Just playing around with builds and I thought of one that may well be horrible but the idea amused me enough that I have to try it out. The idea is Lando, Dutch, and Horton, who is armed with two protons. Between Lando and Dutch, Hortan should theoretically be able to focus+target lock every round, thus allowing him to fire off both torpedoes quickly and with his ability get some good damage off, from that point if flown in a tight formation I should be able to squeeze 5 actions a round out of the three ships which would hopefully give out enough of a damage and defense buff to squeak out a win.

Initial thoughts? I know the proton doesn't get much love from these boards and it's not a typical way to fly a y-wing either but that's honestly part of the appeal.

Vonpenguin said:

It won't be easy, but what you say makes sense regarding the Actions and all. Swarms will likely be very difficult for you, and I defeinitely feel like there's a learning curve here you're going to have to overcome (assuming of course you haven't already played a bunch of games with this list or something closely related), but there are some possibilities and potential here.

I've messed around some with a Lando, Dreis, and fill-in-the-blank list, which is kinda, sorta, similar to what you're talking about here in the Action passing department. Be sure to maneuver Dutch so that he's always acquiring something with his Target Lock if you're going to rely on that. Also, be aware that since you don't have the points for Nien Nunb, you've only got four greeen maneuvers at your disposal to hand out those Lando Free Actions and two of them are straights.

You do have some decent damage potential going for you though. Salm ought to be able to put a serious dent in a couple of ships early, which if you run into somebody who over-relies on a particular ship- Kath, Howlrunner, Vader, etc., you have a decent shot at hurting them pretty badly right off the bat- if, of course, you can maneuver Horton more effectively than they can maneuver whatever you're trying to shoot. Me personally, I'm not so great with Y-Wings so that'd be assuming a lot, your mileage may vary.

I kinda wonder if Dutch and Salm both aren't overkill one way or another. Salm already kinda can't miss at Range 2-3 with just a Focus and his card text, and in a weird way, you might be better off from a Pilot Skill perspective having Lando burn off some/ all shields and consume whatever Action token they've acquired with his primary then having a lower PS pilot fire off those torps to hopefully finish the target off or stick a critical to them. For the same points, you could roll a Gold Squadron Y-Wing with double torps and even sneak in an Ion Cannon which I think reduces this overall difficulty in running this list dramatically.

Long story long, I think you have a good core concept here building around the notion of having ships always firing with active Target Locks and a Focus token, one way or another. Making it work exactly as you have it posted will probably be really tough, but keep your mind open to some possible tweaks you'll likely end up with a fun and capable list.

Good luck!

Thank you for the in-depth response. Honestly this was originally conceived as a 120 point build, I don’t do tournaments most of the time and my regular opponents like to play with upgrades and we find that’s the sweet spot, in which case nein nunb, dual ions, luke, and one or two cheap droids, were all in play. This is the stripped down standard version. One possibility I had considered was dropping the second torp so that I could use Nein and some other low cost upgrades, thinking either weapons engineer, which is probably overkill but provides a cushion to my action economy if I can’t pull off the ideal 5 actions, r2-f2- or r5-d8 on Horton to keep him around longer, or spreading the love with the falcon title and two standard r2s.