"You're too far out, we can't cover you!" The worth of tactical anti-squadron attacks

By Cruzer, in Star Wars: Armada Organized Play

Posted at

Let me preface this by stating this idea only really applies to squadron-heavy lists.

So, I'm sure plenty of people know the power of heavy squadron lists: bombers and/or multi-role squads in high numbers to exhaust an enemy ship's defenses. Obviously, one of the key strategies for this is getting big alpha-strikes in, most often using "Intel" squadrons to dampen enemy squadrons' ability to protect enemy ships from attack. However, I do often wonder to myself, is there a case to be made for alt versions of ships that seem to exist (at least in-part) for anti-squadron and/or kitting out multi-purpose ships for heavy squadron support via ship-to-squadron attack.

Of course there are the more obvious ones: Quasar-Fire Carriers, Neb-B Escorts, and flotillas that are already there to activate squadrons, but I'm talking also of the more expensive ships that don't get much shine: Assault Frigate Mk2 As, Gladiator IIs, heck I'd even throw in the Raider II. On top of that, there's upgrades to think of as well (General Draven, ordinance pods, DTTs for the red-die chance, etc.).

I guess the TLDR here is, has anyone here had big success with putting more into their anti-squadron game ship-wise when making a squadron list? Bonus points if you've found ways to use normally hard-to-use cards (like cluster bombs or point-defense reroute). Thanks!

Posted at

Hi! This kind of thing belongs in general discussion; organized play is for groups and events. That said, a GSD2 Demolisher with Kallus tacked on is a legitimate flak build that can perform 2 3 dice attacks against squads or just do Demolisher things. Antisquadron support is really nice in 134 vs 134 matchups, so long as you're comfortable trusting your squadrons to compensate for weakened/fewer combat ships when they didn't bring squads. If I had to choose between flak buffs and Slicers though, I know which I'd take.

Posted at

Agreed; you'll get more responses in the main forum.

Gladiator II-Class Star Destroyer (62 points)
- Demolisher ( 10 points)
- Agent Kallus ( 3 points)
- Ordnance Experts ( 4 points)
- Engine Techs ( 8 points)
- Fletchette Torpedoes ( 3 points)
= 92 total ship cost

This can be effective with Admiral Screed. @CommanderDave came up with it. If you're attacking a unique squadron, add a black die and hope for a hit/crit. Reroll with Ordnance Experts if needed. If that doesn't do it, you can use Screed on one squad. Spend the hit/crit to shut down squads. On top of all that, you can set up that second shot easier with Demolisher!

Two mistakes I've made with this that have cost me games:

1. Attacking ships with Demolisher when I should have attacked squads.

2. Having a small bid.

Posted at

You can also do a cheaper version of the above with a

Raider-I, OE, Flechettes, Kallus, and Instigator

Instigator will lock down the squadrons and keep them around until you can pull the trigger. A bid for first player is useful. It also helps to have a squadron or two go along too as the Raider may be killed by the squadrons it is trying to hurt. Send in the Raider against several A-wings and all will be great. Do this against 3 B-wigns and you may not survive the squadron phase to get your shot off and flecette de-activate the targets.

I have seen nasty Ruthless strategist builds based on the Quasar-II or ISD Kuat. Some freindly TIE-bombers or TIE-Advanced can make your Flak very deadly and the extra point of damage ignores scatters and is not added to the initial damage pool so brace isn't going to help.

Toryn Farr on a nearby ship can makes double blue flak ships like the NEB-Escort or AF-IIA very effective. GTs too on the AFII lets you shoot a broadside and also flak out of that arc at squadrons. Draven is an optional extra but probably not worth the cost unless the enemy use Dengar a lot.

Finally remember the following upgrades can also be used against squadrons (though some are inefficient pointwise or a bit situational)

  • Screed (as noted by @Bertie Wooster ) once per activation and you need a black flak dice to benefit properly.
  • Leading Shots - Just thrown 2 bad dice? Discard a blue and reroll the other. Doesn't exhaust so keep on rerolling against all squadron targets in your fire arc.
  • Overload Pulse - Pricy but great against aces. Again it doesn't exhaust so you can get some use out of those otherwise useless blue crit results. Even works with counter-1 from QLTs. Screed can also help.
  • External racks - not reccomended but sometimes you just have to, or you can see your own death aproaching... so why not. Remember your OE rerolls too.
  • DTTs - It's an exhaust but you can add a red die after seeing a dud die roll that you can safely discard.
  • H9s - great against scatter aces if you have 2 die flak.
  • QTCs - Very sutuational. You need Kallus and/or to be one of the larger SSDs to benefit.
  • TRCs - An Exhaust. Similar to QTCs above but also needs Captain Needa to grant the evade.
  • Caitken & Shollan - It's an exhaust and rather inefficient to use it on one squadron attack but hey.
  • Veteran Gunners - Ditto
  • Avenger - Seriously... I played Avenger for 2 years before realising it also works with Flak! Nowadays it is an exhaust card so a little situational.
  • Devastator - Expensive, sutuational and once per round. However, an ISD-II could have 6 blue dice and one black at one poor B@stard of a squadron. LS can get you upto 6 rerolls too. On a Kuat with E-Rax, Kallus, OE & LS things can get very nasty. 10 Dice with a CF command and 2 reroll sources.
  • Dominator - Expensive. You can easily denude your ship of shields very quickly but it does work against squadrons.
  • Warlord - A nice reliable (but expensive) combo with H9s.
Posted at
3 hours ago, Mad Cat said:

You can also do a cheaper version of the above with a

Raider-I, OE, Flechettes, Kallus, and Instigator

Instigator will lock down the squadrons and keep them around until you can pull the trigger. A bid for first player is useful. It also helps to have a squadron or two go along too as the Raider may be killed by the squadrons it is trying to hurt. Send in the Raider against several A-wings and all will be great. Do this against 3 B-wigns and you may not survive the squadron phase to get your shot off and flecette de-activate the targets.

I have seen nasty Ruthless strategist builds based on the Quasar-II or ISD Kuat. Some freindly TIE-bombers or TIE-Advanced can make your Flak very deadly and the extra point of damage ignores scatters and is not added to the initial damage pool so brace isn't going to help.

Toryn Farr on a nearby ship can makes double blue flak ships like the NEB-Escort or AF-IIA very effective. GTs too on the AFII lets you shoot a broadside and also flak out of that arc at squadrons. Draven is an optional extra but probably not worth the cost unless the enemy use Dengar a lot.

Finally remember the following upgrades can also be used against squadrons (though some are inefficient pointwise or a bit situational)

  • Screed (as noted by @Bertie Wooster ) once per activation and you need a black flak dice to benefit properly.
  • Leading Shots - Just thrown 2 bad dice? Discard a blue and reroll the other. Doesn't exhaust so keep on rerolling against all squadron targets in your fire arc.
  • Overload Pulse - Pricy but great against aces. Again it doesn't exhaust so you can get some use out of those otherwise useless blue crit results. Even works with counter-1 from QLTs. Screed can also help.
  • External racks - not reccomended but sometimes you just have to, or you can see your own death aproaching... so why not. Remember your OE rerolls too.
  • DTTs - It's an exhaust but you can add a red die after seeing a dud die roll that you can safely discard.
  • H9s - great against scatter aces if you have 2 die flak.
  • QTCs - Very sutuational. You need Kallus and/or to be one of the larger SSDs to benefit.
  • TRCs - An Exhaust. Similar to QTCs above but also needs Captain Needa to grant the evade.
  • Caitken & Shollan - It's an exhaust and rather inefficient to use it on one squadron attack but hey.
  • Veteran Gunners - Ditto
  • Avenger - Seriously... I played Avenger for 2 years before realising it also works with Flak! Nowadays it is an exhaust card so a little situational.
  • Devastator - Expensive, sutuational and once per round. However, an ISD-II could have 6 blue dice and one black at one poor B@stard of a squadron. LS can get you upto 6 rerolls too. On a Kuat with E-Rax, Kallus, OE & LS things can get very nasty. 10 Dice with a CF command and 2 reroll sources.
  • Dominator - Expensive. You can easily denude your ship of shields very quickly but it does work against squadrons.
  • Warlord - A nice reliable (but expensive) combo with H9s.

I've had some good success with the Raider-I/Instigator/Kallus/Ordnance Experts/Flechettes build against Thrawn 2-ship. The trick is keeping the **** thing alive during the initial alpha-strike by their squads, as they have to take the Raider out first.

Posted at

@The Jabbawookie @Bertie Wooster thanks for the heads-up. Guess I misinterpreted the description of the forum-space. ^^'

I do appreciate all the responses thus-far, thank you all! :)