One of the many benefits that Gold Squadron Podcast’s inaugural Space Jam had bestowed upon the community was the popularization of the fact that single-day tournaments (at least the Swiss thereof) were quite feasible using a combination of Discord, Tabletop TO, and an X-Wing simulator of choice. I was never really one for online tournaments given their precedence for taking a month to do what would be a day IRL, but single-day tournaments are sprouting up considerably more often. One of these was the first of Liberty Squadron’s monthly Tabletop Simulator tournament. I am not from Philadelphia–Liberty Squadron’s home base–nor am I even of Pennsylvania, but the tournament was announced online, so attend I did.
The list for the extended event:
Kylo Ren (76)
Supernatural Reflexes (24)
Advanced Optics (4)
Ship total: 104 Half Points: 52 Threshold: 3
Major Vonreg (57)
Outmaneuver (6)
Pattern Analyzer (5)
Mag-Pulse Warheads (6)
Afterburners (6)
Ship total: 80 Half Points: 40 Threshold: 2
Total: 184
View in Yet Another Squad Builder 2.0: https://raithos.github.io/?f=First%20Order&d=v8ZsZ200Z236X74W186WWY381X126W206W311W105&sn=New%20Squadron&obs=
Essentially, this is a variation of the 2-ship Kylo Vonreg I have been flying for some time. The big difference, however, is that I dropped the Deuterium Power Cells to equip Pattern Analyzer and Afterburners. Why use the regen if you’re mobile enough to not have to use it? Pattern allows you to aggressively dial in red maneuvers, especially in tandem with Outmaneuver, or even influence the opponent with the threat of the red maneuver. Afterburners allow Vonreg to fly a lot more like an actual interceptor-class craft, thereby helping his tendency of being caught. In most my practice games, Vonreg eliminates a threat and a half before he is killed off, letting Kylo mop up. I have very rarely had a game finish before time with this list, opting to just play cagey for most of the round: double reposition and Mag Pulse Warheads at least make this possible. I have had games where I have not lost more than a shield, but those are by far the outlier. If flying this list, score at least 41 pt (Vonreg’s half point value of 40 being outdone), preferably at least 81 (Vonreg’s destruction value being outdone), and most optimally at least 133 pt (Kylo at only half points and his bid are worth 68 pt, thereby outdoing whatever 67 pt alive the opposition has).
It may be asked why I am running a fat 2-ship Kylo Vonreg instead of the lean 3-ship Kylo Vonreg Rivas I wrote about earlier. Well, that can be attributed to all the Oli Aces that I have seen on Vassal; Space Jam had even further popularized Vader Whisper Grand Inquisitor, and I don’t want to be flying a list that has a little less of a coin flip’s chance of beating it. Kylo Vonreg in this form is currently 3-0 against Oli Aces (1-1 with the Deuterium version), so yeah, I’m being silly and teching against the meta in a casual tournament. Also, unlike Vassal, TTS is short on keyboard shortcuts for executing a lot of tasks. You gain some (3D models and full art) and you lose some (a cluster of clicks and camera movement just to get a ship to move [and that is even with using the few shortcuts there are]). The fewer the dials the better with this software.
Round 1: Graham (IG A and B with Marksmanship, Autoblasters, Contraband, and title; with 4-Lom with IG D, Autoblasters, and the title).
Most unfortunately for both Graham and myself, Graham had some technical difficulties. His internet was regularly reaching and remaining over 1 second of ping, which resulted in input lag/failure, a rather frustrating plight as the game was not allowing him to dial/maneuver/reposition an alarming amount of times. Considering the defensive nature of Brobots and how Vonreg’s worth is a Brobot and a half, with an unknown few number of turns, I threw caution to the wind and went high-aggro–the opposite of what my list wants. Hence, whereas Vonreg would 2-sloop and reposition so as to chill at the bottom of the board, I had him zoom up to engage the next turn. Whereas Kylo would nope out with a turn and a roll depending on the opponent’s move, I rushed him in towards the path of least resistance.
The bots turned in towards Vonreg, still unable to shoot at him this turn. Kylo landed on the debris cloud, so combined with 4-Lom’s token stress, ended up being double stressed as he traded a shield with the Brobot that had a shot with him. This is OK, I just have to score a lot of points really fast. The next turn, Vonreg chomps some health off 4-Lom while Kylo runs. The brobots kill Vonreg. Turns out it is hard to throw caution to the wind only to a limited degree. Fortunately, it was right here that Graham’s internet started to regularize to a much lower ping. This is a boon to both of us, as it means that Kylo can play more conservatively as he tries to catch up, while Graham can actually set his dials.
Vonreg’s death, although misplayed by a longshot on my part, was not in vain, as it allowed for a Disabled Power Regulator on to 4-Lom. With more controlled maneuvering, with 4-Lom inching towards the board edge and forced to turn, Kylo had room to breathe, sometimes daring to pull a Talon Roll that gave him a range 1 or 2 shot (with a previously taken lock taken on a fleeing turn) while not taking any fire. First came half of 4-Lom, then half of one of the bots. That bot died, which put me in the lead, but with about 25 minutes left, I ran with the plan to engage again. After killing off 4-Lom, I chased the surviving bot, but turned away whenever it looked like he would have a shot. It was ugly, but a win all the same. 126-80.
Round 2: Chance (Palpmobile, 2 Delta Squad Pilots with Heavy Laser Cannon)
Defenders are hard to kill, and I should know flying a lot of Rexler. In that case, my plan is to assassinate the emperor as fast as possible, run a lot, and if Vonreg gets caught, half-point a Defender. A difficult game plan but at least I have Outmaneuver, can generate an occaisional 4 dice full mod attack, and whenever Palp coordinates, he is without a reinforce. But what rocketed this game from hard to near-impossible was the first turn of engaging: on round 2 of the game, Kylo weaved to exchange range 2 shots with Palpatine alone while Vonreg crept along the other end of the board. Palp maxed out on hits (OK, maybe a shield taken) and Kylo rolled a single focus result (ouch). Now, due to his high point value, if Kylo even so much as takes 1 more damage, he has to kill nearly everthing…which is not going to happen against this list.
Vonreg wallops the shuttle as Kylo continues to dance, but on the inevitable turn where both Defenders would have shots on Vonreg, and where I turtled up for the shot….well, you can check that image caption for what I was expecting versus what actually happened. Miraculously, Vonreg’s maneuvering before the crit was inflicted allowed him to bring the shuttle down to low health, while Kylo made some meaningless shots. Even more miraculously, ioned Vonreg was only obstructed range 3 in arc the next turn of a Defender, so when he and Kylo took out Palp I was technically in the lead. In reality, I was leagues behind, however. Thus, Kylo baited and Vonreg Outmaneuvered, nearly scoring half on a range 1 shot of one of the defenders. Unfortunately, it happened again. Vonreg with his burners spent was not getting out of a defender’s firing arc, as we both had come to expect. If he did a white move, he couldn’t get the double reposition. If he did a red move, he’d be dead for sure the following turn. Thus, he did a blue, and turtled up by rolling to range 3 with a focus. Max hits. 1 lone focus result on 4 green dice.
After that, it was a bunch of more squirreling about, arc-dodging, taking meaningless shots, cowering behind a cloud when I would get shot at. Eventually, Kylo did weave about and score a range 1 full mod shot on the weakened Defender and brought it to half, and then proceeded to run. I couldn’t run forever, though, due to staggered firing arcs closing in on my position and eventually I would have to defend against a 3 die focused attack against my 4 dice focused defense. Naturally, his 2 hits overpower my single focus result another bucket of 3 blanks. Get rekt and learn to roll some paint. I couldn’t generate enough shots to kill the weakened Defender or do enough damage to the healthy one, a far cry from what was needed to win. 90 – 132 loss. I’m quite sure there’s a lesson to be learned here from some bad flying on my part, but I legitimately cannot identify which were calculated minor risks that went fantastically bad and which were mistakes. There were literally only 2 shots that I took this entire game that when I was not behind a gas cloud, I would roll more than a single paint–the 1 die rear arc range 3 depleted shuttle shot and the TIE Defender that shot at Vonreg immediately after his friend capitalized on his blankout. The other 4 similar shots over the course of an entire 75 minutes were what they were.
Round 3: Brett (4-Lom with Advanced Sensors, IG D, and title; Guri with Advanced Sensors, Afterburners, and Predator; L337 with 000 and BT-1).
4-Lom is slow, so Kylo started on his end of the board to at least force him to continue down that opening lane. Then, on the subsequent turns, Kylo teleported to the other end of the board to slug the list’s big blocker (also handily the easiest target to eliminate). Vonreg meanwhile side-stepped Guri. It wasn’t good enough to catch her in range 1, so he decided to blast past and stunt the Falcon. The following turn, Vonreg 5-K’s to be out of everyone’s arc as he depletes the Falcon again, letting Kylo dance around and range 1 shoot Guri with only a weak Falcon shot in retaliation.
The next turn was brilliance by my opponent. I was certain he’d call Vonreg executing a fast blue straight maneuver to try to dodge the the Falcon and to catch Guri in a really bad spot. Thus, I dialed in the escape route (which was only a 2 bank and thus could not trigger afterburners), which would dodge 4-Lom and Guri should the greedy move be called. Rather, my opponent called me making the conservative move, and positioned Guri to be exposed to the greedy move, but ready to catch my escape. Vonreg dodges 4-Lom’s arc with a boost, but is tokenless against the Falcon and Guri. He dies, but at least eats more at the shuttle, making Kylo’s job easier. In retrospect, getting blocked by Guri calling the greedy move might not have been all that bad, as the Falcon would have only a weak shot at best at Vonreg, and sure, range 2 full mods from 4-Lom is nasty, but it’s better than death. Kylo will live and learn.
Kylo runs by executing a hard 3 around the Falcon’s attempted block, remaining stressed, but at least having only range 3 and/or obstructed shots from Brett’s damage dealers. IIRC, I lose a shield or two, but continue to flee with the 5 forward and autothrutsers into the cloud cluster. From there, once I clear the stress and don’t self stress to prepare Supernatural Reflexes, Kylo goes wherever the damage dealers are not, and kills the structural damage 3 hp Falcon. He continues to dance and finishes the deed on tokenless Range 2 Guri. Greedy for more points, I then trade half of Kylo to eliminate the full pointed 4-Lom. Technically the proper move by scoring even more points despite losing another 52 pt, but I wanted to better my sorry looking MOV. A mistake that I did not pay for, 200 – 132 pt victory.
Game 4: Ebro 505 (IG A and B with Crackshot, Ion Cannon, and Title; Nom Lumb with Dengar Gunner, Ion Cannon, and IG D)
There are so many incentives to kill the easiest Brobot that presents itself and simply ignore Nom Lumb. Unless he’s firing with his cannon, he at best plinks with a 2 die turret….on a Jumpmaster. I’ve flown enough Jumpmaster to know how clunky its maneuvering and rotating are even when Contraband Cybernetics are equipped. Furthermore, it is impossible to Outmaneuver him with that pilot ability. Even furthermore, Dengunner is brutal to something that is force-reliant even with Advanced Optics (Kylo) or something that is inherently green-token anemic (aside from Holo or a coordinator supporting) until the Xi-class shuttle drops (Vonreg). Thus, I’ll mix the formation up, especially in taking advantage of Nom Lumb’s poor turn radius and his position in the inside by blocking the next round’s turn while arc-dodging for now. The following turn, Vonreg and Kylo pound into IG-A, with that Mag Pulse piled on top of Vonreg’s bullseye ability to turn the gun irrelevant. When the formation of the droids regrouped, the aces dispersed and plotted again.
Well, some of my plotting went wrong–a clear and undeniable mistake. I got greedy with Vonreg and ended up on 2hp remaining. Later, I made a mistake again and planned to bait the Brobots on one of the future turns by presenting Kylo, albeit in range 3 and obstructed through the clouds to both Brobots. Unfortunately, I miscalculated and barely left a range 3 clear shot for one of the droids. Because of the optimal Brobot loadout (Crackshot and Ion Cannon) without that cloud, I was force-depleted and got half-pointed. The following turn, Kylo held back from engaging against B, while Vonreg triggered the fuel leak and finished off A. I spent the focus, and accepted Vonreg’s death–I was legitimately surprised by B’s 4-K and I thus did not have the space to roll and dodge with Vonreg. IG B generated 4 hits, I nattied evades and lived on 1 hp, unbelievably lucky. Sure, the odds of him killing me before dice were dropped were in the range of 29%, but I got an even luckier defensive roll than Ebro’s offensive roll. Instead of Kylo having to kill a relatively healthy Brobot with about half an hour left, now Vonreg can use his 1hp to finish that task faster.
IG B self-bumped into Vonreg to clear his stress and catch the turn from the Major. If not, he could block Vonreg so that Nom Lumb could kill him. Thanks to Pattern Analyzer and the geometry of the 2-sloop, Vonreg was able to range 1 Outmaneuver with a target lock against a tokenless brobot. If that weren’t enough to cripple him, Kylo’s hard 1 that did not need Supernat correction resulted in 4 dice optics force. The next turn, Vonreg guarantees the kill on IG B while Nom Lumb kills him. Kylo dances for a bit, and gets lazy on the final turn and parks in the front arc, where the turret at this point is not. The ion cannon can hit as hard as it wants, but it is allowed to deal only 1 damage. A very sloppy and lucky win, 146 – 132.
Getting lucky and winning at least one game that I should have had gone a lot closer or quite possibly lost means that I should improve my Vonreg game and not simply hope to not roll the outlier variance that I have had on the brutalizing blanking loss. I am glad to go 3-1 and 3rd out of 14th overall, but I have only scored 200 pt of damage dealt in one game, held onto all of Kylo’s points in one game, and had Vonreg survive to the end of 0 games. Such sloppiness resulted in notably low MOV for a fast player such as myself: 886 across 4 rounds. I also have to wait longer for obstacles to mix up an enemy formation in general, especially given the presence of Outmaneuver-disregarding ships (turrets and Nom Lumb, shuttle rear-arcs, and the high time on target of Defenders and Brobots) and ships that don’t care about Mag Pulse (double-tapping Brobots and their friend, TIE Defenders that can token up against the attack and still hold on to 3 dice, etc.). Well, it was a good and fun test run for a list that has more potential than I can muster with it.
Screaming into the Void 