Vorpal Sword said:

I agree on expose - if a ship has to chose between expose and focus or target lock, its generally at least equal odds, if not better odds, to take the focus. There are exceptions to this: 1 attack die - you would be better to expose for 2 AD than to focus 1 AD. 3 and 4 Attack Dice w/ target Lock OR focus is slightly better than 2 and 3 attack dice with target lock and focus.

If you can find a way to stack extra actions on a ship with expose, especially both target lock and focus on a ship, expose is worth a look. This means that without squad leader or another benefit, on the ship with expose, you're better just taking the focus. Lets look at the situations where we can stack extra actions:

Rebel:

In rebels, you're rather limited in what you can take Expose on - you've got Luke, Wedge, Chewie, Lando, Han, Green Squadron, and Tycho. Squad leader is the most obvious way to stack the extra action, but that won't work on Wedge and Han, and you can pretty much leave out Lando as well due to point concerns. You probably don't want to put expose on Luke, either, since his pilot ability works on Green Dice and you really don't want to decrease those. Lando and Tycho can't benefit from Garvin's focus offensively and you don't have many options to get them benefits from squad leader and still work in another buff, so I wouldn't recommend expose on either of them either. That pretty much leaves us with Chewie and the Green Squadron.

Green Squadron:
Lando w/ Squad Leader, or Dutch and Garvin can give target lock and focus to a Green Squadron w/ Expose. This is a pretty good increase in firepower at range 2 and 3 over a stock A-Wing, but you'll still manage more hits buying a Concussion Missile. At range one you only need to stack expose with a target lock or a focus to get an increase in firepower but you have to keep Lando in Range 2 or have Dutch or Garvin within range 2. You'll have to watch out for the low Pilot Skill, as the Green Squadron can end up taking quite a bit of fire before it actually gets to shoot.

Chewie
Much like a Green Squadron, Lando w/ Squad Leader, or Dutch and Garvin can give target lock and focus to a Chewie w/ Expose. At range 2 and 3, you get a minimal increase in firepower with expose + target lock (as opposed to target lock and focus) to the point where 0 defense dice isn't worth it. You'll get a much larger increase in damage with expose + target lock and focus, but you still get 0 defense dice. Additonally, there isn't much room left in the list for upgrades either way you go, and chewie with a gunner may be a better option than chewie with expose (with expose, you may squeeze 1 damage in, whereas with a gunner, the first shot may miss and the second shot may land multiple hits now that their defense is removed).

Imperial:

In imperial, you've got extra options for expose (Black Squadron, Sabre Squadron, Mauler, Boba, Kath, Vader, Maarek, Soontir, and Turr). Howlrunner gives a semi target lock to friendly ships and can be given squad leader to stack the extra action without having to bring other ships to do the buffing in the squad. Without Howlrunner around, you really don't pick up much (a few tenths of a perctage in expected hits) in imperials with Expose as you can't stack both target lock and focus on anything but the Firespray and the Tie Advanced. Then, you have the same problems with PS 9, so I think we can rule out Boba and Soontir from really wanting expose. Maarek would prefer marksman ship to try to trigger his pilot skill, so he is out. The Black Squadron isn't really worth it IMO, as for 18 points you can just bring an interceptor, though you do pick up some pilot skill with the Black Squadron. Sabre Squadron w/ Expose has promise, though you're still at PS 4, but for fewer points you can bring Mauler who is even higher pilot skill and might kill his target before it gets to shoot back. So, the interesting options are Mauler, Vader, Kath, and Turr.

Turr Phennir:
Turr is probably the most obvious place for expose - if you can't benfit from Squad leader you're still better to Focus with Turr, but if you can get the focus from squad leader, you can expose and either destory your target or potentially barrell roll out of their arc. Howrunner helps Turr even more, but being able to shoot so early and move out of arcs is really in favor of Turr w/ Expose. Just watch out for 360 arcs as you're looking at a 29 point Turr…

Vader:
Vader gets two actions, so he can target lock and expose, and he gets to fire first almost all the time, so if you can kill your target before it gets to shoot back expose can be an OK choice. As long as Vader isn't in the line of fire from multiple enemy ships, Expose isn't a bad choice here, but it still bumps him up to 33 points for a small increase in offensive firepower and a pretty big decrease in survivability. I'd say, use with caution.

Mauler:
Expose gives Mauler interceptor firepower for the same points as as a Sabre squadron. You'll lose out on the boost action, but you do get the higher pilot skill. Not a terrible choice, but Mauler only has 3 hull and he can't get out of danger as easily as Turr. If you're considering an Alpha squadron and already have Howl Runner w/ Squad leader floating around, I'd be tempted to go with Mauler w/ Expose instead.

Kath:
You'll probably be firing the heavy laser every turn when you're not in range one, but you would have the option to fire 5 dice at range one with Howlrunner giving a reroll. The problem is, once you drop Expose on Kath you're pretty much limited to a 4 ship list, and 3 of those ships will be ties. I'm not sure how competitive that is in the long run…

Endgame124 said:

I actually blogged about this a little while ago. I agree with a lot of your post, with a few exceptions:

• I would argue that Green Squadron is a bad place for Expose: for 23 points, you get a ship that can transition between an A-wing with no upgrades and an X-wing with no actions; for the same 23, you could buy a Red Squadron Pilot with the same pilot skill and notably better offense. There's some discussion on this point in the comments over at my place.

• I also think you missed a couple of steps with respect to putting Expose on X-wings. Dutch can donate a Target Lock to Wedge, allowing him to get some use out of Expose--as long as you can otherwise arrange to keep a 1-Agility Wedge alive. And even Luke actually isn't a terrible place for Expose, since his pseudo-Focus actually leaves him in a better defensive position than Wedge should he be fired upon. Obviously you'd like to direct some attacks and/or damage away from him in this situation.

Overall, though, I think it's worth emphasizing your point that it's a very hard upgrade to use well, and if you use it poorly it's at least a waste of points (even a torpedo is better, in many cases) and possibly a handicap.

Vorpal Sword said:

IMO a Green Squadron A-Wing w/ Expose is better than a Red Squadron if you're bringing the standard support models like Dutch / Garvin. You get the extra defense of an A-Wing when you want it and the option to evade and boost, plus you can switch to X Wing firepower and survivability with Expose. Of course, with a Green Squadron, I'm finding Push the Limits + a missile to be better than Expose, but the idea could use lots of extra testing.

Regarding wedge, you can also contribute an action with Lando in place of dutch if you like, or you could use both but not really have an effective list IMO. Honestly, I'd rather not spend the points on Expose with Wedge as he is already such a target and you really only gain an increase in offense with expose at range 2 and 3. I think I'd consider dead eye + a proton torp over expose as you'd pickup more firepower at Range 2 / 3 and at range 1, 5 dice + Target Lock is literally a wash with 4 dice + Target Lock + Focus.

Endgame124 said:

you got my gears turning to test out the A-wing with expose now.. PtL with Missle is indeed stupid good, there is no denying that. but now on the flipside with expose, you can use it as many times as deemed necissary vs the one time missle shot for 1 extra point.

i just may be inclined to try out a list with 1-2 A-wings with expose (one to start), dutch and X-wings to fill the remaining points

it's truely a shame that Arvel can't use pilot abilities, arvel with expose would be just gross

executor said:

Yes, I've been frustrated to no end that Arvel can't have pilot abilitys. Same with Horton and Garvin, only I think Arvel could really get a lot of use out of so many pilot abilities.

gr8 discussion here guys, keep it up. ive had a few months off playing x-wing but now my wave2 ships have arrived im getn back into it. only have 3 interecpters so will try a 5 ship build similar to hothies when i can.

next week im playing a Han shoots first list (han + 2 rooie x-wings, will give marsman a go on han).

The one great asset of Awings is their 3 agility, which makes them difficult to hit, especially when they are equipped with a Stealth Device. Putting Expose on one would help their one great detriment, their lack of firepower, but at the cost of reducing their agility. I think you would only use it in a situation where you aren't worried about a counter strike, otherwise that Awing would go down pretty fast with only 2 agility. On the plus side, their maneuverability makes them so unpredictable that you may just be able to pull off using expose without getting attacked, which would make for a very powerful, nimble little fighter.

hothie said:

I haven't played enough combos enough to get a real feel for the effectiveness of any one combo / build. My testing of expose on a Green Squadron consists of a single game with this list:

Garvin
Dutch w/ R5 and Ion Cannon
Green Squadron w/ Expose
Prototype w/ Homing Missile

Played against this list:
Vader w/ PtL and Engine Upgrade
Dark Curse
Academy
2x Alpha Squadron

I only used Expose twice - the first was the 2nd turn and the Green Squadorn was going head to head w/ a 1 damage Alpha Squadron (It rolled 3 evades on my homing missile and took only 1 damage). I was in range to drop both target lock and focus on the Green Squadron and only ended up with Dark Curse shooting at the exposed A-Wing. I killed the Alpha and lost 1 shield from Dark Curse. The next time was a couple of turns later where I was betting that Dark Curse would end up in range 1 of the Green Squadron. It did and I landed 2 hits on Dark Curse. In the end I lost the game because I couldn't pin down vader, but the exposed Green Squadron really ended up being the best of both worlds between an A-Wing and a X-Wing for me. It also reminded me that I really don't like running Dutch without R2-D2…

Well, I tweaked my tourney squad some (isn't that how it goes?), so I'll post what I made up last weekend to open the floor for discussion.

Mauler with Veteran Instincts
Backstabber
Saber Squadron Pilot with Veteran Instincts
Tempest Squadron Pilot with Homing missiles
Alpha Squadron Pilot

This is the list that I ran which I talked about in reply #94 of this thread. As I mentioned earlier, I was getting many, many 4 dice shots against the Falcon, since every one of these pilots can have 4 dice in certain situations. But I was only rolling 1 hit nearly every time, which got very annoying.

Essentially my thought with this squad is Mauler is a PS9, so he will shoot simultaneously with Han, so even if Han takes him out, he'll still get to shoot back. Backstabber is awesome, assuming he doesn't get one-shotted right away, so I need to figure something else out for him. The Saber with VI is PS6, and there are enough PS6 and 5 pilots that it makes a difference having him go simultaneously or before them. Tempest has the Homing Missiles, and the Alpha is a PS1 with 3 attack dice.

The star of game 2 was the Tempest Squadron Pilot. After I killed Han, I only had Tempest left with his shields down (so only 3 hull left) vs his 2 Rookie Xwings at full health. I managed to take 1 Xwing out, and had the other one down to 1 hull left when time ran out, and I had only taken 1 hull damage from an asteroid, which I did on purpose to avoid him getting a shot. I managed to barrel roll out of his firing arc a few times, so I could get shots on him but he couldn't shoot at me. If this one would have ended at 60 minutes, he would have won due to having both Xwings alive, but we played to 75, so I won.

Originally I had Fel's Wrath in there, but I changed him out for the Saber Pilot and put VI on Mauler. I figured having Mauler at PS9 would benefit me more than having FW in there against Han Shoots First.

This squad is close, but not quite fully my play style, so I've tweaked it some to a squad that is a better fit for me, i think. I'll play that one this weekend and see how it goes.

Well I got a few games in this evening.

I was running:

Turr with PtL
Saber Squadron
Alpha Squadron
Backstaber
Mauler

The first game was against the standard Han with 2 rookie pilots. This game was a teaching game for her as she wanted to improve so I let her redo manuevers, actions, etc as I explained things to her.

The second was against a 4 interceptor list of Fel, Turr with PtL, Fel's Wrath and Saber Squadron. The guy kept on going about how his squad was unbeatable in any game and tournaments. He looked confused when I laid out the first asteroid, and went on about how no one in tournaments uses them. I told him otherwise and put the tournament rules out in front of him. He took out two of his own ships by repeatedly flying through asteroids, those two were Fel's Wrath and the Saber Squadron. His remaining ships were pretty easy to take out. I only lost the Alpha in this game.

The third was against the same guy as the second as he demanded that he show me just how awesome his 4 interceptor squad was without asteroids as that is the way that the game is played. He lost this bout as well and got really pissed tossing stuff around. Broke one of my interceptors after I did the PtL action after the free barrel roll. Never thought I would meet someone that bad in this game as everyone else I have met has enjoyed it win or lose. Never going to play this guy again as long as I can help it.

My last game of the evening was against the Kessel Run Imperial list. This one made me smile as I got to play it a couple times at KRT's. I started straight across from his two interceptors, blew past them in the second movement with the 5 k-turn and was behind him. The three interceptors took down his two in the first exchange. My two TIEs were after the firespray. He got caught up on an asteroid on his second move. I worked on trying to stay in his blindspot and to the rear of him as to not worry about having to deal with the HLC. Managed to beat him without any losses that match. Talked to him a bit after the match and he revealed he has a hard time coming up with lists, so gave him advice on where to go to get help on that..aka here.

I watched a game where someone was using 3 interceptos, 2 ties and howlrunner. He was doing alright, but never had more then one to two ships in range 1 of howlrunner so she really did lose a lot of effectiveness. So this supports the claim that Howlrunner with be a lot less useful with the wave 2 stuff. Not sure who on here made that statement.

Overall it was a fun night of messing around, beyond the guy I played game two and three with. Will have to go join that gaming club at the college again sometime. Though I am considering going down to two interceptors. Got so many ideas to try out to find one that really seems to mesh with how I want to play.

DeadInkPen said:

cool story, sorry to hear about the interceptor.. did you force a trade for your broken one for his due to him breaking it?

over all it sounds like you had a pretty good night of gaming though.. 4 games is hard to get in, i'm lucky if i can get 2 games in a single night as we start around 6-6:30 and the store closes at 9

DeadInkPen said:

That's too bad about the jerk you played. Generally from what I've found, that guy is the exception, not the rule. I do hope he compensated you for the Interceptor he broke. Unfortunately where you play, I have a feeling you'll be facing him again next month. I just hope that he can have a cooler head about the game next time, especially if you're not the first one to beat him. Maybe mention something to the TO before the tournament starts to keep an eye on him.

I'm glad guys like that haven't driven you from the game. We had a few people like that at the KRT's I attended, and poor Ziggy2000's wife ended up playing them each time. The first one rattled her to the point where she didn't want to play anymore that weekend, but we talked her into continuing to play, and she ended up winning one of them.

Anyway, I'm rambling, glad you had a good time. That's a pretty good list you ran, especially if you can run it effectively, which it sounds like you did.

DeadInkPen said:

That's really incredible, and I'm sorry you had to sit through the middle two matches. I have literally seen eight-year-old children play X-wing with more grace and maturity than that.

I'm also amused that Han + 2x Rookie is now the "standard". I guessed quite a while ago that it was going to be a tough list, but not that it was going to dominate the meta! I got just one game in last night against it, using a Firespray + 4 TIE list--and, with reference to the thread topic, it only took about two rounds for me to really wish I'd brought some Interceptors. Aside from Boost, what I missed most actually wasn't the attack dice but rather the K-turn at 5.

I ended up losing after a long string of bad rolls, including three(!) shots with the Heavy Laser Cannon that failed to generate any hit results. But it was close, with a crippled X-wing as the only surviving Rebel ship, so I didn't feel like I had to break any of my opponent's models…

Vorpal Sword said:

You run across gamers like that from time to time. I like to call them the douchebag type, though a little more colorful language is added in with that description. As I said before I am going to avoid playing again with him no matter what.

I am pretty much saying its a standard as since wave 2 officially hit, I am seeing that one being used quite a bit. Though it is suffering from people not knowing the nuances of the list. Though I do see a varying degree of upgrades on Han. Though I am thinking about making a for fun list of Han with Chewbacca (crew) and Luke with R2D2 in an X-Wing as a thematic list. Maybe more of a save/aid Luke during the trench run type of mission. I have also seen quite a few of the all interceptor squads. I am expecting in a couple of months we will see where the various local games are settleing on the meta. The local regional winners sqauds will be copied first then the Worlds and GenCon winners lists.

Has anyone tried four saber squadron pilots with shields? I'm tempted to run it, but I'll have to borrow two ships. Or just buy them. They are one of my favorite ships.

My original list when we knew the stats on wave 2 was 4 sabers with VI and stealth. The problem I found with it was that it wasn't consistent. I would win 3 without losing a ship and then get demolished in the 4th game. The defense dice are really fickle and will bite you in the a$$ if you are not careful. Inerceptor are great but the take away from the empires main strength of numbers. I mainly use the 2 to 1 ratio with them any more. A 4 tie/2 int list is the way to go in my opinion.

Howlrunner with stealth and swarm

mauler

2 AP

2 alphas int