Name: Motti
Faction: Imperial
Commander: Admiral Motti

Assault:
Defense:
Navigation:

Imperial II (120)
• Admiral Motti (24)
• Reinforced Blast Doors (5)
• Leading Shots (4)
• Quad Battery Turrets (5)
• Avenger (5)
= 163 Points

Victory II (85)
• Disposable Capacitors (3)
• Quad Battery Turrets (5)
• Overload Pulse (8)
= 101 Points

Gozanti Cruisers (23)
• Comms Net (2)
= 25 Points

Raider II (48)
• Agent Kallus (3)
• Disposable Capacitors (3)
• Heavy Ion Emplacements (9)
= 63 Points

Squadrons:
• Howlrunner (16)
• 4 x TIE Fighter Squadron (32)
= 48 Points

Total Points: 400

(Or take out the Gozantis & Raider, and replace with a GSD, Demolisher, Engine Techs, Ordnance Experts, Assault Concussion Missiles, which would bring the total down to 395).

-----------------

I'm at an early stage of playing Armada (less games played than the fingers of two hands) and play Imperial to my son's Rebels.

I've only used Motti and Screed up to now, and because I don't have to remember about Screeds rules, Motti is my preferred option at the moment.

The idea to this list is to have the ISD2 be very tanky - 11 hull points, plus 3 from Motti plus another 3 regained from RBD means 17 hull points to be chewed through. Motti obviously helps the other ships too.

I want to fly the ISD and the VSD together. VSD fires first, hopefully gets benefit of Overload Pulse. Disposable Capacitors and QBT hopefully gain another 2 blue dice.

I've added Avenger to the ISD so that the defence tokens exhausted by the OPulse can't be burnt completely, so the hits from ISD should go through.

If using the Gozantis and Raider, the Gozanti Cruisers chuck tokens around, and the Raider hopes for the best.

If using the GSD, that probably sits on one flank of the ISD, the VSD on the other.

Small fighter screen thrown in as well for CAP.

Is this list and these ideas sound? Is the GSD better than the Gozantis/Raider? More activations with the latter and possibly more flexibility, but lacks hitting power compared to GSD?

If there are any ideas for amendments, please shout them out.

Thanks.

The upgrades and such seem decent, but you have no way to force engagement on your own terms and so it’ll be rare for you to come out ahead. When building a list, I find that you need one or more of the following:

- A big bid for first

- 6+ activations in order to hold a key asset for the end of the round

- A significant anti-ship squadron presence

- Point-generating objectives (Fire Lanes, Sensor Net, etc)

Upgrades like Bail and Pryce let you sneak in one of these factors for a turn so you don’t need that bid with Bail and you don’t need all those superfluous activations with Pryce.

You should definitely fill that officer chair on the ISD, even if it’s just Strategic Advisor. If you drop the Victory for say a second Raider and Gozanti, you’ll have six activations and a bid. You’ll start to have a much more threatening list. Alternatively, if you drop the Victory and Raider for a Quasar and do a large anti-ship fighter wing, you’ll have greater effect as well. Another option would be to get some lambdas in and work the objectives to your advantage.

When it comes to tanking and defense - if you take even one shot over 6 damage with an accuracy, ECM has saved you more damage than RBD can shuck off. I like RBD on ships like the Arquitens that don't have a brace and have a double redirect, but on the ISD I almost always prefer ECM. It's going to let you tank a lot longer than RBD 9 out of 10 times.

@CommanderDave @BrobaFett many thanks for the advice.

Points noted and advice taken!

Another option I thought of was Brunson - She allows you to save more potential damage than RBD and ECM combined if you figure you are cancelling at least 2 damage per turn with her. She is also useful in conjunction with ECM to even out odd damage shots in order to brace - IE you take 7, all single hits, you Brunson a single and then can brace it to 3 (instead of 4).

On 8/14/2018 at 10:15 AM, RedDogReb said:

Name: Motti
Faction: Imperial
Commander: Admiral Motti

Assault:
Defense:
Navigation:

Imperial II (120)
• Admiral Motti (24)
• Reinforced Blast Doors (5)
• Leading Shots (4)
• Quad Battery Turrets (5)
• Avenger (5)
= 163 Points

Victory II (85)
• Disposable Capacitors (3)
• Quad Battery Turrets (5)
• Overload Pulse (8)
= 101 Points

Gozanti Cruisers (23)
• Comms Net (2)
= 25 Points

Raider II (48)
• Agent Kallus (3)
• Disposable Capacitors (3)
• Heavy Ion Emplacements (9)
= 63 Points

Squadrons:
• Howlrunner (16)
• 4 x TIE Fighter Squadron (32)
= 48 Points

Total Points: 400

I would consider a few changes. Personally, I'm having a really hard time making R2 w/ Dcap HIEs work. Raiders don't want to be the early engagement force, yet HIEs wants to be the first thing to shoot. It's not for a lack of trying... It's one of the main things I've played the past year (though I haven't played that much to be fair). They hit hard, and then they die. Or they don't hit hard and don't contribute. This is compounded by not having Screed/Vader. Even throwing 3 blues via CF, you're not *that* likely (57.8%) to get a crit. Your selection of Kallus coupled with HIEs is also a bit puzzling. I get that it's a 3 point upgrade to make your double flak even better, but if your Raider really shouldn't be positioned where it's flying through the swarm ball. And you don't have the squadrons to keep your Raider alive if it does fly through the swarm ball.

Instead, might I suggest a R1 w/ ExRacks, OE, and Brunson. It comes in at 56 points and is a much better build (imo). With double evades and Brunson, your Raider should have no problems living through long range attacks before it gets into position. And with the ExRacks, you can push some serious damage once you get in close. I would argue that your single turn damage should be about the same as a single turn of HIE. The difference is that you can bring the R1 in on round 4 to finish off a ship and fly off into the horizon safely, or you can bring him in on round 2, giving a juicy target, but keeping shots off your main force. You still get to dump your dice for similar damage to an HIE R2, but you have the option of doing it early or late. Often I deploy my Raider first, setting it at speed 3 on a flank. If they end up setting up across from him, I can easily drop to speed 2, but I will still be engaging early in the game. If they setup on the far side, I can speed up to 4 and then come in hot in the end game to finish ships off.

With those points saved, let's do some changes to the rest of your list. I do really like HIEs, so I would recommend upgrading from OLP to HIE on the VSD2. It has enough dice (4 w/ QBT = 68.35%, 5 w/ CF = 76.27%) to reliably trigger it so you don't have to worry about Screed/rerolls. Though with 3 damage on the line, you might want to still consider a way to ensure that. But that's a personal choice. You only have a single crit effect, so I probably wouldn't worry about it too much. You target the brace, and they won't use it, basically allowing your entire attack to go through. I would also recommend Gunnery Teams, allowing you to double tap from the same arc. I say same arc because often the VSD with its restricted movement will struggle to point that forward arc at things, but those side arcs can still do work with 2 blues and 2 reds. You can leave the VSD alone like that, but I might recommend an Intel Officer. Or if they do use it, then you don't have to worry about it next turn or with the Avenger's shot.

Speaking of Avenger, I might advised against the title now. While it's always a nice to have title, without OLP, GTs, or Sloane, you don't have a great way to trigger it. But that's okay. Instead, with HIEs and IO, you don't have to worry about defensive tokens. HIEs end up drastically reducing the usefulness of redirects, and IO on the VSD will either discard the brace or cause the VSDs damage to go through, which is on par with the ISD's (actually better at long range due to dcaps). I would again recommend GTs on the ISD, and as others have said, I would go with ECM over RBDs. I would also recommend either Pryce or Strategic Advisor on the ISD. Depending on your choice will depend on your squadron load out. If you want to go with SA, then we'll leave the Gozanti in to give you a 5th activation. In which case we'll go with the standard 30 point option of Ciena and Valen for maximum longevity of squads. And then I would take a Gozanti w/ Hondo and Comms Net for maximum support. Plus it puts you at 400 points, and there's really nowhere else to spend 4 points.

If you go with Pryce, then we won't keep the Gozanti, leaving you with 54 points for squadrons. You can keep the squads you have... but I would recommend at least upgrading 2 of the generics to TIE interceptors for the counter 2 (and putting you at a full 400 points). Or you could drop a pair of them for a single defender. This would put you at 4 squads instead of 5. You would still have 6 points to upgrade other things, you could make both of the remaining TIE/ln interceptors as the above recommendation. Even numbers are useful as an additional deployment. And the interceptors will pop back with a counter 3 (go go Howlrunner), meaning that they'll go for HR with her tokens and the Defender with its 6 health first, meaning your 3 health squishies will stay around longer. Or if they go for the interceptors first to just 1 shot pop them, at least they get their counter 3 for some damage on their way out.

Objectives are really up to you, but I'd probably go with Station Assault, Contested Outpost, and Solar Corona. The first two give you defendable positions, so the lack of mobility of the VSD is minimized. And I would expect to see a lot of people choosing SC, and the main advantage of that is that you deploy second, so you make sure you're not out positioned to begin with on that unforgiving VSD.

@Khyros thanks for the detail - Really helpful.

A lot of my choices are down to what cards I actually own, so that's why some might be puzzling to better/more experienced players.

My collection is relatively small in terms of numbers and variations possible.

Hoping to increase this though!