Worlds Doldrums 3: Store Champs

By ThatJakeGuy, in Imperial Assault Skirmish

We are just a few days before Worlds! Hopefully afterwards this place will thrive with discussion and fun once again.

Until then though, let's talk about the future. With store champs approaching quickly, the way is open for more interesting lists to flourish in the lower stakes environment. What lists do you want to try in the upcoming season?

I'll start with an Onar/Vader combo, using Onar to trigger Parting Blow:

Bad Idea? (15/15/40)
==================
[18] Darth Vader
[-5] Driven by Hatred
[7] Elite Jet Trooper
[7] Elite Jet Trooper
[1] Temporary Alliance
[6] Onar Koma
[2] Imperial Officer
[2] Imperial Officer
[1] Zillo Technique
[1] Unshakable

-------------------

[3] Grenadier
[2] Call the Vanguard
[2] Overrun
[2] Parting Blow
[2] Parting Blow
[1] Dark Energy
[1] Deathblow
[1] Extra Protection
[1] Negation
[0] Looking for a Fight
[0] Planning
[0] Positioning Advantage
[0] Take Initiative
[0] To the Limit
[0] Urgency

Sounds fun! Thats a ton of investment in Vader though- seems like against hunters and no brace for impact/stealth tactics he could go down really fast, and then half your cc's are useless. I would actually target him before jets if facing this list.

46 minutes ago, TheWelcomeMat88 said:

Sounds fun! Thats a ton of investment in Vader though- seems like against hunters and no brace for impact/stealth tactics he could go down really fast, and then half your cc's are useless. I would actually target him before jets if facing this list.

That's IF you knew what the command deck was. If you actually sat down across from it without knowing the CCs, would you still do it or go after the jets per normal?

18 minutes ago, ThatJakeGuy said:

That's IF you knew what the command deck was. If you actually sat down across from it without knowing the CCs, would you still do it or go after the jets per normal?

Thats a good question. I would say it depends on a lot of factors like objectives and the list i have. I suppose the fear of brace for impact/stealth/ and even brace yourself would avert some people from attacking Vader at all. I think if i didnt have the wombo combos i would hold back Vader and force choke since he would be more fragile in this list. If Vader is hiding safe i would go for objectives or jets. I would tend to assume my opponent has Onars card (more Likely to be used in an imperial list) so i would attack him and not other stuff if he is within 2 spaces. Since Onar is the only hunter i would assume you dont have other ccs so i would be more ok with him hanging around (except get down could really be annoying). We are kinda talking speculation here though. I like the list it could be fun, i tend to like high risk high reward with Vader so i dig it except i would trade deathblow with brace for impact or stealth. My question is- do you contest most shields on nal hutta or rush against weeqs and ranger lists?

20 minutes ago, TheWelcomeMat88 said:

My question is- do you contest most shields on nal hutta or rush against weeqs and ranger lists?

Since most of the time those lists stick in or near their deployment, I would aspire to move jets to objectives round one then move in and attack round 2. Most objectives are halfway between zones so it's a good stopping point since you can't get fly-by attacks R1.

1 hour ago, ThatJakeGuy said:

Since most of the time those lists stick in or near their deployment, I would aspire to move jets to objectives round one then move in and attack round 2. Most objectives are halfway between zones so it's a good stopping point since you can't get fly-by attacks R1.

Yup sounds about right to me! I like it.

My regular opponent plays a list similar to this, no Onar but he always discard cards to avoid damage on Vader. I find this lacks of command cards for those eJets, I feel them ineffective or at least not as effective as they could with a full set of command cards. Everything is Vader-centric and the guy doesn't really need any boost to be a pain in the neck.

I tend to win just ignoring Vader and splitting my team before he gets behind the enemy lines. My strategy is usually to soften asap all the other activations using Chewie and Han, so that they won't score too many objective points.

Once I decided to go for Vader because a uber combo kicked in with Chewie: Attack, Wild Fury, Focused Attack, Slam, To The Limit, Attack. Then the opponent scored a relaxed kill because Chewie was incapacitated by Stun and Bleed. I played Debt Repaid and an underestimated Rally, so I could go for another Focused attack and Slam with Self Defense.

Vader is tough but it's somewhat simple to deal with him. If you manage to avoid his attacks, then opponent game is crippled. 4 damages and 2 strains per round until end of round 2 is like having a decent support for more than half of the game at a doubled cost. It's amazing how Force Choking twice a round can give a feeling of accomplishment even if - mathematically speaking - it's a total fail.

Needs more Fuel Upgrade IMO. And probably RbF to get the combo off. With Onar there I can see how you dont necessarily have to draw into the full combo. But it's still possible to never draw a single Parting Blow when you start with only 3 cards.

Edited by defkhan1
On 4/29/2018 at 11:31 AM, ThatJakeGuy said:

With store champs approaching quickly, the way is open for more interesting lists to flourish in the lower stakes environment. What lists do you want to try in the upcoming season?

Well I don't exactly expect this to flourish (in fact far from it) but I'd love to find a way to make a Vader/Fett list "work" for a random store tournament. It will almost certainly be called "No Disintegrations", and right now I'm thinking that I'll probably add a few officers and some riots to leave my opponent with no appealing options for targets.

My thought right now is to bring a bunch of defensive command cards to try to keep my heavy hitters alive until time is called. If I can use Fett and the riots to grab enough objective points I'm hoping that I can hold out for a win or two.

Thanks for all the great pointers. Here's v2:

Bad Idea? (15/15/40)
==================
[18] Darth Vader
[-5] Driven by Hatred
[7] Elite Jet Trooper
[7] Elite Jet Trooper
[1] Temporary Alliance
[6] Onar Koma
[2] Imperial Officer
[1] Zillo Technique
[1] Unshakable
[1] Targeting Computer
[1] Rule by Fear

-------------------

[2] Call the Vanguard
[2] Overrun
[2] Parting Blow
[2] Parting Blow
[1] Dark Energy
[1] Deathblow
[1] Fuel Upgrade
[1] Negation
[1] Brace for Impact
[1] Extra Protection
[1] Tough Luck
[0] Take Initiative
[0] Planning
[0] Looking for a Fight
[0] To the Limit

I took the following list to the weekly IA night at my local store a couple of months ago. It’s probably terrible but I had a lot of fun with it:

Vader (13)

Rancor (10)

Palpatine (8)

Regular Riots (5)

Officer (2)

Zillo (1)

Temp Alliance (1)

The thought was to rush Vader or the Rancor right in the middle of the deployment zone, have them soak up a ton of attacks, and the when they die run the other one in to clean up. I actually won a couple of games with it (against an ugnaught swarm and an old school trooper swarm so take that with a grain of salt), but I’m sure it would melt under a somewhat meta list.

Ive been thinking about bringing it to a store champ, but maybe dropping Palp for another regular riot and officer to add an activation, or an elite riot and RbF for some more offense/card draw.

Again, probably not a good list, but seeing people’s reactions when you plop down Vader and the Rancor was pretty great.

Needs more Grenadier now. =P

I've been messing around with idea like this

Nexu x 4

Hired Gun x 2

Clawdite x 3

Jawa

beast tamer

black market

Sounds daft but 10 activations!

2 hours ago, defkhan1 said:

Needs more Grenadier now. =P

I think Jets get less utility from the Big G than Riots or Storms, so it's an acceptable cut to get the other cool stuff.

When you cant quite justify Ahsoka in rebels. Play her in Mercs:

Ahsoka Tano(8)

Shyla Varad (8)

Onar Koma (6)

0-0-0 (4)

Greedo (4)

Gideon Argus (3)

Jawa Scavanger (3)

C-3P0 (2)

Devious Scheme (1)

Temporary Alliance (1)

Who says Hunters need to snipe you from a mile away? Go up and Onar them.

8 minutes ago, ThatJakeGuy said:

I think Jets get less utility from the Big G than Riots or Storms, so it's an acceptable cut to get the other cool stuff.

Grenadier is clutch even with just Jets. You won't always be in flyby range and its amazing for breaking boxes. I never run Jets without it.

I played against a IG, Bossk, Jabba list the other day, it hit really hard and often.

Have they announced 2018 SC prizes yet?

13 hours ago, FrogTrigger said:

Have they announced 2018 SC prizes yet?

I don't think they have. Which is odd, because we're probably about two weeks away from the start of the season.

On 5/1/2018 at 9:48 AM, ThatJakeGuy said:

I don't think they have. Which is odd, because we're probably about two weeks away from the start of the season.

Isn't it the set with the Ahsoka alt-art card? Or am I crazy ...

11 minutes ago, GottaBadFeelingAboutThis said:

Isn't it the set with the Ahsoka alt-art card? Or am I crazy ...

No that was the Q1 kit with Ahsoka and AT-DP. Also had the Hidden tokens but they'll have to pry my X-Wing cloak tokens from my cold dead hands before I use those :P

Edited by ThatJakeGuy
11 hours ago, ThatJakeGuy said:

No that was the Q1 kit with Ahsoka and AT-DP. Also had the Hidden tokens but they'll have to pry my X-Wing cloak tokens from my cold dead hands before I use those :P

"No figure that small has a cloaking device!"