This was a small four-round tournament with 14 participants. I brought the five A-wings in version 4: all ships have heroic+crackshot, the generics get AdvancedOptics. Additionally I brought the 3 largest rocks to break up swarms if I had to play against them.
Game 1
vs
non-competitive XYYU variant
A good (hungover) player who hasn’t played in a while and thought there’s a price for the best fluff list… very fun game as we always enjoy playing each other. Usually the games are extremely tight as we are very likely on an extremely similar level. But the list and recent practice made the difference this time.
Opponent’s determining action and my target priority: His Benthic is the key piece. Edrio and the Gray are dangerous due to the torpedoes. Dutch is largely irrelevant, only his extra lock is good.
Deployment: I set up my first two rocks as usual, giving me a screen for table flips, a way to thread through, and occupying the center. He placed the three in the south field, so my third went to the NW field. His ships started in the NW corner, but my rocks were already placed to go into the SE corner anyway, so that fit me perfectly.
The gameplan for the first turns: Full flight, flank with Lulo. I want to surprised him with going fast and past him in the west gutter/west field. That gives me the NW part of the map to run away while he has to go through the rocks to turn.
How it went:
Turn 1-2: I did the full flight, he moved into the gap in the rocks as expected. Dutch came around north but we didn’t exchange shots for half a centimeter. You see in the image that I did something new: team 12 did 1hards and I split up the team a bit before, with escape routes towards east.
Turn 3: His gray surprised me a bit by banking in and covering for Dutch so he couldn’t be arc dodged well, and Dutch threw him a target lock. Edrio tried to proton team 34 but couldn’t get the lock. No clue what his U was doing. My team 34 went directly against Edrio. Nr 2 went a bit forward to get bullseye on the U (but later shot the Gray anyway, for focus fire), and Nr1 did a 3bank+1bank boost around the rock. That brought him too close to Dutch and I paid for that mistake! Edrio went almost down, Dutch took a beating, and the Gray lost shields. Mistake: I didn’t follow my target priority, and lost a ship. But I also did a lot of damage, so in the end the trade was worth it. I lost too much on ship nr4, who went down to 1 hull. That was unnecessary.
Turn 4: His U came slow, the Gray turned in. Dutch tried to jump Lulo but bumped. My Nr4 bailed out with 5 straight and boost, nr 3 and 2 made sure that Edrio goes down. Lulo jumped past Dutch and turned arc for a 4vs1 shot (and took him out!). Good round for me overall, suddenly he was down two ships. My nr2 lost two shields iirc.
Turn 5+6+7: Both his ships turned around, my ships circled and I took him out.
200-80 (1 full ship, 2 halfs)
Conclusion/Lessons:
Much done right this time
- The approach of nr1 was a bit off, that rock messed me up more than it should have;
- Targeting was flexible enough, but also consistent enough.
Game 2
vs
HanTerochLandoSeevor
Opponent’s determining action and my target priority: ALL THE GUNS ON HAN! Block Teroch and use remaining crackshots. Seevor and Lando… take them when they are offered, but don’t focus on them.
Deployment: Uh… So, I don’t remember who put which rocks. But anyway he replaced one with Tobias. His Escapecraft started docked, and Han set aside. Seevor was on the NE end at a weird angle facing out, probably to bank around the rock. I deployed the finger five in the SE corner, and Lulo in the SW corner. Teroch setup in the NW corner. Now, Han deployed right in front of my swarm facing inside the field.
The gameplan for the first turns: Go after Han. I mean.. what?
How it went: Uhhh…
Turn 1: System phase. Shuttle docks off. Coordinates an action to Han. Han drops rigged cargo chute. Rrriighhhtt… Whoops! Unfortunately for him he wanted to afterburner, but didn’t move fast enough. That caused Han to bump after being made aware, and then he didn’t get mods. But it was a hilarious first turn for sure! My team 12 went straight, 34 banked after Han. Nr4 was able to get out of the way, but nr3 had to roll (no boost though, I learnt that lesson!) to prepare next turn. Ofc nr3 was shot. Oh, and Teroch shot unstressed Lulo (nothing happened), and Lulo shot Lando (nothing happened).
Turn 2: Here was my thinking: He can’t possibly go 3bank with Seevor because I’ll block that and take him apart with my own 3 banks. Much smarter would be to bank and roll out of my arcs. So I tried to cover more by staying closer to the edge and going straight+boost. He didn’t care and went 3bank anyway. The middle saw some very important action: His Lando blocked his own boost by a tiny bit, and the final position of Han meant he couldn’t shoot the stressed Lulo, but Lulo could shoot Han. That was huge! I almost took out Seevor and started to hurt Han quite a bit.
Turn 3: I expected Han to turn NW through these rocks. His position was perfect for that. Fenn was obviously coming close from behind, and Lando… who cares. So I set Lulo to hunt down and finish Seevor, and the others to close in on Han. I was a bit proud on my super tight maneuvering for the three generics. What I did not expect was that Han just bumped into Lando. That meant I took heavy shots from Teroch, and nearly destroyed Han.
Turn 4: He did again a strange move with Han (2 hard) and placed him
neatly in front of all my generics, who also blocked Teroch in the process. Han
was gone, Teroch wounded.
Turn 5: Teroch did a T-roll and died to the rear arcs.
Turns 6+7: Finished Lando.
200-60 win (3 ships down to half)
Conclusion/Lessons:
- Focusing Han was the right call. Even if I had lost a ship or two in the process
- Teroch used his ability just once (and forgot it a second time I think?), which is good.
- Seevor… he shouldn’t be separated like this.
Game 3
vs
XUUU without Wedge
Opponent’s determining action and my target priority: Leia really makes the three Uwings work, so she’s the first target. Benthic with Perceptive Copilot gives great action economy, so another target right there. I don’t care too much about Saw. Garven is just an easier Benthic, so of similar priority.
Deployment: I don’t remember the order of obstacles. I set down the L-debris and the middle rock, he placed the south field debris. He showed me the Partisan in the NE corner, so I set up the finger four in the SW corner and Lulo in the SE corner. His innermost U is the Partisan with Leia, then Benthic, then Saw. Perfect!
The gameplan for the first turns: Go fast with 1-4, 1hard for Lulo.
How it went:
Turn 1:
He stopped, I did my thing plus boost for generics, plus roll for Lulo.
Turn 2: See image. Again fast, and Lulo trying to catch up. I got some first
free shots. In the end I’d say my front team was a bit out of synch, but I kind
of had to due to 3bank1bank.
Turn 3: All generics lined up crakshots on the Partisan, except for nr4 in the front who did the 2 hard and turned arc. The Partisan got obliterated, and some first damage into Garven or Benthic (I don’t remember).
Rest of the game: Nr 4 circled around the L. The others blocked Garven and took close range shots. His Us 1banked to the middle. It was a slaughter, and I made a mistake or two. One turn I couldn’t decide between the maneuvers but completely forgot about him moving first. Garven went down, then Benthic.
In the end it was Saw against several As and I wanted to get some more MOV. 200-100 (1 full, 3 half iirc). I could and should have disengaged with little time on the clock.
Conclusion/Lessons:
- Taking out Leia was good
- 4-5 Awings can really take out a U quickly when crackshots are lined up!
Game 4
vs
XUUU with Wedge
Funny side note : He had blue sqd scouts and predator on the sheet but played with trickshot and partisans all day. Same points and I was the first to notice
He’s also a very good player and played that list for a while now, even before Leia got cheaper if I remember that correctly. So yes, before Uwings and Leia were cool.
Opponent’s determining action and my target priority: Leia really makes the three Uwings work, so she’s the first target again. However… Wedge is really, really dangerous for me. If there is any chance on taking him down I will!
Deployment: Two middle rocks are mine again. He setup in the NE corner, so I took SW again with the generics and SE with Lulo.
The gameplan for the first turns: This time go slowly because he, too, will be very slow.
How it went:
Turn 1-3: I think my approach worked pretty well, again a bit too fast in the middle. However, my mistake was to forget how quickly a Uwing melts against me. So I should have boosted with the guy between the rocks (see image) to make space for a left boost instead of right boost for the one behind. I didn’t want to take too many shots, that’s why I didn’t boost and that sabotaged the engagement on turn 4.
Turn 4: Because I wasn’t confident to melt a whole ship, I rather dodged. The two on the northern side went behind his ships. In every other game that would be a great move, but not against Uwings with Leia. I know, of course I knew then too, but I forgot in that moment.
From here on out it was a brawl! Turn 6 he blocked me. Wedge evaporated a 3 health focused generic at range 1, but in turn died himself. One Uwing died (the yellow guy?). It was a great game, very interesting and fun for both of us! The rest is in the conclusion.
Conclusion/Lessons:
The game ended a bit
unstatisfying as I had thrown the game on several occasions.
For example turn 8 when I set my guy on the asteroid. I had a good idea, move 3
straight and bank. But then I thought, why not 2 straight and bank instead? But
then I thought, why not 3 bank from the start? Now, I had dismissed the 3 bank
in the beginning as that would land on the rock. But coming to it from a
maneuver that fit, I failed to remember my conclusion from mere moments ago and
made that stupid mistake.
For example turn 6 and 7 (and 8 if I hadn’t set onto the rock) when I forgot to
crackshot.
For example turn 9 when Lulo did the risky, not the safe, maneuver.
And most of all just before the very last turn. I counted up points, told him, and we knew we had just one more turn to play. I had announced that it was 132 to 120 and that I was ahead. We set dials. We moved. Then I had my shots first and I told him myself (!) that I would try to shoot the Leia carrier as this one needed only one more damage to go down to half points. I missed, he fired, didn’t get any points. We shook hands. And then we realized. The Leia carrier wasn’t at half points!
What happened? He used the large damage cards, and one of those on one Uwing had moved unintentionally over to the Leia carrier. So when I counted the points I took it as half. But I had known, as it was I who mentioned right after setting dials that I needed one more damage. Again and the third time in this game I had known but completely forgot it. And again I paid dearly!
We played out the alternative out of interest. My obvious maneuver was to move closer to that ship, which would have allowed me to arcdodge the front Uwing!
In the end I lost the final 109-120 because I wasn’t attentive enough. As mentioned I had unfortunately made several grave mistakes. Every single instance of crackshot was, by coincidence, on the Uwing that needed that one more damage. And I had just forgotten! The points? I had forgotten! My realization that a 3 bank wouldn’t fit and that was why I wanted to do straight+bank in the first place? Forgotten! The fact that circling around Uwings with Leia is completely pointless? Forgotten!
The better player won this game, but I was close!
In the end I finished 2nd/14 and at least redeemed the much worse showing from a month earlier. The most important lesson here is that enough sleep and having fun was so much more important than the exact loadout or finding the perfect upgrade combination.
X-Wing Analytica 