I've been playing a few solo dry runs with HWKs amidst combinations of other Rebel ships, and it occurs to me that they would get the best use if you have a >100 squad build, like 150 or 200 points. Not that they can't be used in 100 point squads, but this would allow more pilots and more named pilots for their own piloting abilities to affect.

Say you were spending 100 points and ran Jan or Kyle with one or two upgrades (I wouldn't take them without the Moldy Crow title card, at least not Kyle). That would leave you with only about 65-70 points to spend on other ships, so you get maybe two named pilots with upgrades, or one named and a couple of vanilla pilots with some upgrades. This isn't a bad thing, but I think if there were more named pilots on the board that you could get more mileage out of a) the HWK's piloting ability and b) any passengers carried.

Between the HWK, Lambada and Bombers, I can't help but wonder if 3/4th of the ships from wave 3 weren't designed with the Epic rules in mind.

People have made those ships work just fine in 100 points lists, but they seem to take more work to work then say a X-Wing or Firespray does. With 100 point lists, there just isn't much room for 25% of that to be spent on support.

Exactly. With 150 or 200 points, you have more breathing room for support ships. I really want to use supports, especially Kyle Katarn with his focus spewing ability, but I'd prefer more ships to spend those focus tokens on.

Another though...

Look at the upgrades for B's and Bombers. There is no way you can use even even half the upgrades on those ships without them becoming too high. 2 Torpedos, or a torp/missile combo pushes even the bottom end bombers into the 24 point range. B-Wings are worse with a blue squad B being 26 points with just 1 torp.

A B-Wing with FCS, Ion Cannon, 2 Trops and a shield upgrade is 39 points, just a few points under Chewie in a YT-1300. Change that to Adv Torps, a HLC and you're now upto 47 points. 1 point higher then Han Solo. A fully loaded Bomber with eng upgrade is the same amount of points.

Now the easy answer is "they don't need the biggest and best upgrades". Which is true, they don't. But at the same time why do they have all those options if you aren't supposed to use them? The Bombers sort of make sense that you have the option of torps or missiles, or a bomb. But even then, 2 of any secondary weapon and you're back into the 4 ships for 100 points list.

So I'm even more currious to see how the Epic and Cinimatic rules work.

For the next monthly X-Wing games day at the store, we'll be going to 150 points.

You're gonna' want to run it as an AWACS, for sure. The HWK is indeed better for 100+ builds, but it's pretty **** good with two X-wings as well.

Just make sure it can defend itself.

Partly due to having a few ships, I'm considering moving to 150 point games too. Had a 100 point per player 2v2 last week with 2 noob's and it went pretty well on a 3x4, though we only had 3-4 asteroids

If you take a named pilot and a few upgrades to make a Hawk or Lambda a decent support ship, there's precious few points left out of 100 to give it a squad to support. Kyle + Garven + 2 Rookies is the best one I've played yet.

I'll have to run that list sometime. Do you think it would work well against a TIE Interceptor swarm or a squad built around the Firespray? A friend of mine that I play against often will use those combos.

The problem I ran into flying the graven Kyle list is higher pilot skills shred you. Fel and turr destroyed me while I was only able to get the other two squints he flew because of the low pilot skills they had.

I went against a nasty list last night, lando with upgrades, and two hwks with recon specialist and blaster turrets.

This game is broken @ 100 pts with all the added options in Wave 2 (and now 3)

You end up missing on 75% of the fun stuff because you need to min-max every single point you're gonna spend

I wouldn't say it is broken, but we have been playing a lot more 150. And it is more fun to play with more toys.

I think epic play will balance this out. Also I've got a guy in my local group who flys two hawks with recon specialist and the blaster turret. It works well for him.

The HWK list I really want to try is:

Roark with Blaster turret and saboteur

Garven with R2

Blue B-wing with FCS

Blue B-wing with FCS

Picasso, so it didn't go so well with your Kyle and Garven list. Can you playtest this list for me? Will still be a week before I can get people together for a game.

B wings fly first and are damage soakers.

Roark puts one of your ships to firing first with PS 12.

Garven is Roark's wingman and passes him a focus when Roark uses saboteur.

I'll see what I can do. That is an interesting solution to the low pilot skill.

You might still run into problems with them boosting out of your firing arcs

B-Wings can Barrel roll to keep ships in arc and HWK is turreted. I like the proposed synergy and having no ship standing out as the one to kill.

What was flying with Garven and Kyle in your list? What synergy were you getting with your squad?

I had a rookie an a red. In addition to Garven and Kyle. I forget how I upgraded them. My biggest problem was Fel just rocked Kyle so bad both times I played the list that there was no coming back. The squints closed so fast on me that I was out maneuvered and my x-wings couldn't focus and target lock the return fire. I'd need to fly the list a lot more to get used to it.

I've been flying Kyle in the Moldy + Recon + BT; Garven + R5, 2x Rookies.

Slow advance with 1 straights while Kyle piles up a horde of Focus. At first chance, both Rookies target lock and each one gets a focus handed to them. At times Garven can Target Lock, receive a Focus from Kyle and then pass it on to a Rookie.

Yes a high PS squad is the greatest challenge to face. So far, my best counter to that is a Thatch Weave with Kyle+Rookie on one flank and Garven+Rookie on the other.

It's also really sweet having Garven do a K-turn, receive a Focus, and then hand it off ^,^

I ran Wedge Biggs Jan and it beat Soontir + 3 Squints. Close game but with Blaster and Recon to focus it Jan pulled her weight. And then that ability.

Does handing off a focus to friendly ship count as 'spending' that focus...because as the card is written, you only gain an additional focus if you spend one (I assumed 'spending' a focus only occurred if you used it on an attack or evade roll where the focus symbol came up). Otherwise, it seems pretty hard to amass focus tokens. I must be missing something though, as it seems the rules intend for you to be able to amass focus due to all the extra tokens that come with the kit.

How exactly does it all work?

Recon Specialist works when you "perform a Focus action" -- that is when you give the ship a Focus token, you get 2. This is different than spending the focus token later on.

For Garven you have to use it to change your dice. Then and only then can you pass it off.

as for Kyle. if he has Rec Spec with him his action during the activation phase can be to get 2 focus tokens. one the activation phase is over & the combat phase begins then Kyle can pass off ONE focus token to anyone within range.

so Kyle can double focus, then when the combat starts hand one to Garven. Garven can use that focus on his evade dice (he's a PS 6 so chances are some one is shooting b4 him). and hand it off to whoever he wants (even Kyle I guess).

does that help?

Has anyone had success running more than one HWK? I was debating wether or not to buy another one or not. Maybe in 150 point games two HWK's could be interesting.

Also note that Garven can spend his Focus token to change all of his focus results, even if that number is 0, on any roll of the combat dice. Then once it's spent, pass it on.