Is Zealous Recruit the best blocker in the game?!

By Sixter, in X-Wing Squad Lists

I have been playing Scum for awhile and for some reason I have never shown the Zealous Recruit any respect. Always trying to fit both Fenn and Teroch in a list but the high cost of Fenn always limits the options for the 3rd ship. I know Fenn/Teroch/Guri is somewhat viable but you have to live with 3 flimsy ships then which can be a challenge against many of those beef-lists out there. I have been wanting to try Boba again after he got nerfed in the last point revision, but you cant really fit two strong ships alongside him in this point patch. So, having noticed all those Fenn/3xRecruits lists out there I finally decided to give the Zealous Recruit a try. Wow, what a nice little ship! Moving at I1 with a great linked action for a blocker (BR or a boost with a red focus) and then you get the Concordia Faceoff at range-1, which again is great for a blocker.

Here is my current Boba/Teroch/Z-Recruit list:

Boba/Fearless/Marauder 95 pts

Old Teroch/Fearless 59 pts

Zealous Recruit 44 pts

This leaves me with a 2 point bid which might actually be useful to make sure the Recruit gets to move first against lists with I1 ships, or to move last with Boba/Teroch against non-bid lists.

Recruit seems good. I haven't gotten around to flying one (despite having 4 fangs), but I think they're solid.

If they have a weakness as a blocker, it's 44. They cost a lot more than a TIE Fighter, for example. They've got a lot of nice perks, but it's still an expensive ship, only 2-3 points cheaper than the limited B-Wings Ten Nunb and Braylen Stramm. Concordia Faceoff can be amazing for keeping that investment working, but it needs to be.

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The particular list seems solid.

I have a friend who's been flying a lot of Old Teroch lately, and he swears by Predator. He said something to the effect that he often is using Old T's ability on someone he's not attacking, and intending to use Predator on someone else. I kind of want to get a feel for it, but personally think I'd prefer Fearless.

I go back and forth on Marauder for Boba. Rerolls on the rear arc make it feel a lot better to boost out and still get dice mods when disengaging, but I still kind of want to run through options. Half the time I'm commenting on these, I'm trying to work out options for my own use, more than advise someone else. Slave 1 seems like a tempting option. No title also seems fine. Seismic Charges might be good, blow up some awkward obstacles, but I don't think a list which is prioritizing blocking actually wants to destroy obstacles. Fewer obstacles means wider lanes, wider lanes means it's easier to avoid blocks. L3-37 always kind of tempts me for Hyperspace Boba. Messing up an opponent's attack once your shields are down and there are incoming crits seems like it could be handy.

We've used this in a couple of store tourneys. It's been a bit much for the more casual opponents and definitely holds its own against the competitive ones.

(56) Old Teroch [Fang Fighter] (3) Swarm Tactics. Points: 59

(44) Zealous Recruit [Fang Fighter] Points: 44

(86) Boba Fett [Firespray-class Patrol Craft] (8) Perceptive Copilot (2) Slave 1. Points: 96

Total points: 199

Slave 1 needs planning for and can be great when you do. PerCo is super solid with 3 red and 2 green dice.

Terochs ability is more for emergencies. It can obviously be very strong but not getting shot at is often preferable, so we don't get much mileage from Fearless. Recruit shoots at I5 on the 1st/2nd engage ofc, maybe later too, which is priceless in comparison.

Jakuu Gunrunner is the best blocker in the game IMHO

Depends on how you define "best"

Even though the Viper Enforcer can't block I 1, I rate it as FAR superior because of additional low speed manueverability and the hilarity of microthruster rolls

Course, neither of these guys are really dedicated blockers. They're WAY too pricey and also have 3 die primaries; blocking is just something they can do in a pinch

Basically, they're great at blocking but don't GUN for it (like dogpiling up an entire swarm in your face) because you're probably going to lose your considerable investment in a way that hurts far more than losing a Z

Edited by ficklegreendice