Help Please

By hanswoleo, in X-Wing Squad Lists

I need help with a rebel list that is killing us in league.

Our player is running 2 blue squad b wings and 3 gold squad y wings with dorsal turret and vet turret gunner. It's a lot of health to chew through and has decimated rebel, first order, and republic lists.

I want to fashion a list to deal with this and only things I can come up with are 3 dice ships with lots of health to survive. U wings, b-wings, k-wings with missiles, etc... Anyone have ideas as to deal with such a list? I tried flying behind him but with 5 ships on the board he does a good job of covering multiple attack angles. I manage to be able to kill 1 ship first round and another after but then attrition sets in.

My latest idea is Miranda, Cassian, Braylen and blade squadron vet with a few upgrades. Suggestions and advice welcome.

57 minutes ago, hanswoleo said:

I need help with a rebel list that is killing us in league.

Our player is running 2 blue squad b wings and 3 gold squad y wings with dorsal turret and vet turret gunner. It's a lot of health to chew through and has decimated rebel, first order, and republic lists.

I want to fashion a list to deal with this and only things I can come up with are 3 dice ships with lots of health to survive. U wings, b-wings, k-wings with missiles, etc... Anyone have ideas as to deal with such a list? I tried flying behind him but with 5 ships on the board he does a good job of covering multiple attack angles. I manage to be able to kill 1 ship first round and another after but then attrition sets in.

My latest idea is Miranda, Cassian, Braylen and blade squadron vet with a few upgrades. Suggestions and advice welcome.

The resistance might put up a fair fight, bringing in something like 3 named A-wings & Poe. Bringing in 4 highly mobile ships capable of arc-dodging biggest momentary threads, capable of PS-killing and with high defensive potential, they should be able to initiate the game by focusing on staying safe while punching some opportunity-shots. With time, the 1 Agi rebel ships will wear down. After one or two of them are pacified, the aces can shift their priorities to an offence, at which point they should be able to PS-kill / cripple a ship a turn and secure the win.

Wedge Antilles (52)
Swarm Tactics (3)
Proton Torpedoes (12)
R3 Astromech (3)
Servomotor S-Foils (0)

Luke Skywalker (62)
Proton Torpedoes (12)
Servomotor S-Foils (0)

“Dutch” Vander (39)
Selfless (3)
Dorsal Turret (2)
Proton Torpedoes (12)
Total: 200

Wipe a ship off the board at range 3, dont get range 3 on five of their ships, you only want to take maybe two (cause you kill one), shots back in return. Its important all three of your ships fire next round, so range control is crucial. Next round, pskill another ship off the board.

With three low ps ships left its now alot more manageable.

Definitely want higher initiative. You can't beat rebel beef with more beef. I would suggest Kylo. +2 other ships. Keep your distance and play very conservative. Your ships are faster and can be choosy about their shots. Make him split up/go through rocks and pick them off one by one.

None of those ships are very maneuverable, and all have low initiative (PS). They are beefy, though. Those b-wings don't have much of a dial, and hate stress (unlike their named brethren). Everything is 1 agility so they take damage if you sneeze at them. If you can snipe from afar (YT-1300 with turret on sides) and maybe force/encourage them through the rocks, you'd have a better shot. Maybe Lando in the YT + Luke + Norra (ARC)... they are all tough ships that the Y-wings will have trouble penetrating (esp. last two). Your initiative should allow you to chip away, and your better maneuverability should allow you to control the battle, a bit. Is this helpful?

so u want to beat it with a rebel squad? u got any other factions to go to war with?

8 hours ago, Da_Brown_Bomber said:

so u want to beat it with a rebel squad? u got any other factions to go to war with?

No, I only have Rebels for second edition.

12 hours ago, ahdaniels76 said:

None of those ships are very maneuverable, and all have low initiative (PS). They are beefy, though. Those b-wings don't have much of a dial, and hate stress (unlike their named brethren). Everything is 1 agility so they take damage if you sneeze at them. If you can snipe from afar (YT-1300 with turret on sides) and maybe force/encourage them through the rocks, you'd have a better shot. Maybe Lando in the YT + Luke + Norra (ARC)... they are all tough ships that the Y-wings will have trouble penetrating (esp. last two). Your initiative should allow you to chip away, and your better maneuverability should allow you to control the battle, a bit. Is this helpful?

It is helpful thank you. I tried a list with Wedge in it and flew it horribly so I'm gun shy about flying Luke even though he does have force to help out. I love Norra and her shenanigans are fun to make him deal with. I was thinking missiles would be a good help to quickly knock off shields.

15 hours ago, Amc879 said:

Definitely want higher initiative. You can't beat rebel beef with more beef. I would suggest Kylo. +2 other ships. Keep your distance and play very conservative. Your ships are faster and can be choosy about their shots. Make him split up/go through rocks and pick them off one by one.

I will try to make him go through rocks as he flies his lists in formations every game. I will have to get better about placing obstacles. I am thinking of putting them close together on my side so that when he gets to me he will have to break formation or not have shots? Also with Miranda slamming behind him to set up for next turn.

You need to rangecontrol, so he cant shoot with all his ships at the same time (applies to any swarmtype).

If he flies in a quadrant, you need to pick of the corners. So you get 2 vs 1 situations.

22 minutes ago, hanswoleo said:

It is helpful thank you. I tried a list with Wedge in it and flew it horribly so I'm gun shy about flying Luke even though he does have force to help out. I love Norra and her shenanigans are fun to make him deal with. I was thinking missiles would be a good help to quickly knock off shields. 

Luke is possibly one of the best pilots to face a swarm-ish squadron like the one you've described, as he offers an infinite supply of defence modifiers. When caught by 3 different arcs, no other pilot* will come with a supply of tokens big enough to influence all of their defence rolls.

* Norra Wexley and her guaranteed evade is a strong tie-in with Luke, if not for the R1 requirement. Also, Moldy Hawks can stack up 3 focuses.

18 hours ago, hanswoleo said:

Our player is running 2 blue squad b wings and 3 gold squad y wings with dorsal turret and vet turret gunner. It's a lot of health to chew through and has decimated rebel, first order, and republic lists. 

It's also 205 points.

Gold Squadron (33) + Dorsal Turret (2) + Veteran Turret Gunner (6) = 41

Blue Squadron Pilot (41)

If they're Gray Squadron Y-wings instead of Gold then it works, but that does also put the squad at universal initiative 1, meaning initiative 2 and above gets the drop on them. Something like a squad of torpedo-laden scimitar bombers or an 8-ship obsidian squadron swarm might make a nice mess of them.

17 hours ago, wurms said:

Wedge Antilles (52)
Swarm Tactics (3)
Proton Torpedoes (12)
R3 Astromech (3)
Servomotor S-Foils (0)

Luke Skywalker (62)
Proton Torpedoes (12)
Servomotor S-Foils (0)

“Dutch” Vander (39)
Selfless (3)
Dorsal Turret (2)
Proton Torpedoes (12)
Total: 200

Wipe a ship off the board at range 3, dont get range 3 on five of their ships, you only want to take maybe two (cause you kill one), shots back in return. Its important all three of your ships fire next round, so range control is crucial. Next round, pskill another ship off the board.

With three low ps ships left its now alot more manageable.

A good concept. You don't actually need swarm tactics for this specific matchup, though. Wedge is nice simply to take the target's single green die away, but even a trio of lesser named X-wings (say, Thane, Garven, Jek) would still be able to lock and fire three torpedoes safely from range 3, where dorsal turrets can't reach and a Y-wing's 2-dice primary popguns will struggle to touch an agility 2 T-65.

Luke is good. As noted he's a great opponent for a swarm because he gets perma-modified dice. I might suggest instinctive aim - it's cheap and lets him focus for his action instead of locking, which could save you force if you end up using the token defensively.

2 hours ago, hanswoleo said:

I will try to make him go through rocks as he flies his lists in formations every game. I will have to get better about placing obstacles. I am thinking of putting them close together on my side so that when he gets to me he will have to break formation or not have shots? Also with Miranda slamming behind him to set up for next turn.

Breaking up the formation is key. If you can force him to engage with part of his list - or at least put part of the list at a longer range band - you have a fighting chance of getting a kill before he gets to shoot.

"Leebo" (88)
Concussion Missiles (6)
Deadman's Switch (2)

Ship total: 96 Half Points: 48 Threshold: 5

Luke Skywalker (62)
Supernatural Reflexes (24)
Proton Torpedoes (12)
R2-D2 (6)
Servomotor S-Foils (0)

Ship total: 104 Half Points: 52 Threshold: 3


Total: 200

View in Yet Another Squad Builder 2.0: https://raithos.github.io/?f=Rebel Alliance&d=v6!s=200!40:99,,,,93:;4:74,136,3,,142:&sn=Unnamed Squadron&obs=

This one might work as you can sit away at range 3 out of range of the dorsal turrets with Leebo and still get a really good shot in and Luke can shoot with protons from range 3 for 2 turns at least. By that time one ship should be down and another well on it's way if not already dead. With boths ships at range 3 the y-wings can't touch them and the b-wings shouldn't be too much of a problem. Both of them are able to get infinite defensive modifiers also working well against swarms. Luke can get around behind them with SNR and arc dodge great if they're all in formation. The concussion missiles always completely WRECK swarm squads in my experience.

I know you said you're only flying Rebels, and it sounds like you've gotten some really good advice, but as an Imperial player, I'm thankful that Thrawn invented Tie Defenders for exactly this situation.

Come to the dark side...

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(do not join the dark side)… REBELS RULE!!!