Quadjumpers are my favourite ship in the game - they're enormously fun to fly, and incredibly effective for their points in many games. Being a competitive person, I've tried combining success and quadjumpers before, to limited success. With a store championship season coming up, I decided to refine and practice an old quadjumper favourite of mine:
Fenn Rau
(34)
PTL
Autothrusters
Latts
Asajj Ventress
(47)
Shadowcaster
Predator
Latts
Glitterstim
Jakku Gunrunner
(17)
STA
Courier Droid
Totalling 98 points.
The firepower of the list is quite decent, what with Fenn and Predator Asajj around, and the durability of its pieces is very high for their cost. But where the list really shines is in its control element. Asajj's stress is well known, but people rarely associate the title with her - it's normally Ketsu's thing. It really lets her dominate lower PS ships without token stacks for defence. When you can tractor a heavy-hitting ship like a Nu with harpoons onto a rock after stressing it, it's going to be out of the fight for a long, long while. The quadjumper meanwhile presents an activation phase threat - high PS ships really can't stand losing their positioning advantage and their egility defence each turn, and potentially their actions and some hull too if they overlep an obstacle. All the while Fenn takes chunks out of the opponent's list and presents a huge endgame threat.
I went to a 22 person Store Championship yesterday, and played four rounds of swisse to see if quads could make it to the top.
Round 1: Kylo, Quickdraw and... Zeta Ace?!
M first opponent was very new to competitive X-wing, as was shown by his list - Standard Kylo - but without anything in the system slot - not even collision detector, QD with debris gambit instead of expertise, and an expensive Zeta Ace that removed his bid. Kylo's normally a big concern, but without advanced sensors he's barely more manoeuvrable than Fenn, and my bid let me have the choice of initiative, which I game to him.
We set up a rather dense field of obstacles, but I ensured Asajj could fit where I wanted her to. Zeta ace deployed first thanks to my courier droid, allowing me perfect positioning in the centre of the board, intending to cut through the rocks with Asajj and the quad while flanking with Fenn on the left flank. he deployed down the right side of the board, clearly intending on a joust.
For the first few turns we slow played, with me tactically bumping my little ships and getting Fenn to midway along the board facing the right edge, ready to bring the hammer down.
He ended up in some strange positions, which I realised he couldn't effectively attack from, so I brought Asajj into the rocks with the quad behind,, intending to box him into the middle of the board. He went for Fenn with the whole list except Kylo, who began to flank, while Fenn executed a 4-straight and boost left to suddenly be behind the enemy. No shots from any of the heavy hitters left Asajj a shield down and enemy ships on full health.
Next turn he beings in Kylo and QD, flanking with Zeta ace for reasons unknown. I bring Fenn around a rock that was in his way to be behind both Kylo and QD, while Asajj and the quad both tactically bump to get their positioning just right. Asajj taps the 'stims since Kylo has a shot, along with QD's rear arc. After double stressing Kylo with Asajj, I proceed to whiff the whole turn - missing an opportunity to damage QD and barrel roll her onto a rock before her ability could proc , while Asajj loses her shields in return.
Seeing my opening, I bring the quad hammer down on Kylo - reducing his agility by one and putting the quad in a killer blocking position - if any of his ships tried to engage at all, they'd bump him instead. Asajj swings left around an obstacle. QD gtfos with a 4-straight, while Kylo narrowly avoids my block, then instead of using his actions to get to range 3 - and away from Fenn - he tries to close the gap on Asajj, who remains out of arc. Fenn does a clutch 2-hard left and ends up at R1 of a tractored Kylo, who he then locks onto and focuses. In the combat phase, I take no damage while Kylo takes 5, a second stress token from Asajj and a damaged sensor array crit. Kylo dishes out a Blinded Pilot crit with his ability.
On the next turn, Fenn moves in behind Kylo and hills him, and Asajj 1-shots Zeta Ace, leaving a full health QD against the world. Asajj plays for time while Fenn and the quad come back around, and together they wipe her out in a few turns.
100-0 win.
Round 2:
Hard Counter
Control Bots
Coming into the tournament, I knew the one thing both my list and my skills were least prepared for was control bots. The gunner ability utterly wrecks Fenn, and Asajj can easily be walked off the board. The quad is all but useless except as a blocker, which is nearly negated by advanced sensors anyway. Rocks were places in a row along the right board edge, with a loose scattering in the middle-left.
Asajj pushed hard through the centre, with the intent of cutting the bots off from one another. Fenn faked left and pushed right at just the wrong time, leading to him being caught in both brobots arcs at R3. My opponent ionised both quads and Fenn, with Fenn going over a rock the next turn and Asajj (just barely) unable to turn back into the fight due to a rock in the way.
Fortunately, C has go go around the central rock, and B only has an R1 shot on Fenn (who took a second damage from overlapping an obstacle) modified by focus. He whiffs his shots, Fenn does nothing in return and the quad does a damage to B, surprisingly. Asajj takes two turns to move counterclockwise around the board, resetting for a second attack run while Fenn runs and turns around. THe quad is utterly clutch here - unexpected reverse manoeuvres bump the bots and deny their shots on two crucial rounds. Asajj moves directly behind the bots, sadly just at R3.
The bots, seeing Fenn and Asajj about to come back around from two completely unexpected directions, drops his only Ion bomb (equipped to C) on Asajj and tries to move in behind Fenn. He fails, and realises that he's blocked his own segnors loop, so has to also boost to make room. B sloops behind the quad, and into R2 of Asajj, whose mobile arc is set forwards for the juicy double stress. Fenn does an unexpected 3-turn to close in on the bots, dodges the potential rigged cargo chute and ends up at R1 of B inside his arc. Fenn blasts away 2? shields, while B's ineffectual fire at Fenn wastes his whole turn of shooting. Asajj plinks B down to 0 shields.
On the next turn, B tries to gtfo but is foiled by the quad, who facilitates a R1 shot from Asajj into B while Fenn and C reset. Asajj blasts B down to 1 hit remaining, while taking 1? shield in return.
On the next round, Fenn moves clockwise behind B for the killshot (which succeeds) while Asajj pulls an unexpected manoeuvre and stresses C.
With B (and the double tap) dead, C had no chance of killing Fenn, and spent all its health to get half points on Asajj and kill the quad (who went over the same asteroid 3 times in a row to block C to death, effectively). C ended up flinching and running, which with Fenn on its trail cunningly avoiding the rigged cargo led to an ultimately quick demise with 15 minutes still on the clock.
100 - 60 win.
Round 3: The Dreaded Bob.
I'd been warned by my brobots opponent about 'Bob' (short for Abobmination), consisting of crimson specialist with proton bombs and tragedy stimulator, Nym with bomblets and tragedy stimulator and strezra carrying Sabine. It's a brutal list. We set up rocks in a fairly loose manner, mostly because I wanted Fenn's dial to always be open.
There's not much to tell in this game. While Asajj flanked beautifully - dodging multiple bombs and almost all arcs for several turns - and Fenn led Crimson specialist to deploy all but one of his proton bombs on himself only, I managed to roll 8/10 hits on the freaking bomblets, shredding both Asajj and Fenn. I killed strezra early, knowing Sabine would be too much, but the ridiculously lucky bomblets had set my too far behind. The game ended with a 4 hull Nym with Fenn behind and a crimson specialist at R1 of a 2 hull Fenn. After taking a double hit bomblet (again!!) on the turn before, Fenn was at 2 hull remaining. I take the proton crit and... direct hit.
We did a bit of a test after, and that turn alone Fenn would have reduced Crimson to 1 hull with his attack, killed it the next turn and wiped Nym out with plenty of time on the clock if that direct hit hadn't been drawn. I always have at least one ridiculously unlucky round, and that was it.
23 - 100 loss
Round 4: Juking Ryad, Major Krennic and The Inquisitor
Ryad, Major Vermeil and The Inquisitor is one of those wave 14 lists with crazy good options, and I was excited to fly against it. Sadly, there wasn't much to tell here either. I baited the Major into coming close to Asajj and Fenn, who did 6 damage to him (plus he'd gone over a rock the turn before for 1), and the quad finished him off that same turn. I baited the Inquisitor with Fenn while the QUad ruined Ryad by shoving her onto rocks turn after turn (which he managed to avoid all but one damage from). He attempted to lay a trap for Fenn, but the quad gave Ryad no actions, and Fenn easily made it to R1 of the inquisitor and, between him and Asajj, killed the poor guy in one round due to some natties on Fenn's part (4 hit + crit natural).
Ryad really did some work, but Fenn's brutal shots forced her to spend the evade token before she could juke every time, and a second set of natties from Fenn (2 hit + 3 crit natural) sealed the deal. Ryad had managed to get half points on Asajj, but that was all.
100 - 23 win.
So in the end I was 3/1 with an MoV of 540, which is pretty great on the whole. I was in the cut until the final moments of the last round, at which point I got bumped down to 5th place, narrowly missing the top 4 cut and that lovely Krennic alt-art. I fell that, had my dice been consistent arross the last two games, I'd have pulled off two narrow wins instead of a win/loss, but that's hindsight for you.
The list performed admirably, with that Quadjumper doing a ridiculous amount of work for his meagre 17 points. Fenn's always amazing, but particularly so in a list like this where he's not the biggest threat. Asajj with glitterstim is the tank we've always known her to be. Together, it's a really fun and surprisingly punchy list.