So trying to sort out the best options I can for a strikers list. I currently have 4 can easily get up to 5. Question is best way to approach this.

I like Duchess and her ability but do not want to just slap VI on her. She wants/needs a different pet IMO. Don’t really use Sabacc and never actually used countdown. So am I best off using a group of aces, or Ace and 3 lowers, or just break down get the 5th?

@Parakitor and @Magnus Grendel I know you two always talk about your strikers so input is welcome.

Recently did this: was okay for a pickup game.

Duchess/ outmaneuver AA LWF

3x BSS Snap Shot AA LWF

My goto is 4 Trainees and a Doom Shuttle...but I'm 1-5 in the Vassal League, so it hasn't been going well. Next I think I'm going to replace the Doom Shuttle with Captain Yorr (Collision Detector) and bring debris instead of asteroids. That should give me more focus tokens for better defense and more reliable attacks. It will fly quite differently from the Doom Shuttle, so it will be another fun puzzle to solve.

If you go 1 ace, it's kind of hard to balance the list. I find that I end up going all or none, but I'm probably just not seeing some obvious good stuff. I've heard that running the three named pilots with Hux on an Omicron is good stuff, but I haven't gotten around to trying that yet.

As you can tell, I feel like strikers really benefit from some kind of anchor, i.e. a shuttle. It takes up space, which is bad for other ships, but your strikers can Adaptive right into the shuttle, and fly over it with their maneuver. If you aren't comfortable with a shuttle, I can only suggest 5 TIE strikers. If you go down to 4, you still lose one early because the high PS ships will destroy it before it gets to shoot, and you are left with 3 ships vs. their squad, which is a lot harder than 4 ships vs. their squad.

3 hours ago, Ronu said:

I like Duchess and her ability but do not want to just slap VI on her. She wants/needs a different pet IMO. Don’t really use Sabacc and never actually used countdown. So am I best off using a group of aces, or Ace and 3 lowers, or just break down get the 5th?

Duchess

I would strongly recommend Duchess with Veteran Instincts, because her 'thing' is being able to get PS10 with 'smart' repositioning for the price of a middling X-wing pilot. It does limit her in dice modifiers, and despite her manoeuvrability she does get badly punished by turrets.

The other option I'd consider for her is either Wired or Adrenaline Rush. The place where a striker really outclasses everything else in the game is its red dial - it's chained aileron and dial segnor and koiogran turns, allowing it to come about and point its nose anywhere in a 180 arc. The problem with the red moves is that they lock your ailerons, you have a god-awful green dial to clear the stress (equivalent to a T-70 X-wing with no astromech) and you're left with no tokens for dice-fettling.

Adrenaline Rush lets you do one loop with tokens, no stress, the works, whilst Wired gives you a half an offensive focus and a half a defensive focus whenever you're stressed - probably better since Duchess (as your more expensive PS8 ace) should be around a long time, so one-use talents are less adviseable on her.

Note - in a Furball (30 point many-on-many fight) you can do far worse than Duchess with Intensity, Adaptive Ailerons and an Engine Upgrade for maximum hooning-around-like-a-fruitbat-on-nitrous.

Pure Sabacc

Pure Sabacc is the reverse - as soon as he starts taking punishment he pretty much immediately reverts to a 'normal' striker, so maximum-early-punch talents like Crack Shot are the order of the day. Fly him cagey and try to flank your target. Remember and be warned that being obstructed from your target often provides no protection due to the way Lightweight Frame works!

Countdown

Countdown is a freaking kamikaze. I agree wholeheartedly with @Parakitor that non-swarmy strikers need an anchor, but if you just take officer-in-shuttle plus only three strikers, someone's gotta fly wing on the shuttle or it'll be torn to pieces before your relatively limited number of attackers can take a big enough chunk out of the enemy to matter. Countdown is your guy. There is something immensely satisfying about going head-to-head with fenn rau, talonbane or a ghost and coming out of it 'lightly singed'.

Shuttle

I can't agree more with Parakitor here. Yorr is amazing - remember what I said about the striker's red dial? Well, if you can fit Yorr, Electronic Baffle and Inspiring Recruit, you can the shuttle stop, have the entire rest of your squad segnor behind someone and still have everyone token up for a measly cost of a single shield token.

If I wanted a 'striker aces' force, I'd consider the following:

• Duchess
  • Adaptive Ailerons
  • Veteran Instincts
  • Lightweight Frame
• Pure Sabacc
  • Adaptive Ailerons
  • Crack Shot
  • Lightweight Frame
• Countdown
  • Adaptive Ailerons
  • Lightweight Frame
• Captain Yorr
  • Electronic Baffle
  • Inspiring Recruit
  • Intelligence Officer

I concur that 4 veteran strikers aren't really worth it; I'd rather have 5 generics or 4 trainees plus a shuttle.

Purely because of the aesthetics of pointy bits, I do want to figure out a strikers-plus-decimator list, though. Maybe a 'ramming speed' oicunn and two black squadron scouts with snap shot?

Hmm what about something like this?

Duchess/Adrenaline Rush, LWF, AA.

Countdown, AA, LWF

Pure Sabacc LWF, AA

Onyx Squadron Escort, LWF, TLT

draw thier fire away with the TLT opening up lanes for the Strikers?

or

4x Imperial Trainees AA LWF

Sienar Specialists TLT and MK2 Engines

I'd just be worried that a single twin laser turret doesn't present enough of a threat to force your opponent to do as you want.

I prefer this. Gives you a pair of PS5 ships and PS8 ships. Sabacc cant be ignored and as long as you can get the Inquisitor and Countdown to the late game it gives you a fighting chance against alot of lists.

You can swap Inq for OL to take Duchess, or Quickdraw and bring a PS1 Striker to block.

Or this little beast and dare them not to shoot the Gunboat first.

Its all bad and should be used with low expectations but it is fun.

"Duchess" (23)
Veteran Instincts (1)
Lightweight Frame (2)
Adaptive Ailerons (0)

"Pure Sabacc" (22)
Adaptability (0)
Lightweight Frame (2)
Adaptive Ailerons (0)

"Countdown" (20)
Adaptive Ailerons (0)

Captain Yorr (24)
Collision Detector (0)
General Hux (5)
Inspiring Recruit (1)

Total: 100

View in Yet Another Squad Builder

Something like this is pretty good. I faced off against it and it was mean. Yorr tosses all three a focus, and puts the condition on countdown. Then all three strikers take an evade. Makes them quite tanky. Yorr moves first, so can clear the stress and get closer to strikers to help with his ability when needed, or when countdown gets attacked (Yorr + countdown is heaven). Gotta manage yorrs ability with hux, but inspired recruit lets you hux and take 1 stress.

Ive flown the three named above, but with Omega Leader, and that is fun. Love throwing that on the table in casual games.

I don't think Hux is a good pair with Yorr - you want to take as much stress as possible.

Hmm seriously looking at this.

Duchess, Adrenaline Rush, LWF, AA

Pure Sabacc Adrenaline Rush, LWF, AA

Countdown LWF, AA

Black Squadron Scout, Swarm Leader, LWF, AA

98 Points

Going off of @Parakitor ‘s original idea and @Magnus Grendel input how might this look/perform.

3x Scarif Def, LWF, AA

Vizier : 2x Recon Specialist, AA, MFC

So is countdown better than a BSQ with Adrenaline Rush?

Depends on your purpose. Countdown makes your list more resilient, a BSQ w/ the Rush boosts offense

On 6/22/2018 at 8:18 PM, Ronu said:

Going off of @Parakitor ‘s original idea and @Magnus Grendel input how might this look/perform.

3x Scarif Def, LWF, AA

Vizier : 2x Recon Specialist, AA, MFC

That lets you hand out two focus tokens to other ships and still have your own action. The question is, how much you need those tokens; the problem with Vizier in a striker list is what the striker is planning to do with their own action now they have a free focus token; evade is nice but generally evade is a wasted action on all but one ship. Barrel roll is good but situational on a lower PS ship. It's nice during a segnor's loop for tokens, but that means vizier can't be doing a red move himself, so getting the strikers to move through the 'bubble' may be difficult.

Getting the same pilot skill cross-squad does make a big difference - vizier will be easier to fly with the strikers because whilst you want to move him first to hand out tokens, you can choose to move him last if it avoids collisions.

6 points does seem a lot to spend on the 'trick'. Personally, I think I'd prefer Systems Officer/Twin Ion engines MkII/Recon Specialist. That way, you can pick one ship to 'buddy' and hand it focus/target lock - and then use it's action to evade, as a fully modified shot makes it a 'high value target'.

On 6/23/2018 at 5:14 PM, Ronu said:

So is countdown better than a BSQ with Adrenaline Rush? 

4 hours ago, Greebwahn said:

Depends on your purpose. Countdown makes your list more resilient, a BSQ w/ the Rush boosts offense 

More or less agree. Adrenaline Rush Scouts give you manouvrability - you probably won't be engaging in the opening turn of shooting with a red move (I mean, if you can, all credit!) but it means that after the first shots are fired, you can loop to the sides, 'safely' out of fixed arcs, without losing tokens or locking your ailerons.

Countdown, on the other hand, can also boost your offence, because he can afford to aim for range 1 and blocking. This is often the safest place to be, because in people's faces where one ship bumps and another is out of arc can give him the single-ship-range-1-face-off that he excels at, turning him into 'fenn rau lite'. Just try and avoid multiple people having shots on him at once if you plan to commit him early.

I'm playing more with the generics lately; have this (unplayed) squad that should be fun:

Captain Oicunn: Dauntless, Ion Projector, Predator, Mara Jade, Moff Jerjerrod, Courier Droid (52 pts)

2x Black Squadron Scouts: Adaptive Ailerons, Lightweight Frame, Adrenaline Rush (46 pts)

And I played this the other day, trying out cheap Reaper support:

4x Imperial Trainee: Ailerons, LWF

1x Scarif Base Pilot: Death Troopers

3 hours ago, Rossetti1828 said:

4x Imperial Trainee: Ailerons, LWF

1x Scarif Base Pilot: Death Troopers

Hmm...

Thing is, without Lightweight Frame, the Scarif Base Pilot is both more expensive and - probably - more fragile than the Lightweight Frame Trainees, meaning he's going to be shot at anyway where your opponent has a choice, meaning Death Troopers probably won't trigger.

A tactical officer feels like a waste because you're giving up an action on a 24 point ship to give it to a 19 point ship.

That leaves either:

• Lightweight Frame & Courier Droid
  • essentially giving up the PS3 of Scarif Defenders to make one ship a 'heavy striker', much the same as 4 trainees and Countdown
• ISB Slicer & Courier Droid
  • This seems like the better option. Courier droid might let you use the reaper to flank, and if you can come in from a safe direction and start jamming people, ISB slicer means you can rack up a decent action advantage quite quickly.

3 hours ago, Rossetti1828 said:

Captain Oicunn: Dauntless, Ion Projector, Predator, Mara Jade, Moff Jerjerrod, Courier Droid (52 pts)

2x Black Squadron Scouts: Adaptive Ailerons, Lightweight Frame, Adrenaline Rush (46 pts)

• The Black Squadron Scouts are awesome.
• The visuals of strikers + a decimator are great.
• I'm tempted to suggest that if you're taking Oicunn, turn him into the 'ramming speed' variant. That way, you've got a nice blocker to pair with the hypermanouvrable strikers. For the same cost:
  • Captain Oicunn - Dauntless, Daredevil, Inspiring Recruit, Courier Droid, Engine Upgrade
• Manoeuvre to hit someone, cause an automatic damage, trigger Dauntless and use Daredevil, then do it again. With inspiring recruit, a single green move removes both stress tokens - or lets a striker recover from being double-stressed if needs be.

On 6/25/2018 at 3:48 PM, Magnus Grendel said:

Thing is, without Lightweight Frame, the Scarif Base Pilot is both more expensive and - probably - more fragile than the Lightweight Frame Trainees, meaning he's going to be shot at anyway where your opponent has a choice, meaning Death Troopers probably won't trigger.

Well, I made sure that the Reaper was at range 3 during the first major exchange of fire. The Strikers were at range 1-2 if I remember but my opponent still chose to shoot the Reaper to avoid stress, which worked well for me.