Hi everyone, my name’s Rainbow_Chaser and just recently I won the Vancouver X-wing Regionals tournament. This is my first time ever winning a tournament in any kind of gaming format, and the second X-wing Regionals I’ve played in since the start of the tournament season.

This X-wing Regional tournament was held at Dice Age Games in Vancouver, Washington on the 8 ^th of June, 2013. Fourteen players participated in the tournament, which meant we would all play 4 rounds with no top cut. Rounds were the full 75-minute duration.

Here is the list I chose for the Vancouver X-wing Regionals:

Rookie Pilot w/ Shield Upgrade (25 points)

Rookie Pilot w/ Shield Upgrade (25 points)

‘Dutch’ Vander w/ Ion Cannon Turret (28 points)

Green Squadron Pilot w/ Push The Limit (22 points)

For inquiring minds, this list originated from the list I took to the Kessel Run hosted at Dice Age Games last fall. That list was:

Rookie Pilot (21 points)

Rookie Pilot (21 points)

‘Dutch’ Vander w/ Ion Cannon Turret (28 points)

Wedge Antilles w/ R2 Astromech (30 points)

Developing the list from Kessel Run to Regionals:

When I got hooked on playing X-wing back when it came out, I initially splurged on a Core Set and three Y-wing Expansion kits as they were one of my favorite Rebel Alliance starfighters. Regardless of any opinions otherwise, I really enjoyed flying my all-Y-wing formations – filling groups of enemy ships with target-locking, proton torping, ion-blasting frustration was my kind of style, and the only bad day you had was when you whiffed every torpedo attack dice roll in a row.

I began running ‘Dutch’ Vander early on, realizing how well he could keep all of your other starfighters locked up on enemy ships throughout the course of a game. What I began to realize though was that three or four proton torpedoes did not always provide enough damage to down large groups of TIEs. Then I came up with the idea of dropping a few Gold/Gray Squadron Pilots and their proton torpedoes for Rookie Pilots w/ R2 Astromechs, flying the X-wings at Range 1 like proton torpedoes with shield and hull points and using Dutch’s free target locking ability to make their firepower that much more damaging. This became the basis of the list I flew at the Kessel Run, earning 3 ^rd place, and proving itself to be an effective and reliable tool in my tactical toolbox.

After spending much of the winter months familiarizing myself with the wave 2 ships, and flying poorly in the May the Fourth Be with You tournament at Dice Age Games and X-wing Regionals at Olympic Cards and Comics, I went back to the drawing board with my Kessel Run list. After testing a particular X-wing/A-wing group, I came to really respect the resiliency of X-wings w/ Shield Upgrades. What I realized then was that – as much as I love how effective Wedge Antilles is at blowing up stuff (on top of being my favorite Star Wars character) – he was too much of a liability in this list. I replaced Wedge with a third Rookie Pilot and then gave shield upgrades to the other two Rookies.

My new list looked like this a week before the X-wing Regionals in Vancouver:

Rookie Pilot w/ Shield Upgrade

Rookie Pilot w/ Shield Upgrade

‘Dutch’ Vander w/ Ion Cannon

Rookie Pilot w/ R2 Astromech

Were it not for the sage advice of my good friend and fellow X-winger Cody (who won the local May the Fourth Be with You tournament) I may have dropped the ion cannon on Dutch to pick up a Shield Upgrade for the naked Rookie Pilot - testing out my new list against him quickly reminded me just how bad an idea that was, so the ion cannon stayed on Dutch. At the same time, I realized that a Rookie Pilot w/ R2 Astromech = Green Squadron Pilot w/ Push The Limit points-wise, so I changed that out and gave it a try as well. The A-wing proved its worth, acting as a “lone ranger” unit and offering tactical flexibility in the form of being able to take two actions in any combination of focus, evade, target lock, or boost – something that no other ship in this group could do. Needless to say I was happy with what I saw, so that’s what I took to Regionals.

The Tournament:

Round 1 –

My first opponent, Andy, was a new face on our X-wing scene. He ran a six TIE Fighter list that included the following:

Mauler Mithell w/ Veteran Instincts

Howl Runner w/ Swarm Tactics

Dark Curse

Backstabber

Winged Gundark

Night Beast

He won the initiative. Then he informed me that this would be the third game he’d ever played of X-wing. Okay, I thought, so he’s got the core game mechanics down – and that’s wonderful - but that group of named TIEs isn’t exactly a beginner’s list and wasn’t going to be terribly forgiving of misplays. However new my opponent was though, he turned out to be a quick study and flew all six TIEs with more foresight and fewer mishaps than I anticipated. He did opt not to use barrel rolls for the duration of the round, which didn’t help his situation, but he did focus and evade in most of the situations where I’d have done the same - so kudos to Andy for bringing the A-game he knew he could! Though I had yet to face a TIE swarm with my mixed list, it survived reasonably well, able to bring firepower to bear where and when it was needed. The highlights of this round for my list were when both my Green Squadron Pilot and Dutch one-shoted a TIE each with blasters at range 1. By the end of the match, I had lost one Rookie and Dutch, and destroyed every opposing TIE save for Dark Curse.

1-0

Round 2 –

The next pairings saw me pitted against Cody, the same friend I had been practicing for Regionals with! I was stoked because we both knew each other’s lists like the back of our hands, so here would stand only a contest of skill and luck of the dice – this was going to be a fun game. Cody’s list:

Chewbacca w/ Veteran Instincts, Gunner, Millenium Falcon title card

Rookie Pilot w/ Shield Upgrade

Green Squadron Pilot w/ Push The Limit

The first two turns of maneuvering were intense, we both decided just gun our engines headlong into each to each other while studying each other’s plan of attack in anticipation. Then the second turn of combat came with the air of the showdown at O.K. Corral: both of my Rookies and Dutch – locked and focused – staring down his entire force – locked and focused – at range 1. He had won the initiative and would win all ties for shooting, which meant my Rookies were at the bottom of the pecking order. Somebody was going get pasted really quickly, and I was probably going to be me. Chewy’s fire splashes a shield or two on my closest Rookie, and then Dutch fails to tag Chewy with his ion cannon. My A-wing has no target. His A-wing shoots and drops another shield on my Rookie. Then he rolls his four attack dice for his Rookie while I hold my breath. All misses. He spends his target lock and rerolls… all misses. Both of my Rookies return fire on his lone Rookie… his X-wing is gone a short moment later. From here my force concentrated their fire on Chewbacca and brought him down three turns later, and after a game of lousy dice rolls my friend concedes the match. Looking back, I’m still amazed all my ships survived that fight – by all rights I should’ve lost at least one or more of my X-wings had his dice treated him better. Still, an intense game with a good friend, I can’t ask for more.

2-0

Round 3 –

I actually don’t recall playing Kyle before this tournament, but we’ve talked X-wing a bit on downtime at leagues. He’s a great sport, easy-going, and just simply enjoys the game – its players like him that make games fun. Best of all, he was 2-0 in his second tournament! I was grateful to have a more relaxing round than the last two.

Kyle’s list looked like:

Garven Dreis w/ R2 Astromech

Rookie Pilot w/ R2-F2

Chewbacca w/ Veteran instincts, Gunner, Millenium Falcon title card

I knew there weren’t any real surprises to be had, and that there wasn’t anything here my list couldn’t handle. I also had a reasonable idea about what his plan of attack was. I had steady dice throughout most of the round, nothing really to write home about. Except when Chewbacca takes a range 1 shot at my A-wing and completely whiffs both times between his bad attack rolls and my good defence rolls, only for his Rookie to make the shot – at range 3, through the big asteroid, with no focus or target lock – that completely obliterates said A-wing. Go figure.

3-0

Round 4 –

I had been jones-ing to play Scott a game since I had my regional list figured out two weeks back, and as things normally go for me, that chance to do so never happened. He’s a great guy to play, knows how to build a solid ship list, and is a skilled, seasoned X-winger. So between round 2 and 3 I mention to him I hope to see him in one of my last two rounds and wish him good luck. Destiny would have it then, that we face each other – both 3-0 – jockeying for the Vancouver title. I saw Scott’s list and felt my stomach drop like a sack full of hammers…

Garven Dreis

Biggs Darklighter w/ Stealth Device, R2-D2

Rookie Pilot

Rookie Pilot

THIS LIST. I knew he would bring it, should’ve seen it coming! I fought this list once or twice before, each time mostly just rolling dice and watching my ships disappear in explosive fires. We both loathed the fact that he won the initiative (which I had now failed to gain all four rounds) – him for the fact that I now moved first, and me for the fact he now would shoot first. From my perspective, I was surely the end of the line for me. Four X-wings with superior firepower, focus support from Garven, and Biggs twisting up my targeting priority. And all I had was two Rookies and the A-wing that would be lucky to see the light of day inside four turns. Regardless, it was time to face the forging fires of the final round.

Two turns into the match we finish our maneuvers. I have my Rookies keeping a tight pair as the move up the center just behind the big asteroid, the A-wing doing an blocking/attacking outflank maneuver on my left, and Dutch bringing up the rear. His ships were in a tight diamond formation coming in from my right on an attack vector with my X-wings and Dutch. My ships are locked and focused, and his are all focused up. Garven fires the first shots from the back at range 3 trying to peel shields of my exposed Rookie, so does Biggs. Then something amazing happened: my evade dice began to work! A lot! That Rookie denies Biggs and Garven any hits, and Scotts Rookies switch targets to Dutch.

At about this point the light illuminating the details of the mid-game dim, but I do know that Scott wanted Dutch dead. I stuck one of my X-wings on the big asteroid on turn 3, I was able to pull off some fancy maneuvering when our groups clustered together in the center that allowed my Rookies to target lock Scott’s lead Rookie, which I used after executing a kiogran 4 maneuver a turn later. Dutch was eventually destroyed but not before getting a key ionization on Garven that in the following turn forced him to do a hard 3 maneuver instead of a kiogran 4 (which would’ve forced him off the field), and my two Rookies destroyed Biggs on turn 4-5 and then avenged Dutch by destroying the Rookie on turn 5-6 that destroyed him. After Biggs and the first Rookie were down, both of my Rookies and the A-wing converge on Garven’s six and drop him.

At this point I have a slightly damaged A-wing and two fully shielded X-wings versus my opponent’s remaining Rookie. He surrenders. I’ve won the match.

Final Score: 4-0

Closing Thoughts:

Personally, I want to see Scott take the title at Guardian Games on the 22 ^nd . He deserved that win as much as I did, his list was solid and scary as hell, and I couldn’t have asked for a better opponent to play in the final round.

On that note, I couldn’t have asked for a better group of X-wing players to win the Regionals title with! Thank you to everyone who came. Thanks to Fantasy Flight for making Star Wars: X-wing the great game it is. A special thanks to Jim for running the show and calling the shots, and to Lisa and Roy at Dice Age Games for hosting the Regionals in Vancouver.

-Rainbow_Chaser

Rainbow_Chaser said:

gr8 report. thanx. gr8 to see some new variations making the finals. mad respect to u for playing and winning with an A-Wing. i bet that surprised many people. PTL is a gr8 upgrade, u see how good it is when u play it/or against it. ive used it successfully on Maarek in the past… similar to ur A-Wing he gets target lock/evade or focus… although hed need engine upgrade to get the boost (ur A-Wing gets it for free!)

I also played at the Vancouver regional tourney last weekend, and also had a great time. Much to my chagrin, I was one of three dual-firespray builds…and I would end up playing both of the others!

My list: http://x-wing.voidstate.com/view/8734/starsky-hutch

Round 1:

My opponent was running Kath with HLC/Gunner/Seismic Charges & Krassis with HLC/Gunner.

I had good feelings going in to this match, as my engine upgrades typically have a huge impact on the game. Unfortunately, I lost a lot of shields early on, and it came down to his Krassis with 2 shields vs my Krassis with 5 hull. On the upside, taking Kath out with a seismic charge was extremely satisfying.

Round 2:

My opponent was running a 7-ship swarm with a mix of Tie's and Interceptors, including Mauler Mithel. He mentioned that he'd been strictly playing Rebel-only for a long time, and that all his imperial stuff still had dust on it. He tried to fly all 7 ships in a single formation, but it ended up with 2-3 of them taking actions while the remaining 4-5 collided with his other ships. I managed to drop both seismic charges on a group of 4 ships, and his fleet quickly evaporated from there.

Round 3:

My opponent had won a previous event, and was looking to "turn the trophies into bookends." He was running Han with Marksmanship/Gunner and Chewie with PTL/Falcon.

The game started off very well. He was able to force me into splitting fire between his two YT's, but his shields were dropping fast. And then, just as Boba Fett was about to pounce on Han….it happened: laziness kicked my ass. At this point in the game, all the ships were near my own board edge, so I was able to see everything just fine from my chair (while he had to stand and lean over the table to reach his own ships). Han was down 1or 2 hull, and Boba was poised to unleash 4 more dice into his tail, with focus & gunner, before Han could react (Boba was at PS 10). Han activated…and revealed a small asteroid, which I couldn't physically see because my line of sight was blocked by the falcon's hull! Instead of crippling/killing Han, Boba slammed directly into the asteroid--and even worse, had landed in such a way that I would hit it again on my next action.

Yeah, I felt pretty stupid.

So, Han & Chewie immediately finish off poor Boba and then chase Krassis down in short order.

Round 4

My opponent was the third dual Firespray player, who was running a variant of Hothie's list: Two bounty hunters with Gunner & Seismic Charges and Howlrunner with Squad Leader. Since we were both sitting at 1-2 (and thus, completely out of the running), we were able to relax and just have a fun game. He'd never seen Firesprays with Engine Upgrades before, and was pretty shocked by how easily I was able to evade his own ships. In the course of the game, he was only able to fire on me twice, and once we'd finished, told me, "I'm blatantly stealing your list, just fyi."

So, I finished 2-2, with two mirror matches and a double YT opponent. While I would have preferred to take home the lucite brick, it was still a great day with four fantastic opponents. The TO decided to divvy up the plastic Focus tokens among all the players, so we each got five plus the event patch. I also scored an oversized Boba Fett / Han Solo pilot card for my trouble, which was just fine by me.

Kudos to Dice Age games for running a great event.

After Winning Regionals In Olympia WA I came with to the Diceage Vancouver WA Event.

I ran Han Solo with Gunner and Marksman and Chew with PTL and Falcon.

#1 Game: 1-0

Found my self vs to Salve units. The player had a good build but made 5 errors during play that let me chrew threw him very fast.

#2 Got a bad draw to play vs my best friend of 15 years.

He was running Salve with heavy cannon, Backstabber, Howl Runner and Mauler Mith with Squad leader on Mauler and Swarm on Howl

Game started ok but having played 100+ games vs me he knew how to mess up my play. He took a big gamble and pushed in hard and killed Chew in the 1st two rounds. He then worked over Han and I had my 1st loss with my build in 30 games.

#3 Played Catpeeler. Good guy. Had a nice build but again he made a few errors and I was able to clean up.

Q: Round 3:

"My opponent had won a previous event, and was looking to "turn the trophies into bookends." He was running Han with Marksmanship/Gunner and Chewie with PTL/Falcon.

The game started off very well. He was able to force me into splitting fire between his two YT's, but his shields were dropping fast. And then, just as Boba Fett was about to pounce on Han….it happened: laziness kicked my ass. At this point in the game, all the ships were near my own board edge, so I was able to see everything just fine from my chair (while he had to stand and lean over the table to reach his own ships). Han was down 1or 2 hull, and Boba was poised to unleash 4 more dice into his tail, with focus & gunner, before Han could react (Boba was at PS 10). Han activated…and revealed a small asteroid, which I couldn't physically see because my line of sight was blocked by the falcon's hull! Instead of crippling/killing Han, Boba slammed directly into the asteroid--and even worse, had landed in such a way that I would hit it again on my next action.

Yeah, I felt pretty stupid.

So, Han & Chewie immediately finish off poor Boba and then chase Krassis down in short order."

Round 4

Was vs Chew with Gunner, A wing and Rookie X wing.

He started out strong but I was able to in in 18 min out of a 75 min round.

Ended the day 3-1 Should have won the tournament to compleat my bookends lol. But didn't work out :-)~ Next event will be different.

Great battle report. I knew things were going bad for me in our finals game when, after the first two rounds of shooting, I had only done 1 damage. Your A-Wing took 3 shots from my guys at range 1 and I only knocked off 1 shield, while Biggs was almost dead. After that I made some poor piloting choices and I wasn't able to focus my fire on any ship except Dutch. I think frustration got the best of me there, but you played a great game, and took advantage of my mistakes. The Ion you did on Garven was huge, and sealed my fate.

Rainbow_Chaser said:

Congrats on your victory, and thanks for the write-up! I really enjoy reading through these!

I'm a little puzzled about the portion I quoted above, though, because AFAIK that's not how initiative works. The player who has initiative moves first AND fires first. The direct quote from the rulebook is:

"When ships of equal pilot skill value are activated,
the player with initiative activates all of his ships
with that pilot skill value first. Then the opposing
player activates his ships. Initiative also applies
during the Combat phase; the player with initiative
resolves combat steps for his ships with that pilot
skill value before his opponent (see “Simultaneous
Attack Rule” above)."

I have heard that some folks play it like you did, but I don't find anything in the FAQ or tournament rules that changes what's stated in the rulebook. Did you have a house rule that made it that way?

Initiative:::: you have initiative, you move first, perform actions, then other player moves and performs actions, finally initiative player shoots first, then opponent shoots.

Rainbow_Chaser said:

We both loathed the fact that he won the initiative (which I had now failed to gain all four rounds) – him for the fact that I now moved first, and me for the fact he now would shoot first.

Congrats on your victory, and thanks for the write-up! I really enjoy reading through these!

I'm a little puzzled about the portion I quoted above, though, because AFAIK that's not how initiative works. The player who has initiative moves first AND fires first. The direct quote from the rulebook is:

"When ships of equal pilot skill value are activated,

the player with initiative activates all of his ships

with that pilot skill value first. Then the opposing

player activates his ships. Initiative also applies

during the Combat phase; the player with initiative

resolves combat steps for his ships with that pilot

skill value before his opponent (see “Simultaneous

Attack Rule” above)."

I have heard that some folks play it like you did, but I don't find anything in the FAQ or tournament rules that changes what's stated in the rulebook. Did you have a house rule that made it that way?

My bad! I meant to say, "him for the fact that HE now moved first, and me for the fact he now would shoot first."