The Imperial Aces are in Town!
The Imperial Aces Expansion Pack was
released worldwide last week. In a rare display of efficiency, our Malaysian
distributor actually managed to deliver it pretty quick rather
than weeks later. If not mistaken, Sparta was the first to get their hands on
these babies and given how long we’ve hold our collective breaths during the
wait, all 5-6 sets flew off the shelf on day one. So kudos to the good people
in Sparta for being responsive to players' needs and to my sparring partner Justin who bought one for me. Not sure if other shops are stocked but my guess is that’s all the
stock there is in the first batch, so the rest of you guys are in for a looooooong wait.
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| My box of Imperial Aces. Yet to unbox it :P |
I’m sure most of you would have read about what’s in the Expansion. If you didn't you can check out the Card Browser function from
this site. I’m not going to go through the contents one-by-one. You
guys can check it out yourselves. I’m more interested in discussing strategies
and squad builds.
Everyone is excited about Carnor Jax. There’s
good reasons to it. His card ability works like a reverse area-of-effect Dark Curse.
Clearly Jax would be devastating against a Swarm and most small Imperial ships but by no means that’s the
only thing he is good against. His ability could still limit the option a Rebel
player by forcing them to take a target lock even if a focus is more desirable. His ability works on anyone and everyone and I think we’re likely to
see a huge shift in meta with Jax inspired Imperial builds being fielded in competitive plays and
Rebel players adjusting builds and play styles to counter him.
With such offensive capabilities, Jax would
naturally be on top of your opponent’s hit list. What’s the best way to protect
him? You have an array of tools to achieve that. Push the Limit (PTL) to Interceptors
is like honey to milk – it synergise well. At PS8 he would like have seen the
ending positions of most ships and can barrel roll + boost his way either to
stay out of arc (like most Interceptors do), or move into range 1 and activate
his ability. In a pinch, he could turtle behind a focus + evade action shell to minimise damage. If you
have extra points to spare, you could throw in a Stealth Device to give him an
extra green dice. Hull or Shield upgrade works well too. Season according to your own taste.
Mini Swarm + Jax
Squad Points: 98
Carnor Jax + PTL
Howlrunner + Stealth Device
Academy Pilots (AP) x 4
One of the drawbacks of a typical 7-ship Swarm is that it takes a lot of focus and energy to maximise its potential simply because there is so many ships that you need to keep track. More so during competitive plays where you're expected to play 3-4 games in a row without breaks. So, this 6-ship build should be a piece of cake to manage for those who are used to flying the standard Swarm, like me.
You can have Howlrunner and the APs setup
the usually Swarm formation and Jax fly separately. Ideally your opponent tries to
take on the Swarm and Jax could boost/ barrel roll into range 1 combat while
staying out of firing arc. Or perhaps you opponent choose to take out Jax
first? Again you could boost/ barrel roll out of arc, if possible and failing
which you could still hide behind a focus + evade action shell. Meanwhile, your
Swarm attacks from behind.
There’s 2 squad points left and you could
add in whatever upgrade that fancies you. You could throw in a Royal Guard
upgrade + Targeting Computer on Jax. Or Swarm Tactics on Howlrunner to have an
AP shoot first. For those who wants to have initiative, you can leave the squad
at 98 points or put Determination or Adrenaline Rush on Howlrunner for a total squad points of 99.
Three Amigoes Reloaded
Squad Points: 100
Soontir Fell + PTL + Stealth Device + Royal Guard
+ Targeting Computer
Carnor Jax + PTL + Stealth Device + Royal Guard +
Targeting Computer
Turr Phennir + PTL + Stealth
The original Three Amigoes (Vader + Fel +
Phennir) could be re-engineered to a 3 interceptor squad list. Play it like you
would with the original i.e. staying out of firing arc with boost/ barrel roll,
because this list is squishy with only 9 hit points and one bad roll could ruin
your day. Targeting Computer can be swapped out as I suspect you will not find
the opportunity to use it often. Overall, not a list for rookies and even some
seasoned players avoid it because it can be very unforgiving when you make a
mistake.
Royal Guard Pilot (RGP) is my 2nd
favourite card in the Expansion. At PS 6 it shoots first ahead of all generic
pilots and some named pilots. It cost 22 pts to field RGP, only 4 pts more vs Alpha
(PS 1) and 1 pt more vs Saber (PS 4), making it a cheap way to gain an advantage in PS. More importantly, it can carry Elite
Pilot Talent (EPT), allowing you to play PTL (I know PTL gets mentioned a lot but its really good on Interceptors).
Royal Guard Squadron
Squad Points: 100
RGP + PTL x 4
The original 4 interceptor list called "Saber Rattlers" (Phennir +
3 Sabres all with PTL) just got a major boost in Pilot Skill. At PS 6 there’s
not a lot of pilots out there that you need to guess their final position,
making it easier for you to boost/ barrel roll out of arc, while keeping enemy
ships in your sight. Play style wise you probably don’t want to group them in a
formation and keep getting in each others’ way. Best is to fly them
individually or at most in twos. In the event that the enemy have you boxed in,
do the usual focus + evade to mitigate damage.
It used to be financially expensive to play Saber Rattlers because you need to buy 4 interceptors and another 4 A-Wings just to get 4 PTLs (only available in the A-Wing Expansion Pack). Not anymore, since each box of Imperial Ace Expansion Pack comes with 2 PTLs, so that would cut down your cash outlay by half. One more reason to play this build, eh?
Vader's (Royal) Escort
Squad Points: 99
Omicron Group Pilot + Vader Crew +
Intelligence Agent
RGP + PTL x2
AP x2
This modification of the existing Suicide
Shuttle built just popped in my head while writing this post. The RGP complements
well with the Suicide Shuttle because the hard-hitting interceptors get to
shoot first and strip shields off rebel ships before Vader crushes them with his dark-side Force powers. APs gives the list more body and helps take heat off the
RGPs. You could easily swap those APs for one more RGP if you want.
I added Intelligence Agent in
there mostly as a filler but it could be useful in predicting the movement of high PS enemy ships. Maybe
a Saboteur or Anti Pursuit Laser would work better? I don’t know. Still needs
testing.
Other Named Pilots
I'm less excited about other pilots. Sure, their abilities are good, but its not great. I'm looking for Great (that's a capital G). Lieutenant Lorrir's crazy barrel roll could pull off surprising moves while Kir Kanos's evade token is equivalent to a super focus (His evade increases attack/ defense by a factor of 1 vs a normal focus which increases attack/ defense by a factor of 0.75, assuming 3 dice rolls), but the lack of EPT puts me off. I like my interceptors with PTL. Period.
Don't even get me started on Tetran Cowell. An interceptor, as a rule of thumb, should never K-turn and risk being shot down without actions. You could easy do a hard turn and boost and would be facing 270 degree. After that, use PTL for evade token if you think you're going to get shot at. In my book, that's good enough.
Perhaps you can find better use for these guys. But for me, these folks goes straight into the 'Casual Play/ Fun Build' category.
Counter Strategies
The meta is likely to shift with competitive builds fielding a lot more interceptors and you will want to have tools in place to deal with them effectively. For Rebels, Falcon + Gunner works well, since they can’t
avoid your arc and a well placed shot would kill them outright. If the meta turns out to be very heavy in Jax, you could throw
in Marksmanship to counter his ability and to dish out crits on these squishy interceptors.
B-Wings with Adv Sensors would be a match
for PTL Interceptors at close combat but less effective against Jax since you
can’t take focus. Lure them to fight near an asteroid and use advance sensors +
barrel roll to dance around the rock. Even if RGP shoots first, it would be
foolish for them to burn the focus on attack because when you shoot back with 4
dice, there’s a non-zero chance that your B-Wing can 1-shot the RGP.
For Imperials, Suicide Shuttle can be
devastating if you have firing arc, dealing critical damage regardless whether
you hit anything with your primary weapon. Buzzsaw shuttle (Shuttle + Gunner)
could punch through action shells, but again if you have firing arc. Same goes
for Bounty Hunter + Gunner but this build is a huge point sink.
Ironically, you could play Jax against...
Jax. Nobody gets action and the better player (or dice rolls win) :P. Jokes
aside, RGP has plenty of reasons to be afraid of Jax because they rely heavily
on actions to stay alive.
Lacking the options above, your best bet is
to force a bump and Interceptors without actions are sitting ducks. You need to
get into your opponent’s head and figure out where his ships are likely to go,
but get there first. I’m not going to say it’s easy but it can be done.
