Total Squad Points: 97

Pilot: “Mauler Mithel”
Tie Fighter (17)
Upgrades:

• Elusiveness (2)
• Engine Upgrade (4)

Pilot: Darth Vader
Tie Advanced x1 (29)
Upgrades:

• Expose (4)
• Assault Missiles (5)
• Engine Upgrade (4)

Pilot: Soontir Fel
Tie Interceptor (27)
Upgrades:

• Elusiveness (2)
• Stealth (3)

This is a very aggressive squad that relies on staying in close combat with enemy ships and makes the most of it’s range 1 bonuses. Actions like Boost and Barrel Roll will aid your ships in the middle of combat whether it is closing the gap or getting out of an enemy’s firing arch. See my full strategy in my new blog here .

Ack! Only three TIEs! You're breaking my sensibilities here!

….seriously, though, not being critical…I just don't think I have it in me to have that few TIEs.

Speed and durability makes up for the lack of numbers. Plus I plan on spliting them up to force opponet to either focus on 1 giving my other two ships free attacks or split their forces which gives my single ships the advantage.

Sprenger said:

Agreeable. Easier said than done, but it's the sort of game I'd rather play.

Sprenger said:

i like ur team alot. hard not to make room for Howlrunner ho. his rereoll ability is impressive… most impressive!

If I could get Howl on this team he would make it in a heart beat but since I'm not planning on keeping them together until the end of the game it would be hard to justify he ability.

Well, you solved my only real complaint about this sort of thing with the engine upgrade. I have a similar list…giving an Advanced the engine upgrade so it can 'keep up', but the rest are Interceptors.

I think Mauler Mithil has served his time. the basic Tie intercepter trades for one point more, an extra attack at range 2-3 and boast. He does lack a pilot upgrade and 7 skill, but I think its more then a fair trade off. I see Mauler Mithil retiring from my lists that involves wave 2. (though I am humored by Mauler Mithil range 1 behind someone with Expose….)

Funny thing is that this squad was originally built around Mithel. I don't see him going anywhere just yet. If anyone of the good Tie-Fighter pilots were to be shelved my money would be on Howlrunner. Assault missiles will do away with the Tie-Swarm squads.

Sprenger said:

I'm not sure how you kill the falcon with anything short of a TIE swarm. A slightly small TIE Interceptor swarm might do it. But the Falcon is going to be abble to shoot back every round it is attacked, your only hope to come out ahead is to attack it with more than one ship a turn. Add to that the fact that it takes a total of 13 hits to kill it (15) if it has chewbaka, and I don't think the TIE swarm is dead just yet.

Sprenger said:

Howlrunner isn't going anywhere and the swarm is still viable. Assault Missiles are a one-trick pony that isn't going to suddenly break the swarm. Even outside a swarm, Howlrunner still has her uses. She can support a Firespray, for example. Regardless, any 'discard' upgrade that requires a Target Lock to operate isn't going to utterly change the battlefield. They're not the ugly thing at the end of the Mayan Calendar. Sorry. You're still rolling 4 attack dice against 3 defense dice, probably 4, since Stealth is popular…and if your opponent remembers you have those, I'm sure the table will be littered with evade tokens. Are Assault Missiles a bad thing to try? No, but they're not going to alter the viability of the Swarm, the Swarm is just going to look different than it did last week.

If anything, what could kill the swarm is the fact there are more choices. The Swarm got stagnant quick as far as enjoyability for me, and I think a lot of other people. Rebel builds are just more fun to engineer, and if all the reports I've seen from this weekend are an average of the rest, a lot of other people preferred playing them, too. You pretty much had to play a Swarm with Imperials, and now there are many more combinations to diversify that faction.

Hrathen said:

I agree that the falcon will be a pain in every Imperial player's side however I think we will se more offensive Imperial builds that include fighters that can roll 3 or 4 dice an attack. Howlrunner is good and it was difficult to not run her but in the end I wanted pure attack power and I could see risking Howlrunner with an Expose just to fit her into my line up.

Sprenger said:

Here's what I came up with for a Wave 2 build after my experience at the KRT:

Total Squad Points: 100

Pilot: Darth Vader
Tie Advanced x1 (29)
Upgrades:

• Daredevil (3)
• Engine Upgrade (4)

Pilot: Soontir Fel
Tie Interceptor (27)
Upgrades:

• Daredevil (3)
• Stealth (3)

Pilot: Turr Fennirr
Tie Fighter (25)
Upgrades:

• Daredevil (3)
• Stealth (3)

zathras23 said:

The only thing I would have to change about that squad is the Daredevil on Soontir Fel to Elusiveness. It puts your squad at 99 for initative and goes really well with Soontir Fel's ability to gain a focus. Other than that it looks like a solid squad.

CaptainRook said:

But it's also worth noting that even in the Wave 1 metagame, the giant ball of TIE fighters has been losing steam. 4-ship Rebel builds have a decent chance, as do 6-ship Imperial builds. The final nail in the the swarm's coffin will be the existence of a very desirable ship that displaces 1.5 TIEs. The largest list that includes any Interceptors at all is 7 ships, and if you want named pilots or upgrades you're looking at 6 ships.

I think the Imperial sweet spot is currently at 6, and will shift to 5 (in another thread, hothie predicted seeing a lot of Imperial lists at 4). Builds with Firesprays will be around 3. The swarm might still see play, but it will be much more rare than it is now.

In order to get howl runner in id drop the assault to conc missiles. Personally if your abusing boost get push the limit on your ships. The ability to go green, to lose stress, boost then either barrel roll, focus or evade is amazing. I dont know why i'm really not a fan of expose or elusiveness, but i think thats more a personal play style thing

Sprenger said:

I'll give it a try when Wave 2 comes out but I prefer to use Daredevil over Elusiveness. I can use the Focus from Daredevil offensively or defensively, giving me more options than the one I would get from Elusiveness.

Using the ships I currently have, for a five ships at 100 points:

Bounty Hunter (Firespray-31) with Stealth, Gunner, and Seismic Charges - 43 points

Alpha Squadron (TIE Interceptor) with Stealth - 21 points

3 x Academy Pilots (3 x TIE Fighters) - 36 points

Fluffwise, the Empire is escorting prisoner transfers.

Gamewise, it's about firepower. I could swith the Gunner and Seismic Charges for Heavy Laser Cannons, but I might be shooting behind me a lot with the Firespray, so the Gunner might be more useful - I also really like be able to shoot twice!