Hey guys!

I've wanted to get into Armada for a while now and I've finally had the time to sit down and learn the rules a bit and try list building. In this list I wanted to focus on a heavy hitter and some squadrons and I chose what seemed to work well together (to my novice eye) and ships that I like. I omitted objectives because I didn't really spend any time learning those. I'm open to any and all feedback and I appreciate any teaching you're willing to offer.

Side question: I plan on playing online, which is better/easier to use, Vassal or Tabletop Simulator?

First Fleet
Author: RogerWilco

Faction: Rebel Alliance
Points: 398/400

Commander: Kyrsta Agate (com)

[ flagship ] Starhawk-class Battleship Mark I (140 points)
- Kyrsta Agate (com) ( 20 points)
- Concord ( 12 points)
- Raymus Antilles ( 7 points)
- Major Derlin ( 7 points)
- Caitken and Shollan ( 6 points)
- Linked Turbolaser Towers ( 7 points)
- Magnite Crystal Tractor Beam Array ( 10 points)
= 209 total ship cost

Modified Pelta-class Command Ship (60 points)
- Adar Tallon ( 10 points)
- Fighter Coordination Team ( 3 points)
- All Fighters, Follow Me! ( 5 points)
= 78 total ship cost

1 Hera Syndulla ( 28 points)
1 Ketsu Onyo ( 22 points)
1 Shara Bey ( 17 points)
1 B-Wing Squadron ( 14 points)
2 E-Wing Squadrons ( 30 points)
= 111 total squadron cost

A few thoughts:

How are you getting the token to activate the Fleet Command?

More B-Wings needed, to take advantage of that command, otherwise you don't need it and should drop the single B for a faster squadron.

I would drop some of the upgrades from the Starhawk to buy a Comms Net Transport.

Then try it out. And then try other changes.

Table Top Simulator is very easy to learn how to use and works very well. Vassal has been around longer and has many more players on it, but is very clunky to learn - then gets much quicker after a few games. I use TTS, and find games via groups on Facebook and Discord. Vassal has a very active Discord channel and more players on pretty much every time zone.

10 hours ago, Gilarius said:

A few thoughts:

How are you getting the token to activate the Fleet Command?

More B-Wings needed, to take advantage of that command, otherwise you don't need it and should drop the single B for a faster squadron.

I would drop some of the upgrades from the Starhawk to buy a Comms Net Transport.

Then try it out. And then try other changes.

Table Top Simulator is very easy to learn how to use and works very well. Vassal has been around longer and has many more players on it, but is very clunky to learn - then gets much quicker after a few games. I use TTS, and find games via groups on Facebook and Discord. Vassal has a very active Discord channel and more players on pretty much every time zone.

Thanks for the input! I just have a couple questions to learn more.

Are you referring to how I'll get the token to use All Fighters Follow Me? I figured I would stock up on the tokens in the turns leading up to combat and use the Fighter Coordination Team to drag those fighters along at first. I guess more reliably I could put the Phoenix Home title on the Pelta and move Raymus Antilles over to get tokens each turn. I probably don't want to load the Pelta up that much and will just drop AFFM and the B-Wing from the list. I have Ketsu Onyo for ship damage as well, but what are the top choices to fill that role that has more speed? I'm looking at possibly Wedge, Tycho, or Green Squadron as multi-role options instead.

I did notice that GR-75s are in everyone's lists right now. Adding one with Comms Net looks like it could let me keep the B's and AFFM. What upgrades are essential on the Starhawk? Caitken and Shollan and Linked Turbolaser Towers have some overlap and I'd probably choose to drop LTT because the Starhawk will be focusing on ships and not squadrons. The Magnite Tractor Beam seems interesting but I would probably drop that as well because it seems pretty extra and not essential. Raymus Antilles can come off as well if I'm adding the GR-75.

You can only hold 1 token of each kind on a ship. As a result you need to 'feed' the ship tokens every turn. The comms net gozanti/gr75 is a pretty standard way of doing it.

Since you have just 1 speed-2 bomber, I would also be tempted to bin it for a faster fighter and change AFFM to something else, such as Intensify Firepower.

Numbers of activations are very important in the game. The more activations you have the longer you can wait out your opponent and then move after them, or wait for them to move in to shooting range before you attack. That's one of the reasons cheap activations are popular.

As other's have said, change your squadrons a bit, adding more B-Wings.

I don't personally think you need to add cheap activations like GR-75, as you will be out-activated anyway by many lists. And a GR-75 just to aid token generation is a bit expensive. Adding 2 GR-75 for activation padding is even more expensive. Just trust that your Agate Starhawk can take a beating for activating first.

Alternate ideas to get those tokens;

1. Put Raymus Antilles on the Pelta instead

2. Remove Adar to add Ahsoka

3. Add the Phoenix Home title for the second officer, and add Ahsoka. Then you can stack tokens as planned, and change them as needed

Also; I'd strongly suggest Boosted Comms on the Pelta. It will need to sit back to stay alive. It is also a very forgiving upgrade for new players. Nothing worse then activating all your squadrons and accidentally moving them out of range of your ships.

13 hours ago, flatpackhamster said:

You can only hold 1 token of each kind on a ship. As a result you need to 'feed' the ship tokens every turn. The comms net gozanti/gr75 is a pretty standard way of doing it.

. . .

Numbers of activations are very important in the game. The more activations you have the longer you can wait out your opponent and then move after them, or wait for them to move in to shooting range before you attack. That's one of the reasons cheap activations are popular.

Thanks for the clarification about token stacking. The way activations work is making more sense now. So it seems in general durable ships or something cheap like a GR-75 are ok activating early in a round so you can save your fragile and more important ships to activate as late as possible?

13 hours ago, flatpackhamster said:

Since you have just 1 speed-2 bomber, I would also be tempted to bin it for a faster fighter and change AFFM to something else, such as Intensify Firepower.

My B-Wings were intended to be another small source of ship damage since my Starhawk is really the only source of consistent damage, but I also didn't realize how much of the list would have to be built around them. If I was to replace just the B-Wings or start over with my squadrons altogether what are the typical choices?

16 hours ago, Divad said:

. . .

Alternate ideas to get those tokens;

1. Put Raymus Antilles on the Pelta instead

2. Remove Adar to add Ahsoka

3. Add the Phoenix Home title for the second officer, and add Ahsoka. Then you can stack tokens as planned, and change them as needed

Also; I'd strongly suggest Boosted Comms on the Pelta. It will need to sit back to stay alive. It is also a very forgiving upgrade for new players. Nothing worse then activating all your squadrons and accidentally moving them out of range of your ships.

I hadn't seen Boosted Comms, that seems like an easy add. And I have the empty space on the Starhawk, I can add Ahsoka to that and with the range 5 it should still provide benefit to the Pelta most of the time right?

10 hours ago, RogerWilco15 said:

Thanks for the clarification about token stacking. The way activations work is making more sense now. So it seems in general durable ships or something cheap like a GR-75 are ok activating early in a round so you can save your fragile and more important ships to activate as late as possible?

My B-Wings were intended to be another small source of ship damage since my Starhawk is really the only source of consistent damage, but I also didn't realize how much of the list would have to be built around them. If I was to replace just the B-Wings or start over with my squadrons altogether what are the typical choices?

Re: Activation - yes, that's the idea. For example, let's say you have a fleet with an assault frigate, an MC75, a CR90 and a transport. You could activate the transport in order to delay moving your bigger ships, planning to let your opponent move their ships in to firing range of yours (because ships shoot twice and then move, the only exception being the Imperial Gladiator ship title Demolisher). So you might set it up so your transport and CR90 do their actions in order to get your enemy to move their VSDin to close range of your MC75, so you can use a black dice attack on it.

If you are bringing bombers then really those bombers need an escort, otherwise enemy fighters squash them before they get in to firing range. This is particularly true of the B-Wing which is the slowest squad in the game. B-wings can be outrun by any ship doing speed 3 or 4 and they can find it hard to catch a speed 2 ship. Have a think about the purpose of your wing. You have a largeish fighter wing (110 pts out of a maximum 134) so it's best having it multi purpose because a 110pt wing just for killing enemy fighters is a lot of points. Luckily rebel fighters are multi purpose, so have a look at X-wings as the backbone, with A-wings to escort. X-wings are solid anti-ship (1 red dice with Bomber tag meaning crit rolls damage the ship too).

Something like Tycho and Shara as A-wing escort alongside Biggs, Wedge and 2 or 3 X-wings would give you a reliable source of anti-ship damage while being robust enough to face enemy squads, and would be a good way to practice the combat dynamic of the game.

On 4/7/2020 at 1:41 AM, RogerWilco15 said:

Hey guys!

I've wanted to get into Armada for a while now and I've finally had the time to sit down and learn the rules a bit and try list building. In this list I wanted to focus on a heavy hitter and some squadrons and I chose what seemed to work well together (to my novice eye) and ships that I like. I omitted objectives because I didn't really spend any time learning those. I'm open to any and all feedback and I appreciate any teaching you're willing to offer.

Side question: I plan on playing online, which is better/easier to use, Vassal or Tabletop Simulator?

First Fleet
Author: RogerWilco

Faction: Rebel Alliance
Points: 398/400

Commander: Kyrsta Agate (com)

[ flagship ] Starhawk-class Battleship Mark I (140 points)
- Kyrsta Agate (com) ( 20 points)
- Concord ( 12 points)
- Raymus Antilles ( 7 points)
- Major Derlin ( 7 points)
- Caitken and Shollan ( 6 points)
- Linked Turbolaser Towers ( 7 points)
- Magnite Crystal Tractor Beam Array ( 10 points)
= 209 total ship cost

Modified Pelta-class Command Ship (60 points)
- Adar Tallon ( 10 points)
- Fighter Coordination Team ( 3 points)
- All Fighters, Follow Me! ( 5 points)
= 78 total ship cost

1 Hera Syndulla ( 28 points)
1 Ketsu Onyo ( 22 points)
1 Shara Bey ( 17 points)
1 B-Wing Squadron ( 14 points)
2 E-Wing Squadrons ( 30 points)
= 111 total squadron cost

Pretty good start. You could go a few ways with this, and there’s some general tightening up to be done, but there’s nothing in here that looks “weak” or “bad.” So you’re off to a strong start!

The others have made some strong suggestions about various parts of the list; Ahsoka Tano, 2-3 more B-Wings (generics; the Ace versions, Ten Numb and Keyan Farlander, are horrendously expensive, and I think they need a really focused plan to get the most from them)... this is one way to go, if you want to keep All Fighters Follow Me. Unlike most Fleet Command upgrades, AFFM tends to be the sort of command that you use once, *maybe* twice in a game, and the second use can be powered by discarding the upgrade, which means you really don’t need to feed it tokens (for this reason, I actually think it makes a pretty good fit on a CR90A with the “Liberator” Title and Turbolaser Reroute Circuits. Cheaper than a Pelta, and a capable little gunship, though the Pelta has other upsides, like a far better squadron value).

Anyway, if you DO decide to keep the B-Wings, put in at least 3 generics and add in Wedge Antilles (Officer). He’s absolutely fantastic with B-Wings, as (in conjunction with Fighter Coordination Team or AFFM), you can end up with B-Wings that potentially move further than anything in the game, and can break engagement with Cloak while they do it. It’s terrifying and difficult to stop, but pretty expensive and involves a lot of triggers which are all too easy to forget, so beware of that.

If you DON’T keep the B-Wings, I would consider reworking the squadrons a little bit, and maybe take out anything that isn’t a Rogue (or that Hera can’t give Rogue to). Starhawks are notoriously command hungry; as the focal point of your list, and by far the biggest target, they tend to draw a ton of fire, and you’ll be wanting to Engineer, Navigate, and Concentrate Fire frequently. You won’t have any breathing room for Squadron commands. I kinda like Hera and two E-Wings; those things are cool. Drop Shara (great as she is). Think about Corran Horn or Lando (in the Falcon) instead. I also really love to combo Hera with Dutch and Wedge, if you want to go without the E-Wings... Wedge and Dutch offer better bombing dice and of course, defense tokens, as well as their comboriffic anti-squadron synergy. You could also drop Hera and all the nonRogues for cheaper Rogues like Dash, or Rogue Squadron.

If you end up going the Rogue route, consider a ship other than the Pelta. It isn’t bad, but without a Fleet Command Upgrade, you can probably do better. Even a lowly CR90A Corvette with Turbolaser Reroute Circuits is a totally viable improvement.

But if you hear only ONE piece of advice from this whole ramble, make it this one: ANY list containing a Starhawk should *almost automatically* include Leia Organa (the 3-point Officer upgrade, not the 38-point Commander), aboard (and this is important) a Command 1 ship. CR90, Hammerhead, GR75, your choice, but you MUST put Leia on one of these. That command-starved, Command 4 Starhawk is incredibly unresponsive. Trying to guess what command you’ll need 2/3 of the way through the game is incredibly difficult, if not total folly. Leia on a Command 1 ship that really doesn’t care what it does most of the time makes feeding the Starhawk the correct commands SO much easier, it’s unreal. The cool thing is, she can set the Starhawk up for the current turn, if you activate her ship first, or (if you like the dial your Starhawk has for this turn already), you can activate her AFTER the Starhawk and set its dial for the following turn. It’s so good, it feels like cheating.

Anyway, let us know how it goes, or if you have more questions. And welcome!

3 hours ago, flatpackhamster said:

so have a look at X-wings as the backbone, with A-wings to escort

Please don't do this. X-Wings and A-Wings have anti-synergy. To explain;

1. A-Wings want to be attacked, to make use out of Counter.

2. X-Wings with Escort MUST be attacked (except with Snipe, but that bypasses Counter too).

3. Your X-Wings are the more valuable bomber, thus you want them to outlast your A-Wings, but Escort means they are targeted first.

Instead combo X-Wings with Y-Wings or B-Wings (or Scurrg). That way they protect a squadron better at bombing then they are.

In your original list, without a Bomber Command Center GR-75; consider a YT-1300 as escort instead of X-Wing. You have great upgrades to improve their speed. If you do get the Bomber Command Center then X-Wings are a must as you'll want to maximize your squadrons with bomber.

But as per my previous post, I don't think getting a GR-75 is necessary. Yes having an activation advantage is great in this games, but when you spend over half your points of a single ship, you have to be realistic in knowing you are not going to win the activation game. The cost is basically 50 points for 2 GR-75, one with Bomber Command Center and one with Comms Net. That gives you 4 activations, but you'll have to cut a lot to make those 50 points. And even then you'll still lose activation advantage to most lists (except SSD, but I think Agate Starhawk should do well in that watch-up anyway). So without a strong activation bid, you are now paying 50 points for token passing and bomber re-rolls, which is expensive, particularly as you won't have many points left for actual bombers. It's only really 1 turn you want to stall with the Starhawk's activations anyway even if you had the advantage. Once it is in the brawl you'll usually want to move it as soon as possible. The Pelta on the other hand is fine so long as you keep it behind the Starhawk and relatively safe. Aim to keep it at long range.

Now someone suggested to get officer Leia. I'm not against this idea if you grab a GR-75 for instance. But I don't think it is as necessary as suggested. To be honest you'll want to use navigate on turns 1 and 2, then spam engineering from then on. Maybe another navigate turn 3 or 4 if you plan on using speed zero Concord tricks. NEVER use concentrate fire. And leave the squadrons to the Pelta.

Officer Wedge is also great, as suggested. But you'd have a very high token burden to feed him and the Pelta. So definitely not possible on a 2 ship build.

In summary; you have built a fine first list. I'd stick with the 2 Ship build you have. Just ensure the Pelta has a way to activate AFFM 2-3 times (not too hard as 1 time is a discard). Drop Adar as he's expensive without trying to build around him. Optimize your squadrons; 3 YT-1300, 4 B-Wings and Jan Ors might be a decent pack.

1 hour ago, Divad said:

Just ensure the Pelta has a way to activate AFFM 2-3 times (not too hard as 1 time is a discard). Drop Adar as he's expensive without trying to build around him. Optimize your squadrons; 3 YT-1300, 4 B-Wings and Jan Ors might be a decent pack.

Most of this post is excellent advice, and that is a good wing, but if you’re relying on speed 2 squadrons to do meaningful lifting you need consistent AFFM usage. Especially because this list doesn’t control tempo much as it is. Otherwise you will risk overlapping them, losing the ability to control engagement at all with faster squads, and/or failing to finish off fleeing targets. (FCT and Wedge are definitely good, but also timing and range dependent, and Wedge needs to be fed just like AFFM.)

I’d add a BCC Flotilla and Raymus (on the Pelta) to the 2 ship build. This circumvents the need for Comms Net, which addresses @Divad’s point about BCC cost efficiency to an extent.

On 4/9/2020 at 7:19 AM, The Jabbawookie said:

Most of this post is excellent advice, and that is a good wing, but if you’re relying on speed 2 squadrons to do meaningful lifting you need consistent AFFM usage. Especially because this list doesn’t control tempo much as it is. Otherwise you will risk overlapping them, losing the ability to control engagement at all with faster squads, and/or failing to finish off fleeing targets. (FCT and Wedge are definitely good, but also timing and range dependent, and Wedge needs to be fed just like AFFM.)

I’d add a BCC Flotilla and Raymus (on the Pelta) to the 2 ship build. This circumvents the need for Comms Net, which addresses @Divad’s point about BCC cost efficiency to an extent.

Put Leia on that flotilla, too. Nav-Nav-Engineering for the rest of the game I’d what I might do if I had no other choice, but it pays to be flexible. You’ll find that with only one real damage dealer, the extra click a Nav dial can get you might be the difference between making a double-arc or not, and that can be the game. And yeah, if you don’t have Leia, you NEVER ConFire, because the risk of going too aggressive when you really should have been repairing or something is too great. But there will be times when you have full health, you don’t need a Nav dial, and hey, using Leia to pass you a ConFire dial can buy an extra attack die. Take it!

On 4/8/2020 at 11:51 PM, Cpt ObVus said:

The others have made some strong suggestions about various parts of the list; Ahsoka Tano, 2-3 more B-Wings (generics; the Ace versions, Ten Numb and Keyan Farlander, are horrendously expensive, and I think they need a really focused plan to get the most from them)... this is one way to go, if you want to keep All Fighters Follow Me. Unlike most Fleet Command upgrades, AFFM tends to be the sort of command that you use once, *maybe* twice in a game, and the second use can be powered by discarding the upgrade, which means you really don’t need to feed it tokens (for this reason, I actually think it makes a pretty good fit on a CR90A with the “Liberator” Title and Turbolaser Reroute Circuits. Cheaper than a Pelta, and a capable little gunship, though the Pelta has other upsides, like a far better squadron value).

Anyway, if you DO decide to keep the B-Wings, put in at least 3 generics and add in Wedge Antilles (Officer). He’s absolutely fantastic with B-Wings, as (in conjunction with Fighter Coordination Team or AFFM), you can end up with B-Wings that potentially move further than anything in the game, and can break engagement with Cloak while they do it. It’s terrifying and difficult to stop, but pretty expensive and involves a lot of triggers which are all too easy to forget, so beware of that.

I do like the idea of keeping B-Wings in my list and I think I'll up the number to 3 to take advantage of the Pelta's squadron value of 3. I just finished a 200 pt game with my brother and I used a couple B's and the Pelta with Fighter Coord Team and AFFM and I totally saw what you meant about only using AFFM once or twice per match. If I add in officer Wedge and I keep FCT can I drop AFFM? Or is the ability to get those B's into combat in the second round with a squadron command worth it enough to keep AFFM?

On 4/9/2020 at 3:01 AM, Divad said:

In summary; you have built a fine first list. I'd stick with the 2 Ship build you have. Just ensure the Pelta has a way to activate AFFM 2-3 times (not too hard as 1 time is a discard). Drop Adar as he's expensive without trying to build around him. Optimize your squadrons; 3 YT-1300, 4 B-Wings and Jan Ors might be a decent pack.

Adar is an easy drop and I'm considering adding a GR-75 with Bomber Command Center and Leia on it so the BCC would serve the purpose of adding extra damage from the bombers anyways. If I use YT-1300's as an escort, how do I get all of those speed-2 ships into combat efficiently with just the Pelta activating them? Wedge, FCT, and AFFM only affect 3 at a time so it seems like someone would be left behind. I'm really interested in adding the YT-1300 as an escort because I love that ship and that seems like an important role that I do not have, I just wasn't sure how that would work.

If you are bringing a BCC, then use X-Wings as an escort. They are much more flexible and really enjoy having BCC around as their red bomber dice has a 3/8 chance of rolling blank/accuracy.

YT-1300 are more specialized escorts, with a tonne of heath and Counter 1, but low anti-ship damage. Thus I like them when I haven't brought a BCC and need to protect some valuable bombers. Protecting B-Wings is extra nice because they have lower health then Y-Wings and Scurrg and better anti-squadron dice thus can make up for the YT-1300's relatively poor damage output against squadrons.

Just remember Wedge needs an unspent token. I think that it would only be possible to feed Wedge and AFFM (and still use squadron dials!) if you put the title on the Pelta, and give it officer Antilles. Then ideally somewhere else have Hondo. With Hondo and the discarding of AFFM, you can essentially use AFFM without saving a token twice.

Having a full list of speed 2 squadrons can be tricky. Since you brought the Concord title, I'd assumed you might try some speed Zero tricks. At any rate I'd suspect you would be moving forward very slowly, thus in this list your squadrons should be able to keep up. What is more, with the Tractor Beam, you can enforce that the target enemy ship's speed remains slow, so you should be able to keep up. For the speed boost; if they have a decent squadron wing themselves you'd boost the YT-1300's first to get them engaged. If they have no squadron threat you'd boost the B-Wings first to maximize their time bombing.

Speaking of Concord, the nice advantage of B-Wings is they can bring a lot of damage quickly. If you have forced your opponent to speed Zero, they lose their Brace, Redirect and Contain. All tokens which are potentially useful against B-Wings! Thus with this and the above, B-Wings are a perfect fit for this list.

Adar with generics is just a bit expensive for my tastes. To get the most out of him you'd use him in a list with Yavaris (usually on a different ship to Yavaris), powerful squadrons like Dutch/Wedge, Nym, Farlander or Corran. Playing him with Corran is quite fun as you send him in, snipe attack, then in squadron phase he snipes again and rogues back out. Anyway, that would be building a very different fleet to what you have here.

17 hours ago, RogerWilco15 said:

I do like the idea of keeping B-Wings in my list and I think I'll up the number to 3 to take advantage of the Pelta's squadron value of 3. I just finished a 200 pt game with my brother and I used a couple B's and the Pelta with Fighter Coord Team and AFFM and I totally saw what you meant about only using AFFM once or twice per match. If I add in officer Wedge and I keep FCT can I drop AFFM? Or is the ability to get those B's into combat in the second round with a squadron command worth it enough to keep AFFM?

Adar is an easy drop and I'm considering adding a GR-75 with Bomber Command Center and Leia on it so the BCC would serve the purpose of adding extra damage from the bombers anyways. If I use YT-1300's as an escort, how do I get all of those speed-2 ships into combat efficiently with just the Pelta activating them? Wedge, FCT, and AFFM only affect 3 at a time so it seems like someone would be left behind. I'm really interested in adding the YT-1300 as an escort because I love that ship and that seems like an important role that I do not have, I just wasn't sure how that would work.

I’d see about keeping AFFM in this case. A bit of redundancy is good. However, if you need the points, it’s probably not strictly necessary.

If you’re leaning toward non-Rogues, I really think you want Leia on a GR75. There will be times when the Concord will need to throw a squadron command, and Leia can make that happen without making you guess when you’ll need it.

Divad had a good reminder about Wedge needing an unspent token. AFFM needs one as well, and annoyingly, they need them at different times. So let’s get complicated...

If you’re taking the Pelta, you can add the Phoenix Home title. This allows you to add another Officer, and also to carry up to four command tokens.

Ahsoka Tano can transmute tokens of one type into tokens of another type, and she’s cheap.

Taking those two cards, together with AFFM and Wedge can make for an interesting and effective little engine. Comms Net and Raymus Antilles are also good pieces to try and plug in to the equation. It would require some re-working of things, however.

Check out the MC-80 Bomber Fleet thread that’s near the top of the Fleet Builds forum right now; that fellow is grappling with some of the same questions about B-Wings that you are.

Alright after a few swaps and painful cuts this is my second iteration of the list that I'll try out in my first 400pt game. I added the BCC/Leia GR, an X-Wing and a couple B-Wings but I didn't have the room to add Ahsoka and Boosted Comms. Ahsoka's command efficiency was filled by Leia and Raymus Antilles, and hopefully I can manage not having Boosted Comms. The cut I'm most unsure about is AFFM but I have Wedge and FCT, and I think it will take me some play time to determine the right combo of those three upgrades to use for the B-Wings. I wish I had a couple more points for a bid too but that definitely wasn't a priority and I'm not sure how much that even matters in Armada. It has been challenging fitting everything I want into the list but I think that's a testament to how balanced things seem to be which is great.

Everyone's help and insight has been invaluable just starting out. Hopefully this list doesn't make you feel like you've wasted your time with me!

First Fleet 2.0
Author: RogerWilco

Faction: Rebel Alliance
Points: 399/400

Commander: Kyrsta Agate (com)

Assault Objective: Precision Strike
Defense Objective: Fighter Ambush
Navigation Objective: Superior Positions

[ flagship ] Starhawk-class Battleship Mark I (140 points)
- Kyrsta Agate (com) ( 20 points)
- Concord ( 12 points)
- Major Derlin ( 7 points)
- Caitken and Shollan ( 6 points)
- Magnite Crystal Tractor Beam Array ( 10 points)
= 195 total ship cost

Modified Pelta-class Command Ship (60 points)
- Phoenix Home ( 3 points)
- Wedge Antilles ( 4 points)
- Raymus Antilles ( 7 points)
- Fighter Coordination Team ( 3 points)
= 77 total ship cost

GR-75 Medium Transports (18 points)
- Leia Organa (off) ( 3 points)
- Bomber Command Center ( 8 points)
= 29 total ship cost

1 X-Wing Squadron ( 13 points)
1 E-Wing Squadron ( 15 points)
3 B-Wing Squadrons ( 42 points)
1 Hera Syndulla ( 28 points)
= 98 total squadron cost

9 hours ago, RogerWilco15 said:

Alright after a few swaps and painful cuts this is my second iteration of the list that I'll try out in my first 400pt game. I added the BCC/Leia GR, an X-Wing and a couple B-Wings but I didn't have the room to add Ahsoka and Boosted Comms. Ahsoka's command efficiency was filled by Leia and Raymus Antilles, and hopefully I can manage not having Boosted Comms. The cut I'm most unsure about is AFFM but I have Wedge and FCT, and I think it will take me some play time to determine the right combo of those three upgrades to use for the B-Wings. I wish I had a couple more points for a bid too but that definitely wasn't a priority and I'm not sure how much that even matters in Armada. It has been challenging fitting everything I want into the list but I think that's a testament to how balanced things seem to be which is great.

Everyone's help and insight has been invaluable just starting out. Hopefully this list doesn't make you feel like you've wasted your time with me!

First Fleet 2.0
Author: RogerWilco

Faction: Rebel Alliance
Points: 399/400

Commander: Kyrsta Agate (com)

Assault Objective: Precision Strike
Defense Objective: Fighter Ambush
Navigation Objective: Superior Positions

[ flagship ] Starhawk-class Battleship Mark I (140 points)
- Kyrsta Agate (com) ( 20 points)
- Concord ( 12 points)
- Major Derlin ( 7 points)
- Caitken and Shollan ( 6 points)
- Magnite Crystal Tractor Beam Array ( 10 points)
= 195 total ship cost

Modified Pelta-class Command Ship (60 points)
- Phoenix Home ( 3 points)
- Wedge Antilles ( 4 points)
- Raymus Antilles ( 7 points)
- Fighter Coordination Team ( 3 points)
= 77 total ship cost

GR-75 Medium Transports (18 points)
- Leia Organa (off) ( 3 points)
- Bomber Command Center ( 8 points)
= 29 total ship cost

1 X-Wing Squadron ( 13 points)
1 E-Wing Squadron ( 15 points)
3 B-Wing Squadrons ( 42 points)
1 Hera Syndulla ( 28 points)
= 98 total squadron cost

I have a solution to your Ahsoka/Boosted Comms problem: Cut Derlin. Put Ahsoka and Boosted Comms on either the Pelta or the Starhawk (1 point savings, too).

Derlin is okay. He definitely earns his money here, as the Starhawk absorbs a ton of fire, but since his is an ‘exhaust’ effect, the absolute most he’ll ever save you is 6 points of damage (if they brought an SSD or Onager. 4-5 if they didn’t). Which is good, but I think you really want Ahsoka and Boosted Comms.

There’s something still gnawing at me a little about your squadron selection, too. I think it’s Hera. She is fantastic, no doubt. In certain builds, she can really help with a shortfall of squadron commands, or just allow you to run a couple of non-Rogues and not need to use squadron commands, so you can do other things. But I think here, she doesn’t quite give you enough benefit to justify being 1/3 of your squadron list. You have enough command value to push all your squadrons, if you need to, and while it may mean using more squadron commands than you typically might with the Starhawk, Leia can help you pick your spots to use them. The other thing that strikes me as that while E-Wings are great, I feel like X-Wings are cheaper and more on plan here; protect the B-Wings! So I’d suggest cutting Hera & the E-Wing, and adding Biggs and a second X-Wing. That saves you 11 points, gives you more Escort power, gives you Biggs’ damage sharing ability, and doesn’t really hurt your anti-squadron game much at all. Combine that 11 point savings with the 1 point from the Derlin—>Ahsoka/Boosted Comms switcheroo, and the 1 odd point you have for a bid (1 point of bid won’t really be a factor), and you have 13 points. Which is exactly one more X-Wing. Which Biggs loves. And which should REALLY help your squadron game out!

In a perfect world, you’d somehow find a way to free up 6 more points and buy Jan Ors instead of the third X-Wing (because the only thing Biggs loves more than more Escort buddies, is Escort buddies with virtual defense tokens). But that doesn’t look easy, and would probably require cutting the Magnite Tractor Beams and switching Starhawk titles, which you may not want to do, and might take your list in a very different direction.

I will add: Your list as it stands is not in a bad spot. All of this might just focus it a bit. And you’re working with a fleet archetype that’s pretty demanding of points, and really needs to have every card pulling its weight. The Starhawk might be fairly simple to actually fly (as in, there aren’t a lot of in-game decisions you can make, regarding maneuvers and whatnot), but list-building with it is very difficult. It needs a really well-tuned list to do well, since you aren’t going to be able to really outfly and outmaneuver anyone.

Not an easy beginner’s ship, especially with the moving pieces you have here. This is one reason why many Starhawk lists are like, Starhawk with all the things, two flotillas, Leia on one, full 134-points of Rogue squadrons who fly themselves, go. It’s simple! But I think your list is fun and interesting. And if you like what it can do, but you end up frustrated by how tight the points are, this basic framework can do well by replacing the ‘Hawk with an MC-80 Command Cruiser, which will give you a substantial points savings.