Guest Blog: One Fantastic Community: One Fantastic Title

This blog is called Stay on the Leader and for me the leader I’ve been trying to hang onto the coat tails of is Tom Reed.  The Reed family already have a former UK National Champion in their ranks with father, Craig, and after a fantastic 2016 they can now also count the Italian National Champion among their number.  To date this year Tom has bagged no less than 5 Store Championship titles, 3 Regional Championships, won the Kashyyyk Open and now the Italian National Championships as well.  His Worlds ticket is booked and one more title is firmly in his sights at the end next month.

That makes me very pleased to be able to hand over the reins of this blog to special guest columnist Tom and let him share his globe-trotting ‘X-Wing Italiano’ experience with you…

(Full Pairings, Results and some Squad Lists from the Italian National Championships can be found at http://nerdando.com/report-x-wing-national-event-2016/)

One Fantastic Community: One Fantastic Title

This past weekend myself and a small team of Brits took our second trip to Italy - this time we were over for the Italian Nationals.  On our first trip, for the Kashyyyk Open, Wave 8 had arrived in Italy only hours before the first games kicked off which gave us a big advantage as we’d been able to play the new ships for weeks ahead of the event.  Triple Jumps has been massive in the UK and against the understandably underprepared Italians it hit like a train.  That advantage of extra practice with Wave 8 meant we actually ended up making the final game of the Kashyyyk Open an all-Reed affair between myself and my brother Scott!

Although we had taken their Open slot on the first visit we were warmly welcomed by the Italian players and invited back for their National Championships.  This time around, with the element of Jumpmaster surprise well and truly gone, we expected a really tough weekend in Italy. The gaming scene over there is very well developed, with a huge Warhammer and 40K scene, and X-Wing has been growing steadily.  We certainly didn't expect to have such an easy time of it. 

The trip started Friday morning with a 2 hour drive to Liverpool for a flight over to Pisa.  I hate flying.  As in: hands-on-the-seat-in-front-window-down-white-face-ignore-the-cabin-crew, really, really hate flying - but I thought it would be worth it.  With that ordeal over, and a great pizza in Modena on Friday night, I could drop into X-Wing mode for Saturday. 

Seeing this at the airport... maybe a good omen?

The first experience that morning set the theme of the weekend: breakfast in the hotel was the first chance to re-encounter some of the Italian players and the welcome was fantastic. Our Italian hosts could not have been more welcoming. The X-Wing was great, but it was their warmth and generosity which justified every cent penny spent to get there.  

Arriving at the venue this happened again and again - handshakes and, erm, kisses on both cheeks from the guys we had met at the System Open and loads of the ETC guys.  But once greetings were exchanged and stories swapped, we settled down for the serious stuff.

Yes, It Was Jumpmasters

I had got on the Triple Jumpmasters bandwagon early which gave me the chance to tinker with the list during the gap between Store Champs and Regionals. The R4 Agromech nerf changed things a bit but I've been flying my current list for a good long while now and had a lot of success with it despite the nerf.  The only change I made was a decision to drop the list from 99 to 98 points.  As events were to prove, this was a good move:

• Contracted scout - Plasma torp - Extra munitions  - Overclocked R4 - Deadeye - 4 Lom - Guidance Chips (33)

• Contracted scout -  Proton torp  - Extra munitions - Overclocked  R4 - Deadeye - Boba Fett - Guidance Chips (34) 

• Contracted scout - Plasma Torp - Adaptability - K4 Security droid - Guidance chips (31)

Early in the season I'd experimented with a pure "Bumpmaster" designed to block other Jumpmasters and prevent them for getting their torpedoes away.  Over time I'd decided that it was better to use one of the Jumps as a potential blocker which could also get actions in even when banging up against other Jumps and still provide a torp threat, which is where the K4 Security Droid version came from.  Adaptability lets me drop my PS to ensure I can bump and the K4-Security Droid gives me a target lock to fire now that I’m not using Deadeye.  Critically, a 2 point initiative bid put me ahead of most other Jumpmaster lists. 

The raiding party of Brits are ready to go!
(L-R) Nick Barker, Rob Derbyshire, Scott Reed, Tom Reed, Craig Reed

Round 1 vs Maurizio Cignoni 

Not the start I wanted: Carnor Jax and the Inquisitor in the same list, with a Tie blocker to top it off.  The game started well and the initial engagement went to plan so within 3 or 4 turns the Tie had met its end.  But that was where the good stuff ended.  Out-flown, out-thought and a 100 – 12 loss.  If nothing else, this confirmed my view of the Italian scene - it's highly competitive with a bunch of skilful players.  Maurizio managed a turn where he dropped Jax into the only spot I had not blocked and followed it with a 3 Turn to sit next to all my ships.  Maurizio deserved the game right there and all credit to him.  

So far, so not worth 800 miles in the air.  By the end of the game, I knew I was up against it for the rest of the day...

Loss: 12-100 (0 Wins, 1 Loss)

Round 2 vs Daniele Prejano

Probably the nicest opponent you could ever hope for, this guy had presented the Reed family with a light up engine Soontir Fel when we visited last time - it's pretty cool - and it was a pleasure to share a game with him.  Unfortunately for Daniele this was a mirror match where his U-boats were set up to kill aces and mine were designed to kill his. With the initiative advantage I could bump his ships and I set up the initial engage where I was firing 3 torpedoes to Daniele's 1. That tells the story of the game, which I closed out by only losing my single torpedo Jumpmaster.  Back in the room!

Win 100 – 31 (1 Win, 1 Loss)

Round 3 vs Rob "Bob Dee" Darbyshire 

Well it had to happen - two of the travelling contingent meeting each other. With all 5 of us travelling Brits on 1-1, there was a good chance of facing one of our own and it happened to Bob and I.

Bob was also running Triple Jumps and the game was similar to my second round in the sense I had initiative and made it count.  I managed to control range on the first exchange and came out better. The dice were fairly unpleasant to Bob which made the gap bigger than it should have been, but I was glad of the MOV as due to a poor game 1 I was playing catch up.

 Win 100 – 16 (2 Wins, 1 Loss)

Interlude - The Heat
I think it was about this point that the phenomenal heat of the day was really taking its toll. You know it's hot when you see an Italian sweating - those guys normally wear their padded gilets in 27 degree heat but were very much in t-shirt and shorts mode for Nationals.  Our travelling party of Brits were taking turns to do trips to the shop fridge to get armfuls of cold water bottles!  We were dropping about half a litre of water every hour.  There's a lot of (slightly overstated) advice about food and hydration offered to tourney players, but this time it was bang on.  I've known some heat in my time but to stay mentally focussed in the unavoidable heat was tough.

 Round 4 vs Adriano Grassi

With the prevalence of Jumpmasters this was to be my only test against a mini Crack Swarm.  Adriano wasn’t running with any PS 1 academy pilots, but this bunch came with a fully tooled up Tomax Bren whose missiles scared me – not as scary as a plane ride, but still scary.  Spacing out the rocks during asteroid placement and splitting my ships allowed me to approach from three different angles and make use of the available space and this was a game where I was careful to ensure I had actions.  In the end I did manage to get the block I needed, resulting in Tomax dying without firing a missile.  This was decisive and allowed the turrets to mop up with everything in close proximity whilst bumping Adriano’s Ties out of their actions.

Win 100 – 32 (3 Wins, 1 Loss)

Round 5 vs Simone Provenzano 

Another Palp Aces list like the one I faced in the first round, but this time Darth Vader was standing in for Carnor Jax and Simone’s shuttle was equipped with an Engine Upgrade which Simone was carrying to counter any escaping Manaroos.  The asteroid placement again helped out here and meant the left half the board was very obstructed with two clear firing/ moving lanes. I stalled by self-bumping until the shuttle committed down my left flank before racing for those lanes and closing the space off. Again, the blocks paid off and Vader’s lack of Autothrusters really told as even my 2 dice turret shots chipped him down.  On the other side of the board Simone’s attack dice abandoned him leaving me with a good win against a skilful player. 

Win 100 – 0 (4 Wins, 1 Loss)

Round 6 vs Tony Petriconi 

Of all the round 6 draws I didn’t want (just behind having to duel it out with a family member) was this matchup.  Tony and I had been exchanging regular messages about the game and Jumpmaster options since I was over there for the System Open, so the prospect of knocking out a good friend wasn’t a nice feeling but something that’s part of the game. Again, this was a Triple Jump mirror match in which the choice to drop a point to 98 came good and, again, I milked the initiative advantage for a decisive edge.

Win 100 – 34 (5 Wins, 1 Loss)

Interlude: Tourney Dinner.  Really?
After the games on day 1, we had ourselves an X-Wing first and an absolutely stunning event.  That night, most of the competitors in Nationals sat down for a group meal put on at the sports complex we had been playing at. This was stunning - two courses of pasta and some amazing meat, cheese and bread malarkey, all accompanied by plenty of sparkling red wine. Three of our UK team hadn't managed to make cut and didn’t need to be sharp in the morning, so let’s just say they “took full advantage of the hospitality”.  

It really goes without saying that it was good; we were eating in Italy, where serving a bad meal will see the chef and his family exiled, but to see X-Wingers from all over the country come together like this to eat and drink together was a special thing.  It was very similar to the camaraderie we enjoy in our friendly domestic scene, with the teams mixing, sharing a drink or two and demonstrating what a fantastic community we have.  It is often said that the community sells the game, and it was a genuine delight to see that this isn't limited to the UK. 

I genuinely wonder if the way the game is designed contributes to this - the cards are open, the dials remain hidden only for a few moments and the players often have to work together to move ships. 

Day 2: Ship Gets Serious

With 80 players in Italian Nationals there was a cut to top 16.  I'd spotted a lot of Dengaroo, Party Bus and Triple Jump builds in the cut which gave me some confidence - I'd had a lot of experience against those builds and thought I could at least approach the games with a tested plan.

Top 16 vs Marco Peloni 

Potentially my best performance of the weekend: a starter against Dengaroo.  I managed to get some good range control and force the early expenditure of counter measures.  With that gone the Plasma Torpedoes made the dent that the Proton Torpedo needed to remove the Punishing One title with Boba Fett, which probably secured the game. 

Win 100 – 48 

Top 8 vs Roberto Savino 

This was the scariest moment since my loss in Game 1 on Saturday, for a number of reasons: Defenders are tough, Palpatine is always bad news and there was, weirdly, a bomber shuttle carrying Rebel Captive.  Roberto had also beaten my Dad by 4 points in Round 6 to qualify so I knew he was handy!  I knew that if I could get through the game, I could approach the rest of the builds in the event with confidence.

This was an extremely strange build that on first look shouldn’t work, but it really did. Tomax Bren with Rebel Captive, Hull Upgrade and Crack Shot became more of a problem then I expected. With a bit of much-needed luck I landed Blinded Pilot and Direct Hit criticals which later put me in the driving seat, leaving 2 Jumpmasters to get torpedoes off at the Defender and eventually secure the win. It was a tricky match which proved that peculiar, but good, builds can go a long way even in a meta heavy environment. 

Win 100 – 64

Top 4 vs Alessandro Marmorini 

Every player who wins a major event has some luck along the way and mine came here.  This was another Triple Jumps match and the first I didn’t automatically get initiative against.  Luckily the dice gods smiled on me and gave me the single hit I needed to choose initiative and go first.  Unfortunately it went wrong very quickly for Alessandro, who I think was trying something new that didn’t quite go to plan: a barrel roll towards me left one of his ships millimetres inside range three of two missile boats and effectively handing me the game right there.  However he reacted like a champ and was an absolute joy fly against.

Alessandro’s one of the big characters of the lively Italian scene and it was a privilege to play him.

Win 100 – 0

Ah. I made the final. That's good. 

Final vs Dante Stefanucci 

Another Dengaroo build from Dante, this time without Recon Specialist but with torps on both Manaroo and Dengar, which made for a matchup I was fairly happy with.  Steaming up the left side of the board after stalling twice I made Manaroo turn back along her board edge, and that meant that when the initial combat took place with Dengar she was within range two and Lone Wolf could not trigger.  Again the Plasma Torpedoes did the leg work for a Proton Torpedo and I used Boba to strip the vital title.  After initially looking fairly behind in the match up, the lack of title and my positioning  won out and Dengar was removed, leaving far too much for Manaroo to do on her own...

And I'm the National Champion of Italy!  It's been a really good year for me, but to take a National event is amazing. It was super hot in there, which perhaps explains why my eyes got so sweaty at that moment.  

Probably. 

Win 100 – 33

As well as the all-important trophy for winning the National Championships I've been spoiled by my Italian hosts on both visits, who had arranged custom-painted ships to be added to the prizes for both the Kashyyyk Open and the Nationals.  I think you'll agree that they all look fantastic, and if anybody ever manages to prise the Jumpmasters from my hands then I look forward to getting them onto the table as soon as possible!

A Galaxy Not So Far, Far Away

With the ETC, cheap flights into Europe, the prospect of more System Opens and a European Championship  it looks like the larger European community is going to get more and more chances to meet and play, and I couldn’t recommend it more.  If you can spare the time and the money (and I reckon this 4 day trip cost about £250 including flights, hotel room and car hire), then please, get out to a foreign National Championship.  There's the chance to make a holiday of it or just enjoy a weekend with the lads.  The experiences we’ve shared and friends we have made go to strengthen the X-Wing ethos that is the same - but different - in countries hundreds of miles apart.

All in all, massive thanks to my travelling buddies, my opponents and, most of all, to the wonderfully inclusive, friendly, funny, talented Italian community!  And their chefs. 

Now, let me settle down to prepare for some Intercontinental X-Wing at Worlds! 

"You Switched Off Your Targeting Computer..." - Something casual for the Post-Nationals meta

Not every tournament can be a National Championships, and not every blog can be about cutting edge tech and insight.  With Nationals behind us, Regionals still off in the distance ahead and a new wave coming up it's 'Silly September' and time to dig out the lists that you know aren't worldbeaters but you just like flying with, or want to try out a wacky new combo.

For me that's been an excuse to become acquainted with a certain Mr Corran Horn and to pair him with my favourite Ghost pilot; Kanan Jarrus.

Corran Horn

I never really got the hype for Corran.  This might sound odd to a lot of you but remember that I'd come into the game around the time of Poe Dameron and Red Ace locking up the Rebel fighter slots, and then recently even Corran's place alongside the new improved Super Dash was lost to the VCX-100.  With that in mind most of my experience of Corran Horn was being played outside of the best lists and I'd usually look over the table and struggle to see what he was doing that justified being a whole bunch of points more expensive than Poe.

Well I'm happy to say that, now, I kind of get it.  He's super-expensive but the System slot and double-tap just about justifies the extra cost.  The E-Wing dial is a bit sketchy for using with R2-D2, particularly with Push The Limit (you need either green 1 banks or hard 2 turns) but having tried both the popular variants of Corran I've become enough of a fan to paint myself Corran's custom CorSec-green E-Wing.

There's two common versions of Corran because there's two EPTs you want him to have but you can only pick one.  If you take Veteran Instincts to make him PS10 and get the drop on the likes of Soontir Fel then you need to go with Fire Control System for the action economy of free Target Locks that really pay off in the double-tap scenario.  Alternatively if you turn to Push The Limit for your action economy then adding a Fire Control System on top is a bit superfluous but Advanced Sensors give you some great pre-dial options.  Advanced Sensors also combines well with Push The Limit to allow you to immediately clear your stress with a green maneuver (just be sure not to dial a red K-turn!).

I've tried both and been successful with both, but if you're not scared of Soontir Fel and happy just playing for funsies then you can probably lose the PS10 of Veteran Instincts and just enjoy all the extra options that PTL/Advanced Sensors give you.

Kanan Jarrus

When the Ghost expansion first came out my playgroup went through a bit of a period of trying to min-max just how much of a defensive fortress you could build with Kanan Jarrus.  We tried him with Biggs Darklighter to shield the Ghost's 0 Agility, we tried him with Lando Calrissian crew for extra Focus tokens, we tried him with Jan Ors crew for evades, we tried him with an Ion Cannon and Attack Shuttle for extra control, we tried him with a Kyle Katarn HWK for support, we tried him alongside a tanky Chewbacca in the Millenium Falcon... we tried him with pretty much everything.

Although the uber-tanky Kanan fortress won a lot of games against unsuspecting opponent it never really made the cut as a top list because keeping the guys together in formation limited your options too much.  Ultimately it was the Lothal Rebel/Hera crew Ghost that could dart about the table which proved the breakout build for tournaments, but I never lost my love of frustrating opponents with Kanan Jarrus.

Recon Specialist and Fire Control System are pretty standard additions to the Kanan Jarrus version of Ghost for the action economy the give you, so I stuck with those as basic building blocks for the squad.  

Less obvious is that I've chosen an Ion Cannon Turret and Chewbacca crew to round out the build, so, what's the deal there?

Well for the Ion Cannon Turret it's primarily there because I just find Ion an interesting thing to bring into games.  With this list I will bring the three largest asteroids and that gives plenty of things that my opponent has to worry about being Ioned into if he's not careful.  

Secondly, though, I think the Ion Cannon Turret does actually complement Corran Horn quite well because it helps you to control traffic while Corran either runs away to regenerate shields or sets up his lethal double-tap shots.  

I've used the Ion Cannon Turret to great effect in all sorts of matches.  Playing against a list of 3 B-Wings and a Stresshog I managed to mess up my initial engagement and flew Corran right into the teeth of my opponent's ships - he came out the other side with 3 stress tokens and 1 hull left!  But thanks to the Ion Turret I was able isolate Corran to just one-on-one against a B-Wing while the Stresshog tried to turn around and Kanan kept the other two B-Wings tied up.  Corran recovered his shields and picked the B-Wings off one-by one as I won comfortably.   

In another game earlier this week against Dash Rendar it was second Ion Cannon Turret shot onto Dash that set up the Ghost blocking Dash's 1-forward move and allowed Corran to slip into the Heavy Laser Cannon's donut for a kill shot.  Everyone focuses on Twin Laser Turret as their weapon of choice, or the bargain Autoblast Turret, but for fun & games I don't think much can match leaving your opponent helplessly drifting into asteroids with Ion sparks flying across his cockpit.

Adding Chewbacca crew came about after a failed attempt at using Moff Jerjerrod to avoid stacking up nasty critical hits on an Imperial Decimator.  The idea was good in theory, but in practice just turning the crit face down wasn't doing enough to justify the slot.  What I really needed was for Jerjerrod to allow me to scrap a crew member to discard a nasty Critical Hit altogether.

Kind of... err... kind of... like... let me read that Chewbacca crew again?

For 4pts Chewbacca is always worth at least 2 hull points (3 if you prevent a Direct Hit), making him much more efficient than a Hull Upgrade or Shield Upgrade alone, but the real added value is that he offers some protection from the critical hits that can really ruin your day, like a Damaged Sensor Array or Damaged Engine.

I'm not really surprised that Chewbacca hasn't seen play before now because the Rebels haven't had the right large ship for him.  On the Millenium Falcon you'll get more value from C-3PO, for instance, and something like Super Dash is already using the crew slot for something more important.  There just hasn't really been the sort of 0 agility hog that is the Ghost for Chewbacca to sit in.  Yes, 4pts is a lot to pay for pure defense but on a defensive pilot like Kanan with Ion Cannon Turret the extra turn on the table that Chewbacca gives you, or the protection from a bad critical hit, can really make a difference.  You should be dead, but you're not and instead you Ion the incoming ship and duck out the way next turn, lining Corran up for a kill.  Without Chewbacca you'd be dead, they wouldn't be Ioned, and Corran would be chasing empty space.  That exact situation happens more often than you'd think.

Partnering Up

Throwing those two ships together comes out at 97 points, and for the remaining 3pts I'll usually add Plasma Torpedoes and Guidance Chips to the Ghost just to make people worry about the rear arc, but there's a case to be made for giving Corran Horn a Hull Upgrade and buy him time to regenerate his shields if he winds up taking a pounding.  

The two guys really need to work together more than in most squads - Kanan is the shield for anyone chasing Corran and Corran needs to work fast to remove threats that are chasing Kanan.  The Ion Turret helps in both those plans because any turn you can Ion somebody out of having a shot you're preventing incoming fire. This isn't the type of list where you're setting up apart from each other, this is very much about working as a team.  

A good initial engagement would see Kanan and Corran combining forces to throw 10 or 12 dice at the same target through their front arcs and try to remove a threat through sheer force of dice.  What you have to manage during the game, though, is how inconsistent your dice threat is.  Unlike most lists where your red dice output is quite constant it's relatively common for this list to throw 10 dice one turn then 3 the next with an Ion Turret, then maybe 6 dice with a Turret and Corran not double-tapping, then you've set up a big 12 dice turn.  It requires a bit more forward planning than just being able to fire at what's in front of you each turn and letting the damage add up.  You're required to be planning ahead for where you can Ion Turret a ship to drift helplessly across the table and how you can get Corran there two turns later with a Focus and a Target Lock ready to take advantage.

When you pull that off it can be really rewarding, both on a spiritual/emotional level and on the level of just battering a plastic ship off the board in one turn.  But that you have to be working that hard to kill ships is also probably where this list falls short of being 'good' and becomes one just to bring out when you're trying to bring your game down a notch or two and just spend an evening playing X-Wing.

Maybe you'll want to give my list a try in 'Silly September', and if you enjoy it or come up with some good suggestions for changes then I'd love to hear them!

"Laser-Dodging Gangster" - Soontir Fel and You

Soontir Fel.  Few pilots in the whole of the X-Wing Miniatures Game trigger the sort of emotional response that you get when you start talking about the elite Imperial Ace who has crushed so many dreams.  When I was starting to think about this blog I posted a question on the UK X-Wing Facebook page asking people to describe Soontir Fel in three words.  I expected to get a dozen replies, maybe 20 max.

I got over 140, and I've turned some of those responses into word clouds that show precisely what players think of Soontir.

EVERYONE, it seems, has an opinion on Soontir Fel and whether that opinion is good or bad seems to depend largely on whether you're on on his team or up against him!

Love him or hate him, and plenty of players do both, I'm going to look at what the pieces are that make Soontir Fel's TIE Interceptor such a formidable opponent and then at what you can do to try and knock the cocky Imperial baron off his perch should you find yourself across the table from him.

F@#$ing Soontir Slippery Fel

The secret to Soontir's notoriety is encapsulated by that one word: Slippery.  I also liked some of the other descriptions I got in my three word replies, such as "Like Nailing Fog" or the plea for him to "Bloody hold still!".   What Soontir does best is avoid taking damage, with the powerful EPT Push The Limit sitting at the base of two potent defensive strategies - Arc-Dodging and Turtling.  

Arc-dodging means precisely what it says - with the combination of a Boost and/or Barrel Roll coming in at PS9 the nimble TIE Interceptor can frequently avoid all incoming fire entirely by simply seeing where the opponent's firing arcs are and then maneuvering out of them.  Usually Soontir Fel equips Autothrusters that mean you can't engage him effectively at long range, but the closer you get to a TIE Interceptor the more narrow your cone of fire becomes and the easier it is for Soontir to duck sideways to somewhere you can't shoot at him.  This might mean Soontir misses his own shot but the Imperial Aces player frequently plays a slow waiting game, usually happy to give up a shot of his own to avoid incoming fire on his fragile TIE.  He'll back his own maneuverability to create another shooting chance at some point in future turns so long as he lives past this one.

'Turtling' is usually the TIE Interceptor's Plan B, coming into force when Soontir finds himself unable to dance away from opposing firing arcs - say you've laid down arcs from several ships and he can't avoid all of them, or your ships have a higher Pilot Skill so he doesn't know exactly where your arc is going to fall.  The classic 'turtle' move is for Soontir to take a Focus action and an Evade action, gaining a second Focus token from his pilot ability, and then daring you to try your hardest against his fantastic dice modification.

This table clearly shows just how effectively Soontir's defensive upgrades combine to shield the TIE Interceptor from incoming fire.  A typical 3 dice attack against a naked TIE Interceptor would deal 0.6 damage on average, and 1.2 damage if you could manage to sneak into range 1 for an extra dice.  The extra green dice from Stealth Device and the Evade token that Push The Limit enables you to stack alongside Focus rapidly shunt those chances of hitting down to a 93% chance of missing entirely at range 2 - just 0.1 damage on average, and only 0.3 damage at range 1!

As if that wasn't bad enough it gets even worse if Soontir Fel is flying escort for the Emperor on his Lambda shuttle.  The combination of the Emperor and an Evade token almost entirely shuts down your chances of doing any damage with 3 red dice, and cuts even a range 1 attack down to only a 6% chance of doing any damage at all!

This, in a nutshell, is what vexes opponent's of Soontir Fel most badly.  One of the descriptions I got was "No point shooting" and what this table shows is that unless you're at Range 1 then lot of the time that's basically true, especially when the Emperor is on hand to help iron out the last few odd chances that something may go wrong.   The whole build of Soontir's TIE Interceptor is an overlapping web of complementary defensive upgrades that box any resistance into near-futility.  

Soontir Fel can just be a black hole for your red dice, gobbling up any hits that you try to throw his way. 

This is what happened to Jeff Berling in the final of the North American Championships last month when even the dreaded Dengaroo found itself hurling all its red dice into the abyss of Soontir Fel's slipperiness for zero reward, ultimately costing him the game.

 Almost whatever your plan is, Soontir has the appropriate response to hand..

• Try to stay at long range to keep him in arc?  He's got Autothrusters.
• Try to get close for an extra dice?  He's going to barrel roll out of your arc.
• Try to pin him in multiple arcs to wear down his one-shot Evades and Palpatine uses?  He can probably dodge clear of some of your shots and still have a Focus and Evade.
• Use a turret so he can't arc dodge?  Autothrusters again.
• Bring a high PS pilot to stop him dodging arcs?  Well you can't afford many of them, then, and he'll defend with Evade and Palpatine.

So... what the hell ARE you supposed to do!?!?

Going Monster Hunting

If you allow Soontir Fel to run wild and free he's probably going to win, especially if you try and fight fair.  It doesn't really matter how many generic X-Wings or TIE Fighters you bring to the party, he's probably going to see them all off by a combination or dodging and turtling.  I've heard legend of players who took 35 points of Soontir Fel to tournaments and managed to win games against opponents running 100pts of ships, and I believe them!  

No, to beat this laser-dodging gangster you need to come properly equipped for the hunt if you want to stand a chance.  Failing that you need be prepared to fight smart or better yet... fight dirty!

"What do you kids need all this stuff for?"
"Monster Hunting"
"Oh.  Okay"

If we take the start point of assuming that we're going to be trying to kill Soontir when he has all his actions available and the Emperor watching over his dice then the odds of us dealing any damage at all are very slim indeed, even if we manage to catch him at range 1.  

So what upgrades can we use to try and shift those odds in our favour a bit?

Push The Limit

In this example I'm assuming we use Push The Limit (or similar action economy) to fire at Soontir Fel with both a Focus and a Target Lock to modify our dice so that we get more hits and put more pressure on his green dice.  Unfortunately, as the table shows, Soontir is so good at producing evades with his dice that simply making your dice better doesn't really improve your chances.  The biggest impact from making your dice better isn't that you push much more damage through, it just makes it much more likely that you force Soontir to start burning his Evades/Focuses/Palpatines to prevent the damage, so perhaps if you can follow up with a second attack you might reap rewards from adding Push The Limit.

Push The Limit is standing in for most of the positive dice modification you can add to your attack, so it can also represent the top end of what you might get from Predator/Dengar allowing you to reroll some blanks.  PTL is giving you a full target lock of rerolls which is better than either of those options, so you can safely assume that Predator/Dengar are not the key to beating Soontir as they're both worse than a target lock.

Wedge / Tractor Beam

Both these effects remove an Agility from the target, so if modifying your own red dice with a Target Lock doesn't do very much then do you get better results from taking away one of Soontir's green dice?

Well... no.  Not really.  

The results are almost identical to Push The Limit improving your dice because while ignoring the extra dice that the TIE Interceptor gets from the Stealth Device does help it doesn't deal with the fact that in an Evade Token and Palpatine they effectively start out with 2 evade results before they even have to roll their green dice.

Zuckuss & 4-LOM

These tricky bounty hunter crew cards have been nipping around the edges of tournaments ever since they arrived in Wave 8 because although they can be painful to use they bring some effective interfering with your opponent's defences for a super-low cost of just 1pt.  So how do they do in your test?

Well compared to taking away an Agility they're actually pretty good, and when the opponent has four green dice they're pretty similar because forcing your opponent to reroll any of his non-blank dice with Zuckuss pretty much adds up to the 1 evade result you can certainly deny your opponent by using 4-LOM to block their use of the Evade Token in your attack.  Where the two bounty hunters differ is that if you're going to be attacking with several ships then 4-LOM is only supressing the Evade Token for his attack, while the benefit of the extra pressure from Zuckuss carries over into future attack if you were able to force Soontir to spend his Evade Token to avoid damage.

Even so, although bringing either of these boys to the fight is about twice as effective as something like Push The Limit or Wedge it's still only a small chance of dealing damage, especially if you can't catch Soontir in arc at range 1!

Gunner

Much more expensive than either of the bounty hunter options but available to every faction is the Gunner, who gives you a second shot at downing your target if the first one misses.  The strength of this upgrade against Soontir Fel is that if you're able to force him into burning his one-shot Evade/Emperor uses on the first shot you've got a much better chance of pushing damage through with your second shot.  In fact the one thing really standing in the way of Gunner being an excellent option against Soontir Fel in particular is that Soontir gets a second Focus Token when he 'turtles', meaning hes'  still got good defences for the second attack.

That second Focus has a big impact on how good Gunner is, meaning that for an extra four points you don't really swing your odds of hitting Soontir all that much.  A second reason for why you don't get all that extra point investment back in damage dealt is that you might not have enough dice modification to make your second attack as dangerous as it could be.  The shots where you roll three natural hits with your first attack and then Focus three hits up in your second attack are going to put a lot of pressure onto Soontir's tokens, but too often you're going to come out of rolling those 6 dice with only 4 or 5 hits and Soontir can flex his defences to match them.

This is why upgrading to the super-gunner of Luke Skywalker makes such a difference to your damage output because he means your second shot can put more pressure on Soontir's dice once his tokens have been spent on your first.  It's also similar to the sort of result other 'double tap' effects like Corran Horn or Dengar might have when they've got more dice modification to back up the second shot, such as with Fire Control System or Lone Wolf.

Dengaroo

The new boogeyman of X-Wing is Dengar, specifically the version that sees him paired up with Manaroo and carrying Zuckuss as his crew, so he can push all your green dice down with rerolls and not worry about the stress.  This is the build that debuted at North American Championships and came close to winning the whole event only losing in the final due to... err... Soontir Fel.

In truth Jeff Berling, who piloted Dengaroo in the final, was a bit unlucky to get nothing from his efforts to chase Soontir down.  He managed to set up not just one range 1 shot against Soontir but FOUR shots, only to finish empty handed as Soontir scooted away unharmed to fight another day.  With Lone Wolf and Focus to fix his own red dice and Zuckuss to push down any non-blank rolls from Soontir the Dengaroo player buys approximately a 1 in 3 chance of dealing damage at range 1, the flipside of which being that even with all this the supposed 'anti-aces' build of Dengaroo still manages to miss entirely 66% of the time at range 1!  

I wasn't in the final of the NA Championships.  I hadn't played and beaten the great players and strong lists that Jeff had played and beaten to get there, so any criticism of strategy has to be seen through that lens - he was there for a reason, and I wasn't there.  But, that said, chasing Soontir Fel with Dengar is a high variance game, even at Range 1.  Four range 1 shots means you SHOULD get a damage through leaves open a pretty sizeable probability that you won't, while the alternate strategy of using Dengar to remove the Lambda Shuttle first would certainly reap a reward.  That said, I'm sure Jeff knew the odds when he made those choices and took those shots... he just wound up on the losing side of variance.

Wes Janson & Wedge Antilles

Creeping back into popularity is the 'trench run' list of T-65 X-Wings utilising three great pilot abilities - Wes, Wedge and Biggs.  With the potential for playing both Wedge and Wes at a higher pilot skill than Soontir Fel you might be able to avoid his arc-dodging ways by moving after him, and if you can get Soontir into arc of both your aces they might combine to do some real damage.

Wes Janson shoots first and removes the Evade token in much the same way 4-LOM does, then Wedge can shoot and reduce Soontir's agility.  The double-nerf of Soontir's defences can start to open the door on damage, especially at range one when both your ships roll four dice.  The hardest part here is that you need the notoriously slippery Soontir to oblige and sit in arc of BOTH your ships... no easy ask!

Omega Leader

The popular TIE ace Omega Leader (or 'Lockdown' to his friends) really puts serious hurt onto Soontir Fel by preventing him from using either his Focus or his Evade tokens to fix his dice, and even using Juke to push down the first evade that Soontir rolls! 

Unfortunately the one loophole in Omega Leader's plan is that he can't prevent Emperor Palpatine from saving Soontir because he's aboard a different ship to the one Omega has target locked.  Even with having to contend with the Emperor, though, Omega Leader has a very good chance of pushing damage though.  Four green dice without Focus are only going to average just over 1 evade result, and with Juke you can push the first one back down to a focus result and ignore it.  That puts Omega Leader's red dice output pretty much only up against the Emperor's evade, meaning that even with throwing 1 less dice than our other options Omega Leader comes out and pretty much the best option for fighting the crazy defensive skills of Soontir Fel.  

Omega Leader is also one of the few ships effective out at range 3 because he can ignore Autothrusters and the extra green dice Soontir gets at that range is worth very little when he can't focus.

Double Stress

Soontir Fel lives on his actions - that's where he gets the Focus to convert a couple of dice into evades and the Evade token to go on top.  Without actions Soontir is in real trouble, and if you can find a way to give him a second stress (after Push The Limit gave him the first) then you can ensure he's going action-free on the next turn.

There are a few options for where that second stress comes from, such as Tactician or the 'stressbot' R3-A2 attaching stress to your attacks, or making one of your ships an unpaletable target with Rebel Captive.  However you get the stress onto Soontir it marks a fantastic opportunity to capitalise, pretty much equivalent to the impact that Omega Leader has on Soontir's defenses - you've got one more red dice but not Juke to push his dice down so it comes out very similar.

The 'Party Bus'

A recent development at top level X-Wing tournaments is the so-called 'Party Bus' which sees a YV-666 loaded up with more scum & villainy than the Mos Eisley Cantina on a busy Friday night!  What the Party Bus does is effectively throw together three of the options we've already discussed - the rerolls of Dengar to make your own red dice stronger, then the double-whammy of BOTH Zuckuss and 4-LOM.  It means the YV-666 eats a ton of stress tokens and even Ions itself, but hot-diggity-dog is it good at smashing through green dice.

I was stunned to see how effective the Party Bus is against Soontir Fel when I ran the maths, so much so that I reran them a couple of times just to check, but it's right.  Using 4-LOM to prevent the Evade Token, Zuckuss to reroll any non-blank dice and Dengar to force maximum hits you batter Soontir's defences.  In fact it's such a powerful combination that you push Soontir's odds right back to square one and he's barely any better than a naked TIE Interceptor without any of the trimmings!

Add to that the fact that the YV-666 has a 180 degree arc that's tough to dodge and you start to see quite why the Party Bus is finding a place in player's lists - it's almost the ultimate in bug-splatting goodness when it comes to nailing 'F@#$ing Soontir Slippery Fel' to the wall.

What's striking, though, is that it takes the combined might of all the upgrades on the Party Bus to finally bring your odds against Soontir to the point where they're better than, well... simply flying better and landing a bump, as we're about to see!

Bump Block Feedback

Bump Soontir.  Done.  Finished.  Thus endeth the lesson.  You can go.

If you can successfully predict where Soontir Fel is going to be after he's completed his maneuver then you buy an excellent chance of injuring or at least wounding him, not just because you will deny him the actions he needs to stack up those vital Focus/Evade tokens but because you'll also know where he is on the table and can move other ships into great firing positions.  

A lot of the time a bumped Soontir is a dead Soontir, assuming you've got other ships around to take advantage of his misfortune.

The hard part, of course, is actually getting that bump to land.  Most of the time Soontir Fel is going to start a turn stressed after using Push The Limit and that means you know he's going to shoot for a green move, which cuts his options down a lot - often to either a hard 2 turn in either direction or a 4 straight forwards to try and get out of trouble.  It's possible to get a ship into position so that their base blocks both a turn or bank in one direction, and all it takes is an unfortunate asteroid placement to block one of Soontir's other options and you can start to really cut his options.

When your opponent knows you're looking for a bump it can become a real game of cat and mouse, with the Soontir player trying to guess your moves and plan ahead to avoid asteroids becoming a problem, while you're trying to second guess their move if they assume you're going to block the obvious one, then they try to second-guess your second-guess... ad infinitum.

Some ships are better at blocking than others - a Barrel Roll action allows a degree of fine-tuning over precisely where your base sits that can make a crucial difference particularly on large base ships like the Jumpmaster 5000 or YT-2400.  As players adapted to the Wave 8 meta one of the developments was a ship designed specifically for bumping; the 'Bumpmaster' which was was a Jumpmaster equipped with Intimidation, Anti-Pursuit Lasers and Intelligence Agent.

The reward for blocking Soontir, though, is so good that for many players it's going to be their only go-to option in trying to beat the odds and bag themselves a coveted scalp.

Fight Dirty

When all else fails.  When the bumps don't land and you just don't want to spend all day futilely throwing red dice into a black hole of Soontir's evasiveness, there's one last trick for the players who really, REALLY, want to hurt Soontir: just ignore his green dice entirely!

Feedback Array, Wampa, Darth Vader crew, Autoblaster Turret, Black Market Slicer Tools... Soontir Fel hates to play against these cards because they simply negate so much of his defenses and push through guaranteed damage regardless of his Evade tokens or Palpatine protection.

Perhaps the ultimate threat to Soontir is Darth Vader riding on a Decimator with a Gunner.  That combination delivers the potential that he's going to suck up two Critical Hits guaranteed and could potentially explode right there from a Direct Hit... and that it's a threat that is just as effective at range 3 as range 1 and in any direction?  Brutal.  You pay a high price for pouring that much damage onto your Decimator, though, and against almost any other target it's often not worth the points investment, but against the shieldless TIE Interceptors in particular Darth Vader is maybe the tool you need to swing the matchup.

Feedback Array and Autoblaster Turret are very similar in that they share the same weakness - they're a lot better at simply making Soontir stay out of range 1 than they are at actually dealing damage.  With Boost and Barrel Roll options available it's usually pretty easy for Soontir to dance out of range and alone these upgrades do little actually land damage, they're more like large obstacles on the board that limit where Soontir can comfortably sit.

Coming soon in Wave 9 (now just a couple of weeks away, allegedly) is something new and more potent than either Feedback Array or Autoblaster Turret - Black Market Slicer Tools (BMST, to it's friends).  BMST is a new Illicit upgrade available to scum ships that really hurts the lists that rely on Push The Limit by punishing the fact they are reliably handing themselves stress.  Alhough there's only 50% chance of dealing damage the strength of BMST is that it has a much larger range and also that it's an action, so you can fly into range to use it and not have to wait until Soontir has moved and had the chance to dodge away again, the way he could with Feedback Array.  For just 1pt BMST is a very attractive tool to complement a lot of Scum builds and I think it's going to be rapidly adopted in competitive lists.  

I don't see BMST ringing the death knell for Soontir Fel completely, but so long as it shaves just a little bit off his competitive edge and untouchable reputation it may do the job it needs to.

CONCLUSION

What comes out of all this, unfortunately is that the Rebels are desperately short of answers for Soontir Fel.  If you're playing Imperials you can call on Darth Vader, Omega Leader or Wampa to help you ignore all of Soontir's dice modification, while if you're playing Scum & Villainy you've got the combined might of Zuckuss, 4-LOM and Illicits like Feedback Array and Black Market Slicer Tools, and ships like the YV-666 and Jumpmaster 5000 that are well-equipped to threaten Soontir with either a wide firing arc or flexible barrel roll.  But if you're trying to fight the good fight for the Rebellion you've got... uh... fly better and try to bump him?

These are dark times for the Rebellion.  The Imperial Raider and Imperial Veterans expansions mean the Empire have stolen a march on the Rebel,s with upgrades to several ships that were previously underpowered (TIE Advanced, TIE Defender, TIE Bomber) going unanswered from a Rebel fleet now looking sorely lacking.  The addition of the Emperor Palpatine as a massive game-changing option has also swung things towards the Dark Side of the Force.  That the Rebels are currently poorly-positioned against the resurgent firepower of Scum lists and also struggle to deal with the likes of Soontir Fel has been all but the final nail in the coffin.

This will change.  Wave 9 is followed rapidly by Heroes of the Resistance which will bring an improved Poe Dameron and improved Millenium Falcon, along with the ability to equip some of those key Illicit upgrades onto Rebel ships.  Much of the great frustration about Soontir and Palpatine comes, I think, from Rebel players who have seen their chances of dealing with Fel take a nosedive from 'slim' to 'none'.  Hopefully I've at least been able to demonstrate why that is, and maybe sparked some new thoughts for how you're going to tackle the dread Soontir next time you see him.

Because, mark my words, Soontir is going nowhere.  He's going to remain as slippery as ever, and if you want to progress to the top end of tournaments you're going to need a plan for dealing with him - hoping he gets unlucky, as we've seen, simply won't cut it.  You need to work hard for your chances and make sure you take them, or those angled wings and quad lasers are going to be the last thing you see.

"Several Fighters Have Broken Off From The Main Group" - Top-16 at UK Nationals with the luxury TIE Fighters

Regular readers may recall my exploits with TIE Fighters at the Yavin Open and Regional but since then I've had very little opportunity to play.  I was on holiday for the next two Regionals, didn't join our raiding party to Italy for the Kashyyyk Open, and the two Regionals after that were just a little too far away.  Where other players in my team have clocked up playing in four or five Regionals I've managed... just that first one, actually.

This past weekend marked the UK National Championships and my last chance to throw the TIEs into serious combat before Wave 9 arrives.  Since Yavin I'd spent a couple of months messing about with other lists but when it got close to the deadline for submitting my squad I only had one strong option: the Slaughterhouse TIEs.  

As the list hasn't changed I'm going to blatantly copy/paste my description of the team from my Yavin report.

"Slaughterhouse is a Crack Swarm variant which trades the sixth TIE Fighter from a classic Crack Swarm for higher Pilot Skill across the swarm and the endgame prowess of Omega Leader.  

With Zeta Leader and Scourge's abilities I still roll the same 12 red dice on initial engagement that a Crack Swarm does but, sometimes critically, I roll them much earlier in the combat phase as my PS is that much higher.  This is most material in matchups against other Crack Swarms where I'll frequently take two of their TIEs off and create a pivotal advantage before they can open fire, and it also flips the matchup against PS6 Brobots where instead of usually losing a couple of ships to their PS6 I've got a very good chance of removing one of the Aggressors before it can fire.

Occasionally the higher PS does matter for maneuvering as well - the Dash lists don't like that I could potentially have 4 of my ships moving after Dash as they're used to having perfect Barrel/Boosting information to keep the TIEs at arm's length - but most commonly the high PS is leveraged in firing earlier and removing targets before they can fire.

The transition down to five TIEs does come at a price, most notably that as my ships are destroyed you're taking a greater % of my firepower at a time and when I've played against some high PS lists I've had to be more cagey in my play.  Perhaps my single heaviest defeat with this list came at the hands of a Dengar/Boba Fett squad that had given both the pilots PS10.  Jousting me heads-up with Glitterstim for the initial engagement he simply blew me away.

But outside of that sort of scenario I'm convinced this is better than a basic Crack Swarm in most of the key matchups, especially mirror matches against other Swarms and against Brobots.  If Slaughterhouse is 'Crack Swarm+' then the '+' in that is Omega Leader, and I can't even begin to count the number of times that it's my trusty O.Leader who deals the lethal damage.  If he was just any other elite TIE then I'd be back at six ships, but bringing Omega Leader in for the endgame without sacrificing any of the Crack Swarm's alpha strike power occurs to me as being the best of both worlds."

Yavin had seen me make some critical personal play errors and I felt that my 4-2 finish on the first day was not doing the squad justice.  On the first day of the UK Nationals I managed to eradicate most of those from my games and actually played very well in some tough games, going one better to end the day on 5-1 despite having had very little decent preparation.

• Round One: Triple Imperial Aces (Win: 100-35)
• Round Two: Dengaroo (Win 100-44)
• Round Three: Triple Jumps (Win 100-56)
• Round Four: Dengaroo (Loss 21-100)
• Round Five: Triple Imperial Aces (Win 65-18)
• Round Six: Triple Jumps (Win 100-45)

The meta had definitely come out to play and every round I faced top ships and tough opponents.  That made it all the more pleasing that my TIEs eased through the challenge and into the second day, which was a cut to Top-32 knockout rounds.

As always I'm not a huge fan of tournament reports so I won't bore you with the blow-by-blow of those six rounds but I'd like to share my two knockout games on the second day, which were both intensely fought and desperately close games.

Top-32 vs Stephen Gage

• YT-2400 - Dash Rendar (Push The Limit, Outrider, Heavy Laser Cannon, Kanan Jarrus, Engine Upgrade)
• VCX-100 - Lothal Rebel (Hera Syndulla, Fire Control System, Autoblaster Turret, Intelligence Agent)

My initial reaction to turning up on Sunday morning to find Dash as my opponent can be summed up by this message that I sent to my team as we set up...

I was not thrilled.  Dash is death to TIE Swarms as he picks off your flimsy ships with his big cannon while running away faster than you can chase him.  With most of my TIEs PS7+ if I win the dice roll I can gain an edge in that he doesn't know where my TIEs are going when he Boosts/Barrels (Stephen was at 99pts with a bid, so that wasn't an option), but I still hate to see Dash and this was going to be an uphill struggle.

We lined up with my TIEs jousting the Ghost head-on while Dash would circle around behind me.  On the second turn he threw the Ghost forward in an unexpected 5 K-Turn that bumped a lot of my ships up (I'd been expecting a 4 straight).  That move turned out to have mixed results for Steven and although his Ghost absorbed a bit less fire from my TIEs it limited his output to the Autoblaster turret, which he aimed at Omega Leader and then blanked on.  With Omega Leader also dodging Dash's fire shot of the day I managed to escape the bump without a scratch.  

On the next turn I successfully called the Ghost's dial and my TIEs swarmed around it, culminating in a Ghost-sized hole in the table as I removed the Lothal Rebel in a second round of shooting!  This was now going about as well as I could hope for as I was down to just facing Ghost with all five of my TIEs remaining, but even from this position I knew I was going to be in trouble.  

Rather than send my scattered swarm after Dash straight away I deliberately turned them away to the opposite corner to reform the swarm out of range of Dash, while Omega Leader dared enough to chase Dash and keep him from turning back to the others straight away, stripping a couple of shields away as he did so.  While the rest of the swarm formed up poor Youngster strayed a little too close to Dash and a clean HLC shot took him down.  

I had four TIEs left, then, when a critical moment occurred...

What was left of my swarm was stressed after K-turning, but largely reformed in the far right quadrant of the table while Dash and Omega Leader were on the near-left quadrant with most of the asteroids arranged up the left hand side of the table.  With my swarm now facing the right way I knew that Dash would run into the rocks to hide while I chased him down, so I set my dials appropriately.

Then Stephen said something to the effect of: "I'm supposed to be hiding in among these rocks over here, but for some reason you don't want to go there.  Haha!"

"Yeah, for some reason!" I laughed.  

Then I stopped dead in my tracks. 

I've played tournaments of different games for over two decades and my spidey-sense was tingling at what Stephen had just said.  I knew that Dash was going to run for the rocks, and Stephen knew that Dash was going to run for the rocks.  That's why he'd said that's what he was going to do.  

Because it was what he wanted me to think he was going to do.  

I looked at the table again with new eyes.  Yes the run for the rocks was the obvious play because it was the safest place for Dash to be.  No, wait... it was only the second-safest place.  The actual safest place for Dash to be was behind my swarm!

I picked up Scourge's dial and changed it from a 2 bank towards the rocks into a 5 straight.  I picked up Omega Leader's dial and changed it from a 5 straight after Dash into a 2 straight.

Set.  Done.  Thumbs up.  Reveal the dials.

Scourge's 5 straight put him right smack where Dash's attempt to cut behind my TIEs had taken him, leaving the YT-2400 bumped and vulnerable in arc of all three of my other TIEs, and my Omega Leader's 2 straight even putting him at range 1!  

Dash took withering fire and managed to escape next turn with only a couple of hull points left.

That critical moment gave me a huge foothold in the match but it wasn't done yet.  As Dash escaped from my impromptu trap he managed to take Zeta Leader out and damage Scourge, Omega Leader chased him around for what I hoped would be the killing blow but only managed to get Dash to one hull before a fantastic roll of the red dice from Stephen saw Omega Leader taken out despite his lockdown on the dice!

This was bad, from the five TIEs I had left when the Ghost went down I was now down to just Howlrunner and Scourge who had only 1 hull left.  Yes Dash was almost dead but he was still swinging those big 4 dice attacks and my delicate TIEs wouldn't last long.

On the next turn I misjudged Stephen's play as once again he tried to get around behind my TIEs instead of running across the front of them.  I left Scourge stranded out in the middle nowhere and about to be obliterated, but with a heroic barrel roll Howlrunner managed to spiral backwards into range one of Dash and get a shot off - perhaps here was a last gasp chance to win the game?

Three red dice, no focus, against two focused green dice.  The odds work out that I would miss entirely 60% of the time but I got lucky... blank, hit, hit from Howlrunner's dice and Stephen could only manage to focus up a single Evade!

Howlrunner the heroine had saved me from the fearsome Dash and hurled me into the Top-16!

Top-16 vs Luke Pearce

• Jumpmaster 5000 - Contracted Scout (Deadeye, Plasma Torpedoes, Extra Munitions, Overclocked R4, Guidance Chips)
• Jumpmaster 5000 - Contracted Scout (Deadeye, Plasma Torpedoes, Extra Munitions, Overclocked R4, Guidance Chips, 4-LOM)
• Jumpmaster 5000 - Contracted Scout (Deadeye, Proton Torpedoes, Extra Munitions, R4 Agromech, Guidance Chips, Boba Fett)

After scraping through a rough draw against Dash I was thrilled to see Contracted Scouts across the table.  I wasn't taking anything for granted because by the time you're at the Top-16 stage there's no slouches left, but this was a much better match for me.

We lined up to joust down my right flank, heads-up vs one of his Scouts with the other two angling in from my left flank.  I opened with a 2 straight to retain range options for the second turn, then hurled forward a 4 straight on the second turn.  Luke came close to bumping me with a 4 straight of his own but came up half a ship base short.

"I thought you were going to go 5 forward!" he complained, as I revealed my dials.

"I know you did, that's why I did a 4!"

This was perfect.  I'd played against Scouts twice on the first day and both time my initial alpha strike had come up one point short of removing a Scout before it could fire.  It turned out that this was a critical difference in the fact they're using Overclocked R4 instead of R4 Agromech and because I'd not tested my TIEs much recently I wasn't prepared for it.  This time, though, all five of my TIEs were nestled in range 1 and the extra couple of dice I got should be enough to push the last damage I needed to kill a Scout before it could fire even despite Overclocked.

Nope.

My dice were rubbish his dice were good.  Even though I threw all my Focus tokens and Crack Shots at him his Scout came away from the initial shooting not only still standing but with two hull remaining instead of one!  Even worse because it had taken all my Focus tokens to push for that kill my TIEs were defenceless - Howlrunner exploded from a turret shot and a torpedo, and Omega Leader took a second torpedo shot and limped away damaged.

I was pretty sure I'd blown the game in that round of shooting, but somehow over the next few turns I managed to get back on top.  Although the switch to Overclocked R4 has nerfed  my initial alpha strike against the Scouts the extra stress means I'm much better at hunting them down after that, which had won me the two games against Scouts on the first day.  Once again that proved my salvation as my TIEs turned faster than the Jumpmasters and got behind them, finishing off the wounded ship and rapidly punching through the shields of a second one.  Omega Leader pulled away from the fight to re-equip is Evade and Target Lock before returning to the fight while Scourge and Zeta pulled great positions and poured on the firepower.

My chances took a bit of a knock when Zeta Leader unexpectedly blanked his green dice and died from a turret shot that should have been pretty harmless but as the second Jumpmaster exploded I still had Scourge and Omega Leader left to tackle the last remaining Contracted Scout, which only had 1 shield left.

Then... disaster!

A second blank green dice roll saw Omega Leader fall to another opportunistic turret shot from the Scout and I was suddenly one-on-one between Scourge and the Scout.  What was utterly critical was that the Jumpmaster still had one shield left - that not only kept Scourge locked away from rolling his extra red dice but it also meant that I wasn't getting half points from the Jumpmaster and Luke was ahead on points against my lone TIE Fighter!

For about half an hour our two ships dodged, ducked, dipped, dived and dodged their way in great zig-zag patterns up and down the table as I tried to buy shots and keep Scourge in one piece.  It was a duel where Luke held the upper hand as his tight turns and barrel roll would constantly threaten to bump my TIE and prevent my firing, but if I ever tried to break away from the close dogfight I would likely face a torpedo shot from Luke's last remaining piece of ordnance.

The clock ticked down inexorably as I failed time and again to scratch the Jumpmaster's shields, and although I feel like variance had gone against me earlier in the game (both in the initial engage and the deaths of Zeta and Omega) it absolutely went my way during this duel as time and again I rolled 3 Evades to keep Scourge flying.

With minutes left on the round Luke switched to simply barrel-rolling to block me each turn and I had no choice but to throw caution to the wind and try to force the win.  I pulled a big K-turn to get separation, although that finally gave Luke a shot with his torpedo that saw Scourge take a hit and a crit - some Structural Damage that reduced my agility!

The next turn would be vital: Scourge cut into a range one shot just as the TO shouted time on the round... I would have one more combat phase to deal two damage and win the game with half points from the Contracted Scout...

Three red dice: Blank, Focus, Focus.  Focus up two hits.

Two green dice: Blank, Blank.

I've done it!  I've bloody done it!  Two damage means I'm ahead in the game!  I just need to survive the Jumpmaster's final shot and Scourge has proven invincible thus far!

Three red dice: Hit, Hit, Crit

I've only two green dice.  I've only got one hull left.  That's not enough of either.  

Game, set, match and tournament.

Rounding Up

So in the knockout rounds I beat the squad I should have lost to, then lost to the squad that I should have beaten.  I can't complain about that.  All told I was very happy with how my TIEs performed and even more pleased with how I performed, and felt like I'd done my list a lot more justice than I managed in Yavin.  The wonderful 186th Squadron has now published the entire Top-32 squad lists and I found it really interesting that the three TIE swarms to make the cut to Sunday all had something in common - we all played Omega Leader, and Paul Hughes' list was even more similar in that it ran five TIEs with Zeta Leader.  I thought I was ploughing a lone furrow with my list but obviously not.

If you're interested in giving the elite Slaughterhouse TIEs a try then I've got a few simple tips and thoughts for you to get started.

On Formation

There's a specific formation to run that I've developed over time.  As you put your TIEs down try and work out which direction you are most likely to turn it.  It's not a disaster if you have to turn the other way but it helps to get it right.  Youngster goes on the front corner of the formation in the direction you're going to turn in, Scourge goes in the middle of the front row and then Zeta Leader goes on the opposite end of the front row.  Omega Leader then slots in offset behind Youngster so that he won't run into the back of Scourge if he gets bumped, and Howlrunner in the same position behind Zeta Leader.

Why so specific about the line-up?

• Youngster has the lowest PS so if he gets stuck at the back of the formation he's forever having to leapfrog your other TIEs and it all gets a bit more complicated.  If you're going to turn right you want him to be the pivot of the front of your formation and not filling in behind.

• Zeta Leader is probably going to stress when he fires and so having him on the end of your firing lines allows him to throw the hard 2 turn without crashing into Youngster or Scourge as they wheel about.  Alternatively being on the outside allows him to S-Loop off to the side and clear space for Howlrunner to K-Turn in past him.

• Scourge, as PS7, wants to sit in front of the PS8s.  You want to make sure he's not a blocking worry for Howlrunner or Omega Leader as well in case he gets bumped and pushed back half a ship base in your formation.  I developed the offset back row after playing against Jumpmaster players who loved to run a 3 Bank and Barrel Roll to bump my TIEs on the initial engage - in this formation all they bump is Scourge and the other four TIEs slot in around him even if he can't complete his move.

• Omega Leader wants to be the closer of your two PS8s on the back row because it might make the difference on landing his target lock.

• Howlrunner wants to be on the outside because it might make the difference on either being out of range of some incoming fire, or at least of getting an extra dice at range 3.  Also, as Howlrunner doesn't reroll her own dice she's got the least reliable shots so if she's the one who misses out on firing due to being out of range you've lost less than if it's Omega Leader who can't fire.

On Openings

Most of the time you'll open with a 5 straight.  You want to make the table as small as possible and get on top of the opponent before they can re-organise.  You're looking ideally for a setup position that has two lanes for your second turn - a straight run to the opponent or a cut inside to a 45-degree lane in case they try and run across the back.  That gives you options and makes you less predictable.  You fear very little in the joust, even other Crack Swarms or Brobots can be taken head-on because you'll fire first and shred their damage output back at you.

What you DO fear are ships with PS9+ that are aggressively-loaded because they do to you want you were planning on doing to them.  Perhaps the worst matchup I've had was against a Boba/Dengar pairing at PS10 who were happy to joust me head-on and remove Howlrunner before I could fire, then a second TIE with Dengar's revenge attack.

As with most jousting lists you need to learn your Rule of 11 maths.  In the Top-16 match against the Scouts I opened on a 2 straight because that gave me control over the range of the engagement on the next turn.  If I'd raced forward a 5 straight then my opponent understands very well where I'm going to put my ships the next turn but a 2 straight gives me options.  Things like that take time to learn what your opponents want to achieve in their approaches so you can adjust yours to suit.

On Dengaroo

When I first met Dengaroo it was like this list ran into a brick wall.  I got utterly annihilated and came away from that encounter feeling like I was Dengaroo's dream opponent - I was the TIE Swarm with only five TIEs having spent points buying PS that didn't make a difference in the matchup.

After playing against Dengaroo a bunch more times I'm not so sure about that evaluation, and in fact I think I'm quite a bit better than a standard TIE Swarm is against Dengar.  It's still not an easy match, but I think it's far from unwinnable.  What's changed is that I think my elite TIEs pose Dengar problems that basic TIEs don't, so long as you play them cagily enough that they survive enough turns to make it count.

When a standard TIE Swarm rolls up it hurls the Crack Shots at Dengar and buys a few points of damage, but then it's pretty much punched itself out.  From there on in it's rolling two red dice with Focus against two green dice with Lone Wolf and Focus, so forever facing an uphill struggle to deal a single point of damage.  My TIEs, on the other hand, with Zeta Leader, Scourge, bring more painful three/four dice attacks that can continue to chip Dengar down and Omega Leader brings a whole new threat and requires them to be very certain of when they want to use Countermeasures.

Is Dengaroo a good matchup?  Hell, no,but it's better than you might expect.  Oh, and block the sloop.  Block.  The.  Sloop.

On Contracted Scouts

As I said in my write-up of the Top-16 match the Contracted Scouts maths have changed a lot since they switched from Agromechs to Overclocked R4.  I used to be 85%+ to kill a Jumpmaster before it fire and now that must be more like 30-40% if they're prepared to refocus a couple of times to stay alive.  However the flipside of this change is that my midgame against the Jumpmasters is now much easier and, if anything, the matchup has actually improved a little.  The worst turn was always the one when I wanted to K-turn after the initial engagement and they wanted to S-Loop for a second torpedo shot against my stressed TIEs, but now I don't have to worry about that anywhere near as much.

On Youngster

If I had a dollar for every time I get asked why I'm playing Youngster with Crack Shot I'd almost be able to buy a $5 milkshake by now.  Youngster makes sense primarily for the Brobots matchup - that's where specifically his PS6 will come in most useful and buy him a shot.  Overall, though, with Contracted Scouts and Dengaroo both focussing through my alpha strike that initial engagement seems to have got less critical since I played at Yavin.  I'm going to try Backstabber in that role for a while, switching out a Crack Shot up front for more dice in the midgame which seems to be where I'm winning both the Scouts and Dengaroo matches.

On The Future

Nothing in Wave 9 makes me think I don't want to continue playing these guys - ARCS, /SFs, Evade-less Fang Fighters, Shadowcasters; they all look like easy meat to me!  The real danger comes not from the new ships but from a resurgence of the old ones.  The hot gossip on the street at the UK Nationals was that the Triple Jump's days are numbered and that FFG are going to ensure that they aren't around when Wave 9 lands.

If that's the case then it's not hard to see the metagame swinging heavily towards Dengaroo, and that along with that the Dash/Ghost builds could become more popular as they're very good against Dengar.  Neither of these developments would make my TIE Fighters happy.  It's something that I'm going to have to monitor closely, and I'm going to need to work on a Plan B in case the gossip proves real and the metagame cycles against the TIEs.

We shall see, but until somebody forces me off them I'm certainly going to be player my Murder H's a while longer!