Here's an idea I've had for a Rebel squad after Wave 2 hits in a couple of months:

Chewbacca (42) + Draw Their Fire (1) + Mercenary Copilot (2) + Millennium Falcon (1) – 46 Points

Biggs Darklighter (25) + R2-F2 (3) + Stealth (3) – 31 Points

Gold Squadron Pilot (18) + Ion Cannon Turret (5) – 23 Points

Total Points: 100

I did a full strategy write-up on my blog , but the short version is: be very hard to kill and hit back with turret weapons. Thoughts?

Biggs is going to die quickly as always and then you only have two ships left. Its not a bad list but I can see it losing to being outshot.

After seeing just how hard it is to do all 13 damage nessisary to kill the falcon I came up with the following list

Han Solo with Luke Skywalker

Chewbaka with a Gunner

I know it is only 2 ships, but it is 26 hull points, and you don't lose any strength until you have take 13 on a single ship.

It looks like am going to have to buy two Falcons

saiharris said:

Bigs has 4 defense dice to roll until he takes his first hit, 5 dice at range 3. Unless he rolls badly, 2 attack dice from Imperials aren't going to touch him for several turns, even with a lot of shots from multiple ships. Even 3-dice Firespray and Interceptors will have a little bit of trouble, especially if you can keep him at range 3 from most of them. Meanwhile, the Falcon will be dealing damage.

My 2-dice A-wings couldn't hit the 4-dice Soontir Fel very well in the finals.

That said, though, I'd consider a more offensive-oriented Falcon to maximize the damage caused until Biggs gives before he gets hit/dies.

@ Hrathen:

I think the challenge will be maneuvering two large ships in the 3'x3' table, while also avoiding asteroids and other ships. You'll want them two close enough to help support each other, but far enough apart that they'll be able to maneuver without hitting each other.

Two games in a row I used 4 dice Biggs vs a tie swarm. Both games Biggs died turn 2.

The dice were terrible yes, but it made me think twice about his ability. Sure, Ill still take him but I'm not convinced 4 dice is an auto pass by a long shot! Pre tournament, I did…

dvang said:

Except you only have two ships. Also you don't have to worry about putting other ships in your firing arc. Don't forget teh Falcon has that wonderful Hard 1 turn

I'm probably a little biased by my 3-agility Biggs surviving 3 rounds of cluster missiles without a scratch over the weekend, but I think he won't be an easy hit with 4 dice. I would consider cutting stealth and the copilot to add R2D2 to the y-wing.

@saiharris

Dice can always be a problem. For example, in my finals game my Falcon rolled 4 dice and scored 4 hits, and my opponent's Interceptor rolled 3 dice and rolled one evade, and so killed it with one attack. Such results does not mean that the Falcon 1-shots everything, nor that the TIE Interceptor's 3 agility dice are useless. To get a 4-dice Biggs, you had to have been at range 3. So, now it is a 5-dice Biggs at range 3, and 4-dice at range 1-2 until he gets hit.

Don't get me wrong, I am not saying it is uber-powerful. Certainly good/bad dice rolling happens. The addition of an extra Agility *should* on average, allow Biggs to last longer. Another option might be to give him an additional shield instead of the stealth field as his Mod. You reduce his agility, but allow him the surety of being able to take one more hit. Either case, makes Biggs more durable, perhaps for one or two more rounds.

@Hrathen

Yes, only two ships. But two HUGE ships. You need to keep in mind that they aren't just moving the distance of the template. They are also moving the distance of their base. A 1 straight is essentially a 3 straight in terms of distance traveled. A hard turn 1 is more like an "L" shape. I do think the Falcon has the advantage over the Firespray in that it has a turreted primary. So yes, it does make things easier, as you only need to worry about facing for movement and not for shooting. I saw my opponent having difficulty maneuvering his Firespray to get targets with the front/rear firce arcs. Meanwhile, my Falcon just mostly did a lazy circle of the table. I still ran into my own ships and asteroids by misjudging the size of the base. As did my opponent, when he made his firespray make a K-turn and it ended up with the base halfway off the table.

I like the idea of Han in the Falcon (title) with Luke and Chewie riding shotgun, and 2 Rookie Pilots following him into the chaos. That gives you 3 ships, the massive falcon with 13 hull/shield plus chewie and evade tokens to keep it alive, Han with Luke to blow ships out of the sky, and the always potent X-wings to dead anciliary damage to whatever gets in their way. With Han on the table (and over half your points on one ship), everyone will be gunning for him and mostly ignoring the X-wings, minimalizing their low pilot skill.

The typical Biggs strategy of 'Keep him at Range 3' always falls apart to the typical Imperial startegy of 'Never be in Range 3'. Then you get the issue of overlap, which is going to be significantly easier to achieve than ever…so they'll be firing at Biggs anyways, because he'll be the only thing not touched. I can only think of one way to use Biggs properly, and even then…I can do that with a more offensive ship.

CaptainRook said:

I was thinking less "keep Biggs at range 3" and more "keep the Falcon and Y-Wing between Biggs and the TIEs." Sure, the TIEs will charge in and overlap one of the two ships, but that will give the other one a point-blank shot (not that point blank is relevant for the ion cannon). Biggs' main job is to die though, just as slowly as possible. Each one of those shots fired at Biggs trying to overcome his 5hp with 3-4 agility is a shot not fired at the Falcon.

Poor Biggs, even his own friends want him to die.

:-) I don't know that I want him to die, but I do expect it and plan for it.