17 hours ago, ClassicalMoser said:

I feel like this just has to be telegraphing to us that the TIE Interceptor will get the same treatment at the next adjustment.

It has to be, right?

Double mods are its gimmick. TBH, until we get Carnor Jax, the best double mod interceptor is not Soontir, but a chassis with a built in double shield and a hull upgrade, both munition tubes, the tech slot, and dropping the evade for lock.

18 hours ago, Zazaa32 said:

Im still bit baffled by that missing modification slot that I was auto including in my head for some reason?

My supposition is that the Nantex had one--maybe two--mod slots in playtesting, but the mods got cut and Ensnare got it's price jacked way up, because the ship was busted.

I mean, with two mods in the pack, and most of the quickbuilds for the Nantex having two modifications (and every qb having one mod), it seems almost certain they intended the ship to have a mod slot. I know there are a few quickbuilds which have non-standard upgrades, but never so many in one expansion.

In the right hands, Sun Fac will be an 80 points beast with ensnare and predator.

In 1 on 1, there is no small base ship that can keep up i think.

In close ranges, he will often be able to get a shot without getting shot. Not all the time modified though, except tractored enemy

Sun Fac is too expensive for this, but the PS5 guy seems reasonable.

CIS Triple Aces?
Berwer Kret (40)
Ensnare (16)

Ship total: 56 Half Points: 28 Threshold: NaN

General Grievous (44)
Impervium Plating (4)
Soulless One (6)

Ship total: 54 Half Points: 27 Threshold: 4

Darth Maul (67)
Hate (9)
Count Dooku (10)

Ship total: 86 Half Points: 43 Threshold: 5


Total: 196

View in Yet Another Squad Builder 2.0: https://raithos.github.io/?f=Separatist Alliance&d=v8ZsZ200Z358X248WY305XWW207W229Y272X204WWW218WWWWW&sn=Unnamed Squadron&obs=

39 minutes ago, RunnerAZ said:

Sun Fac is too expensive for this, but the PS5 guy seems reasonable.

CIS Triple Aces?
Berwer Kret (40)
Ensnare (16)

Ship total: 56 Half Points: 28 Threshold: NaN

General Grievous (44)
Impervium Plating (4)
Soulless One (6)

Ship total: 54 Half Points: 27 Threshold: 4

Darth Maul (67)
Hate (9)
Count Dooku (10)

Ship total: 86 Half Points: 43 Threshold: 5


Total: 196

View in Yet Another Squad Builder 2.0: https://raithos.github.io/?f=Separatist Alliance&d=v8ZsZ200Z358X248WY305XWW207W229Y272X204WWW218WWWWW&sn=Unnamed Squadron&obs=

Berwer Ket is the new definition of blank pilot skill.

I came up with a similar list (upgrades to flavor) because double tap Maul seems like a good counterpart to tractor shenanigans.

2 hours ago, ClassicalMoser said:

but it doesn’t make sense for lore

2 hours ago, ClassicalMoser said:

Generic Interceptors don’t want 2 mods. They don’t want ONE mod. They’d like intimidation as blockers, Outmaneuver as flankers, or crack or predator as snipers.

2 mods are as useless on the Interceptor as they are on the Kihraxz. It’s a nod to 1st edition, but it doesn’t make sense for lore or gameplay. They desperately need the A-Wing treatment.

Having flown a little 5-health Soontir, and even some triple-mod Kihraxzes before they went double-illicit (hull + shield + burners or stealth device), they're fun.

I'm kind of glad that they erred on the side of caution regarding the I6 guy who can drop a tractor token on an enemy without even rolling and then dump five attack dice into them. If it's too much they'll fix it in a few months; We'll all still be here.

1 hour ago, theBitterFig said:

Having flown a little 5-health Soontir, and even some triple-mod Kihraxzes before they went double-illicit (hull + shield + burners or stealth device), they're fun.

Again, that's good for Soontir only, and he's not in any trouble as it is. Putting more points into a generic interceptor is exactly what you shouldn't do with them, be it shield, hull, or targeting computer. They're not cheap enough to be blockers, they're too fragile to be flankers, and because of that they get very little value from Autothrusters. At least the striker is stress-free and has a device slot (and gunner!). Targeting Computer is an especially bad choice: Even if Soontir can afford to skip his tokens for a lock one turn, it's because he knows he's not getting shot. The generics have no such knowledge so focus is literally always the mathematically superior choice, even without the cost involved.

Double Elites for the interceptor and an elite I1 would be enough to make it see the table. At the very least it would with a 1-2 point drop to the generics and Turr. It doesn't need new pilots as much as it needs the existing (non-Soontir) pilots to be playable. I would fly intimidation alphas as blockers at 36 points. And I would fly 5 crack sabers if you could afford them and at least 1 point of bid. But you can't do either of those, so they won't be used except in some fringe Sloane lists where you'd be better off with TIE/lns or strikers anyway.

I've played two games tonight with Sun Fac: once with Ensnare+Deflective and once with Ensnare+Predator, both against some mix of Jedi with 1 y-wing and n-1/ARC.

It seems to me that he is too expensive to have a reasonable companions. Also, straight boost-a-like-self-tractoring is REALLY limiting his potential. What is the most annoying- you have to rotate this freaking turret arc in order to tractor yourself. The ships ability goves you only one, one repositioning, so you are at T-65 X-wing's level of maneuverability.

Moreover, my friend took gas clouds. I tried to be careful in my approach, so did my opponent. I've tractored his ships maybe twice in both games.

I'm quite experienced player, definately not top-tier, but intermediate at least. But flying Sun Fac, who costed 40% of my list, was quite painful. I was really excited for the ship and harsh reality in form of precautious overcosting it (especially in comparison with other ps6 aces, jedi and n-1 pilots), took everything from me and left me dead inside.

@Jedu give it some time. It's a very unique and weird ship at first. Gravitic Deflection goes against what Sun Fac is trying to do so I wouldn't use that. Predator, Trick Shot and Treacherous could all be useful alternatives. It also really matters what the rest of the list is around Sun Fac.

4 minutes ago, RStan said:

Gravitic Deflection goes against what Sun Fac is trying to do so I wouldn't use that.

Sort of. Sun doesn't need to have the tractor token on him to gain its bonus against ships shooting him other than the one he's Ensnared, just needs the tractored ship to be in the attack arc of the incoming attack, and it stacks at +1 re-roll per tractored ship in the attack arc. It is 1 less re-roll than he would have had if he'd retained the token for attacks coming from his Ensnared target, but he's rolling 1 more green than he'd have been if he had.

19 minutes ago, RStan said:

@Jedu give it some time. It's a very unique and weird ship at first. Gravitic Deflection goes against what Sun Fac is trying to do so I wouldn't use that. Predator, Trick Shot and Treacherous could all be useful alternatives. It also really matters what the rest of the list is around Sun Fac.

10 minutes ago, Hiemfire said:

Sort of. Sun doesn't need to have the tractor token on him to gain its bonus against ships shooting him other than the one he's Ensnared, just needs the tractored ship to be in the attack arc of the incoming attack, and it stacks at +1 re-roll per tractored ship in the attack arc.

I feel like I might skip Gravitic Deflection on Sun Fac if they're the only Nantex, but if they're one of several, I probably want it. Kind of turns other Nantex almost into mini-Serissu, and I think Serissu is a massively underrated pilot.

1 hour ago, RStan said:

@JeduGravitic Deflection goes against what Sun Fac is trying to do so I wouldn't use that.

Yeah, I was reading GD wrong and thought that the tractored ship should be in Sun Fac's arc (translation issues).

Sun was accompanied by 3 graplling ESC drones and 1 grappling ESC DRK-probes hyena. The second time: 404 witH APT, Grievous with title and outmanouver and dfs-pass the calc droid. Unfortunatelly, Grievous blanked-out against two 4 dice attacks. The rest of the list was unable to handle Ric, Odd Ball (Y-W version) and Plo Koon.

I'll give the ship a go, maybe PS5 pilot will be better.

17 hours ago, theBitterFig said:

I feel like I might skip Gravitic Deflection on Sun Fac if they're the only Nantex, but if they're one of several, I probably want it. Kind of turns other Nantex almost into mini-Serissu, and I think Serissu is a massively underrated pilot.

This. A bunch of Stalgasin Hive Guard in a 'Bughouse Swarm' can offer mutual defensive rerolls and are probably a pretty tough nut to crack, especially with that extra hull over the TIE fighter or interceptor. Strikers are a pain to kill in numbers because they're juuuuust tough enough that one-shotting them is not really possible - even with a torpedo or range 1 shot you need perfect hits and for them to roll no evades at all. When a ship that's damaged can start flying with 3 dice and rerolls, and/or use turn/pinpoint/rotate to continue shooting to broadside instead of having to koiogran and loose its focus tokens, it's going to be annoyingly hard to finish ships off.

18 hours ago, Jedu said:

Also, straight boost-a-like-self-tractoring is REALLY limiting his potential. What is the most annoying- you have to rotate this freaking turret arc in order to tractor yourself.

Agreed. The inability to turn his nose when boosting, and the fact that you need to approach a target with your arc pointed 'the wrong way' is going to take a lot of getting used to. Right now I can't even picture what I want the engagement geometry to look like, let alone how to get it.

19 hours ago, Jedu said:

The ships ability goves you only one, one repositioning, so you are at T-65 X-wing's level of maneuverability.

Now this one I do disagree with. Yes, a T-65 can single-reposition, but you can do so without costing you your action. And, for that matter, without stressing yourself, so if you want to do a white or even red move next turn, you can, and your arsenal of white moves includes the speed 5 straight and speed 1 turn. I will grant you that your ability to reactively reposition is limited (not least because of turret-rotating shenanigans) but that means you need to plan your use of Pinpoint Tractor Array in rather than use it on a whim, more like Adaptive Ailerons on a striker. That goes double because if you do pull off ensnare, there's a second reposition tied up in that - granted you're actually moving the enemy, not yourself, but the effect is to move relative to them.

Over multiple turns, I'd be hard pressed to suggest any ship outside maybe the Delta-7, Supernatural Reflexes Kylo Ren, or "Duchess", who can keep on a Nantex that doesn't want to be kept on.

Conservative pricing is good pricing

Honestly, just having i6 at all is HUGE. Then you throw on stuff like having a turret, Ensnare, AND a bullseye...you'd never playing anything but sun fac

****, maybe you still won't! But at least there's a decision to be made now between him and the other pilots

W/Ensnare:

78 - Fac.

56 - glorified I 5 generic

49 - the other good pilot ability guy (I 4)

The trick is fitting him into a list where everything else doesn't suck.

45 minutes ago, thespaceinvader said:

The trick is fitting him into a list where everything else doesn't suck.

Exactly.

1 hour ago, thespaceinvader said:

The trick is fitting him into a list where everything else doesn't suck.

6 Vultures with Struts seems pretty strong to take advantage of Sun Fac's tractoring.

4 hours ago, ficklegreendice said:

Conservative pricing is good pricing

Honestly, just having i6 at all is HUGE. Then you throw on stuff like having a turret, Ensnare, AND a bullseye...you'd never playing anything but sun fac

****, maybe you still won't! But at least there's a decision to be made now between him and the other pilots

W/Ensnare:

78 - Fac.

56 - glorified I 5 generic

49 - the other good pilot ability guy (I 4)

To put the points into perspective for non CIS players, the I4 w/ensnare plus an I1 Ottraw Bellyrub Auto Pilot is 85. Sun w/ensnare is 78.

Makes the comparison interesting to me. I am going to run Sun of course. But I am still going to try the lower initiatives too. So many options now.

3 hours ago, Archangelspiv said:

To put the points into perspective for non CIS players, the I4 w/ensnare plus an I1 Ottraw Bellyrub Auto Pilot is 85. Sun w/ensnare is 78.

Makes the comparison interesting to me. I am going to run Sun of course. But I am still going to try the lower initiatives too. So many options now.

Agreed, the lower init guys are very competitively priced based on the early look.

Speaking of price, might not even bother with Ensnare on the 34 point duders

Just run em cold; might be surprised by what you could accomplish with the base ship at that price

54 minutes ago, ficklegreendice said:

Speaking of price, might not even bother with Ensnare on the 34 point duders

Just run em cold; might be surprised by what you could accomplish with the base ship at that price

They're basically RZ-2s. Turret without all arcs available, 2 reds, 3 greens, 4 health, access to a focus along with a boost or barrel roll. Not entirely the same, but close enough.

Off to the side, sure seems like Quickbuild Sun Fac is a great bargain. Ensnare, Predator, Afterburners, Shield Upgrade. That'd cost 94 points in standard (if you could take Mods), but is available for 3 threat (75-ish).

Kind of makes up for most Vulture Quickbuilds being ridiculously over-priced. Vulture QB over-priced-ness kind of irks me. I get that a lot of builds are too potent for 1 threat, but even with stuffed-on upgrades, it's not worth 2 threat for 1 vulture. Similar to how TIE Fighters will often have multiple ships in a single threat entry, there ought to be little groups of Vultures to buy with one entry. Stuff like 3 Precise Hunters with Energy Shell Charges, Struts, and Munitions Failsafe for 4 threat. 2 Haor-Chall Prototypes with Cluster Missiles and Shield Upgrade for 3 threat.

//

For a Separatist QB list: Sun Fac, DFS-311 (one of the few Vultures not overpriced), and either [2 Petranaki Arena Aces] or [2 Skakoan Aces] or [Maul].

27 minutes ago, theBitterFig said:

They're basically RZ-2s. Turret without all arcs available, 2 reds, 3 greens, 4 health, access to a focus along with a boost or barrel roll. Not entirely the same, but close enough.

Massive difference, though, in being able to sidewind while also packing a 3 die bullseye