Just played a game against Budgernaut, and we had a blast!

I had "Mauler Mithel" [Expert Handling], "Dark Curse" and Maarek Stele [Cluster Missiles, Marksmanship]

Budgernaut put out Dutch Vander [R5-K6, Proton Torpedoes, Proton Torpedoes, Ion Cannon Turret] and Garven Dreis [R5 Astromech, Proton Torpedoes].

One of the nice things about these teams is that we had 3 pilots that shared the same skill level, but since our points were exactly the same, the Empire got initiative . Which is great because "Dark Curse" got to move before the Rebels AND shoot before the rebels.

Budgernaut's strategy was to move Dutch Vander first, then obtain a target lock, allowing Garven Dreis to acquire a lock, too. Garven would take the focus action, and attack first, spending his focus and passing it to Dutch. I saw this synergy in the first two rounds and decided to focus all attacks on Dutch. Unfortunately, Maarek Stele was an early casualty to his tactic, and died before he had a chance to use Marksmanship, though he did snap his Cluster Missiles off at the Y-wing.

After the Y-wing was destroyed we were free to hunt down Garven. Now here's the real kicker: "Mauler Mithel" had Expert Handling, and since he always moved after Garven Dreis, he could perform a barrel roll after Garven had acquired a lock, and ditch the lock. Garven had already spent his torps early on, so he could try to acquire target locks on "Dark Curse" to reroll his attacks -- except that "Dark Curse" prevents rerolls when he is being attacked. So we effectively prevented the opponent from acquiring target locks for the rest of the game.

I was already in the mindset of Barrel Roll because of Expert Handling, and I went crazy with that action. My TIEs were able to dance out of firing range once or twice, and line up an otherwise unattainable shot on at least two occasions. It was extremely rewarding! This was my first time playing as the Empire and I am a fan.

I have been singing the praises of barrel rolls since I got my hands on the game…. It sounds like you had some fun there… Good stuff. I'm hoping to get a game in with my brother this morning before we head downtown. My bro saw Dana White downtown yesterday and my brother is a pro fighter himself and they started talking and bingo bango, Dana gave him 3 tickets to the UFC tonight! So we are heading downtown around 2 o'clock to pick up our tix and grab some food and hang out a bit before the big show at the ACC later tonight… I'm stoked!

What I learned this match is that high-skilled Rebels can be really important, but it's a gamble. If your opponent is using Expert Handling, you need high-skill pilots to target lock after the target barrel rolls. The alternative strategy is to get two locks on the guy with Expert Handling. I actually did this quite consistently during the first half of the game, and it had "Mauler Mithel" running (so he was out of range after our locks), but once "Dutch" bit the dust, target lock ceased to be effective. Not only that, but both my pilot abilities lost efficacy since they are both teamwork abilities, whereas pilots like Luke, Wedge, and many of the Imperial uniques have abilities that just target themselves.

The other really disappointing thing about this game was that I never got to fire my ion cannon! The one time I had a TIE within range 1 of "Dutch", it was Mauler Mithel who had crashed into him and so I couldn't fire at him. What a disappointment. I must say that Parakitor quickly had the TIE-dancing down to an artform by the end of the match.

Okay, scratch that. I got lucky because both pilots in my game had higher skill then the Rebels, so the pilot with Expert Handling got to react to the target lock. I just played a game where my TIE got target locked twice, but it was after his action because he Rebels had higher skill levels, so he couldn't do a thing about it. Got destroyed in round 3.

Wow excellent strategy! No target lock team sounds pretty awesome to me! I'm definitely going to steal this strategy, I never used the card on imperials because I thought , barrel roll? I don't need this! Totally didn't see the take off a lock!