Prologue .

If you have a passing familiarity with my post history, when I say Asajj, Latts, Unkar, you possibly know where I'm going with this....

So last night, with future X Wing looking distant, I grabbed the opportunity to put what is possibly the Final Form on the table. The result, a resounding plus plus plus and the majesty of it securely cemented in my mind.

Point changes have been charitable to this thing and so it has gone from strength to strength. It now stands as near enough my favourite, most pride inducing creation. But also, easily my most horrible, destructive and feared. A strange difficulty, knowing that to inflict it on people is the most selfish decision I can make when preparing for games....

In the beginning, there was Bus.

I had a crawl through my topic history and found that I hadn't ever really given it it's own dedicated thread. However, almost a year ago, I did post an Asajj, Latts, Sunny topic. The very start of the journey.

Previously, I had been running Jabbanetic Latts, alongside Kad Solus and Old Teroch mostly. The high point being a last ditch variance swing defeat to the final 1.0 Euro Champ, Ben Lee, running trip Jedi. A lovely fellow I have the pleasure of playing with, semi regularly, at local store tourneys. The Bus at this point, had proven to be a thing to dread, garnering a little local reputation of it's own.

Asajj, Force of Her Own.

I then picked up a Lancer and immediately took a shine to Heightened Perception Asajj. Trying her out, with some success, with those same 2 Fangs, but also with Swarm Fenn and a Recruit, more recruits and 2x Bounty Hunter apparently, which I have no memory of....

Obvious thing, naturally, combine the big girls...

And so, the starting point, this snip from that original topic, dated Dec 8. A glimpse at how kind the point changes have been-

(59) Latts Razzi [YV-666 Light Freighter]
(6) Jabba the Hutt
(12) Han Solo
(3) Contraband Cybernetics
(4) Trick Shot
Points: 84

(30) Sunny Bounder [M3-A Interceptor]
(2) Autoblasters
Points: 32

(74) Asajj Ventress [Lancer-class Pursuit Craft]
(4) Foresight
(3) Contraband Cybernetics
(3) Shadow Caster
Points: 84

Total points: 200

This would be 184pt in today's money...

I'd gone 3-1 with this at a tourney that wknd and was feeling pretty smart about it. Particularly since this was my first ever foray into flying 2x big bases. Nevertheless, I packed it away for a bit and moved on to other things.

And Then.

Asajj remained in my plans, I really, really enjoyed her and was keen to get under the bonnet and figure her out properly.

Jan 26, I posted a topic 'What to do with Asajj?' . An informative discussion followed which ended up really covering the evolution into what the list is today. In the middle of that, some big point drops occurred and provided it with a big leg up.

I more or less stumbled into what I now regard as one of my favourite ship builds in the game. With 12 extra points to spend, I flung up my hands and put them all on Asajj. Most notably, the inclusion of Hate. Shuffling around made room for 0-0-0, 2pt spare went on Electronic Baffle. Testing pinged up a bright green tick. And lo, the screamingest banshee was birthed.

Also This.

Around this time, the UKSO happened, so I took the 2 big beauties, added Capt. Seevor for an experiment, and lined them up for Sunday's Ext event. Unfortunately, a rotten storm had our Squadron make a run for it after 2 games, for fear of being stranded in Milton Keynes. A fate worse than death.

I'd utterly squashed a Ryad, Vessery list and had an ALMIGHTY game against a Sloane swarm. The 2nd, I really feared, but an error in Latts position, stopping in doubt rather than moving to set up a better position, was really all that kept me from doing some major work against it. I ran it very close in spite of that, Asajj tore them to pieces but simply had a little too much to do. I was emboldened!

However, such is the rotten power of the squads debuffs, Seevors ability was mostly wasted in both, plus another test or 2. Not exactly best use.

Triple Threat.

Given another opportunity to unleash it at a mid sized tourney in late Feb, (With none other than the World Champ mixing it with various luminaries and us local jokers), I added the clutch piece that is Unkar Plutt. At the time, I hadn't tried him before and didn't really know what kind of impact he'd have. Couple of practice games proved decisive.

Whereas Sunny and Seevor were cheap distractions, flung out to be possibly ignored and provide irritation, or to just waste time being killed, Unkar was my agent provocateur. A key piece, impossible to ignore, a spearhead that unless seriously dealt with, will set up all the unpleasantness that follows in his wake. And if not dealt with, able to make it all 10x worse!

My 1st couple of games that day were against what I'd regard as it's hardest counters, BEEF. In the form of 5xY and 4x T70. Nevertheless, expecting the worst, I came away from 2 close games feeling like I could have won both, but for a touch of ill luck.

Dropping down into an objective based side event, I mercilessly crushed all 3 opponents and came away with some sweeet templates

Oh dear, Dash.

The Final Form.

The last point adjustment gave me yet another 5pt to spend. Nothing particularly stood out to me that would up the power level, it was already more or less complete. Those points have a few places they can go. A shield on Latts would be alright. Rigged Cargo for Asajj would add a thing, but also a complication for her. 0-0-0 gels with Asajj far too neatly. But.... Pattern Analyser on Unkar is clearly a winner. It does give up an extra handful of points when he dies, but NVM. Tempting to give him a Cloak, his gun is often useless. But it's unreliable and PA, plus Latts early Lock>Tractor provides him with a nice touch of approach unpredictability already.

So here we are,

The Stress Factor.

(69) Asajj Ventress : (5) 0-0-0, (9) Hate, (2) Contraband Cybernetics, (2) Electronic Baffle, (1) Shadow Caster- Points: 88

(56) Latts Razzi : (6) Jabba the Hutt, (10) Han Solo, (2) Contraband Cybernetics, (4) Trick Shot- Points: 78

(29) Unkar Plutt : (5) Pattern Analyzer- Points: 34

Total points: 200 .

And so, at last, we come to its most recent outing. A 200-34 win over 5A, flown by an obviously charitable friend who has some experience of the horror. And is now even more keen to not experience any more of it.

And his Zizi Tlo, about to suffer a similar fate to virtually every other ace that has crossed it's path, despite riding some Heroic greens.

Epilogue.

So clearly, I think it's a powerful list. I have to admit, some of that power is wrapped up in the whole "Gotcha!" element, the various triggers and controls being difficult to keep track of and fathom out. It's not a simple list to approach, at all.

I'm not a fan of leaning into that at all, and generally have to stop myself short of telling people how to play against it. A) I'm not 100% sure I'd be right, and accidentally misleading folks would be worse than leaving them with an open mind to figure it out. B) That's the point of the game, innit.

The control elements it has are as strong, or stronger, than any I've seen. At its heart, it's 2 survivable ships with a choice of defensive mitigation, or full offensive mods. Most 2 (/and a bit) ship builds use high Init to limit incoming fire. This uses control instead, it's as simple as that.

I do now have fairly solid ideas at this point, about where my pieces need to be in relation to each other and the opposition. And with those ideas, I feel that most people, given a decent, flexible squad and a few reps against it, would be able to figure it out and give themselves the upper hand. I welcome that, I really enjoy the challenge of bringing unfancied things together and testing them against strong meta staples. I think this lot, even as a known factor, have the tools to do a job, if I play everything just so.

But if I make a mistake, it's mostly very not good. Which is 2 ship territory all over.

Unfortunately for some, I appear to have created a bit of a monster, and I now know pretty well what I'm doing with it....

I'd love to watch you fly this - do you have any games streamed online?

I've tried a Jabba/Han/Cybernetics on a Slaver and it's been great. I've seen you advocating for Latts previously but always felt like I'd want the double modded shots and the points more than the ability to tractor. I guess that tractor could be clutch though, in terms of getting to shoot something, or maybe dumping it on an obstacle?

I've tended to just park my slaver at a convenient spot for multiple turns, but I think I remember reading you keep Latts mobile?

Love to give your list a try, just want to understand how to fly it

Anyhow - awesome post.

5 hours ago, eljms said:

Love to give your list a try, just want to understand how to fly it

Nothing streamed, no. Maybe one day! So prepare for another massive essay instead

Latts lock. Roughly 8/10 times, it's for double mods, I don't particularly want to spend it on moving things. It is a massive deterrent to ships wanting to get in close to her though, since she can either drag them into arc, or throw them somewhere uncomfortable if they're behind her. It's a threat, rather than something you want to use.

So mainly, the ability is for defence, a no-no area around her. One of the things the Bus detests is squirrelly things jumping in behind it, her ability really puts people off attempting to get there. The other side of that is having Asajj in a position to make them even more miserable if it appears to be on the cards.

The list is decent enough in a joust, if not 1st engage, then definitely 2nd when they're in close enough for ALL the BS. So you can fortress, hang back, 5K back and forth etc, if it looks like they want that. Closes off Latts rear very effectively, leaving the lock for shots.

But with Jabbanetics, it's obviously not that hard to keep approaches to her rear closed off, even in a more open game. There is SO much tractor in the list that she really doesn't need to provide it.

Keeping her mobile is a balance and massively dependent on board state, so it's hard to be categorical. The list does punch extremely hard though, so she often has to move in order to maintain the area of badness, as things explode and others hard nope out of it.

I do stop fairly liberally, but it's rare to do it more than twice in succession. Almost every time I've had some doubt and just stayed where I am, it's turned out badly, generally against massed opposition. With more ships alongside her, it's not such an important consideration.

Honestly, it's really hard to think on all the situations, but I'd say she picks the obstacle to cover the approach from and may stop there for a turn or 2. Then she's likely either suffering damage, needing to flee and trying to drag out her death, while making life diffiicult. Or banking/turning to maintain coverage, or just flatten a thing at R1, then zooming after what's left before Jabba runs out.

After Jabba, it's 3 hard ad infinitum

Making those Latts decisions is really the key to the whole thing and mostly needs planning out at least a couple turns in advance. Each of her moves, right from the get-go, is critical in this list. She's the pivot and the lever.

I take 2 large debris and dump one in the middle. Ideally, I then get one to the side, or slightly towards one of my corners. That's her area. If they come to me, I park on the outside one, if they go away, I make for the centre one. Then obviously stop, bank or turn from there. The 2 hard is really good.

I'll often stop her early so I can try to isolate one enemy ship at R3 on the 1st engage. That can be pivotal and will sometimes give her the space to move a bit more freely.

Worth noting that the obstacle parking plays a decent roll in her defences, so they really need planning out and aiming for. If she's looking at a lot of fire, a focus, reinforce and 2/3ag are pretty darn tanky and can give Asajj and Unkar the time they need to make serious inroads. And ofc, next turn they can end up looking at 5 double mod dice into -1ag for at least 1 turn. That leaves a big dent.

Unkar and Asajj both act as bait, looking to draw things into Latts area from one side or the other and trying to slow an advance directly at her. Asajj wide, Unkar looking like he'll go centre but able to just back out or sloop and roll away. Sometimes just Yolo, he's cheap and can have a big impact in a single turn.

Asajj can joust, but often, they'll start aiming at the Bus. Then Unkar gets thrown straight in there and Asajj will plow in from an angle and look for that 5k zoom and boom.

The big girls are aimng to be a vice, with Unkar squashed in with the things about to die. With the Bus able to park and cover a massive area, and not a lot wanting to get trapped in a wide lane with Assaj, it mostly works at just tunnelling things into that close grip.

If they go for Asajj, (the wise choice), she's obviously super speedy and can blast through, or turn and kite, before the 5k and whatever move Latts needs to realign the vice. While Unkar causes some mischief to enable that set up.

The force, CC, Baffle and evade on Asajj allow a lot of scope for just smashing through debris, double stressing and tanking hits, so she can afford to be pretty ballsy. She does have to be real careful with alpha strikes. Best off just nope and let them eat Bus. Which is why heavy hitting beef is by far the hardest thing to deal with.

It's really difficult for any list to avoid having one small base smashed off the table per turn. If not that, then 2 severely compromised. With the 2 big ships unlikely to go down in a hurry, and if one does, it should be Latts, opposition ship count will dwindle to the point where Asajj can take care of the rest. I've hardly had a game where at least one remaining ship isn't double stressed and wandering off, allowing Asajj to open the turret and start kiting/chasing, stressing and picking things off one by one.

The tractor obviously helps with damage, but the main element is Latts double mod 4/5 dice, combined with heavily stressed enemies, from Asajj and being thrown at debris, unable to turn and focus their fire. Once the damage is all in, it becomes a chase, one way or the other.

You can see my set up in one of the pics. It's a bit funky. Latts faces away from larger, bulkier, lower Init forces, Asajj towards. If they're higher Init and get to choose, Latts is mostly Ok with just turning in and sitting, or going for it.

They'll all stop there on the 1st turn, if they need to, only once, it's never wise to wait longer. If they turn in to go face the Bus, Asajj has a flank to turn in from. If they don't, Asajj can 5k and either scoot the long way round, or 5k again and come back, or turn in from deep. Either way, they mostly end up approaching Latts and looking sidelong at Asajj. Unkar can do all sorts of stuff with blocking the pair, reversing and such. Then it's all just speed, timing, areas and lanes

I believe the way to fight it is to threaten the Bus into defence and then just go all in on Asajj. If you can lock her down and take her out, the game is yours. The obstacle to achieving that is mostly psychological. If they need to trade half, or 2/3 of their list to achieve it, and they normally will, then that's what it costs. But folks will mostly try to stay up on points and that just doesn't really work. It's an everything dies kind of deal.

TL:DR- Wait. Plan. Trade heavily for Unkar, then Latts. Then kill everything with Asajj and ALWAYS put as much stress on the table as you possibly can. Everywhere, on everyone.

This is a thing of evil beauty. Thank you so much for sharing the details. 😎 🥃