The intro…
Hello there! Welcome to this week’s blog!
It’s been an interesting week, both for and outside of X-Wing for me.
Personally, our social calendar has been filling up. Parties, meals, gatherings, carol singing, etc. You know, all the usuals stuff that you get at this time of year. It’s all lovely and I’m a big fan of Christmas so that’s all good. Of course, we are hosting Christmas lunch this year and had started stripping wallpaper to redecorate our dining room. I’m now told this means we have to have that room at least somewhat decorated before the big day. Personally I don’t think there’s enough time but hey, we’re going to bust a gut giving it a try!
In the world of X-Wing, well, it seems that my timing was a little off.
Let’s get into it, shall we?
The main bit…
Last week I posted about some lists I’d been trying in the XWA’s new 50 point system. Major point shifts seem to cause me some problems as I try to figure out exactly what’ s decent value and what isn’t but also comparing what I’m putting together with what other people are doing.
Generally I take the lazy route and wait a little bit for some events to happen and see what sort of lists are being used and what the power level of these lists are like.
Anyway, after a little experimentation I’d tried some things out and talked about them.
Some time int he quite small gap between finishing writing and then publishing and spamming the link in all the normal places, this was released:
Now yes, I AM part of the XWA and yes, I DID have an awareness that this was coming. Had I paid full attention to the timing details? Clearly not, no. I also didn’t have full visibility of what the changes would be until publishing either. At least, I don’t think I did. In all honesty I try to keep my knowledge on things as limited as possible so that I’m finding out roughly the same time as the wider community.
Anyway, all that aside, points have changed which include two of the more viable lists I talked about last week. Typical. I guess it’s time to look at how those lists are affected, whether they’re still any good (if they were ever good in the first place!) and what changes can be made.
Let’s start with the Rebel list since that’s the simplest change.
Original list:
Wullffwarro – Auzituck Gunship (13)
Trick Shot (5)
Hull Upgrade (9)
Ship Cost: 13 Loadout: (14/14) Half Points: 6 Damage Threshold: 4
“Pops” Krail – BTL-A4 Y-wing (9)
Ion Cannon Turret (6)
Concussion Bombs (5)
Ship Cost: 9 Loadout: (11/11) Half Points: 4 Damage Threshold: 4
Jan Ors – HWK-290 Light Freighter (15)
Hopeful (1)
Jyn Erso (6)
Conner Nets (5)
Engine Upgrade (3)
Moldy Crow (0)
Ship Cost: 15 Loadout: (15/15) Half Points: 7 Damage Threshold: 2
Saw Gerrera – UT-60D U-wing (13)
Fire-Control System (2)
Tactical Officer (3)
The Child (7)
Contraband Cybernetics (4)
Pivot Wing (0)
Ship Cost: 13 Loadout: (16/16) Half Points: 6 Damage Threshold: 4
Total: 50
The only change here is to The Child on Saw, who went up from 7 points to 9 points. This is an easy change because really, Fire Control System is a bit unnecessary. Let’s face it, he gets rerolls when damaged (which you do to yourself at the start of the game) and will rarely take a lock action. Dropping FCS allows you to keep the rest of the upgrades intact while dropping the least used updgrade.
I played a game with this online last week in the Tauntaun Fam event. Now, I did fly like a bit of a potato and TWO of the ships died before actually shooting anything. Not great.
That said, I brought it back from twenty-something to six down to leading 38-34 when Wulwarro went full rage mode.
It all went wrong from there on though as I lost Wulf and Jan while not pushing enough damage on to 3 agility ships and lost 38-64.
It looks a bit bad, I know, but I was flying against Dom Flannigan who is, let’s face it, one of the best and most consistent players there is so I’ll give myself a break there.
Obviously my flying was a bit sub-par and my list vs aces (he was flying Republic – Mace, ETA Obi, chunky Ani and a LAAT) simply got out-positioned. Still, Dom’s a lovely guy, we had fun and DEFINITELY nether of us made any basic mistakes or forgot any triggers.
Definitely.
Alright, let’s move on to the list that got hit hardest – Scum.
Fenn Rau (AaD) – Fang Fighter (15)
Fearless (0)
Adaptable Power Systems (AaD) (0)
Beskar Reinforced Plating (0)
Ship Cost: 15 Loadout: (0) Half Points: 7 Damage Threshold: 2
Dengar (AaD) – JumpMaster 5000 (15)
R2-G8 (AaD) (0)
Synchronized Handling (AaD) (0)
Starboard Thrusters (AaD) (0)
Punishing One (0)
Ship Cost: 15 Loadout: (0) Half Points: 7 Damage Threshold: 4
Boba Fett – Firespray-class Patrol Craft (20)
Fearless (3)
The Child (7)
Proton Bombs (5)
Marauder (0)
Veteran Tail Gunner (5)
Ship Cost: 20 Loadout: (20/20) Half Points: 10 Damage Threshold: 5
Total: 50
This list has some more fundamental changes since Boba went up in price from 20 points to 21. This means that the most obvious change is to drop Armed and Dangerous Fenn down to be ‘build your own’ Fenn as he is 1 point cheaper.
There’s definitely a drop off here. AaD Fenn has Fearless (as you’d put on standard Fenn) but crucially has a hull upgrade AND Beskar (a quasi, crit specific, hull upgrade) and the Adaptable Power Systems shenanigans which, while not always used, makes it possible to do some very weird nonsense.
AaD Fenn is DEFINITELY worth the extra squad point. But it doesn’t fit and it’s an easy change.
The Child having gone up also means that Boba’s points are over the limit. Having Force is one of the things that makes this Boba really good so that, ideally has to stay.
Now, I played a game on Wednesday where, in order to make the points, I dropped Fearless but, having more time now to think about it, I think Fearless needs to be kept, as does Vet Tail Gunner. Probably the best thing to do now is to change the Proton Bomb to a Seismic Charge.
When I played on Wednesday it was in person and against Josh Hall who is running a VERY heavy hitting Scum list. He had clearly learned some things from my first game running this list the week before and that, combined with having a weaker Fenn (and some poor decision making on my part) meant that I lost our first game. We had time for a second game and this time I made some adjustments to deployment and position. Technically this went worse with Old T taking my Fenn’s focus while his Fenn rolled into range 1 and put 5 hits/crits in and I blanked out. Typical.
My Dengar was also out of position for too long but I caught a break when I took out Talonbane without him getting any range 1 shots.
Boba then ran, dropping Proton Bombs in his wake while being chased down and in the end, having been down, Josh took a last second dive at claiming objectives, got sniped by Dengar and I stole it right at the end.
Anyway, my main point is that while Boba still feels pretty decent, Fenn is definitely weaker. Does this mean I need to just use him a little more carefully or is it better to drop him and go with something else instead?
Things to ponder.
Speaking of which, I’m after some advice.
Consultation Corner…
A, slightly spontaneous, new section! Woo!
In my game last week there was a turn where I struggled to know what to do. Being a very inexperienced Firespray pilot means I took altogether too long to make a decision and even then, I’m not really sure if it was the right one.
This was a position I had Boba in on Wednesday:
Josh has Fenn (on the left) and Old T (on the right, stressed) vectoring in on Boba. I really wasn’t sure whether I should:
- a) 1 hard right to take the bump into Old T. Pros – It’s a better escape angle to keep him involved and close to objectives (scenario is Assault), I can red focus if bumped, bumping reduces the effectiveness of Old T’s shot. Cons – Talonbane is hovering just behind so Boba could be taking 3 shots instead of 2 if I mess it up. Also, ROAD means I don’t know where I’ll end up.
- b) 3 bank right & boost. Pros – gets me furthest from Old T and likely out of Talonbane rage/arc, lets me drop bombs. Cons – might bump into Fenn?
- c) 4 straight & boost. Pros – gets me further from Old T and pretty much no change of a shot from Talonbane. Also, bombs. Cons – puts me further out of the fight than I’d like, especially given that I’ve only got 2 ships now.
I won’t tell you which I went with (maybe next time!) but I’d be really interested to find out which you’d have done or if you’d have done something completely different (if so, comment on whichever platform you found this post and let me know what!)
The conclusion…
Alright, that’s about it from me this week. Will there be a post next week? Maybe? It depends on just how well/badly the DIY goes in the next 7 days or so. I have some time off work over the Christmas break so maybe that will mean I’ve got time. I’d love to revisit that question once I’ve got some feedback and analyse what the idea move would have been.
But for now I will wrap things up and, probably, see you back here next week!
The outro…
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