Østersund SC 2018, part 2 (AAR)

And now the actual battles:

Round 1

First game was against Anders. I've seen him before, but I don't think we have played. He ran 3 VSD-I with 7th Fleet, light on upgrades and a good 100+ pts in squads. I was 1st player and picked his Intel Sweep. 

Since tokens go down before ships, I had a good idea where he would set up. He had 3+3=6 drops to my 2+4=6, so he could put a VSD on my flank, but he didn't. My Quasar is in the middle of the board, almost parallel to the edge. Squads as far forward as possible. Quasar was my objective ship (his is the VSD on the far left). Plan is to pick up 2 tokens, then loop around and into the back. That gives me 2 tokens, and should let me kill his objective ship before he can pick a 3rd token. My ISD point into the table, forward, speed 2, Pryce to 2. 

I got the jump on his squads r1, using Squall. So my squads quickly took care of Morna and began work on another Decimator. My opponent then sped his other squads to the rescue, killing Maarek with Saber and Interceptor, but the damage was done. The squad fight snowballed, and despite lots of damage from squads and flak, I was able to jump to the station to heal.

With Pryce and aggressive navigation I got the ISD around the flank of the VSDs. It took a bunch of shots, but was only lightly damaged at the end of the game. Quasar flew around in a circle as planned, taking only a few long range shots. I was just able to bring down all three VSDs in round 6, for a 10-1 400 MoV.

I'm not a big fan of VSDs to begin with, and 3 VSD-I in one fleet is too much. 7th Fleet is actually good, but when you face fast bombers and get flanked by an ISD the title doesn't help much.

Round 2

Second game was vs Rolf, the owner of Escapade Gaming and Gear and the organizer of many great X-wing, Armada, IA and Destiny events. We've played a number of times before. Rolf is good, but I always seem to gain the upper hand.

He ran dual Motti ISD, Kuat and Cymoon, with a Vader Raider and 2 Comms Net Goz. SAdv for 6 activations, and a moderate bid. He was 1st player and agonized over my objectives, eventually landing on Precision Strike. I set up a lot like in my 1st game, but with the ISD a bit further to the right. I'm not particularly afraid of dual ISD, but with Motti it takes a lot of shot to kill one, so you gotta be careful. So I was confident, but determined to be cautious.

I quickly took out a Gozanti with squads. Then his Vader raider took out my Boosted Comms, which really crippled my Quasar. Most of the game it was only moving a couple of squads each round. And my Gozanti kill left Jendon out of the battle for 2 rounds.

The raider then flew of the table, saving me the need to kill it. This is where I figured that, without Boosted Comms, and two angry ISD coming for me, I would be unlikely to kill either ISD. So I decided to circle and kill the last Gozanti (it was moving speed 1 into the center, so it was always going to end up in front of my ISD), while farming for PS tokens. 

The Kuat has ONE damage card. ONE! I flip it and... COMMS NOISE. Speed down to 1. Next bomber flips it again. Speed 0. Next bomber changes top dial to CF. The Kuat its stuck at speed 0 and can't do anything but die while I get tokens. It must be the luckiest break in all of Armada history. Not just 1 crippling Comms Noise, but THREE in a row. Not fun for Rolf, who had done nothing to deserve such a devastating loss.

Fun fact: When Maarek killed the first Gozanti he pulled two Projector Missaligned...

Cymoon ran down my Quasar in the end, but it was still a 9-2 for me, in what would have been a 6-5 (7-4 with tokens) for me.

If you disregard the lucky crit, Pryce worked really well this game too. She made the ISD + a few bombers into something my opponent didn't want to turn into. That allowed me to jump forward and turn around his flank. Go PRYCE!

I was now at 19 pts after 2 rounds.

Round 3

Was against Mats. FINALLY! We've played in several tournaments together, and he always gets 2nd place, but we never meet! He ran Rieekan MC80, Yavaris, 2 flots and an innovative (but good) squadron ball. I was 1st player and picked his Fighter Ambush and...

No, wait. Stop. That's not right. 

Mats was tabled in r2. He got 461 vs 400 MoV, but as Micke, who had actually read the regs, pointed out, you get a LOSS if you are tabled. So Mats got 5 pts, rather than 7, which meant that my correct opponent was Micke and his Raider swarm! When last I played Micke's raiders it was regionals. He had Maarek+Jendon then, but now he had 1 more Raider and double slicers. It was a 10-1 for me then, with Raddus, but this was completely different.

After reshuffling tables we proceeded. Micke had a 25 pt bid and picked my Sup Positions. Although that let me set up really well, it was the right choice I think. His fast, small ships I have to shoot to the front and then they just zip past and I can't afford to chase them down if I don't kill them in the first pass. So the token farming options is limited. 

On the other hand he was then in no position to win 9-2 over me, which he needed to win the tourney. Maybe Fighter Ambush, high risk, high gain? Chances are it would have backfired on him. Badly. A dead raider is 3-4 tokens. A Gozanti 2-3. Even if he tabled me, I would have so many tokens that 9-2 would be impossible.

My Quasar started on the inside of the ISD, but here we are round 2, it has bombed the hell out of a Gozanti and a Raider, then moved up and to the side. The ISD is now in PRYCE MODE, and covering every approach to the Quasar. Micke can't really rush forward with his nasty little ExRacks...

I blow up a lot of shit... then I get greedy. My ISD repairs 3 shields, is ALMOST full health, and slows to 2 and turns into the table. There is no REAL chance that the remaining ExRack raider and Demo can bring it down. I'm just making sure I win big and spectacular. Maybe I was instinctively craving revenge for my rushing X-wing defeat the day before? lol

So of course my greed backfires: hot dice and the final double ram takes away my last hull. I have also been overconfident/overspending my Thrawn dials, so on the final round my Quasar is sliced, and I can't kill Demo. Great comeback from Micke there.

End r6 he had 1 Gozanti, 1 Raider with 1 Hull, and 1 Demo with 2 Hull and no Brace/Redir. I had the Quasar and 6 squads remaining. 3 tokens for me, 2 to him.

It ended 6-5 to me with just a few pts of MoV. I could have won big. And Micke could have won if he'd not gotten greedy with an ExRack (or maybe he just forgot?), as my Defender was on 1 hull. If he'd flaked that down he'd gotten the win. Or if my Quasar hadn't gotten an acc/hit on the rear of the Gozanti r6 thanks to the PS CF token. There are so many variables in Armada. Gotta love it!

In the end I got 25 pts and won the SC.

Lessons learned

Don't. Get. Greedy. If you have killed half the enemy fleet, and can run away while bombing the rest of it, DO NOT TURN INTO THE FIGHT THINKING U CAN OUTLIVE A LAST/FIRST DEMO. I knew that already. Now I've been reminded.

I REALLY need to color my Thrawn dials. This was the first time I've used Thrawn anywhere but Vassal, and I had not thought about how messy it could get. 

When a ship finished activating, I would again and again remove the wrong dial, only to realize and put it back. Also against Rolf I'm 100% sure my r3 command for the ISD should be a (wasted) squad (Nav/Nav/Squad from start in every game), but it came up a nav, so I offered to just toss it. He said keep it. It didn't matter either way, but still. Against Micke I suddenly saw my ISD had only 2 commands after the command phase, bc I had put a new command at the bottom of my Thrawn stack. That was quickly fixed, but it was embarrassing. 

Writing this I realize I need not/should not keep the Thrawn dials in a stack at all, but looking at them is faster when they are in a stack. But yeah, I'm coloring my Thrawn dials. It would fix all of the above issues, even when fatigue sets in.

Technicalities aside Thrawn is really good if you use him right. He's perfect for this fleet. It may seem strange to use him in a list with just 2 ships, no? Surely the more ships the more extra dial the better, right? That may be true, but in this list, where you pack all 400 points into just 2 activations you need those ships to be the best they can be. And nothing beats having 2 dials.

He's also perfect against slicers. Just don't spend your Thrawn dials like a drunk sailor spends his money. I did that against Micke - and I also went 2 squad, 1 nav when I should have gone 3 squad. Ah, the benefits of hindsight. Other squad lists can be hurt badly by slicers. At the very least they need multiple squad command platforms. My list has only 2, so Thrawn is the only viable option.

Playing Empire squad heavy again was lovely. I've tried to revive Sloane, but she's dead in the current meta. Thrawn makes squads viable again. He could even be Nationals material. Not 100% sure about that yet, but I would not be afraid/ashamed to take this fleet to Nordics. Since I spoiled the list here, I would have to A) improve the list and B) practice a lot :-) But I have some other ideas as well, so we'll see.

Vader (boarding team) is just great. And it belongs on a raider, with or without ex racks. If u have a raider, take Vader.

Thanks to all my great opponents for excellent opposition, Broba/Sam for great list making tips, and Rolf for hosting a great event.

My next event (X-wing and Armada) is Nordics in Stockholm 27-28 October.

Østersund SC 2018, part 1 (the list)

Me on the left, Mickael (r3) on the right

I'm back from lovely Östersund, Sweden and a great weekend of SC for X-wing 2.0 and Armada! There were also SC events for Destiny and Imp Assault, plus some side events, so a really big event.

I was totally going to do more blog posts about my prepping, but truth be told said prepping (and writing about it) got overshadowed by... X-wing 2.0!

For a while now there has been very little IRL Armada action locally, so I was tempted to jump on the 2.0 bandwagon (there is an active X-wing community here). I finally did, ordering a Core, 1 X-wing, 1 Y-wing, and a Rebel conversion kit (for cards - don't own any old ships - yet) from Rolf Hilleberg at Escapade Gaming And Gear (who also hosted the entire event).

Website: http://escapadegaminggear.com/ 

Then I tried some listbuilding, deciding to run Wedge, Luke, and Dutch. Sicne I didn't even know half the rules I installed the X-wing Vassal module and got some test games in. Man was that a steep learning curve. I had a vague notion of not flying too fast, keep in formation and focus fire on the enemy. In reality it was much harder, as them rocks kept getting in my way. Also, not fully knowing the rules, nor any of the cards and combos outside my own list, made it even harder :-D

But I perservered, and rapidly got better, so that actually won a game and didn't feel like a complete looser after getting 8 games in. My list also improved gradually. I stayed with Luke and Wedge, but Dutch got the boot and was replaced by an ARC. I had two versions of that list in my bag: 1 with Garven and 1 with Norra. I took Garven, which I got to regret all 5 games :-P

I got 2 wins, 3 losses. 1 big win, 1 big loss (to Micael, whom I've played Armada against many times), but the last 3 games were close. Could have been wins, could have been losses. End result was way above my pay grade. But I really like it, and will play more. It's fast and furious, with lots of action, and short play time (big plus there). I like Armada way more, but X-wing ain't bad!

But enough X-wing. Sunday was Armada SC, 3 rounds. I took a Thrawn 2-ship list, ISD+Quasar and a crapload of mean squads. I'd like to thank Broba and Sam on the forums/Discord/Vassal for showing me the archetype. As you might remember I took a long break after regionals, and when I wanted to prepp for SC I had no clue where to begin.

I made some tweaks of my own, changing the squad composition a bit, taking Exp hangars on the Quasar and XI7 on the ISD, but otherwise it's very close to Boba's vision. Without further ado:

Name: Thrawn 2-ship Østersund SC18
Faction: Imperial
Commander: Grand Admiral Thrawn

Assault: Precision Strike
Defense: Fighter Ambush
Navigation: Superior Positions

Imperial II (120)
• Grand Admiral Thrawn (32)
• Governor Pryce (7)
• Gunnery Team (7)
• Electronic Countermeasures (7)
• Leading Shots (4)
• XI7 Turbolasers (6)
• Avenger (5)
= 188 Points

Quasar Fire I (54)
• Captain Brunson (5)
• Flight Controllers (6)
• Boosted Comms (4)
• Expanded Hangar Bay (5)
• Squall (3)
= 77 Points

Squadrons:
• Colonel Jendon (20)
• Maarek Stele (21)
• TIE Defender Squadron (16)
• Dengar (20)
• Mauler Mithel (15)
• Tempest Squadron (13)
• Captain Jonus (16)
• Gamma Squadron (10)
= 131 Points

Total Points: 396

Let's look at some of the list's key features:

It's a list that loves going first - and loves going second. I absolutely will not build any list that relies on first player.

I'm aware that Precision Strike can be very dangerous to me. It's high risk, high gain. A flipped Comms Noise... look at my 2nd game below and u see what I mean. Close-Range Intel Sweep (with Jonus you WILL get points, just not as many) is a great replacement, with less risk, slightly fewer points, and the benefit of Dust Clouds.

Fighter Ambush takes away my deployments, but it's OK. If ur squad heavy, it doesn't matter too much, as I can handle your squads. If you're not squad heavy, your first little ship dies in round 1 and then I get 10+ tokens.

Superior Positions makes the Quasar entirely safe, and my ISD nigh unkillable (but see r3 below). it does not, however, usually provide me with that much net gain in tokens. But that's not the point either

The addition of Pryce is a vital component of the list. Not necessarily to go last/first with the ISD (although that IS of course nice), but because setting Pryce to 2 (or VERY RARELY 3 if the board state is passive at setup) delays the enemy's approach. Opponent WILL NOT fly into your front arc so u can bomb and Gunnery Team their ships. This means it's not until round 3 they can actually start their attack runs, and stuff that needs to get into black to setup runs won't be doing much until r4, rather than maybe r2 or 3. If u don't get how this works u should try it out, as it's essential knowledge if you meet Pryce (or Bail).

XI7 over QBT. Both are strong, but I like to have options. And yes, I know bombers and XI7 don't actually mesh that well. But sometimes the bombers aren't available, and you really need the drilling capability of XI7. Besides, I'm usually flying speed 2 or 3, so QBT would not trigger often (but against my r3 opponent QBT would have been great - speed 4 raiders hate them).

Exp Hangars. Is it a waste of points? With it I can command 9 squadrons, more than I have. But I think it's a very good addition. Often my ISD will be out of command range of main squad blob, but between Squall and Jendon the ISD can always reach THREE squads (Jendon + 2 bombers relayed to). So 5+3=8, so perfect. It also gives the Quasar a better Alpha, with 5 (or even 6 if I do a double squad dial). 5 (or 6 with Jendon) is all my anti-squad capability in one strike. 5 (or 6) bombers drilling a flotilla, CR90 or Raider will often kill it, whereas only 4 won't. If I took it out I would have a better bid, 9 pts, but against the really high bidders it won't help at all. 

The rest of the upgrades are pretty self-explanatory. Squall is pure gold in a Thrawn fleet. Usually u want to have Pursuant as slicer protection or extra flexibility, but with Thrawn u can take Squall. Squall lets Defender+Maarekx2 tap on any ship r1, regardless of how they set up. If u want to. And its great for shifting around unengaged shit, to make sure everything is commandable.

Squads are a nice mix of anti-squad and anti-ship. I had several other versions, one in particular where Defender + Tempest were replaced by Vader and Black Squad (at +1 pt), but in the end it was the bomber keyword that was prioritized (the all-ship meta has reached these parts too). I am sure there are squad balls out there than can take my squads, but if I meet something like that I will be more cautious and play really well, and they will lose anyway ;-)

I got in a few test games with this fleet (Vassal), but not very many, and I felt pretty rusty after my break. But like I said X-wing distracted me. Nevertheless I was pretty confident. I know Empire squads well, the ISD-2 is never a wrong pick, and the Quasar is super hard to kill (and nearly worthless in points) in this fleet. Thrawn was fresh and fun - and says a big FUCK YOU to slicers (I think it's a lame upgrade, that really hurts the game, to the point where I won't play squad hvy wo Thrawn at this point).

Next post will have some AAR.

Prepping for the SC 2018 season, part 2 (Sloane again)

This is part 2 of my Prepping for SC season.

Last time I talked about brushing dust of something old. 

So I did. With Sloane, using my winning list from Nordics 2017 as a basis. There has only been 1 more wave since then (wave 7) and a teeny tiny FAQ. 

I mean, how different can the meta be?

Turns out it's quite a lot. 

Relay was hit hard by the FAQ. So I can no longer relay on my flotillas to stay safe while commanding squadrons on the other side of the board. I had 4 Gozanti, remember, as they could then push around all 4 squads, freeing the ISD to maneuver and repair. The ISD would only act as a carrier for alpha strikes and such, or if the Gozanti for some reason were destroyed (I think I lost a total of 2 during the course of 4 matches).

And it's the flotilla nerf as well. Max 2. I used to have 4 (there were lists that took FIVE), which gave me both deployments and activations. Very important for good ISD positioning and activation control. But if I swap in Strategic Adviser and a Quasar, I still have 5 activations, and the same squads.

Which leads to this:

It's not a bad list as such, but the Quasar is just as predictable as the ISD was and far less tanky. The Gozanti have to fly close to the action. And the ISD is downgraded to a I, which is exactly the type I moved away from during playtesting last year. No Defensive retro means the ISD can die really fast, and with the relay limitation I may have to plot in squad commands when I'd rather Nav or Repair.

Name: Sloane w7 (8 squads)
Faction: Imperial
Commander: Admiral Sloane

Assault: Most Wanted
Defense: Fire Lanes
Navigation: Superior Positions

Imperial I (110)
• Admiral Sloane (24)
• Strategic Adviser (4)
• Boarding Troopers (3)
• Leading Shots (4)
• Avenger (5)
= 150 Points

Quasar Fire I (54)
• Flight Controllers (6)
• Boosted Comms (4)
• Pursuant (2)
= 66 Points

Gozanti Cruisers (23)
• Comms Net (2)
= 25 Points

Gozanti Cruisers (23)
• Hondo Ohnaka (2)
= 25 Points

Squadrons:
• Colonel Jendon (20)
• Maarek Stele (21)
• Dengar (20)
• Mauler Mithel (15)
• Ciena Ree (17)
• Howlrunner (16)
• Valen Rudor (13)
• Saber Squadron (12)
= 134 Points

Total Points: 400

I had to drop some squads if I want to keep the ISD-II. Howl and Saber are the ones to go. With only 6 squads I'm still confident in the squad battle. But the problem is I don't kill fast enough. I need to wipe squads ASAP, then start "bombing" for accs. It takes too long to clear squads, and after I don't have enough squads to do enough damage/strip enough tokens. I have GT + XI7 on the ISD, so that does compensate somewhat. It also has 1 less deployment, down to 7 total, so now I'm the one being outdeployed, which is pretty bad actually.

Name: Sloane w7 (6 squads)
Faction: Imperial
Commander: Admiral Sloane

Assault: Most Wanted
Defense: Contested Outpost
Navigation: Superior Positions

Imperial II (120)
• Admiral Sloane (24)
• Strategic Adviser (4)
• Gunnery Team (7)
• Electronic Countermeasures (7)
• Leading Shots (4)
• XI7 Turbolasers (6)
• Avenger (5)
= 177 Points

Quasar Fire I (54)
• Skilled First Officer (1)
• Flight Controllers (6)
• Boosted Comms (4)
• Pursuant (2)
= 67 Points

Gozanti Cruisers (23)
• Comms Net (2)
= 25 Points

Gozanti Cruisers (23)
• Hondo Ohnaka (2)
= 25 Points

Squadrons:
• Maarek Stele (21)
• Colonel Jendon (20)
• Dengar (20)
• Mauler Mithel (15)
• Ciena Ree (17)
• Valen Rudor (13)
= 106 Points

Total Points: 400

So that leaves me with one other option: ditch a Gozanti and go back to 8 squads. But at 3 activations SAdv is pointless, so might as well drop it and put Brunson on the Quasar. No rooms for any XI7, but less need for it. 

Name: Sloane w7 (8 squads, 3 activations)
Faction: Imperial
Commander: Admiral Sloane

Assault: Most Wanted
Defense: Contested Outpost
Navigation: Superior Positions

Imperial II (120)
• Admiral Sloane (24)
• Skilled First Officer (1)
• Gunnery Team (7)
• Electronic Countermeasures (7)
• Leading Shots (4)
• Avenger (5)
= 168 Points

Quasar Fire I (54)
• Captain Brunson (5)
• Flight Controllers (6)
• Boosted Comms (4)
• Pursuant (2)
= 71 Points

Gozanti Cruisers (23)
• Hondo Ohnaka (2)
• Comms Net (2)
= 27 Points

Squadrons:
• Maarek Stele (21)
• Colonel Jendon (20)
• Dengar (20)
• Mauler Mithel (15)
• Ciena Ree (17)
• Valen Rudor (13)
• Howlrunner (16)
• Saber Squadron (12)
= 134 Points

Total Points: 400

I could win games with this, but I'd get plastered by a squad-heavy Pryce list. And Raddus would probably do a number on me. Generally speaking I'm in real danger of being tabled, or at least be forced to run with the ISD and/or abandon the squad game. Furthermore, the squads can no longer reliably go to work on the enemy before I engage with the ISD.

Overall I'm OK with all 3 lists, but none feel like top tier. Not bad exactly, but not what I'm looking for in listbuilding.

Prepping for the SC 2018 season, part 1

Just to make it clear: by SC "season" I mean the one SC I'm going to. That'll be the one in Østersund, Sweden. Locally we don't have a SC this year, because those who play Armada around here can't be bothered to actually make time to come out and play.

But I still need to prep. After I could not go to Worlds or Euros bc of having like zero money to waste on that, I put all my Armada stuff into a closet and logged off Vassal. It's only for the last week I've actually begun thinking about Armada for real. If it wasn't for the SSD announcement, I don't think I would have bothered breaking out my stuff again.

So after 4 Vassal games, 1 with Vader Arq swarm, 2 with Sloane ISD + Quasars and 1 with Raddus (essentially my Regionals-winning list, but with a TRC90 instead for a flotilla and VCXs), I can verify that I am indeed VERY rusty. When last I played I was at the height of my skill, now I do stupid little things and forget to take into account this and that. My fav blunder thus far is constantly fixing shields, then moving the ship to expose stripped arcs... really should know better!

Anyway. I think I'll be OK if only I practice a little bit more. Maybe not 110%, but good enough not to make a fool out of myself. 

Then there is listbuilding. Stuff has happened in the months since I took a break. Worlds oc. Euros. Many other tournaments. Mata has been evolving. People have worked on their lists. I have not. So what do I do?

Should I take something tried and ture and just tweak it a little? It's not as if there have been many new waves, so there is really nothing new to take into account. 

Should I try for something brand new and inventive? I want to, because I don't really like to play the same fleets over and over. But I'm not sure I'm quite there. I look at my screen, and its the same fleets that get built over and over, with a few variations. 

Maybe I can copy someone? Then adjust it after playtesting? I've had success with that before. I just don't think there is time: the SC in late September, so I better settle on a list and start practicing ASAP.

I think I'll be forced to settle for something I've at least some experience with. Stay tuned as I try to narrow down the search for the perfect SC list!