Has Anyone Had the Shuttle Actually Work?

By KineticOperator, in X-Wing

I have 4 shuttles, and a pile of theories. However, every time I have seen someone try to actually use one, it has ended badly for them.

So far I have never, not once, seen a shuttle even come close to being adequate. Poor usually, terrible sometimes, good is right out, but inadequate is definitely where they have been.

Has anyone had one actually work, in a manner that justified its 21+ points? If so, I would love to hear how.

Question: Why do you have 4 shuttles?

Maybe he wants 4 Advanced Sensors. I know I'd like those.

There was a thread recently on the same topic where I posted a successful battle report with 4 shuttles (3 omicron, 1 Captain Yorr). It's all in the sequence of stalling the initial approach and dumping stress on Yorr, but not too much, and exploiting slight rotations by bumping the backward line on the front one so that not all ships are stupidly pointing toward the same direction, or they're too vulnerable to flanks. 40 hp lets you get to at least a second fight even without koiograns.

I did in the last round of escalation. Took Jenny fully loaded with my 3 Scimitars and Jonus. I'm really starting to think the shuttle will work best in non standard games. At 100 points it just seems too limited to really earn its points back. Above 100 and you should be able to pull some sort of shenanigans as there are most likely other higher priority targets which takes the pressure off it to let it really support.

Ive played with Jendon with 3 squints. Worked pretty well.

This would have made so much more sense to my current situation had you said "I have a pile of shuttles and four theories"

I have 4 shuttles, and a pile of theories. However, every time I have seen someone try to actually use one, it has ended badly for them.

So far I have never, not once, seen a shuttle even come close to being adequate. Poor usually, terrible sometimes, good is right out, but inadequate is definitely where they have been.

Has anyone had one actually work, in a manner that justified its 21+ points? If so, I would love to hear how.

I bought 3 for the upgrades, and won a 4th one in the Tourney last Saturday. It does seem like an awfully large pile of shuttles, even for me.

The advanced sensors may be the most useful benefit from having so many...

I've only used one once or twice. I found myself repeatedly wishing I'd used a Firespray instead. ;)

I bought 3 for the upgrades, and won a 4th one in the Tourney last Saturday. It does seem like an awfully large pile of shuttles, even for me.

The advanced sensors may be the most useful benefit from having so many...

And you can have 1-2 really awesome repaints (see other threads around here) or kill one for "asteroids" (again, other threads around here).

I have one in the mail to play with soon. I'll make it work in at least 1 list! I will! Challenge accepted!

I have used it once so far, and it worked well, actually! I took Col. Jendon with engine upgrade and heavy laser cannon, Capt. Jonus (naked), and 2 Scimitar Squad pilots each with cluster missiles. When placing asteroids, I put mine as off to the side as possible to give more room to maneuver. I faced a 4x squad: Wedge, Biggs, and 2 Red squadron pilots. Turn one we both moved up. Turn two, Wedge took 4 shields off my shuttle, but then Jendon (thanks to Jonus' ability) did 4 damage to Biggs, and Jonus finished him off. The Red Squadrons did 5 damage to one of my Scimitars, but I then I killed one of the X-wings with a cluster missiles. So after two turns, 2 X-wings dead to my none. The rest of the game was just me hunting him down, and I only lost one ship.

The shuttle worked nicely with the engine upgrade- boosting let me turn enough to get something in my arc. Moving zero was also huge at one point, letting me keep a target in the shuttle's arc for another turn. Jendon's passing target locks worked nicely with the missile-carrying bombers, and Jonus' made the HLC and missiles very dangerous! I don't think I will take the shuttle without the engine upgrade- it needs all the maneuverability it can get!!!

Edited by rmb43

This feels like it should have been the beginning of a Miniatures Anonymous meeting or something.

Hi, my name is KineticOperator and I have four Lambda Shuttles.

Hi, KineticOperator.

This feels like it should have been the beginning of a Miniatures Anonymous meeting or something.

Hi, my name is KineticOperator and I have four Lambda Shuttles.

Hi, KineticOperator.

:lol:

Could it be that we all just really suck with it?

Huh, I brought the shuttle and 4 obsidian ties to a tourney last weekend and went 2-1 with it.

Passing out target locks to ties and focusing down a ship one at a time is a beautiful thing IMO.

I have used yorr effectively with ptl and interceptors with howl. Sabatoge is great and generally a game changer

I have had an excellent run with using 1 shuttle:
Col. Jendon, with ST-321, Fire Control System, and Weapons Engineer (totaling 34 points), alongside 3 Academy Pilots and Soontir Fel + Push the Limit (30 points).

I have since realized that Soontir Fel + Push the Limit would not be as good for this set as a fourth Academy Pilot and Howlrunner.

The trick is that Col. Jendon (et all) can pick up two target locks on the first turn, and can start distributing them among his allied ships. Moreover, firing at an enemy ship picks up one target locks, or potentially one target lock on the non-defending ship.

The trick I found is to have the shuttle start horizontally across your end of the field, rather than sagitally towards your opponent, and have your tie fighters coming back to the mothership every now and again.

I'll echo one successful run with Jendon +HLC passing locks to Rhymer loaded with Adv. Torps and Jonus rerolling secondary weapons. On turn 2 Rhymer launched at Wedge with Stealth Device from behind an asteroid and brought his shields down followed up by Jendon using the HLC to finish the job. Rhymer would not have been in range to get the lock himself and would not have had the action to focus to ensure his blanks were turned into hits, so a lot of credit has to go to the shuttle for setting up the shot.

Biggs really screws up the works for this squad though. Learned that if I see him again with these guys to rush ahead at full speed to get Biggs in range 2 of Rhymer so I can at least launch one torp at him.

Beyond that, I bought 2 shuttles and after getting a feel for flying them I think I bought 1 too many.

Jendon + Bombers and Janson works nicely as long as you shoot down all the opponent's ships first ^,^

Advance slowly, load up the fleet with target locks. Hammer of an alpha strike.

If they shoot down your other ships first, then the waddling Shuttle with no K-Turn, rear firing weapons, nor turret dies a lonely and horrible death.

Jendon, Krassis and Jonus was my first run, my opponent remarked afterwards how he was really freaked out by the two HLCs and Jonus. Once Jonus and Krassis were gone and he lost nothing it was just a matter of following Jendon until he died a slow, painful death.

Jendon, Soontir and Turr - Total Loss

Jendon and Fettigator - Total Loss

Jendon and 2 Tie Bombers - Total Loss x3 in tournament setting

No one even shoots at the shuttle until all other ships are gone then it is just a matter of processing shots on Jendon's back side. Always do I have the Engine Upgrade. My determination to accept the challenge and make the shuttle work is my downfall. Might do the Jendon/Krassis/Jonus squad again because I don't thjink I have been beat down enough in enough various ways with the shuttle.

I think the trick is to ram the shuttle into anything it can catch until it flys off the other side of the play area.

I really feel Like Shuttle/Tie Swarm is the best way to handle things. It's a support ship, give it some things to support. Plus Tie Swarms are great for drawing attention and blocking movement.

You can fit a sizable Tie Swarm with Jendon if you want. But keep the upgrades sparing too.

I think the shuttle can fly well but it needs an engine upgrade and advanced sensors to be anything other than a pure support ship. Once you add those upgrades I think you would be surprised by what it can do in the right hands. Theorist over on the TC blogs introduced me to the dog fighting shuttle build and it gave me a pretty good surprise. He is 2-0 in the vassal tournament with a list that features 2 sabres and a shuttle.

I've flown a list with an Omicron Group pilot equipped with vader, HLC, adv sensors, and an engine, alongside 4 black squadron pilots with draw there fire and had decent success. I killed 2 x-wings by turn 3, but had some trouble bringing down Chewie, though I ended up squeaking it out.

I'm thinking of running Kagi w/ vader, HLC, adv sensors, and an engine, alongside Fett w/ recon specialist, deadeye, slave 1, assault missile, and proton torpedo, for a tournament this weekend. We will see how it flies but I think it has some potential. Should be fun if nothing else.

I think the shuttle can fly well but it needs an engine upgrade and advanced sensors to be anything other than a pure support ship. Once you add those upgrades I think you would be surprised by what it can do in the right hands. Theorist over on the TC blogs introduced me to the dog fighting shuttle build and it gave me a pretty good surprise. He is 2-0 in the vassal tournament with a list that features 2 sabres and a shuttle.

I've flown a list with an Omicron Group pilot equipped with vader, HLC, adv sensors, and an engine, alongside 4 black squadron pilots with draw there fire and had decent success. I killed 2 x-wings by turn 3, but had some trouble bringing down Chewie, though I ended up squeaking it out.

I'm thinking of running Kagi w/ vader, HLC, adv sensors, and an engine, alongside Fett w/ recon specialist, deadeye, slave 1, assault missile, and proton torpedo, for a tournament this weekend. We will see how it flies but I think it has some potential. Should be fun if nothing else.

I am reluctant to use Kagi, also having vader on anyone higher than Yorr is a waist of points. You have to remember what vader does and when he is supposed to come into play.

This feels like it should have been the beginning of a Miniatures Anonymous meeting or something.

Hi, my name is KineticOperator and I have four Lambda Shuttles.

Hi, KineticOperator.

In that case, I will be there also ;)

I have not had the opportunity yet ti run my 4 Lambda list. No gaming this weekend, so maybe next weekend.

Omicron group, assemble! :ph34r:

I tried the other night Two Shuttles and Jonas. Shuttles had Fire-Control System (2)

Heavy Laser Cannon (7)
Mercenary Copilot (2)
Gunner (5)
Title
Anti-Pursuit Lasers (2)

100 points even. My problem was two fold, still way to new to this game to figure stuff out, and I didn't realize until my fourth match that night that I should have done stop, then green forward, stop, green forward or left/right just moving up a bit at a time.

If I had it to do over again I'd take away the HLC and the Anti-Pursuit Lasers (even though I did manage to kill one ship with the anti-pursuit laser)

The biggest issue I have with this ship is the lack of any rear firing arc. once someone got behind me, it was near impossible to get back around to attack.

The other thing that annoys me is that on the back of the ship there sits a freaking cannon, yet still no rear arc. I'd even take a rear arc with a minus to one die roll if needed.

The other thing that annoys me is that on the back of the ship there sits a freaking cannon, yet still no rear arc. I'd even take a rear arc with a minus to one die roll if needed.

It's the anti-pursuit laser.