any number of dice in your attack pool. 4
Victory II-Class Star Destroyer 85
title-icon-black.png 7th Fleet Star Destroyer : "Star Destroyer" only.

While defending against an attack that targets your front hull zone, before you suffer damage, you may choose and exhaust a copy of this card on another friendly ship at distance 1-4 to reduce the total damage by 1.
5
officer-icon-black.png Skilled First Officer : Before you reveal a command, you may discard this card to discard your top command dial. 1
weapons-team-icon-black.png Gunnery Team : You can attack from the same hull zone more than once per activation. The hull zone cannot target the same ship or squadron more than once during that activation. 7
offensive-retrofit-icon-black.png Disposable Capacitors : Small or medium ship only
When you activate, you may discard this card. If you do, the blue dice in your battery armament can be used while attacking ships at close-long range until the end of the round.
3
turbolasers-icon-black.png Quad Battery Turrets : While attacking a ship with higher speed than yours, you may add 1 blue die to your attack pool. 5
ion-cannons-icon-black.png Leading Shots : While attacking, you may spend 1 blue die to reroll any number of dice in your attack pool. 4
Victory II-Class Star Destroyer 85
commander-icon-black.png Admiral Konstantine : At the start of each Status Phase, for each enemy ship at distance 1-5 of at least 2 friendly medium or large ships, you may increase or decrease that enemy's ship speed by 1 to a minimum of 1. 23
title-icon-black.png 7th Fleet Star Destroyer : "Star Destroyer" only.

While defending against an attack that targets your front hull zone, before you suffer damage, you may choose and exhaust a copy of this card on another friendly ship at distance 1-4 to reduce the total damage by 1.
5
officer-icon-black.png Minister Tua : You gain 1 additional defensive-retrofit-icon-black-small.png icon in your upgrade bar.

You cannot equip this card to a medium or large ship with a defensive-retrofit-icon-black-small.png in its upgrade bar.
2
weapons-team-icon-black.png Gunnery Team : You can attack from the same hull zone more than once per activation. The hull zone cannot target the same ship or squadron more than once during that activation. 7
offensive-retrofit-icon-black.png Disposable Capacitors : Small or medium ship only
When you activate, you may discard this card. If you do, the blue dice in your battery armament can be used while attacking ships at close-long range until the end of the round.
3
defensive-retrofit-icon-black.png Electronic Countermeasures : While defending, you may exhaust this card to spend 1 defense token that your opponent targeted with an dice-accuracy-black.pngresult. 7
turbolasers-icon-black.png Quad Battery Turrets : While attacking a ship with higher speed than yours, you may add 1 blue die to your attack pool. 5
ion-cannons-icon-black.png Leading Shots : While attacking, you may spend 1 blue die to reroll any number of dice in your attack pool. 4
Total cost of ships and upgrades, commander included =362
SQUADRON AMOUNT POINT COST
"Howlrunner" : While another friendly squadron with SWARM at distance 1 is attacking a squadron, it may add 1 blue dice to its attack pool. 1 16
TIE Interceptor Squadron 2 22
Total squadron cost =38

Glad to see that I'm not then only one trying to make Konstantine work

24 minutes ago, Alpharius18 said:

Glad to see that I'm not then only one trying to make Konstantine work

I don't get to play particularly often, but I've made it a focus to try out all of the Commanders (both Rebel and Imperial) for at least a few (3-5) games, to get a first-hand "review" of how I feel they play out. To date, the only Commanders I haven't given a test drive with are Raddus and Rieeken (surprisingly) for Rebels, and Konstantine, Tagge, and Thrawn for the Imperials. I have everything currently available, and multiples of quite a few ships (and a few Ebay card purchases), so I have pretty good flexibility in terms of putting together most any list usable in tournaments. Most notably however, I currently only have one copy of Rebel Squadrons 1, though I intend to pick up a couple more of those (mainly for the Y-wings and A-wings) so I can try out some more squadron-heavy Rebel builds.

I don't feel like writing this same post twice, but no matter who builds what list with Konstantine, this will be the feedback I have to give. It is generally true about every Konstantine list. His ability is simply not a big enough impact - even if you positively ABUSE it - to make a real difference on the game.

Play him thematically if you don't mind losing. That's the only place he works.

For the assault objective, I think I like Blockade Run. Ordinarily, one probably wouldn't consider the lethargic Victory Class a great blockade runner, but I think it works with this list. To cover the necessary distance in time, the fleet will need to be deployed coming in hot (maximum speed! 2! LOL). Dial up navigate commands early to bank a token for later use. Keep in mind that every ship will need to move at speed 2 for at least 3 rounds during the game (ideally in turns 1, 2, and 6), and keep navigating left and right to a minimum (not really a problem with the Victory, LOL). The relatively narrow play area should help keep the opponent somewhat bunched for good use of Gunnery Teams. Depending on how the opponent responds, Konstantine should probably be working on keeping the enemy fleet increasing in speed, both to help trigger Quad battery turrets as well as hopefully get a decent amount of the enemy to end up overflying you and not making themselves obstacles to slow you down by being forced to ram them. Remember that as second player you place all the obstacles, so plan your attack/escape run path wisely, remembering that you REALLY need to spend the majority of the game moving directly towards the enemy deployment zone. For the bonus victory points, the good news is that the Victory Class is a pretty meaty target, and can take a fair amount of punishment to eliminate and grant your opponent the tokens. The bad news is that the Victory Class is fairly unforgiving in both speed and maneuverability, so you'll really need to stay on target and focus on "keeping the road clear" of sacrificial road-blocks.

Edited by LeatherPants

For the Defensive objective I'm a little torn, but I think I like Contested Outpost. Basic strategy is simple: keep the VSD's close and moving slowly once they are at range of the station. Keep them somewhat staggered so that ideally at LEAST 2 of them are in range of the station as many turns of the game as possible, as well as trying to maximize your front arc killing zones a little longer. As always, keep Konstantine working to increase the enemies speed to trigger QBT's and make it difficult to coordinate their fleet and cash in on victory tokens.

Edited by LeatherPants

For the navigation objective, unfortunately I have to choose the horribly-unimaginative Solar Corona. It's probably the only blue objective that this fleet can reasonably hope to benefit from. It shouldn't take too much imagination to formulate a game plan for this objective.

Edited by LeatherPants