@Jammers and I had a couple of games at the weekend and I tried out my triple Cymoon list...

400/400, Blockade Run, Contested Outpost, Solar Corona
ISD Cymoon, Konstantine, Gunnery Team, Strategic Adviser, Intensify Firepower. 152
ISD Cymoon, Gunnery Team, QBTs. 124
ISD Cymoon, Gunnery Team, QBTs. 124

Game 1 V Madine

MC75-Ord, MC30S-Admonition, TRC90 Jiana's Light, 2 flotillas, 4xZ95s

I was second player against his large initiative bid and we played Contested Outpost. We placed rocks on the right of the table then I put the base distance 1 from the maximum left most position in the left hand corner, completely in the open. I deployed my usual speed 2 with ISD-A in the left corner, ISD-B (flagship) distance 1 to the right of it and inner ship in the mid-left position, again distance 1 along. ISD-A faced Noon, ISD-B&C faced 1 O'clock. He deployed Admonition on my left side facing 6 o'clock toward the base and the gap between ISD-A&B. MC75 in front of the gap between ISD-B&C facing 5 o'clock and the flotillas out in the table centre facing 8 O'clock to fall in behind them. Finally Jiana's Light was about mid table facing 5 o'clock speed 4 on a wide flanking path to come around the left of ISD-C's flank.

I set command dials of 3 navs for ISD-A as it would need to manoeuvre a lot. CF+NAV+CF for ISD-B to power the Intensify fire card and NAV+REPAIR+RPAIR for ISD-C as the enemy seemed certain to come around my right and this ship would take the most fire. I was still uncertain that Admonition would go to my right as Madine could have let him cut across the other way so ISD-A would have to wait a while before starting the navigate left too strongly.

Turn 1: he did move Admonition to my right so ISD-A turned left now at speed 3. ISD-B Banked CF token and turned 2 single yaw left at speed 2. ISD-C slowed to 1 and double yawed left. MC75 approached and I took a pot shot at range (with out IF this turn) so it loost a shield or two. Rebels didn't have a Strat adviser so mine paid dividends all game but still he could Last/First me.

Turn 2: Flagship slowed and Naved right as did ISD-A who shot admonition with double accuracy on his evades so it blew a redirect to cancel a double hit taking 2 more round the back. Admonition was speed 2 now to avoid ramming his MC75 and its red dice landed some hits at long range. ISD-C hurt the MC75 but it had ECM to brace and lost it's rear shield. MC75 fired at range then Naved to a glorious double arc on ISD-C. Konstantine had slowed these ships but he had Navs plotted anyway. Fighters were staying back and TRC90 was still burning in.

Turn 3: ISD-C got clobbered by the MC75 and extra damage hit the flagship from Wide area barrage. ISD-A shot Admonition (now at speed 1 from Konstantine) I then navigated down to speed 2 to cut behind my flagship to engage the MC75 on its flanking run. Admonition sped up to 2 but got hammered again by my flagship and more damage went on the MC75 from flank fire. It then shot ISD-C with poor rolling but by the end of the turn ISD-C was in tatters from Jiana's Light and the Z95s.

Turn 4: MC75 shoots the flagship but isn't in close range for the black dice to hurt. It moves clear but flank fire from my flagship and front fire from ISD-A that had cut behind killed the MC75. Addmonition or was it Jiana's light polished off ISD-C as it repaired and ran for open space but Admonition died as Konstantine had slowed it again and it wasn't too healthy despite Walex bringing a token back.

We called the game there with Jiana's light unable to get a second ISD kill on its own (flagship was on 9 hull and ISD-A was almost unscratched. A 7-4 was increased to an 8-3 with the outpost tokens.

Game 2 v Dodonna.

MC75 Ord with APTs this time and Rapid launch bays. 2xTRC90s (one Jiana's light with Dodonna on board), BCC Flotilla. 2 B-Wings & Gold (in the RLBs), 3 X-Wings 2 Z95 & Shara.

His 3 point bid decided to make me first player and I chose Planetary Ion Cannon as opposed to MW or Solar Corona. I deployed in the Right hand corner in my usual way and he deployed mid table facing 7 o'clock to pass in front of me. If you scroll up 10 posts you will see I wrote a chapter on this eventuality and how to handle it. Did I follow this advice?....... Did I Bolingbrokes . Bail was set for turn 4 on the BC75.

Turn 1: I right wheeled and the PIC hammered the flagship over the turn break. I kept my inner ship ISD-A at speed 2 as I would have to chase him down. Being 1st player threw me as I couldn't rely on a 6-5 win if nothing happened. He travelled across my front with the MC75 near me and both TRC90s a little to far out further to my right. Flotilla in the backfield.

Turn 2: I decided to go for it with ISD-A and went first, at speed, 3 landing in the MC75s front area blocking it for the others to come in and finish it off next turn. It then got bombed and front arced by the MC75 and the RLB squadrons and one TRC90 (other was too far out). My other ships moved up but the MC75 managed to get over my blocker going speed 3 and now facing the table edge. He had to do this final yaw to its left to fling the rear of his base out to avoid an overlap.

Turn 3: Before it died ISD-A shot the MC75 from the flank & rear damaging it. It was then bombed to death from the MC75's activation. My other ships were line astern now coming in speed 2 to engage but still no shots on the MC75. TRC90s hard turned left. I was now looking at muscling him up against my own table edge around mid table as he tried to squeeze out and get away into my own bottom right corner.

Turn 4: Bail got the MC75 out of both my death arcs and slowing to 2 (table edge coming up) used up the Nav token. ISD-B (flagship) gunnery teamed both TRC90s hurting them and strangely ignoring the MC75 completely - I had a plan. I then had to get clear, not being in too good health, and with a large cloud of bombers to fly through. ISD-B survived the turn - just.

Turn 5: Konstantine speed up the MC75 to speed 3 and I cross my fingers he has no Nav plotted. My flagship dies and the MC75 has a squadron command so flies off table. I kill a B-wing and a TRC90 (not his flagship) and we fly away.

Turn 6: I loose a few shields and fail to roll an accuracy at his flotilla which didn't turn left with the rest but instead went right into my bottom right table corner. Overall a 4-7 loss as I lost 2 ISDs including the commander.

Thoughts.

Just IF isn't that great for dice quality. I actually found myself either rolling appallingly when IF doesn't really make you feel much better or you roll well when it isn't need. But, unless you have Vader, I think it is all we have. DTTs may be better than QBTs particularly if you don't have Konstantine.

Normally in Armada I will always take first player if it is offered though I don't often include bids of more than 5. So I play second player quite a bit. With triple Cymoon I really think going second is the thing to do but with so few upgrades in such a list you can't really afford more than a token bid to do something about it. So when I win the toss against another 400 point player I will choose second and I will sneakily act mildly disappointed if my opponent picks first player for himself.

Konstantine. He is surprisingly useful for this type of list. He got me an expensive MC75 kill in game 2 and stopped Admonition escaping in game 1. Against a constantly navigating Madine list you sort of loose the sparkle but as soon as a list appears that needs to squadron or repair to fight well he really shines. Motti would have been useful against bombers but I don't think he would make the difference between survival or death over the length of the game that often. He could however keep a ship alive for an extra turn to get another shot in. Moff JJ would have been good - plotting repairs and just taking damage on a rear shield rather than navigating a lot. Vader is the real master of dice quality and not having to take IF and plot CF commands to fuel it also means his high cost is mitigated. 3xISD-Cs with 3xGTs, Vader and a Strat Adviser could be fun with the odd SFO or chart officer mixed in.

13 hours ago, Bertie Wooster said:

Wow! Did you have any dice modification upgrades?

Nope:

Triple Moon (400/400)
Empire - Author: Theia

Commander: Moff Jerjerrod

[flagship] Imperial Star Destroyer Cymoon 1 Refit (112)
- Moff Jerjerrod (23)
- Support Officer (4)
- Gunnery Team (7)
= 146 total points

Imperial Star Destroyer Cymoon 1 Refit (112)
- Entrapment Formation! (5)
- Intel Officer (7)
- Gunnery Team (7)
= 131 total points

Imperial Star Destroyer Cymoon 1 Refit (112)
- Strategic Adviser (4)
- Gunnery Team (7)
= 123 total points

first game was against an ISD, Demo, and 2 Gozantis with a lambda rhymer ball. Took out both bigger ships as time ended, with a lucky long range on a damaged demo.

second game was against a Sloan list with only six fighters, an ISD, Quasar, and a Vic. Kid was 15, but had tabled his first opponent (and got third of nine players). It basically was JJ vs his Cymoon and my other two vs his other two. Slow rolled jj to delay engagement while my other two rolled up his fleet. Final round started with all three of my ISD’s pointed at close-medium at his ISD. I was first (by his choice)

last game was against the kids father, who had a rebel bomber wing (Yavaris, Pelta, HH w/Rieekan, two floats). I lost my fleet command ship, took out his ships. I actually failed to kill his hammerhead by one damage, but we realized he was erroneously using a brace instead of a contain (I’d not played in a while and was distracted running the tourney). My backup TO rules the ship destroyed since I’d shot at him three times, he had one hull left, and he’d basically blocked at least two damage with other tokens from me accuracying the brace.

So i tabled all three, but the second two were newer (played for two years, but only competitively for a few months), and my first was running late so was harried. So not the best test, but I definitely see the power of them, especially with extra maneuvering. 10-15 red dice HURT, especially to medium ships, even without dice mods. I dropped quite a few CF commands though. 5 red 3 blue twice from two ships is nice.

sadly, my last opponent did not pick blockade run.

It’ll require more care against more experienced players, and against speedy fleets, but I think JJ and EF are big helps with that. With a banked token a speed three turns into a spd 1 double click.

Sorry for the strange wording of that post. I'm normally much more coherent, but I was on my phone with two kiddos distracting me.

Two more matches.

Thrawn version 9-2

Tagge version 10-1 (yeah! What means he keeps a 100% success. Totally OP ;P)

I will try to elaborate next Monday.

I have mixed feelings about this weekend. On one hand I played 4 Armada games! On the other Spain is out of the World Cup ?

Anyway! Armada experience was interesting. I tried Triple Cymoons 4 more times against my brother. There is some skill diference in my favour and I must say he was trying things out (as me, but he played his fleet for his first time while I am really acquainted with Triple Cymoons). Whatever, it is not about his list rather than what I got from those matches.

MATCH 1 - Thrawn vs Mothma

My fleet was basically Cymoon+GT+SFO x3. Flagship also brought IF.

His fleet was a swarm of CR90B with ICB and ET. He already used CR90B with SW7 and wanted to test if he could do more damage for the same points. It was Mothma on a TRC90, 1 combat flotilla, 1 transport with Toryn and 5 CR90B with ICB and ET

He won the bid and choose to be first. We both talked about it at the beginning and both agreed about it. First seemed his best chance to kill an ISD last-firsting and fleeing as soon as possible. He chose Blockade Run. Not sure if it was becasue it seemed the best to him or just to play an objective any of us played before. As I said, both trying things.

I placed the obstacles on the sides to make harder to flank my ISDs. And deployed at medium range from the borders to force short range that way. Flagship in the middle a bit backwards in a reversed arrow formation (thanks @Mad Cat). He deployed flagship next to his side with the combat flotilla a bit more in and everythin else in the left corner of his deployment zone(my right) in a tight formation, all at speed 2 but 1 (the third one he deployed). His idea was not but at all at the beginning. Focusing his fleet on one of my ISD playing with speed, ET and activations to setup perfect shops and escape plans BUT... Thrawn was in command.

Nav, Eng and FC for Thrawn. My leftmost ISD turned hard at maximun speed to crack his fleet against the long right side. Flagship kept the formation to hunt runners and the rightmost ISD prepared to fight. I just gave up his flagship. I wanted to flank and support with some TRC shots but if that happened would be probably late and that shot would go to the most fresh one. He made a litte mistake and the speed 1 CR90 ended at long range for the second round just for a couple of mm. For the second round Thrawn commanded navigate to everyone what allowed my rightmost ISD to make an inside turn keeping speed and avoiding medium range. Done! It made impossible to him to flank with any CR90 but the closest one which standed against one shot to have a chance of flanking and it got it!. My leftmost ISD just appoached completely surrendering its flank. What was that? 1 combat flotilla and a TRC? Who cares? I took a picture of the third round:

You can imagine the rest of the match. CR90s trying to escape. Cymoon overlapping arcs everywhere. Nothing to crossed through my formation survived. It is true that I made a risky turn with my rightmost ISD pointing to the right side of the table and being really close to it and going thorugh asteroids fields but nothing a SFO couldn't fix. Mothma realized it was too late and just avoid engagment herself and the combat flotilla. There was a clever captain commanding the last CR90B that just turned hard to his right before entering the deathweb and escaped from a certain death. Toryn Farr was not so quick and rammed onto the frontal arc trying to escape. She couldn't and it felt so much Rogue One

SFO helped me to speed up and turn enough to enter his deployment zone and score 60 extra points.

9-2 to me at the end. Tons of ICBs don't work as intended as all I needed was to avoid redirecting, just like we already do against Norra. They could be interesting combined with SW7 but whatever. What matters: despite the fact I didn't loose any of my ISD it was impossible to table him (too many ships and his flagship didn't engage) so 9-2. I guess I could try to kill the swarm with just 2 ISDs and hunt the flagship and the flotilla with the third but then the other could escape more easily... who knows? Blockade Run is just tailored for Cymoons. Speed 3 is enought to even turn 90º and being able to turn them back and reach the deployment zone. Against this kind of swarms could be more interesting to deploy just nectto the long sides. This way you force them to jump through you (risky and even more if you don't care about flying through obstacles) or flanking between two ISDs and not just one what makes things easier to kill ships with the side batteries thanks to overlapping arcs. Also Thrawn is just awesome and with SFO it is just impossible to fail a single command. I didn't miss too much firepower due to tactical play and weak targets.

MATCH 2 - Tagge vs Leia

Basic build with DTTs on two ISD and IF.

Leia on a Pelta with IF and another swarm, this time TRC90.

I won the bet this time and I chose first (I had enough of CR90 jumping out of my front arcs before I shot them down). Capture the VIP. I was about to follow Mad Cat's advice but I worried about those 50 points (probably too much even when it ended well for me). So I just deploy one on the right corner pointing to the objective token and the other in the middle to cut any chance of fleeing with the VIP. It work as intended for the VIP part. My brother deployed two CR90 on to take the VIP at speed 4 pointing to the middle (brave crew) and the other to flank my righ and punish my rear arc later. The rest of his fleet was deployed on his right side (at my left) also to flank my left. Just after deployment I realized the most important advantage of Mad Cat deployment is to keep the whole enemy fleet in front of my fleet, not only to avoid flanking (of course it does) but also to allow tabling.

I speed up to sink his ship before he could claim the VIP. I got the shot and forced him to turn hard back to his deployment zone to try to escape. What forced me to move my flagship towards him to get another shot for the third round. It let my leftmost ISD to stand the enemy fleet alone for one round. I thought it could as there were just cr90s... I realized the reasons after the TRC nerf! The engagement happened soon due to me pushing hard to make Tagge works. He does. He recovered my brace token what ended being useless against several tiny 3 damage guaranteed shots. I was late to save it but I turned the others enough to put them into battle again to take my vengeance. I could kill the VIP's ship and take advantage from my huge bases to claim the token with a rear corner, while my flagship cracked the enemy fleet against the short left side. Flagship took enough damage to invite the remaining fleet pieces to try a final attempt allowing me to table him. Imagine the oppening scene of Episode IV but with the CR90 chasing the ISD. Funny. Sadly the CR90 took a perfect side shot and died. It ended 10-1 to me but it was actually toughter than the first game. I knew TRC90 do damage but I never faced a swarm of them before. Nasty. My deployment was a bad idea even when it worked. Deploying in the opposite corner where the VIP was I could probably have achieved the same without loosing any ISD...

Matches 3 and 4 later.

MATCH 3 - Tagge vs Rieekan

This time I tried without dice control. 3 Cymoons with xi7 and Tagge.

My brother tried 3 big ship, one of each + Rieekan. Each of them differently suited. LMC with QTC, GT and DTT, Home One with LS and MC75 with OE WAB and something else I don't remember.

I won the bid and I chose to go first. I took Blockade Run. Not sure why my brother added this to his fleet but he built the fleet in ten minutes or so. He place a cluster of obstacles on one side leaving a path free to navigate. It was not so bad idea cause that way he forced me to fly tight or through the obstacles, I guessed to take advantage from his GT-LMC80 and the WAB-MC75. I follow his plan anyways. He messed a bit with his deployment I think. He wanted the LMC80 and the H1 to tank the first shot in order to let the mc75 run into short range more fresh. It worked as intended but H1 and MC75 flew with collision course since the beginning and I used it. It was a quite brutal engagement. The poor lmc80 took shots from every Cymoon and of course it was impossible to it to avoid shot at its sides. On of my Cymoon ended trapped between the lmc80, h1 and mc75 and of course blew up but it tanked enough to force some rammings. Actually that helped a lot with the big surprise! There was a round when I was going to loose a Cymoon and he was going to loose his lmc80. I planned to kill h1 the round after but I killed the same round and he couldn't activate it due to the lmc80 being zombied. The fact is that the h1 took obstructed shots and ram so his death came undercover when both were so focused on the lmc80 and my cymoon. The game basically ended there. He reached my deployment zone with his mc75 and that was all. 8-3 to me. Tagge 2/2 wins.

MATCH 4 - Thrawn vs Sato.

Back to the Thrawn fleet just cause I liked and no some kind of dice control sucks. Minor change Flagship SFO for Hondo.

He tried the ACM-HH fleet I think @Ardaedhel or @Truthiness wrote about. He has just 2 HH so he changed the third for a TRC90.

He won the bid and chose Contested Oupost (enough blockade run hehehe). This time I followed Mad Cat advice and setup a corner deployment with the station right there to score. My brother chose to deploy just in front but a low speed to get time to trigger magic ACM from the outer rim. He was first player and had activation advantage but I prepared my navigation commands to make him enter my arcs and not the other (even when I couldn't shoot him). It worked perfectly. What I did was navigate rounds 1-3, trigger Hondo to IF and Thrans CF. It was even better cause he had all his ship full of tokens so all he ot from Hondo was a squadron token for his flotilla. I ignored the flotilla and focused on his fleet. I manage to kill his mc75 and both HH. The flotilla and the TRC90 escaped from me just running away. He managed to kill one Cymoon. Those HH are dangerous. He stripped the shields in one round of fire and put 1 damage card just before move to get a double arc from his mc75 for the next round. He did not even have good rolls (not bad either). 3 total attacks from both HH (2+1 dice each) and the front arc of the mc75 at medium range (2 more dice) triggering ACM twice and a couple of shots from hwk and vcx and the Cymoon was ready to die next round and it did. So again just one Cymoon destroyed. I scored 120 from objective... 9-2 to me.

Thoughts:

Triple Cymoon is really versatile for its own.

Thrawn is good, really good. He helped a lot even when duing the first match I used him just once. Like Tarkin, he is not able to fix an awful roll but what he does is enough.

DTT and IF are enough dice control to feel confortable with. I struggle with just xi7 and I don't reccomend it without anythin to fix bad rolls and the commanders that allow you that are just incompatible with xi7.

Tagge is not bad. I would say even good but not for Cymoons. He could work better with other options I guess. Problems I see: first the timing (of course), not because it was bad rather than a tiny mistake and he does nothing at all. It happened to me during the match 3. Tagge was completely irrelevant there. He was also during the second match but that was more for other reasons. Basically thousand cuts make brace less relevant and ISDs have two redirects what allow them to spend every shield before discarding the first token so bringing redirect back is useless. Contain, specially with DCO could be a good combo but I see him more powerful with ships with more interesting token suit or rushing ISDs-I/Kuats.

MSUs are easy target but are also hard to table. Better plan carefully how to bring all the enemy ships to your pocket.

Being able to kill two big ships are good news. Actually the mc75 was also close. He survived, not due to lack of time rather than being impossible to turn enough to hunt it down. It just went along my flank so when my leftmost ISD died there was nothing to shoot at it.

My brother was accidentally challenged so...maybe...eventually...he will bring full bomber wing and we will see...bwahahaha.

I guess I will just skip Ozzel and Screed. JJ could still be interesting allowing to feed IF and navigating. Also Motti could remove the chances of loosing 1 ISD ever (of course he won't but he could be close). I would skip Konstantin but I would like to see what he can do. However after the second Tagge match I want to try Vader again, my heart is now with him or Thrawn.

On 6/18/2018 at 6:21 AM, ovinomanc3r said:

Not me. Maybe @Mad Cat

sure...pawn it off...lol

I'm preferring JJ, particularly for the points. I'm toying with a stripped flagship to be the "hang back" ship, then one with IF and Glint, the other with Strat Adviser and Entrapment Formation.

I really like the combo of JJ and EF. It let's me truly put the ISD's wherever I want them, just about whenever I want them there. I'm going to experiment with adding the IF for double fleet command goodness! The only thing I have doubts on is which ship Glint goes on. In both cases it gives the ship full funtionality of its dials while still activating the FCmd, but which gets me more utility? I know on the EF ship I get to start using the navs right away, but getting some extra dice at the right time will be crucial too.

Got a store championship this Saturday, we'll see how it goes.

2 hours ago, Admiral Theia said:

I'm preferring JJ, particularly for the points. I'm toying with a stripped flagship to be the "hang back" ship, then one with IF and Glint, the other with Strat Adviser and Entrapment Formation.

I really like the combo of JJ and EF. It let's me truly put the ISD's wherever I want them, just about whenever I want them there. I'm going to experiment with adding the IF for double fleet command goodness! The only thing I have doubts on is which ship Glint goes on. In both cases it gives the ship full funtionality of its dials while still activating the FCmd, but which gets me more utility? I know on the EF ship I get to start using the navs right away, but getting some extra dice at the right time will be crucial too.

Got a store championship this Saturday, we'll see how it goes.

Good luck! And thanks for remind me Grint.

About where put him I suggest some considerations:

- the cheapest one for point distribution. Useless if they are all the same.

- IF ship. I would like to try EF+JJ sometime but I found inside turn enough more often than not. So I could imagine EF being useless more rounds than IF.

34 minutes ago, ovinomanc3r said:

Good luck! And thanks for remind me Grint.

About where put him I suggest some considerations:

- the cheapest one for point distribution. Useless if they are all the same.

- IF ship. I would like to try EF+JJ sometime but I found inside turn enough more often than not. So I could imagine EF being useless more rounds than IF.

The non flags are pretty even, since the one that doesn't get Grint gets SA.

Inside turns are nice, but so is going speed one to three, or three to one when your opponent thinks you're going to run into them, but you drop back and stay at long range. Or even just changing speeds willy-nilly. Keeps your opponent guessing where your ships will end up, which is always a good thing.

27 minutes ago, Admiral Theia said:

The non flags are pretty even, since the one that doesn't get Grint gets SA.

Inside turns are nice, but so is going speed one to three, or three to one when your opponent thinks you're going to run into them, but you drop back and stay at long range. Or even just changing speeds willy-nilly. Keeps your opponent guessing where your ships will end up, which is always a good thing.

Of course speed changes are good. What I meant is that without triggering EF your ships may have nav tokens and/or the use of inside turn to perform fake speed one maneuver. To fake high speed maneuver is harder. You also have your own nav dials.

IF effect is completely different, no matter what you had (dial or token) so if you cannot trigger IF there is nothing you could do to fake its effect.

That's why I think Grint on IF ship is a better option. But of course fit him in your play style.

Good point. IF ship was my first instinct as well.

@Admiral Theia how did you do at the Store?

I came in second of ten, losing four ISD's the whole day. First game was against Derek's fleet with a Rhymer blob (ISD, Demo, 2 Goz), tabled him turn five with five contested outpost tokens, lost my flagship. I won 500-143.

Second game was against @Mikael Hasselstein and his ISD + 5 external racked Raiders led by Ozzel. He chose Solar Corona and set up in a spread out deployment (2 raiders at either extreme, ISD and fifth raider in the middle). He maneuvered quite deftly, psyching me out a bit, but in the end I bagged his ISD and three raiders at the cost of me EF ISD. I forget the exact total, but it was a 7-4 in my favor.

Third game was against @shmitty and his Sato list with four nasty HH's and a repair happy Pelta. He chose contested outpost. I lost my two non-flag ISD's and bagged three HH's. He ran away with his last HH and his Pelta, and I chose to sit at speed 0 on the station to collect the last three tokens while his fighters weren't able to do enough damage (even if he rolled perfect for three turns he'd fall one damage short. I won by 12 points for a 6-5. We both made some lousy moves. He activated out of order a couple of times, denying himself some repairs and putting his ships in range to die to lucky shots (my reds were on fire, rolled two doubles three times), and I basically gift wrapped my second ISD for him by speeding it up at the wrong time, not to mention sidelining my flagship by turning it into the battle too slowly. At the end I could have sped up to get one long and one medium range shot at his Pelta, but with his 6 ENG a turn I don't know that I'd have been able to kill it without a very lucky roll (considering I had no IF anymore).

It ended with Shmitty taking first with 24 points, me in second with 23. I think 3rd and fourth were 21 and 20 respectively. The top two tables had narrow margins the last round, but round one had three games go 10-1 (me, Mikael, and Shmitty) and one go 9-1 (a skilled young man (15 yrs old!) named TJ, with TJ losing big to Shmitty the second round, so no one else could really catch up to the top two.

I definitely took some lessons away from the day about speed control, managing your echelon so as not to conga-line yourself, and delaying engagement. I find myself JJ'ing earlier in the game more than later, to correct problems with deployment, and less so later; this isn't causing me to drop him, as him and the EF means I don't really have to plot any navs turns 2-4/5. The EF ship tended to be the one I offered up for sacrifice while my other two fix their position to hit hard. First game I deployed backwards, putting my IF ship against the board edge and my flag towards the middle. Gotta keep that IF ship in the fight, as she is throwing extra dice consistently.

16 minutes ago, Admiral Theia said:

Second game was against @Mikael Hasselstein and his ISD + 5 external racked Raiders led by Ozzel. He chose Solar Corona and set up in a spread out deployment (2 raiders at either extreme, ISD and fifth raider in the middle). He maneuvered quite deftly, psyching me out a bit, but in the end I bagged his ISD and three raiders at the cost of my EF ISD. I forget the exact total, but it was a 7-4 in my favor.

Congratulations, of course.

But you were psyched out because my ISD almost survived, which would have turned the table around.

Triple Cymoon is really scary to face with a fleet of Raiders. I think I maneuvered as well as I possibly could (given outdeployment by way of Solar Corona). I was funny to see my Raiders avoiding those front arcs like a school fish zipping around your flank. Let's not forget the Gloria Gaynor raider ("I will survive!"), who zipped between your ships, dumped the external racks, and then zipped away, living to tell the tale.

It's funny how we both wound up lower on the list than the people we (narrowly) beat in the last round.

Two more games. This time I tried JJ during the first one and played with Motti the second one.

First one was quick and brutal, more thanks to the first two shots from a really lucky Cymoon. 10 dmg out from the front and another of 8 with an acc. All with the same activation. It was basically the end of the game, given it killed the ships with more survivalchances at that point. Ridiculous. JJ is as good as he always is. He is a really good option to keep the enemy fleet in your killer arcs avoiding points-lifeboats that prevent you from tabling.

The second was tough. I could chose going second but as I was duing the first I wanted to change, just to keep testing how good it does with opponent's objectives. As always happens to me, Motti helped nothing. I mean, I know how good he is and why people like him. I just never got anything from him. It was the first loose I had with triple Cymoon and I am really happy about it. It was 5-6 and could end in my favour. My brother MC75 saved the day with just one hull remaining. It felt weird it didn't die considering how much shots it took but... dice! DTTs alone are not enough, that's all. As I said, going second I could do better and I chose Opening Salvo just cause I didn't play it since wave 2 (HA would have been less dangerous I think, even with two mc30 in his fleet). But whatever, a defeat is a defeat.

As I said I think DTT are not enough. I mean, they could be if the rolls were really average, rolling average everytime. But they never are. If you roll better you don't really need them (even when they are the best dice modifiers at that), if you roll worse they hardly will fix whatever you got. That let me Tarkin, Thrawn and Vader as the best commanders options. JJ is really powerful in his own way. DTT won't be enough with him but keeping things in arc will help unless you were jinxed. IF wih DTTs is close but not sure. I will go back to Vader. If I am able to fix the initial problems I had with him (thanks to more experience flying Cymoon) I will keep him. If not, I was very happy with Thrawn.

I also need more practise with Mad Cat's deployment.

I attended the Stockton on Tees Store Championship on Sunday and decided to put my Cymoon fleet up to the test. I went for Lord Vader this time.
Enemy fleets are from memory and may contain he odd error or omission.

399/400, Blockade Run, Contested Outpost, Solar Corona
ISD Cymoon, Vader, Gunnery Team, Strategic Adviser. 159
ISD Cymoon, Gunnery Team, SFO. 120
ISD Cymoon, Gunnery Team, SFO. 120

Game 1 v Sato

MC80S, Sato, Strategic Adviser, GTs, H9s, SW7
CR90A, Jiana's Light
Neb Escort, Toryn, Salvation
GR75 Combat, Bright Hope, Comms Net
Han, VCX, Tycho, YT1300, YT2400, Gold

My opponent had a small bid but better than mine and went second. I chose Opening Salvo hoping to get some quick kills before loosing my first ISD. He placed a flotilla and fighters mid table and I did my usual deployment in the right corner at speed 2. He then deployed the Neb to the right of the GR75 (from my point of view) then the Corvette and finally the Liberty furthest away from me. All were speed 2 or 1 so I had time and knew he wasn't coming around my right hand side.

Turn 1: I start the wheel to my left, my outside right most ship at speed 3 and the others at 2. He wheeled towards me with the CR90 speeding up but the liberty staying slow and cutting in behind it. His fighters approached my faster ship.

Turn 2: We all closed and his fighters hammered the right ISD. I think all mine had managed to bank a repair token by now. Liberty was still speed 1 in the sweeper position.

Turn 3: I GT with the left ISD savaging the CR90 and hurting the Neb in the flank with a fantastic 3x2hit red dice volley accuracy both brace. It evades but was on 2 or 3 hull. Salvation retaliates with damage on the right ISD adding to the bomber's efforts with Opening Salvo and lots of black dice but I could brace it anyway. It then activates killing the Neb through the front shield and a little flak out the front arc too rolled excellently against all his squadrons. I never actually got close to killing a squadron but this unnerved him I think as he thought Cymoons only had 1 black flak die.

Turn 4: I polish off the CR90 and Gunnery Team a long range shot on the front of the Liberty. He activates the GR75 before the flotilla gets shot. Using with CF dial, SATO and Opening Salvo = 4 Black Dice - nasty on my flagship. He thought about switching his efforts here but then decided not to and keep on concentrating on the right ISD. My Sadviser and his dead ships allowed me to delay the damaged right ISD until last. My flagship failed to accuracy the scatter on the flotilla and also did some damage dropping shields on the Liberty. Liberty fired at long range at the damaged ISD but it then repaired a lot and fired back setting itself up for a first activation with a double arc shot. After the squadron phase it had a 0 shields and 1 hull. Eeek - but I was first activation....

Turn 5: No I wasn't!!!!!!! Han shoots first and goes for my crippled ISD. He rolls a blue crit only and I point out he isn't a bomber so I survive, repairing 2 shields and running away after shooting away the last of the Liberty's hull. In the remainder of the turn only his YT2400 could reach me but with 1 shield on 2 adjacent hull zones and a redirect available he couldn't get me.

10-1 to me 400-0 MOV. Seriously his fighters couldn't hit the blind side of a barn missing with a black dice 4-5 times out of 6 I think so I should have lost a ship.

Game 2 v Vader

ISD2, Vader, Avenger, GT, XI7, EWS, Q7 Tractors, Strategic Adviser
ISD2: Sovereign, GT, XI7, EWS, Q7 Tractors
Gozanti, Comms Net
Gozanti, Comms Net
No fighters

His bid let him go first and he chose Solar Corona. He deployed centre right with a flotilla on each side with his Vader on Avenger closer to the short table edge. I probably should have rushed him quickly from that side to kill his commander but I decided to deploy far away to the left and roll him up from there.

Turn 1 & 2 I approach with my outer ship (the flagship) speeding up. We bank a repair each.

Turn 3: We both delay with Strat adviser and his flotillas. Then 5 ISDs light up the sky with green pew-pew. We savage Sovereign leaving it on 3 hull. His EWS saved him lots of dice especially on his flagship which was at long range for 2 of my ships. His XI7s really hurt as his gunnery teams concentrated on my right hand ship. My others got to repair but this one struggled.

Turn 4: He activated the damaged Sovereign killing my right ISD but unable to hop over the other two. My center ISD also got savaged. I kill Sovereign and hurt Avenger then ram it. Avenger Kills my center ISD and runs for open space. The flank fire on a Cymoon isn't great and my flagship goes by repairing a bit.

Turn 5&6 He doesn't even bother shooting me but sails past. I chase down a flotilla catching it as it leaves a corner on turn 6 but only do 1 hull damage at long range.

The game ends with a 4-7. Could have gone either way with plenty of violence. Great stuff.

Game 3 v Screed

Quasar-1, Screed, Expanded Hangar, Boosted Comms, Flight Controllers, Brunson
Arquitens CC, Centicore, TRC, Intel Officer
GSD-1, Demolisher, OE, ACM, ET, Chart Officer
Steele, 3xTIE-D, Saxon, Mona

He chose to go first player and Blockade Run. I placed rocks at my end of the table to quickly sail past them. He deploys the Arquitens on my extreme left. I deploy 3 ISDs on my left (flagship), mid left and centre set back a little from the deployment zone edge but all speed 3. He deploys fighters then the Quasar on the centre line and Demolisher extreme right hand side on a flanking path.

Turn 1: Arquitens turns across my bows and the defenders take up bombing positions My right most ISD turns slightly towards Demolisher to either shoot it or force it on a very wide flanking maneuver.

Turn 2: Demolisher engine techs to get out of my arc but is going rather wide to do so. My right ISD gets bombed and shot by 2 red from Demolisher. My ship repairs, flank shoots the GSD and some fighters, then turns back towards the endzone and lines up on the Quasar Carrier. Mona couldn't reach my right ISD so went for the flagship.

Turn 3: Kitten shoots my flagship intel officer the brace. All three ISDs GT the Kitten and Quasar to death (eventually) and we get into a bit of a traffic jam with the odd overlap. Bombers go for the (originally) middle ISD which was now at the back of my conga line. Demolisher chases it getting shot from my rear dice - loosing side shields when it redirects.

Turn 4: We sort out the traffic jam and Demolisher ACMs my centre ship. By this time Demolisher is looking ropey from rear firepower and I move away from it. Flak was doing well against the non character squadrons.

Turn 5 The Fighters run for safety and Demolisher tries one last time then ETs to go rear to rear with my damaged ISD. GSD has 3 hull and 1 shield left. My ship then shoots and doesn't kill it. The other ISDs are all obscured so 1 red die gets cancelled.

Turn 6 Demolisher runs for safety and I score 3 touchdowns.

9-2 for my 2 kills and extras. Perhaps I could have slowed when initially facing Demolisher to prevent pursuit but if I had clobbered it. Demolisher wouldn't have died and would have just run clear into my own deployment zone. At least this way the GSD felt more confident to try its luck giving me a chance to shoot it to bits. I really missed the better flank & rear armaments of ISD-IIs.

I was one point off the guy who came first (using Rieekan bombers) but I would have beaten him on MOV. Still, my first game should have really been a 9-2 and I had luck there. Second place got me a Chimera/Profundity card.

36 minutes ago, Mad Cat said:

Turn 5: No I wasn't!!!!!!! Han shoots first and goes for my crippled ISD. He rolls a blue crit only and I point out he isn't a bomber so I survive,

6 hours ago, Mad Cat said:

10-1 to me 400-0 MOV. Seriously his fighters couldn't hit the blind side of a barn missing with a black dice 4-5 times out of 6 I think so I should have lost a ship.

In retrospect, I think he should've gotten some points due to Opening Salvo:

End of Game: Each player increases his final score by half the fleet point cost of each enemy ship in the play area that has at least 1 damage card, rounded up.

Not that it's your fault, just wanted to point it out.

Ahh yes he should have scorred half for that ship giving a 400 to 60 MOV which is still a 10-1.

7 hours ago, Mad Cat said:

Ahh yes he should have scorred half for that ship giving a 400 to 60 MOV which is still a 10-1.

56 but still.

I gave Triple Cymoon last night for the first time. Went pretty straightforward, Vader and Intensify Firepower on the flagship and Gunnery Teams on all three. I did end up winning the game on objective points, but it was rough. I hate that I have to say this, but... 3 activations is so painfully few. I know, I won, and others are winning, but I missed several opportunities due to my opponent being able to delay intelligently. It's far from intuitive with red die ships, but I feel like they need to be flown pretty aggressively to make up for low activations. I'll certainly be giving it another go, it was an interesting experiment.

1 hour ago, IronNerd said:

I gave Triple Cymoon last night for the first time. Went pretty straightforward, Vader and Intensify Firepower on the flagship and Gunnery Teams on all three. I did end up winning the game on objective points, but it was rough. I hate that I have to say this, but... 3 activations is so painfully few. I know, I won, and others are winning, but I missed several opportunities due to my opponent being able to delay intelligently. It's far from intuitive with red die ships, but I feel like they need to be flown pretty aggressively to make up for low activations. I'll certainly be giving it another go, it was an interesting experiment.

It takes time I guess. I played against a rebel partner since the beginning so being outactivated is how I born to this game. Thrawn or extra nav dials will help you a lot. I mean, it is almost impossible to get them enter your firing arcs ready to fire but it is not so hard to avoid the opposite and end with a situation when a new round start with everyone in arc. I try always to make him to have two ships at least at that point.

3 hours ago, IronNerd said:

I did end up winning the game on objective points, but it was rough. I hate that I have to say this, but... 3 activations is so painfully few.

This. Essentially while 3ISD fleet is fun to play, for competitve setting 2ISD fleet is (in my opinion) strictly better as it has the same set of advantages while having less vulnerabilities.