I am looking for some tried and true 100 point rebel lists.

a) What are you running

b) Upgrades for each

c) What tactics, How are you using them in conjunction with one another.

Love to hear the lists and get some back and forth going here.

Thanks in advance,

Shawn Morris

personal favourite:

luke + R2D2 + swarm tactics

rookie Xwing x2

Gold Ywing + ion cannons

play is terribly simple. Use luke and always keep someone near him, preferbly aiming at the same target. Use swarm tactics to "rescue" low hp pilots, or rather use them one last time before they die. Ywing with ion cannon to help catch targets and guard Luke when using R2D2's repairs. 2 Xwing gives you a lot of tactical flexibility, and can do some pretty amazing stuff, especially if you have been playing the empire side for a while. Always try to go around in pairs, and you can feel free to split up if needed, into two groups. If luke kicks the bucket early, gather all 3 ships close together and hide within the Ywing's ion cannon range, then just pretend you are flying your usual 3 rebel ship formation. all 3 pilots at the same skill level helps prevents friendly overlap from occuring too much, so it is easier to maintain tight formations, and all 3 ships can plummet the same target together if they are close enough. try to keep both rookie Xwings close but away from each other, such that they are close enough to aim the same target at a reasonable range, while also being able to catch TIEs trying to range 1 the other Xwing. Ywing will help cover the butt of the other Xwing, so not too much worries as long as they stay close. Your only real issue is if your Ywing gets taken out, and you will lose some group cohesiveness and defense, as well as your tactical advantage, but if that happens, just switch back to your standard 3 ships play and go aggressive, since the Xwings no longer have a slow ally to worry about and can do their forward 4s happily.

Optimally, have the 3 rookies operate as a team, and Luke circling around the outside of the team and using swarm tactics on whoever happens to be close enough to benefit. Anytime he needs R2D2's repairing, fly straight into your group, and return any challenges to chase Luke with concentrated fire from all 3 ships. Alternatively, you could split them into 2 pairs, and have the 2 group operate independently on 2 seperate sides of the map, forcing the opponent to either split his group or send everybody against one pair, and thus allowing your other pair to pick off stragglers. 4 ships really helps you recover from unlucky situations, such as having 1 ship taken out early or getting disrupted by too many collisions. One interesting tip is using Ywing on swarm tactic to pick off low hp named pilots trying to escape or outside your normal firing arcs, by abusing the ion cannon's 360 range

I'm not happy with any of my current 3 ships setup at the moment for the rebels, so I really cant recommend any to you for the time being.

Thanks a lot, great information and well planned out. I myself am waiting for the 4 Y-wings I have ordered, but in the mean time I will try the Luke and 3 Rookie configuration that you have mentioned. I will let you know about the results.

Theterrainstudio said:

sorry, it should be "2 rookie pilots and 1 gold Ywing", and i left out a R5 astromech on the Ywing. Because Ywings tend to be rather ticklish, the R5 astromech helps it deal with critical hits much better, and i do not find R2 astromech that useful on a Ywing that is flying a supportive defensive role

I've not been a big fan of the 3 ship setup for Rebels, but one thing I've been playing around with is this:

• Garven Dreis, R2 Astromech
• Dutch Vander, R5-K6, Ion Cannon, 1 Proton Torpedo
• Wedge Antilles, Swarm Tactics, R2-D2, 1 Proton Torpedo

The idea is an "all eggs in one basket" strategy to turn Wedge into a "one shot, one kill" juggernaut. Give Wedge Target Locks from Dutch, and use Swarm Tactics to enable Garven to give his Focus to Wedge before Wedge makes his combat rolls. The torps are there to fill in points. Wedge has R2-D2 for some amount of protection. Garven runs the R2 unit to get rid of stress tokens a little easier (he needs to be able to Focus). And R5-K6 on Dutch needs no explanation.

A more serious squad I've been running lately is very similar to a previous one posted:

• Wedge Antilles, R2-D2, Swarm Tactics
• 2x Rookie Pilot
• 1x Gold Squadron Pilot, Ion Cannon

Not a lot to say about it. It's less defensive than the similar squad with Luke. I feel like Wedge has a bigger upside than Luke for one point more, though I see the obvious synergy between Swarm Tactics and keeping Luke alive with his natural defensive ability and R2-D2.

Tawnos said:

Both of these are teams I run. The first one is sort of brutal action economy. My only thing is why would Garven give Wedge focus, unless for defensive purposes? Wedge focuses on his own, gets the target from Dutch. Then Garven goes with swarm tactics. You have two options; pass the focus off onto Wedge if he used his already for defense, or give it to Dutch if you REALLY want to go all out offensive. When initiative 6 comes around Dutch has a target lock, focus, and ion cannon locked and loaded. If he hits his R5-K6 roll it just gets ugly quick for the empire…5 actions for 3 ships.

Only difference I sometimes make is drop the torpedo for Dutch as it's an expensive 4 points for him (Wedge makes better use of them) and give Garven R2-D2 and Wedge R5-D8. It makes them both able to heal. Garven needs R2 because he has to spend his actions to focus, and Wedge really doesn't need his actions because Dutch and Garven can proxy them for him.

Second one is great too, good combatant of the imperial swarms.

You give Wedge the second Focus exactly for the reason you mention. The squad's utilizes a real "all-in" strategy and makes Wedge a huge target. Any defensive edge you can give him to keep him alive makes it that much more effective. I've run a variation of it where Wedge uses R2-F2 to increase the value of that extra defensive Focus token, but ultimately I've found that 3 defense dice with a Focus token has less defensive value than 2 defense dice with Focus + R2-D2.

Here's another one that, well….maybe it doesn't belong in a Top Squad list, but damned if I don't want to give it a try:

• Dutch Vander, R5-K6, Ion Cannon
• 3x Gold Squadron Pilot, Ion Cannon

You know what's better than agility? Locking out your opponents ability to even get a firing arc on you. Every…..turn. You might even occasionally run the opponent right off the board. Weee!

This squad would more than likely fall flat on its face against Imperial swarms, and is very unforgiving of bad dice rolls.

I've run this, and if the dice aren't happy, neither are the rebels. The Imps are not happy regardless.

So wedge can have 2 focus?

Tawnos said:

do you face any problems with Wedge getting taken out too early in the game? would like to hear how you deal with it, because I'm kinda wanting to try this over my Luke ver. and see the differences. I've started off with your version actually, but after Wedge keeps dying on the 3-4th turn I sorta gave up and swapped him for Luke instead

Duraham said:

I haven't run this yet, but I might next time I play:

Luke + 2 Xs + 1 Y

Total Squad Points: 100

Pilot: Luke Skywalker
X-Wing
Upgrades:
R5-D8

Pilot: Rookie Pilot 1
X-Wing

Pilot: Rookie Pilot 2
X-Wing

Pilot: Gold Squadron Pilot 1
Y-Wing
Upgrades:
Ion Cannon Turret
R2-D2

I don't usually play the rebels but I have a few times. Luke gets R5-D8 because he isn't as dependent on focusing for defense and can spare the action. The Y-Wing gets R2-D2 because it has a max of 3 shields instead of 2 and doesn't need to worry about facing any particular direction so it can get a free shield every turn. The Rookies are there just to fill out the team and do more damage. When the A-Wings come out, switching out a rookie might be a good idea as that will open up the possibility of another named pilot while still running 4 ships.

There is no really good target to go after. Luke has extra defense and can undo damage, The Y-Wing has R2-D2 and a ton of Hull+Shields to burn through so it will be guaranteed to regen at least a couple of shields even when focus fired, and lastly the rookies are just rookies. If anything, the rookies will be the first to go and that is ok because they have low pilot skill and no special abilities anyway.

Hopefully I get a chance to try this out tomorrow.

Duraham said:

Wedge always has a huge target painted on him. R2-D2 is there to discourage focusing him first, but even so, chances are good he isn't going to be ignored. The best thing you can do for him is for the Gold Squadron Pilot to focus his Ion on whoever the biggest threat to Wedge is.

I find putting R2D2 on him encourages your opponent to target him more XD I was thinking maybe take out R2D2, then upgrade one of the rookie pilots to Biggs instead, and have him follow Wedge around instead. Biggs could benefit from Wedge's swarm tactics too, then the other rookie and gold pair could do whatever they want.

Wedge + swarm tactics

Biggs

Rookie Xwing

Gold Ywing + ion-C

hmm, itching to try this already, methinks this has more potential than my current Luke setup. Thanks very much for sharing your wedge ver.

Duraham said:

I've been suckered into targeting Luke with R2D2. It was unwise. I haven't had to deal with Biggs in a situation where his ability really applied yet. Still. I have to wonder about him. If Biggs is just there to draw fire, why doesn't the opponent just focus fire on him and be done with it? Yeah, Wedge's ability is neat, but it may be possible to ignore it for one round to free up targeting options by vaporizing Biggs.

Any way,

Gold Y-Wing, R2, Ion cannon 24
Garven Dreis 26
Rookie Pilot 21
Luke 28
One more R2, 1
OR Sub out Luke and the R2 for Wedge, for a different flavor.

Be mindful of turn order and do whatever it takes to keep the Y-wing shooting, but out of enemy firing arcs.

And call me paranoid, but I get antsy when the Empire outnumbers the rebels more than 2 to 1.

Duraham said:

In every game I've played with or against R2-D2, targeting that ship has always been folly. R2-D2 is quite a huge deterrent, as he can easily undo the efforts of any concerted attack, especially those of Imperial squads who will almost always overshoot a slow-moving target.

I'm interested to try this Luke variant.

qwertyuiop said:

The thing with Biggs is that he can fly behind your more valuable ships. If they're within 2 of the enemy, then Biggs is within 3. That makes damaging Biggs tougher than damaging the good guys who are closer. The key to getting the most out of that bodyguard ability is positioning.

I've tried the whole "Biggs eats the hits" squad a few times with mixed results. It seems like it either works like a charm, or he gets plastered second round by a flurry of missiles.

If I were going to run a variant with Biggs instead of Luke/Wedge, this is what it would be:

• Biggs Darklighter, R2-D2
• Rookie Pilot
• Rookie Pilot
• Gold Squadron Pilot, R5-K6, Ion Cannon, 1 Proton Torpedo

Keep Biggs stationed within Range 1 behind the front line of the Y-wing flanked by two X-wings. Hopefully he can eat the hits at Range 3, or Range 2 to prevent Range 1 hits on the Rookies/Gold Squadron Pilot.

Try to get an early kill with the Torp, and protect Biggs as best as possible. The worst thing that can happen here is if the enemy manages to sideslip your line or, worse, get behind you.

Actually, I might drop the Gold Squadron Pilot and Torp in favor of Dutch. He might yield a higher upside with extra Target Locks than a single Torp.

Here's something that's definitely not 'Top' but I've had fun playing around with. Luke + R2-F2 2x Gold Squadron w/Ion Cannons Red Squadron Pilot Basically the idea is to blow through the enemy formation as fast as possible with Luke, and just keep going. Assuming he survives, you should pull a couple of fighters or (even better) Vader to chase him down. Just keep running. The Y-wings just do their thing, dropping Ion Cannon salvos all around with timely primary attacks thrown in. The Red Squadron pilot is meant to be kept in reserve, only coming in to fight with TIEs you've managed to isolate and/or weaken. Hopefully by the time Luke makes his way back you'll have whittled the Imps down, and can make a concentrated pass at his pursuers. I've had varying levels of success. It really just depends on whether or not Luke survives that first pass. Alternatively, I switch the Red for a Rookie, and give Luke Determination and hope for luck, and give the Rookie an R2.