After reviewing the AZ Hyperspace results and watching a streamed game with the triple upsilon (dormitz/starkiller/starkiller) hyperspace tracking shenanigans, I'm seriously impressed with how tough it is. Get behind it! I know... sounds easy.

Is there anything hyperspace legal that can beat it? I'm struggling to find something that won't get shot to bits on turn 1 and has the power and agility to get around them and take them out before a few 4-dice potshots destroy them all.

Any good ideas out there?

Boba crew and Old Teroch are pretty nice counter options.

Any Firespray with Perceptive Copilot and a coordinated focus followed by a reinforce can facetank (ideally at range 3 but probably 2) pretty well, although that leaves the rest of your list to fend for itself.

It's probably a list that's worth practicing openings against.

Thanks! That's interesting, but can Boba crew fail to execute? It might not be possible to be outside of range 3 and touching an obstacle if a starkiller is in the middle and rocks are central.

Fangs seem really squishy... 4 green dice at range 3, but blanking out means you're toast. And closing to range 1 on a single upsilon makes you very vulnerable to the others, especially on turn 1 when the others will be modded up.

16 minutes ago, ahdaniels76 said:

That's interesting, but can Boba crew fail to execute? It might not be possible to be outside of range 3 and touching an obstacle if a starkiller is in the middle and rocks are central.

If the conditions for Boba crew are not met his ship sets up within range 1 of his player's board edge. That being said this only will happen against Triple Upsilons if there are no obstacles in either corner closest to his controlling player's board edge of the obstacle field and the Upsilon player sets up covering the middle line.

TIE strikers can get behind them pretty easily, but you're going to want higher-initiative ships to shoot first. That means you're probably looking at the 3 named pilots and something else, like a TIE reaper for that sweet Jam action. You could go for the 3 named pilots plus 2 Planetary Sentinels, but that's 98 points with no goodies. Also, Advanced Sensors means that even if you are player 1, your blocking doesn't harm the Upsilons at all. I love the named strikers, but in the current meta of i5 bids, it's hard for them to get a foot hold, and they can be outmaneuvered if you're not really clever about your maneuvers. I guess what I'm saying is that although TIE strikers can probably tangle with the triple shuttles, you need to figure out which tools will also give you a fighting chance against the rest of the field.

The best thing about TIE strikers is their maneuverability. They have the ability to adjust their bearings with Adaptive Ailerons, which helps avoid devastating blocks that the Upsilons may employ. "Pure Sabbacc" has extra hitting power which is nice, and Countdown makes a mean end-game ship because he can stand those 4- or 5-dice attacks easily. The 2-sloop means you can realistically collide headlong into one of the shuttles, and the S-loop next turn to be behind them if, for example, there's no other way out of all their firing arcs, or if you can collide into the lagging shuttle, thus avoiding all shots. "Countdown" loves this tactic because it limits the number of incoming shots, but if he does have to use his ability, it puts him back one round because he has to clear stress before getting on their tails to engage.

So far, I really like 3 named + Reaper. This allows you to have goodies like Shield Upgrade on "Pure Sabbacc" and Hull Upgrade on "Countdown." I had been using Vizier as my reaper, but if you want to Jam, then coordinating may not be the best. Still good though. Lots of options. Here's an idea I would like to try:

TIE Reaper - •Major Vermeil - 52
•Major Vermeil - Veteran of Scarif (49)
Intimidation (3)

TIE/sk Striker - •“Pure Sabacc” - 52
•“Pure Sabacc” - Confident Gambler (44)
Predator (2)
Shield Upgrade (6)

TIE/sk Striker - •“Countdown” - 51
•“Countdown” - Death Defier (44)
Predator (2)
Hull Upgrade (5)

TIE/sk Striker - •“Duchess” - 44
•“Duchess” - Urbane Ace (42)
Predator (2)

Total: 199/200

View in the X-Wing Squad Builder

Reapers will have a hard time getting shots without running headlong into the fray, so just plan on it. On his way in, Vermeil can jam to get rid of a reinforce token, which helps so much! Or, if he overshoots, he runs into an Upsilon, reducing its agility with Intimidation, which also functionally negates Reinforce (EDIT: Oops, forgot that reinforce works by adding evade results rather than modifying dice). Actually, if you plan on running into them, Captain Feroph is a little cheaper, and may be a better buy? I like having one i5 and the rest at i4 for ease in executing Ailerons. Oh, and Predator got a stealth buff with the price drop of all the large ships; you'll be more likely to line up bullseye arcs to make use of that upgrade in combat.

resistance han gets to place wherever he wants and play matador with the 3 of them. if they catch han, congrats, the rest of hans friends are in a good position for the rest of the game.

I've been thinking of trying this:

Seyn Marana (30)
- Marksmanship

Gideon Hask (30)
- Crack Shot (1)

Valen Rudor (28)
- Crack Shot (1)

Black Squadron Ace (26)
- Crack Shot (1)

Black Squadron Ace (26)
- Crack Shot (1)

Black Squadron Ace (26)
- Crack Shot (1)

Black Squadron Ace (26)
- Crack Shot (1)

Total: 199 points

You should be able to get into hull pretty easily on the Starkiller Base Pilot before it gets the chance to shoot, and you'll maybe lose one or two TIEs on the initial joust. It shouldn't be too hard to line up bullseyes on those large bases, so you can rely on Crack Shots to overcome their single defense die and chip damage through.

I would encourage you to try High-PS HLC X-Wings. They punch only a tiny bit less hard than Upsilons.

1 hour ago, svelok said:

Boba  crew a  nd Old Teroch are pretty nice counter options. 

Old Teroch was imo already the best Fang before, and now he goes wayyyy up in usefulness.

As for good Hyperspace lists: I'm very optimistic for my Awings. They cost the same and were already able to punch above their weight, against lists that were 15-25pt more expensive. I'm optimistic that they are now rather better than worse, and so will continue to be quite good.

1) Large spread of any 4+ ship lists set at range 2 or so of each other across your entire player side. One of your ships draw aggro, hopefully drawing the overkill waste of red dice factor.

2) Strikers/RZ2s/Fangs to run into them and bump for no attacks, negating the round 1 offense, k-turn behind Rd 2 and start chopping wood,

3) SLAM Poe

4) Reaper Jam-enanigans

5) Two words; Old Teroch

That's all I got

Why not try to beat them at their own game? Take advantage of their faction's discounts! These have worked for me, although a Biggs and Selfless gang could probably work and still have an answer to Poe's dodging.

This list used to have 2 FO pilots, but the discounts mean that Blackout can be taken to turn the Upsilon collision detectors against them! And those bonus points also go to an HLC, which admittedly procs only against shuttles, but that's what we're fighting! Anyway, given the deployment range being incredibly close, getting behind is not a problem, but tanking a front shot is not bad either on turn 1, thanks to the token stack from tracking data. When you lose shields on a Silencer, that's when fanatical funtime starts, with both the talent and the tech slot pumping a consistent 3 hit results. And red maneuvers are not bad at all thanks to your coordinate boat and fanatical (a talent that makes it easier to spend your focus on defense as well). But since set-up is the most important part, that must be discussed.

As always, against this list, set up in the center. Silencers go extended to R2 with slight angles outward. If the UUU goes starts in a corner, dial fast maneuvers for the bump for the inside one, getting help from your Dormitz if needed, whilst the outside one hangs back for an R3 snipe or a very wide-swinging flank. If they mirror your approach, you can dial banks or hards inward to either pincer or Yeet outward to split them up (4 greens plus token stack should take at most 1 damage from 4 reds focus). If they commit to one of the flankers/Yeeter's, they have just opened the door for the one left alone to apply the pressure. But honestly, with a fast dial and autothrusters, you should be able gain more distance from them without too much incoming damage.

TL;DR, these guys do not anticipate somebody mirroring their favorite tactic effectively and having a k turn available.

1 hour ago, Parakitor said:

TIE strikers can get behind them pretty easily, but you're going to want higher-initiative ships to shoot first. That means you're probably looking at the 3 named pilots and something else, like a TIE reaper for that sweet Jam action. You could go for the 3 named pilots plus 2 Planetary Sentinels, but that's 98 points with no goodies. Also, Advanced Sensors means that even if you are player 1, your blocking doesn't harm the Upsilons at all. I love the named strikers, but in the current meta of i5 bids, it's hard for them to get a foot hold, and they can be outmaneuvered if you're not really clever about your maneuvers. I guess what I'm saying is that although TIE strikers can probably tangle with the triple shuttles, you need to figure out which tools will also give you a fighting chance against the rest of the field.

The best thing about TIE strikers is their maneuverability. They have the ability to adjust their bearings with Adaptive Ailerons, which helps avoid devastating blocks that the Upsilons may employ. "Pure Sabbacc" has extra hitting power which is nice, and Countdown makes a mean end-game ship because he can stand those 4- or 5-dice attacks easily. The 2-sloop means you can realistically collide headlong into one of the shuttles, and the S-loop next turn to be behind them if, for example, there's no other way out of all their firing arcs, or if you can collide into the lagging shuttle, thus avoiding all shots. "Countdown" loves this tactic because it limits the number of incoming shots, but if he does have to use his ability, it puts him back one round because he has to clear stress before getting on their tails to engage.

So far, I really like 3 named + Reaper. This allows you to have goodies like Shield Upgrade on "Pure Sabbacc" and Hull Upgrade on "Countdown." I had been using Vizier as my reaper, but if you want to Jam, then coordinating may not be the best. Still good though. Lots of options. Here's an idea I would like to try:

TIE Reaper - •Major Vermeil - 52
•Major Vermeil - Veteran of Scarif (49)
Intimidation (3)

TIE/sk Striker - •“Pure Sabacc” - 52
•“Pure Sabacc” - Confident Gambler (44)
Predator (2)
Shield Upgrade (6)

TIE/sk Striker - •“Countdown” - 51
•“Countdown” - Death Defier (44)
Predator (2)
Hull Upgrade (5)

TIE/sk Striker - •“Duchess” - 44
•“Duchess” - Urbane Ace (42)
Predator (2)

Total: 199/200

View in the X-Wing Squad Builder

Reapers will have a hard time getting shots without running headlong into the fray, so just plan on it. On his way in, Vermeil can jam to get rid of a reinforce token, which helps so much! Or, if he overshoots, he runs into an Upsilon, reducing its agility with Intimidation, which also functionally negates Reinforce. Actually, if you plan on running into them, Captain Feroph is a little cheaper, and may be a better buy? I like have one i5 and the rest at i4 for ease in executing Ailerons. Oh, and Predator got a stealth buff with the price drop of all the large ships; you'll be more likely to line up bullseye arcs to make use of that upgrade in combat.

I love this list, and have flown variations of it (usually Feroph, who is the superior Reaper IMO). The problem is the I6 deploy. They place after all your ships, and so very likely will take out one, maybe two, of your strikers. Pure Sabaac is the one they probably whack. And you can’t really do anything about it.

Mid you spread deploy, then they white 2 hard towards your remaining ships. The Strikers won’t be able to escape that.

Ups deploy down the edge. Erase one Striker. Two hard towards middle and, since you spread deploy to avoid jousting with everything, it rolls up your ships 1 by 1, and you won’t be able to get behind them fast enough. Even if one ship gets behind it won’t have enough power to chew through them before time.

Deploy for the joust, and they face tank. And your 1 k and 2 sloops don’t cover enough ground to truly get behind them.

I want to believe, because it’s the one Hyperspace archetype I’m excited for, but I don’t think it can cut it.

8 minutes ago, millertime059 said:

I love this list, and have flown variations of it (usually Feroph, who is the superior Reaper IMO). The problem is the I6 deploy. They place after all your ships, and so very likely will take out one, maybe two, of your strikers. Pure Sabaac is the one they probably whack. And you can’t really do anything about it.

Mid you spread deploy, then they white 2 hard towards your remaining ships. The Strikers won’t be able to escape that.

Ups deploy down the edge. Erase one Striker. Two hard towards middle and, since you spread deploy to avoid jousting with everything, it rolls up your ships 1 by 1, and you won’t be able to get behind them fast enough. Even if one ship gets behind it won’t have enough power to chew through them before time.

Deploy for the joust, and they face tank. And your 1 k and 2 sloops don’t cover enough ground to truly get behind them.

I want to believe, because it’s the one Hyperspace archetype I’m excited for, but I don’t think it can cut it.

I'm reading through the other thread now, and it's becoming much more clear that you are correct. I want to have at least initiative 4 for simultaneous fire against the highers initiative Upsilon pilot, but maybe just swarm the darn things with Wampa and 5 Planetary Sentinels makes more sense. Suffer your loss, get behind, and just take one attack every turn from trailing Upsilon while you pour fire into the other two. It's definitely not an ideal matchup. I'm only considering squads I would fly anyway, trying not to specifically gun for this list. The fact that Wampa Sentinels hasn't taken off yet suggests that it's not that great of a list, which makes me nervous, but curious to try it at the same time.

5 minutes ago, Parakitor said:

I'm reading through the other thread now, and it's becoming much more clear that you are correct. I want to have at least initiative 4 for simultaneous fire against the highers initiative Upsilon pilot, but maybe just swarm the darn things with Wampa and 5 Planetary Sentinels makes more sense. Suffer your loss, get behind, and just take one attack every turn from trailing Upsilon while you pour fire into the other two. It's definitely not an ideal matchup. I'm only considering squads I would fly anyway, trying not to specifically gun for this list. The fact that Wampa Sentinels hasn't taken off yet suggests that it's not that great of a list, which makes me nervous, but curious to try it at the same time.

Tried it, though with Del Meeko instead of Wampa.

It sufferers the same fate every generic heavily list faces. Not efficient enough to overcome the initiative. Granted the nerf to munitions carriers such that Redline, Deathrain, Jonus, Rhymer with all their toys is illegal, maybe they fare better. But munitions alpha lists were hard counters. Tough break.

But ive tried, and I’m barely over .500 with it. When I’m a roughly .750+ player otherwise.

1 hour ago, PhantomFO said:

I've been thinking of trying this:

<snip>

You should be able to get into hull pretty easily on the Starkiller Base Pilot before it gets the chance to shoot, and you'll maybe lose one or two TIEs on the initial joust. It shouldn't be too hard to line up bullseyes on those large bases, so you can rely on Crack Shots to overcome their single defense die and chip damage through.

Just kicking around ideas, any reason not to squeeze Iden in there? If you can limit initial engagement to just the rushed two Ups, then you could potentially only eat one shot as Iden will erase the 1st. At worst, you lose one ship while they are fully tokened up on the initial joust. After that, they won't be as scary without the token stack and swarms can chew past reinforce. With something like this you loose the Seyn/Gideon combo, but I figure one of those are likely going to be primaried off on round one, anyways. Of course, can Iden and a bunch of Black Cracks beat anything else in Hyperspace

And it’s not like I want to be the Debbie Downer here. I genuinely want the Striker swarm to be good. Triple named striker Reaper is my jam.

And I think it is good, in most contexts. Even against high I protorp alphas I was able to find success. Striker swarm… less so. But point being I think it is viable. I just don’t see how I could reliably beat Tripsilons with it. I’ve seen how they play, I know what you need to do. I also know that what you need to do is very hard because of all that health behind reinforce. Most shots do one damage. And they can spread arcs, and the reality is that once they break formation, it can be very difficult to avoid shots indefinitely. And one shot can be death for a striker.

I just don’t know you can get enough firepower to mid game to be able to push enough damage for points. You need to kill 1.5-2 Upsilons. That is a tall order for 2 3 dice attacks with no rerolls.

6 minutes ago, kris40k said:

Just kicking around ideas, any reason not to squeeze Iden in there? If you can limit initial engagement to just the rushed two Ups, then you could potentially only eat one shot as Iden will erase the 1st. At worst, you lose one ship while they are fully tokened up on the initial joust. After that, they won't be as scary without the token stack and swarms can chew past reinforce. With something like this you loose the Seyn/Gideon combo, but I figure one of those are likely going to be primaried off on round one, anyways. Of course, can Iden and a bunch of Black Cracks beat anything else in Hyperspace

Iden's an option, but I liked the flexibility and synergy with Seyn and Gideon.

As for the Black Cracks in Hyperspace: I think they might be able to do okay now. Supernatural Vader and Kylo were probably their hardest matchups, and both were nerfed. Same goes for Trajectory Simulators. Hate Vader with Afterburners might be their toughest opposition now, but he's still going to be vulnerable to blocking.

TIE Swarm should blow right through it. Nothing happens on initial engage because it's 2 shots vs Iden, then the TIEs can take over.

3 minutes ago, TheCeilican said:

TIE Swarm should blow right through it. Nothing happens on initial engage because it's 2 shots vs Iden, then the TIEs can take over.

Er... I mean, it's not a dumb idea or a foregone conclusion, but "blow right through it" I don't believe. Very dicey, if you get my meaning.

Scum also has Seevor to strip the Reinforce token, or if you're also flying Teroch, then try to strip a TL as well.

Once the Z is released, a swarm of Seevor + 6 Black Sun Soldiers all armed with Crack Shot can strip the Reinforce token off the SBP, then as long as you've got all guns on target and got a couple into R1, you've got a good shot at killing the SBP before it even gets to shoot.

3 hours ago, Captain Lackwit said:

I would encourage you to try High-PS HLC X-Wings. They punch only a tiny bit less hard than Upsilons.

...if they can get all three of their bullseye arcs onto the same target... that's a BIG if.

Also worth nothing that the XXX sports about 50% of the HP of the Shuttles not even counting Reinforce...

So... congrats... you've got a list that admittedly hits less hard while also having radically less HP. Good luck! Better aim for some exhaust ports with those HLCs...

7 minutes ago, Enigami said:

Once the Z is released, a swarm of Seevor + 6 Black Sun Soldiers all armed with Crack Shot can strip the Reinforce token off the SBP, then as long as you've got all guns on target and got a couple into R1, you've got a good shot at killing the SBP before it even gets to shoot.

Z-95 isn't Hyperspace legal this season despite being released next wave. Crack Mining Guild Surveyors might work in their place.

7 minutes ago, AllWingsStandyingBy said:

...if they can get all three of their bullseye arcs onto the same target... that's a BIG if.

Also worth nothing that the XXX sports about 50% of the HP of the Shuttles not even counting Reinforce...

So... congrats... you've got a list that admittedly hits less hard while also having radically less HP. Good luck! Better aim for some exhaust ports with those HLCs...

While I'll give you your other points, if you can't get three boost- and barrel-roll-capable ships to train bullseye arcs on the same lower-PS, large-based shuttle, you should probably just sell your collection now. This game ain't for you.

Well, that's unfortunate about the Zs not being legal. Trouble with Surveyors is they are I2, so SBP atleast gets to fire back. Upside though is you get to bring rocks and ignore them the same as they can with those Collision Detectors, and with the 12 points saved compared to the Black Sun Soldiers, you can add Shield Upgrade to Seevor to help keep him alive longer to strip the Reinforce tokens and still have a 5 pt bid.

Edit: Actually, might as well spend that 5 pt bid to upgrade a Surveyor to Ahhav and get that extra firepower.

List: Whalers on the Moon (formerly known as Ahhav Hunts Moby Trips(ilons))

My working theory was ships fast enough, high enough initiative and enough arc dodging was probably the right call. To that end, I settled on L'ulo, Tallie, Nien and Ello. They split easily, they're higher initiative than all common upsilon pilots, they all have boost and barrel roll and even if they try to use something like Phasma to stress you out of T-Rolling or K-turning, Ello does it anyways, Nien sheds the stress and the A-Wings don't care.

The idea in terms of flight plan was just to split the joust among 4 elements, whatever they don't point at gets free damage and it's also possible if you guess the engagement right to limit or negate the shuttle shots, but have them still converge at a central point. It was also, in my mind, important to have 4 ships just because if 1 got caught you weren't as screwed. Initial tests quite promising and it's really fun to fly (basically the opposite of upsilons).

Well see, but the Resistance (appropriately enough) does seem to have the toolkit to make these shuttles regret some life choices. Bonus, if you're in extended, those jamming beams will actually do some work in this match-up.