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By Roller of blanks, in X-Wing Squad Lists

Wes Janson (29)
Veteran Instincts (1)
Renegade Refit (-2)
R7 Astromech (2)
Integrated Astromech (0)
Servomotor S-Foils (0)

Luke Skywalker (28)
Opportunist (4)
Renegade Refit (-2)
R2-D2 (4)
Integrated Astromech (0)
Servomotor S-Foils (0)

Poe Dameron (31)
Intensity (2)
R5-P9 (3)
Autothrusters (2)

Total: 100

View in Yet Another Squad Builder

Any good or no? Should I replace poe with saw or an auzituck? Is wes too big of a target? Or should I scrap the Idea completely?

If you want to run Poe, you want advanced optics. You can make arguments for and against intensity, but advanced optics should be stapled to Poe.

I don't see opportunist as worth the points on Luke. You can do a lot of better things for less points. I get what you're trying to do, knock tokens off with Wes and extra dice with Luke. But I think you'd get better mods with expertise, PTL, or predator.

I prefer FAA as an astromech for someone like Wes, just because you want him shooting every turn. But I don't think he's too big a target, not compared to Poe anyway.

My favorite Intensity Poe (41):

Black One (1)

Intensity (2)

BB8 (2)

Autothrusters (2)

Primed thrusters (1) (IMO superior to Advanced Optics if you want to run Intensity)

If you then drop Opportunist and R7 you would have 6 points to play with on Luke and Wes.

I echo the sentiment against Opportunist, but I really like the pilots together.

Consider the below list. Poe is at his peak with BB-8, AdOp, and the title, stripping locks and maintaining hella good offense and defense ALL the time. Wes can strip any more locks or tokens you want to ditch, with FAA helping him make sure he can shoot. Luke hits like a truck and is hard AF to kill, especially when he can take a focus action to regen if he doesn't want to B-Roll dodge or TL to crush someone.

Wes Janson — X-Wing 29
Veteran Instincts 1
Renegade Refit -2
Flight-Assist Astromech 1
Integrated Astromech 0
Servomotor S-Foils 0
Ship Total: 28
Luke Skywalker — X-Wing 28
Expertise 4
Renegade Refit -2
R5-P9 3
Integrated Astromech 0
Servomotor S-Foils 0
Ship Total: 32
Poe Dameron — T-70 X-Wing 31
Veteran Instincts 1
BB-8 2
Advanced Optics 2
Autothrusters 2
Black One 1
Ship Total: 39

With these 3 I would run this, all PS10 with a 3 point bid(which can help against Nym). Poe will also be able to strip 2 TL per turn if needed.

T-70 X-Wing: •Poe Dameron (39)
Autothrusters (2)
•Black One (1)
Veteran Instincts (1)
•BB-8 (2)
Advanced Optics (2)

X-Wing: •Luke Skywalker (30)
Integrated Astromech (0)
Servomotor S-Foils (attack) (0)
Veteran Instincts (0)
Renegade Refit (-2)
•R2-D2 (4)

X-Wing: •Wes Janson (28)
Integrated Astromech (0)
Servomotor S-Foils (attack) (0)
Veteran Instincts (0)
Renegade Refit (-2)
Flight-Assist Astromech (1)

Total: 97/100

I would also consider running Luke with Draw Their Fire or Wes with R3-A2 to turn off Expertise or Kylo's Advanced Sensors.

The more I look at it, the more I like Poe and Wes together. I do think PS 11 Poe is worth the 2 points, even if it knocks at your bid.

First is R7 Astromech. I don't think Wes Janson has the action economy to spend too many TLs defensively. I'd replace this with Flight Assist Astromech. This adds actions for early-game positioning, or mid-game fleeing. Since Wes doesn't regen, he's likely to be an early target, and more likely to flee. Getting free boosts to keep up range 3 is nice, and if that allows Luke and Poe to get to work, that's great. R7 is, in theory, a strong defensive action with using a TL to reroll all an opponent's hits, but it only works on one ship you have to declare first, and it goes down in value dramatically when your attacker can convert their focus results with tokens or Expertise. I don't think there are really great options for survival droids for Wes. Maybe R4-D6 is worth consideration, but I think I like Flight Assist Astromech more.

Second is Opportunist. I just don't think it's that good. An extra die is nice, but not necessarily better than either Predator or Expertise, and far more fragile. If your opponent double-stacks tokens, or Wes has been killed, Opportunist will frequently be useless, and it also locks you into Green moves to clear stress. Predator or Expertise don't do that and would be better choices. And moreover, Luke, even with R2-D2, is still going to be fairly easy to kill. I'd consider just Veteran Instincts, for the same PS as Wes. Saving points here doesn't seem too bad.

So what does this do? It opens up as many as 4 points. Poe could use a little help.

Intensity isn't bad, per se, but I don't like it with R5-P9. Both fight over the same Focus token. Intensity can be OK with BB-8 (add in Primed Thrusters, IMHO, for some really nifty stuff), but even then VI/Advanced Optics is about as good in the best case, and a lot easier and less fiddly. For example, pull a Red move on Poe with Intensity? You need to Boost to get that focus, and that might not always fit or be ideal. Advanced Optics, however, just works (until you fight a Jam ship, but that's always going to be rough on Poe). With BB-8, Black One is pretty vital, since you get so many free actions. Cleanly, VI/Optics is the same cost as Intensity/Primed. I still kind of want Wes to shoot first, to maximize the attacks on tokenless defender, so I might not upgrade to the PS 9 baseline with a VI/BB-8 Poe (11 is great, but maybe not in this list?), and instead give Luke an upgrade like Predator. Intensity Poe ought to get PS 9, however.

Alternately, if keeping R5-P9 for double-regen, I'd be inclined towards Pattern Analyzer in the Tech slot. This would allow you to take focus actions on red moves, or when flying over debris (provided you weren't already stressed), but it also allows you to spend the token for R5 each round, rather than sometimes on Intensity, or trying to save it with Advanced Optics. Add in also VI, and that would be 3 points more than listed. I'm not sure if Black One is worth the points over a bid, however. With an R5-P9 Poe, you'll almost always be focusing, so that you can recover shields. As such, boost will be more rare, and might not be easy to fit in. Having at least a 1-point bid can be handy at high PS.

For the three Poes, I'd classify them as follows:

  • [8/VI/R5-P9/Pattern Analyzer] (39 points without Black One) - As the only regen ship, this one is long-run hardest to kill, but also the lowest damage . It'll be hard to find time to squeeze in target locks for increased damage. You have a fully open dial, but it'll be hard to Boost.
    • This allows Luke to go any of VI, Predator, or Expertise, making up for some of Poe's lower damage.
  • [8/VI/BB-8/Advanced Optics/Black One] (39 points) - This is probably the easiest and highest damage version . Focus once and forget it, then take a bunch of TLs or Boosts. Your movement is flexible, since you don't rely on BB-8's barrel roll to generate tokens, but you'll have great options when pulling a green (so long as you weren't stressed from last turn... BB-8 doesn't work on a turn you're clearing stress unless you have Primed Thrusters). However, the durability is probably the lowest , without access to regen, or Intensity for Evade tokens.
    • This allows Luke to go any of VI, Predator, or Expertise, capitalizing on Poe's higher damage.
  • [9/Intensity/BB-8/Primed Thrusters/Black One] (41 points) - this would probably be the most flexible version of the ship, either able to BB-8 Barrel Roll Intensity into an Evade and take a Focus with your normal action for high defenses, BB-8 into a Focus and take a TL for damage, or just pull a white and either focus or Boost-Intensity-focus. However, it's also the most fiddly ship, and the easiest one to get wrong . Relying a lot on BB-8 moves to get tokens probably leaves you more predictable in Green moves.
    • This is expensive enough that Luke is almost surely just VI, but Lone Wolf would also fit. Lone Wolf Luke is pretty classic, and at 31 points with easy access to boost and barrel rolls, it seems a lot better than it used to be.
6 hours ago, Biggsy_boy said:

The more I look at it, the more I like Poe and Wes together. I do think PS 11 Poe is worth the 2 points, even if it knocks at your bid.

This is a hard choice. On the one hand, PS 11 is good, particularly on a dancing, BB-8 Poe. On the other hand, Wes Janson's pilot ability loses a lot of value if he's not attacking first. Decoy Wes seems costly and fiddly. But Wes softening a target for Poe's often mediocre attacks is so good, so maybe PS 9-10 works for Poe... while Wes stays up at night with the hard choices, Wedge is able to just snooze with his VI and double 11s.

I'll agree that Wedge at PS 11 would be meaner against certain lists, imagine going up against alpha strike lists that have 3 ships with ordinance A good example is the Nym/torani/jostero lists. Or any ordinance list that uses deadeye. Wes can plink off the focus on a deadeye missile. He can plink a 3rd TL, that Poe missed since he can only knock off 2 with BB-8. Also, Wes can still soften up targets for Luke, so, there are multiple uses for his ability.