Hi guys, and gals,

I have yet to play this year, not a great surprise, but have a big Rebel collection, and have just purchased the Starhawk, looks great.

I am looking for some inspiration, for what's good with it, I have been looking on You tube, and thought I would pop in here, and ask people what they thought of it.

Soooo, what do people recommend??

Thx in advance.

Apparently Scmitty, has been playing a good Starhawk list, but A, do not know who that is, and B have no idea where I can see it in action, or hear about it 😞

Here is a Starhawk-II list for you

400/400, Most Wanted , Asteroid Tactics , Dangerous Territory
Starhawk-II, Agate , Unity, GTs, LTTs, LS, SADviser, SFO. 203
CR90, TRC. 51
CR90, TRC. 51
GR75, Comms Net. 20
2xYT-2400, Rogue Squadron, Shara, Gold Squadron. 75

5 Activations Should stop the flagship having to move too soon in a turn. The Starhawk can take a lot of damage with duplicate redirects and duplicate braces. Against 134 Bomber type lists consider Agate giving an extra Salvo instead.

Unity's flak can be devastating with 2 or 3 rerolls and a moderate fighter build to hurry the squadron destruction long. Shara's vicious counter (3) will also tip the balance earlier.

I'm still new to the Starhawk aswell but the two games I've ran this build has yielded interesting results.

Starhawk-1, Amity, Agate, Walex Blissex, Local fire control, Hardened Bulkheads, Leading shots, XI7

The idea is you're a attrition brick whos going to outlast everything. Make sure to plot in some engineering commands durring the game.

Thx guys

In general, a good archetype seems to be:

Starhawk

3-4 smalls

5 activations

Mid size squad screen with scatter aces and high hull Squads.

On 10/13/2020 at 2:11 PM, Mcpolle said:

Hi guys, and gals,

I have yet to play this year, not a great surprise, but have a big Rebel collection, and have just purchased the Starhawk, looks great.

I am looking for some inspiration, for what's good with it, I have been looking on You tube, and thought I would pop in here, and ask people what they thought of it.

Soooo, what do people recommend??

Thx in advance.

Starhawk is amazing, it's really strong and does have some counters, notably the Onager.

Agate is probably the best commander for the Hawk, she adds some amazing flexibility and I'd always run the Hawk with one of the three titles, it's a great way to get ANOTHER defensive token on her - Amity is probably the best general title, Concord wants Magnites and Unity wants squads. I really recommend Gunnery Teams, it's saved me a lot more than say LFC* or C&S, the Hawk is A LOT of points and you will want to fire as often as possible....and you may want to use GT with LTTs anyway, since you'll need some anti-squadron defense and you'll get to re-roll one red on every attack. Walex is a great officer choice, so is Stratgeic Advisor**, if you plan on commanding squads, Raymus is a great choice, and DCO to prevent nasty APTs/HIE and those vomit-inducing Onager specials. Your opponents really have two choices, engage the Starhawk with everything they have, or try top get anything else you have. It's hard for them to do both because of defensive the Hawk is. Magnites are hit-or-miss, very satisfying to pull them off.

You can also be real cheeky and toss in a Pelta with StM / Raymus / Projection Experts. Rogue squads also work pretty well, Hera / Wedge / Dutch with some Lancers or YT2400s to pack a bit of extra punch.

*you get a native Salvo and Agate can add one more AND Concord can add ONE MORE so really LFC is a non-starter

**if rumors are true Strategic Advisor is going to be retired or its functionality is changing, so it might not be a great choice after December.

On 10/13/2020 at 2:11 PM, Mcpolle said:

Hi guys, and gals,

I have yet to play this year, not a great surprise, but have a big Rebel collection, and have just purchased the Starhawk, looks great.

I am looking for some inspiration, for what's good with it, I have been looking on You tube, and thought I would pop in here, and ask people what they thought of it.

Soooo, what do people recommend??

Thx in advance.

The biggest problem for the Starhawk is simply getting people to fight it, especially if it's a tough Agate Starhawk. At only speed 2, it can't really use positioning or an aggressive tempo to force a fight. It needs things to come at it and to shoot it so that it can maximize that Salvo firepower. And for the investment, you NEED your opponent taking that Salvo damage, otherwise the Starhawk is simply not capable of putting out enough firepower to be cost effective. If you have other combat ships that give up significant points, it allows your opponent to ignore the Starhawk. I've done it more times than I can count at this point. I had one game where I was literally taking obstructed shots through the Starhawk to hit the other small ships in my opponent's list. I won that game by a nice comfortable 8-3 margin. You need lists that force your opponent to either shoot the Starhawk, or don't take a shot at all. That's why the overall most competitive Starhawk archetype is known as "Hawk134." That means a Starhawk, maximum squadrons, and no meaty ships outside of the Starhawk that can bleed points. Here's the most successful version I've seen to date, used by @Aresius to win the last Vassal World Cup:

GR-75 Medium Transports (18 points)
- Bright Hope ( 2 points)
- Ahsoka Tano ( 2 points)
- Bomber Command Center ( 8 points)
= 30 total ship cost

[ flagship ] Starhawk-class Battleship Mark I (140 points)
- Kyrsta Agate (com) ( 20 points)
- Concord ( 12 points)
- Strategic Adviser ( 4 points)
- Bail Organa ( 7 points)
- Ruthless Strategists ( 4 points)
- Flag Bridge ( 0 points)
- Linked Turbolaser Towers ( 7 points)
- Leading Shots ( 4 points)
- Entrapment Formation! ( 5 points)
- Magnite Crystal Tractor Beam Array ( 10 points)
= 213 total ship cost

GR-75 Medium Transports (18 points)
- Leia Organa (off) ( 3 points)
- Comms Net ( 2 points)
= 23 total ship cost

2 X-Wing Squadrons ( 26 points)
1 Hera Syndulla ( 28 points)
1 Y-Wing Squadron ( 10 points)
1 Jan Ors ( 19 points)
1 Scurrg H-6 Bomber ( 16 points)
1 Gold Squadron ( 12 points)
1 Lando Calrissian ( 23 points)
= 134 total squadron cost

Ares's version also has the ability to deliver a nasty tractor to zero, Bail, entrapment combo.

It's a real indictment of the designers of the Starhawk when "don't bother fighting it if you want to win a battle" is the top players' advice.

Even though I am as far from a top player as mould is, I have to agree with them. You usually lose more points than you gain by fighting it and all it does is waddle around the battlefield like a giant cake-troughing Jabba firing 13 dice a turn. So far the only way I've reliably found to make it sad is to go for a big bid, choose 2nd player, and ruin its day with awful objectives that focus on token collection or stopping it getting a shot at you.

I placed 1st in a 16 person tourney this past February using this list:

Starhawk Battleship Mark I

• Kyrsta Agate
• Strategic Adviser
• Bail Organa
• Weapons Battery Techs
• Ion Cannon Batteries
• Linked Turbolaser Towers
• Magnite Crystal Tractor Beam Array
• Concord

MC30c Torpedo Frigate

• Ordnance Experts
• Assault Proton Torpedoes
• Admonition

CR90 Corvette A

• Turbolaser Reroute Circuits
• Jaina's Light

GR-75 Medium Transports

• Comms Net

Shara Bey & Tycho Celchu

I had a lot of fun playing with this list. It gave the two onager lists I faced a run for their money. My 'less competitive' version of this list has Mothma on the Amity and swaps Admo for Foresight. I have more fun with the Mothma version but without commander Kyrsta I have a much harder time keeping the Hawk around.

Anyway, I hope you have fun with the cudgel. It's definitely my favorite ship in the game right now.

1 hour ago, flatpackhamster said:

It's a real indictment of the designers of the Starhawk when "don't bother fighting it if you want to win a battle" is the top players' advice.

I think it’s just good advice whenever you’re in a tough matchup.

It is far from unbeatable, but it can take such a pounding that it may be a smarter choice to avoid it. That’s why it’s on you as someone bringing the SH to figure out how you can get the opponent to come to it. (as Truthi said)

This isn’t anything new, it’s just that it is magnified by the SH.

4 hours ago, Truthiness said:

The biggest problem for the Starhawk is simply getting people to fight it, especially if it's a tough Agate Starhawk. At only speed 2, it can't really use positioning or an aggressive tempo to force a fight. It needs things to come at it and to shoot it so that it can maximize that Salvo firepower. And for the investment, you NEED your opponent taking that Salvo damage, otherwise the Starhawk is simply not capable of putting out enough firepower to be cost effective. If you have other combat ships that give up significant points, it allows your opponent to ignore the Starhawk. I've done it more times than I can count at this point. I had one game where I was literally taking obstructed shots through the Starhawk to hit the other small ships in my opponent's list. I won that game by a nice comfortable 8-3 margin. You need lists that force your opponent to either shoot the Starhawk, or don't take a shot at all. That's why the overall most competitive Starhawk archetype is known as "Hawk134." That means a Starhawk, maximum squadrons, and no meaty ships outside of the Starhawk that can bleed points. Here's the most successful version I've seen to date, used by @Aresius to win the last Vassal World Cup:

GR-75 Medium Transports (18 points)
- Bright Hope ( 2 points)
- Ahsoka Tano ( 2 points)
- Bomber Command Center ( 8 points)
= 30 total ship cost

[ flagship ] Starhawk-class Battleship Mark I (140 points)
- Kyrsta Agate (com) ( 20 points)
- Concord ( 12 points)
- Strategic Adviser ( 4 points)
- Bail Organa ( 7 points)
- Ruthless Strategists ( 4 points)
- Flag Bridge ( 0 points)
- Linked Turbolaser Towers ( 7 points)
- Leading Shots ( 4 points)
- Entrapment Formation! ( 5 points)
- Magnite Crystal Tractor Beam Array ( 10 points)
= 213 total ship cost

GR-75 Medium Transports (18 points)
- Leia Organa (off) ( 3 points)
- Comms Net ( 2 points)
= 23 total ship cost

2 X-Wing Squadrons ( 26 points)
1 Hera Syndulla ( 28 points)
1 Y-Wing Squadron ( 10 points)
1 Jan Ors ( 19 points)
1 Scurrg H-6 Bomber ( 16 points)
1 Gold Squadron ( 12 points)
1 Lando Calrissian ( 23 points)
= 134 total squadron cost

Thx for posting the list, have also heard about this SH134, any ideas on how he ran it, or what objectives he used?

Is it not a high risk list, only having one ship?

Not really. It's similar to the SSD in that regard, but there's no getting half points for getting it to half HP.

Objectives could be:

Station Assault

Contested Outpost

Infested Fields

30 minutes ago, Green Knight said:

Objectives could be:

Station Assault

Contested Outpost

Infested Fields

Wanna help me out a little, and tell me why those missions, I am totally out of touch with misiions

15 minutes ago, Mcpolle said:

Wanna help me out a little, and tell me why those missions, I am totally out of touch with misiions

You come to me or you lose.

Not much more to it.

SA is probably weakest. Onager can splat those stations. But if he tries, SH moves forward and kills it. So what does opponent do? Start shooting at SH mid-game? Then you win bc he can't kill both stations and you still get the Onager. So not THAT weak.

CO is a horrible trap for 1st player.

IF is also a horrible trap. All those squads AND the slugs eating P1 squads?

Note there is no squadron healing for P1 in any objective.

That's the idea anyway. I suggest testing it 10 times before taking it to a real tourney

Thx for that

2 hours ago, Green Knight said:

You come to me or you lose.

Not much more to it.

SA is probably weakest. Onager can splat those stations. But if he tries, SH moves forward and kills it. So what does opponent do? Start shooting at SH mid-game? Then you win bc he can't kill both stations and you still get the Onager. So not THAT weak.

CO is a horrible trap for 1st player.

IF is also a horrible trap. All those squads AND the slugs eating P1 squads?

Note there is no squadron healing for P1 in any objective.

That's the idea anyway. I suggest testing it 10 times before taking it to a real tourney

I almost always throw Contested Outpost into my list of three objectives. I love it when I'm Player Two.

Edit: I should add, I've only played against the Starhawk in one proper game, and while it did go down, it took the combined firepower of an SSD and Onager to do so. That's a proper tough ship. (I've used it as an opponent in a couple of solo games, but those matches don't really count, in my mind.)

The only imperative for me when building with a Starhawk is Leia (Officer) on a Command 1 ship (usually a GR75 Medium Transport). The Command 4 of the Starhawk makes it brutally unresponsive, Leia is a cheap and easy fix.

14 hours ago, Cpt ObVus said:

The only imperative for me when building with a Starhawk is Leia (Officer) on a Command 1 ship (usually a GR75 Medium Transport). The Command 4 of the Starhawk makes it brutally unresponsive, Leia is a cheap and easy fix.

I like leia on a CR90 A tantive, then if the needed dial is no use to tantive you can convert to a token and move it off to be used by another ship. Also my GR75s are generally activating fighters all the time and need fighter command dials, my CR90 does not really care so much, it can do it’s job without a specific command.

On 10/15/2020 at 11:17 AM, flatpackhamster said:

It's a real indictment of the designers of the Starhawk when "don't bother fighting it if you want to win a battle" is the top players' advice.

Even though I am as far from a top player as mould is, I have to agree with them. You usually lose more points than you gain by fighting it and all it does is waddle around the battlefield like a giant cake-troughing Jabba firing 13 dice a turn. So far the only way I've reliably found to make it sad is to go for a big bid, choose 2nd player, and ruin its day with awful objectives that focus on token collection or stopping it getting a shot at you.

This isn’t really true though. “Don’t fight it,” isn’t the advice. The advice is “don’t half *** fighting it. If you’re going to fight it focus it down.” Anybody who tries to fight it one on one is going to get stomped.

If you don’t stress the defense tokens it lives forever. Stress the defense tokens and it’ll die like anything else. To do that, you would ideally have at least 3 attacks that do good damage and reliably generate accuracies. It works with two large attacks though. Multiple small attacks also works, but you have to deliver them the same turns.

I’ve killed maybe half of the ones I’ve faced and probably lost half the ones i have brought.