It’s really not that salty.

The Scoundrels talk innovation in list building, the X-34, and what it means to be the Beatdown vs. the Control. Plus the dark magic that is contrast paints.

https://podcast.notoriousscoundrels.com/e/notorious-scoundrels-ep-36-salt-potatoes/

I was surprised that salt potatoes are something worth explaining. It is kind of the default version of potatoes where I live.

Concerning vehicles and new list concepts: Have you ever tried 3 naked ATRTs with Astromechs? Two or three droids bring their resilience to another level.

Point for point, ATRTs without hardpoint are already the toughest unit in the game. It needs practice to have some impact with them and it is very easy to end up with a very one-sided list, but so far my record is 13 wins vs 3 losses in tournament games. I used them with a Luke-Leia variant.

3 hours ago, M.Mustermann said:

I was surprised that salt potatoes are something worth explaining. It is kind of the default version of potatoes where I live.

Concerning vehicles and new list concepts: Have you ever tried 3 naked ATRTs with Astromechs? Two or three droids bring their resilience to another level.

Point for point, ATRTs without hardpoint are already the toughest unit in the game. It needs practice to have some impact with them and it is very easy to end up with a very one-sided list, but so far my record is 13 wins vs 3 losses in tournament games. I used them with a Luke-Leia variant.

Interesting, what does the rest of your list look like?

I have always loved RTs. I ran Sorry About the BBQ into the ground awhile back, but I found it to be too inflexible for my style.

The effects of contrast paints was always possible if you thinned your paint just right. It’s interesting that you can just buy it ready to go like that though. I am thinking about using it on some vintage undead.

On 6/12/2019 at 5:00 AM, Orkimedes said:

Interesting, what does the rest of your list look like?

I have always loved RTs. I ran Sorry About the BBQ into the ground awhile back, but I found it to be too inflexible for my style.

I changed the list a little bit in every tournament. I started to run it last October shortly after the release of snipers and Boba/Han, when the specialist pack was not yet around. My last tournament with the list was in late April I think. I still like it a lot and will return to it in the future, but I also wanted to try some other stuff.

As a caveat I should say that I had the higher bid in all but one of those games (which I actually ended up losing) and could choose the tableside. I also managed to get Recover the Supplies as objective in about half of the games with that list. To choose sides in a Recover-game with a Luke/Leia/Fleet combo is obviously quite a good starting point. I was often able to get into the “control”-position as you call it in the podcast very fast. In that situation, the roadblock/bullet sponge capabilities of three ATRTs are usually quite handy, but it would probably not be correct to say that they were the actual match winners in these situations. Luke is just Luke.

Also, Deathtroopers being in almost every imperial list might be a good reason to move back to triple snipers. I was usually able to handle Deathtroopers surprisingly good. If your opponent does you the favor to shoot the ATRTs with them, it is actually even a nice way to neuter them. However, in tournaments people usually tend to have a quite good target priority. As far as I remember I won three tournament games by now against lists that included death trooper units. At one of my losses though, I think I did not even have a realistic chance due to the DTs, the terrain and the objectives. I think in that tournament I went a little bit too far with the resilience aspect of the list and neglected output too much. I made some mistakes as well in the game and my opponent was one of our best players on the national level, but that matchup was honestly a little bit frustrating. Anyway, the variants of the list included:

- Always a very high bid to avoid long-range shootouts and to get Luke and Fleets safely into a good position (until the Errata also due to key positions)

- Always Luke, Stims, Force push and usually Jedi Mind Trick

- Always Leia, Improvised Orders

- Always 3 naked ATRTs

- With the exception of one tournament, I used at least one unit of full Fleets with scattergun, I think once even two. Often I used Environmental Gear, once I tried Emergency Stims

- In the first three tournaments with that list, I used a single sniper strike team.

- Since the release of the specialists I ran one medic and two astromechs

- The rest was usually Z6-squads plus at least one naked Rebel Trooper squad for objectives and as a carrier for the specialists, once or twice even two

I have to admit I never tried to run the ATRTs with a weapon upgrade, so I am at least partly talking out of my *** concerning those comparisons and to the BBQ list. I did play against ATRTs with all weapon options of course. Here is why I never tried them by now:

- 75 to 105 points for the weapons are hard to fit in and reduce your activation count.

- It basically throws their resilience advantage out of the window. For 55 points, 6 wounds with a 6+ save are quite good, for 80 points it is often even a liability and much less expendable, especially multiplied by 3.

- You are locked into a specific way of playing them and can only adapt to your opponent and the situation in a rather limited way. Your opponent knows what they are supposed to do with their specific weapon and where they will go.

- It changes their role from utility unit to damage dealer, and I think there are just better options for that.

Some random things I learned (some quite situational):

- I use to run all three of them closely together, often in downright formations, which I did not do at the beginning. I would even say I would not recommend to play a list with just one or two of them. For me it is either three or none (I have to admit that I actually did not even test that though). They are much better in almost every role if they support each other

- It is advisable to practice a bit where you end up with moves, partial moves, speed-1 moves (the joint for the 90 degree turn is much closer to your base), reverses and pivots. The room you need to pass between obstacles is about a trooper base wide left and right of the movement tool. You also need to be aware of the distance you have to keep from impassable terrain in order to pass it smoothly without wasting an action to pivot.

- For their roadblock-function, it is relatively important that trooper unit leaders have to move along the template and are not allowed to overlap the base of the vehicle. The fact that opposing trooper miniatures can only change direction by about 90 degrees after they passed the joint of the templates can also significantly limit their movement options, especially if there is more than one vehicle base close to them. Sometimes they even have to move slightly backwards for half of their movement-template and then to the side (Snows and Palp love this).

- That can also help to prevent a trooper unit from moving out of base contact at all if you use more than one base (especially the notches) to nail the unit leader in place. You often have to sacrifice an attack to reverse or move into base contact in the proper angle. That can be an option if you can stop a trooper from scoring or if you can catch expensive units like Snows with officer, Wookies, Royal Guard or Deathtroopers. If the unit leader gets focused by two or three ATRTs with aim tokens, even tough units will go down within two turns or so. It is even easier to assist with a nearby trooper unit to engage them of course (for example Luke or a naked Rebel Trooper unit with a spent Astromech).

- You cannot engage, but enemy units are still in melee and have to move into base contact with you after every move you end in base contact with one of their miniatures. When you move into base contact and then reverse or move out of base contact without displacing their unit leader, two or even three ATRTs can sometimes pull an enemy unit just that little bit to move it into the strike distance of Luke, Fleets or Force Push.

- In the same way, You can sometimes also push a unit back by moving past it and in contact to the back with its very last miniature’s base. The unit leader then has to move backwards into base contact with the ATRT. That can be useful to pull a trooper unit out of its weapon range to your main force. With the suppression of the displacement, that might be enough to stop it from shooting at important units that turn.

- For more complicated displacement moves, it is usually helpful if you can displace just one or two miniatures of the displaced unit to make follow-ups by other walkers easier. The second move of a walker should not end in base contact with a miniature of a unit that you want to displace another time with another walker. You are starting a melee and your opponent may get the chance to move some of his miniatures out of the way when he places them in base contact.

- Usually it is better to just use the close combat attack instead of maxing out your displacement moves. If you have just one turn to deal with an activated unit in a good position though, it might be an option to double displace them by moving past the unit leader without displacing the leader himself and then reverse through the unit again. During that reverse, it is important not to displace any miniatures in front of the other Walkers to give them the chance for a similar follow-up. Originally I tried to displace as many different units as possible at once with each ATRT. It is often better though if you focus on one unit and then follow it up with Jedi Mind Trick.

- Against some specific threads like ATSTs or emplacements (probably also the tank), the all-out chicken rush can be viable, especially when Luke has an avenue of approach to get into the fray later on. It is often better to charge in and accept one or two losses than to leave the table to your opponent. The ATST usually needs two turns for an ATRT with droid support, so the odds are stacked against it.

- I used the ATRTs as light cover for Trooper units less often than I expected. Light cover is usually not enough protection for rebels to stick your head out.

- I was surprised how valuable heavy cover can be against full DLT-units. If I realize my opponent is focusing the ATRTs and it suits the objective, I sometimes place them in midfield-cover, pull his fire and fish for crits with the A-300. They don’t deal a lot of damage, but they eat a lot of his fire and activations.

- You can move your base onto non-friendly charge tokens and block line of sight (page 43 rules reference) for their detonation to everything but the ATRT

Things I might change in the future:

- I feel it could make sense to take even more Astromechs, but haven’t tried it by now. I usually keep the ATRTs close together, so the area where the R5-Squads have to hang around is limited. I thought about putting one into the Fleets instead of the Troopers, because they are often waiting behind a line of sight blocker in the mid-field anyway. They are often in a good position for a slingshot move towards the ATRTs and back into cover, and they often kind of skip their activation anyway because they are just waiting for a target and deny space to the opponent

- I might actually try the Gatling gun in case the “Linked Target Array” and the “Electrobinoculars” turn out to be a force multiplier and really make them a proper damage dealer. That would probably be a completely different list though.

- I might switch to 2 ATRTs with one Tauntaun unit. The ATRTs sometimes benefit quite a bit from a near trooper unit to engage a unit. They also bring one more base of impassable terrain to augment the roadblock function. The mobile light cover might help the Tauntauns a little bit, but I don’t think that will make a huge difference. I don’t know yet how to fit them in points wise by now anyway. I fear that the extra points are wasted because they will just get shot to pieces by Bossk or his Men in Black.

Those are all great tips for RTs generally, and will apply particularly to Tauntauns as well. Good stuff.

Yepp, I am really looking forward to the Tauntauns as well.

I am a bit worried that they are a bit too pricey/squishy to operate close to the opposing force.

Maybe the best thing about the naked ATRTs is that they can usualy operate reativly independently from LOS-Blockers.

It also sometimes even works in your favour when the opponent is focusing them. This is quite unique for a rebel unit.

Sorry if I harp on about that matter, but there was one more insight I forgot to mention, but it came from a very interesting game situation:

If you are in melee, the other unit can still shoot, but it can only use melee weapons against the ATRT it is in melee with. This helps a little bit against DLT-Squads, but is really helpful against ATSTs and emplacement troopers (and probably the tank, but I haven't faced it with that list yet). You can move about 15 inches with two move actions, so there is a good chance to reach the target in turn two or three.

Against an ATST, the best case scenario is two ATRTs making it into base contact. The first one can interlock the front notches so the ATST cannot pivot any more. The second one should move behind the ATST so it cannot reverse. If that works, it gives some freedom of movement to the rest of your army (especially Luke) and puts the opponent in a very difficult position in which he has to get rid of the ATRTs fast. If he lets them kick the ATST with three red dice, surge to crit and impact one/two, it will acumulate a lot of damage very fast. The ATST does much less damage to the ATRTs in return in melee. He has a very strong incentive to shoot at the ATRTs instead of your troopers with the rest of his army in that situation, which is usually what you want. Needless to say that Luke can have a lot of impact as soon as he joins the party. He can either finish off the ATST or don't waste time and go for Veers and Stormtroopers who are usually near the ATST to benefit from Veers Spotter ability.
This scenario was actually the first time that I thought about taking more than two astromechs, because Veers and some DLTs are usually part of such lists as well. Together with the ATST, they have a very good chance to destroy more than one ATRT by turn two. With three or four astromechs, that is a lot more difficult. It is also worth noting that each ATRT can get only once per game get a vehicle damage token by reaching its resilience threshold. Once that is repaired, it does not get another one, even if you repair it so often that it is above its threshold again and it gets wounded afterwards.

Ion tokens can be repaired as well, which might help in the future in case ion weapons become a thing.