I was able to get a last minute ticket to Gen Con's Armada tournament! Yay!!! With all the talk of triple Cymoons, Vader ISDs, and Raddus lurking in the shadows constantly, I wanted a list that wasn't going to be instantly blown away. So I settled on this:
Name: Motti Fortress
Faction: Imperial
Commander: Admiral Motti
Assault: Blockade Run
Defense: Contested Outpost
Navigation: Salvage Run
Imperial II (120)
• Admiral Motti (24)
• Strategic Adviser (4)
• Gunnery Team (7)
• Hardend Bulkheads (5)
• Early Warning System (7)
• Leading Shots (4)
• XI7 Turbolasers (6)
• Seventh Fleet Star Destroyer (5)
= 182 Points
Gladiator I (56)
• Taskmaster Grint (5)
• Ordnance Experts (4)
• Projection Experts (6)
• External Racks (3)
• Seventh Fleet Star Destroyer (5)
= 79 Points
Gladiator I (56)
• Captain Brunson (5)
• Ordnance Experts (4)
• Projection Experts (6)
• External Racks (3)
• Seventh Fleet Star Destroyer (5)
= 79 Points
Gozanti Cruisers (23)
• Comms Net (2)
= 25 Points
Squadrons:
• Ciena Ree (17)
• Valen Rudor (13)
= 30 Points
Total Points: 395
Basically, Glads keep the ISD and one another alive and Valen/Cienna try and keep squads off for as long as they can. Deploy in a triangle or inverted triangle, depending on your opponent, making sure to line up obstacles close to where you think Brunson is going to run.
Round 1
My first round opponent was Sean (Sundberg?). He brought an Ackbar MC80 Assault Cruiser w/ Defiance and all the fixin’s, two TRCR90’s (one w/ Jaina’s Light), two GR 75’s and for he had squads two vcxs, a hwk, and a YT 1300. I had the bid over him and chose to go first. His objectives were Advanced Gunnery, Fire Lanes, and Sensor Net. All terrible choices for my list. Per advice I remember from one of @Captain Weather 's videos, I wasn’t choosing Sensor Net or Fire lanes when my opponent had Strategic. So, I went with Advanced Gunnery.
Obstacle placement went ideally. I was able to put an asteroid to one side of the station towards his deployment zone, deterring the MC80 from starting there (though it had engine techs, so I’m sure it would have been fine). After that, all my placements were framing in where I expected Brunson to be coming in on her attack run (side note: having Brunson has made me much more aware of obstacle placement….almost ridiculously so). Below is my approximation of deployment (didn’t take a picture of this round). In the middle of turn two, I sped Grint’s glad to the front of his MC80, trying to keep it blocked on the station and tempted him with my ISD running straight into his side arc (ramming) and hiding Brunson behind my ISD (ready to move into his rear arc). My ISD and Brunson were about to wipe out his front and rear shields. My mistake was not turning Grint hard enough. From his front he could shoot my side arc negating 7th fleet. He wisely chose to shoot twice at Grint, but had to ram to kill him and could only engine tech after that.
After that, my ISD was able to take a front shot into the MC80’s side. I needed 8 damage on 8 dice (with the ability to ram for one more) and was able to get 9, no ram needed. Unfortunately, the CR90’s had made it around by then, and Jainas light doesn’t care about EWS. He was able to take down my ISD, but with double points for his objective ship, I squeaked out at 90 pt 7-4! Sean ended up making top four so he did ok
The Good: Objective choice! Either of the other two would have scored Sean an easy win.
The Bad: Not turning hard enough with Grint. More practice would have likely helped here (I’ve only been playing this list about a month)
Round 2
Second round opponent was Nick Griffiths. He brought an ISD II w/ Jerry, leading shots, Pryce and another upgrade (boosted comms maybe?), a Quasar II w/ boosted comms, ruthless strategists, flight controllers and squall. His squads were Boba, Morna, Maarek, Vader, Zertik and another ace (Mauler maybe?). He had the super bid of 24 points! He chose my Contested Outpost, and chose to Pryce round two.
My initial plan was to blitz the ISD pinning w/ good Glad placement on my ISDs edges, and turn my Glad to fork w/ his quasar and ISD. This was a mistake. I shouldn’t have been as aggressive with my left Gladiator and should have just threatened the quasar while keep his ISD from sprinting past my ISD. I would have had to eat a rock to do it, but it would have been the right play. Instead, I got into close of the ISD and Brunson died. Grint (having thought Brunson was gonna block) was slipping behind my ISD to keep chasing the quasar, but after Brunson failed, he was one shot away. A 9-2 beat down.
The Good: I’ve replayed it in my head, and I’m still convinced, pinning Jerry turn two (even with Pryce getting two shots) was the right call. My ISD could tank two shots and recover shields from the Glads to survive…probably. It would have been closer to say the least.
The Bad: Glad placement again/hubris for Brunson being able to take a volley from the ISD.
Round 3
Nick Mock was my third opponent. He too is a seventh fleet believer! He ran Thrawn on a Cymoon with gunnery teams, Aresko, intensify firepower, spinal armament, XI7s, DCaps (which I pointed out don’t work on a cymoon), and seventh fleet, a VSD II with Brunson, gunnery teams, DCaps, quad battery turrets, and seventh fleet, and a Needa TRC Arq, with 5 ties. I chose first player and we played his Contested Outpost. He placed it in the right corner of the set up area and then we deployed. I started with Grint and my ISD on the right, pointing to about 1 o’clock, and then had Brunson being stand offish to the left (hugging obstacles). He deployed his vic towards the right, leaving enough room for his Cymoon if he wanted it on the right, then delayed with squads and put down his Arq. His mistake then was placing the ISD to the right of Needa (I like to think Brunson tempted him into that).
Turn two saw his VSD controlling the station with my ISD and Grint coming in, Brunson slowed to speed one (but had nav dials and a nav token to jump up when she needed to). Valen and Cienna were waiting to eat some ties and possibly not die for the first time that day. I jumped the VSD with my ISD turning my front towards the Cymoon trying to keep them both only able to fire into my front. I turned too far however and the VSD had line of sight to my side. Grint being a shield battery charger worked well this game, combining with the ISD to help it only take 4 damage the whole game (hardened bulkheads finally paying off against his VSD). Everything else went as planned. Turns three and four saw the goz get at long range of the cymoon and pass engineering tokens out, my ISD and Grint made quick work of his VSD and Arquitens, and Brunson slid into the side of the Cymoon softening it up for my ISD to go first on turn 5 and take out/cripple the Cymoon. Ended up crippling it and Brunson finished it off.
The Good: This list is an ideal matchup for mine. I get to go first, opponent has CO for an objective choice so I know where they’ll be, two thirds of their fleet can’t ram my ISD for easy damage, and I out activate them.
The Bad: On turn 3 I didn’t have a nav command dialed up for Grint and ended up stuck behind my ISD for a turn. This kept me obstructed from the VSDs DCaps shot and my evade useful, but I would have activated him first and got out of the front arc too so =/ who knows how that would have gone. Another moment where I wished I’d played it more (this is a theme folks).
Round 4
My brain was about done. My opponent John (Thompson) was too, and we shared multiple laughs over shaky hands and bumps making sure to measure immediately after moving something to see what was in our arcs (advice I remember from @Snipafist at Indy Regionals). John brought Thrawn on an ISD Kuat w/ Pryce, ruthless strategists, ECM, leading shots and external racks, a GSD II with Brunson, ruthless strategists, external racks and Demolisher, two gozanti’s with comms net, dengar, mauler, a lambda and 5 bombers. We both commented immediately on how well we liked one another’s lists. He definitely convinced me to change EWS to ECM, as well as made me wonder what this list would do with a Kuat ISD (although 8 dice at medium creates a bigger kill zone). I outbid him for first and chose his Contested Outpost (thank goodness he didn’t have Fighter Ambush).
We deployed on the left side of the table this time. With his gozs and squads guarding the outpost, and Demo and ISD more central, trying to flank. I deployed the same as my previous game, just mirrored with Grint on the board edge and Brunson and goz to the right of my ISD. He decided to Pryce turn two. Having learned about the evils of blitzing Pryce earlier, I planned to slow down, shoot at his gozs (maybe get lucky and kill one?) while turning the ISD and Brunson hard to face his Kuat. All of this worked great. What didn’t work was everything else. Demo got around to my side, but was blocked by his gozs. I foolishly threw Cienna and Valen at Dengar thinking I’d lock up Mithel, completely forgetting about ruthless strategists. I failed to remember my EWS trigger and didn’t rotate it around to deal with his bombers/pot shots from the goz’s and Demo. Though, the squads may still have flown to my front, removing 5 total dice from the 3 ships would have helped, not to mention, seventh fleeting away some bomber hits could have helped. I didn’t walk around and look when I moved my ISD and slid too far up the board giving him an unneeded double arc with his Kuat. Grint failed to kill the second gozanti and then couldn’t move in to block Demo. All of this happened poorly, but the final difference in the game was one Contested Outpost token. John played really well, and in the moment it felt like a great game I just barely lost. But in hindsight, I played really poorly and probably had no business loosing that game the way I did (though no doubt, my different play would have made John play differently too).
As someone who was never into table top gaming until a friend introduced me to Armada in 2016, I’m incredibly thankful for how relaxed, kind, and compassionate this community has been and continues to be. All of my opponents had spectacular attitudes throughout the day, and I couldn’t have asked for a better experience at my first major tournament. I look forward to making tweaks to this list and seeing what it can do going forward, and hopefully get to make a respectful showing at a regional! Any suggestions or tweaks for my list are welcome!
Edited by ta5erface