Board Thread:General Discussion/@comment-27029853-20170703223814/@comment-454133-20170917063106

Continuing the narrative from a few posts back:

Match 3 had me up against a PS1 TIE Striker + title, Maarek Steele with Ion Cannon + Stealth Device + TIE/D and maybe more; plus Backdraft with standard equipment. This took about an hour. I think I killed Backdraft first, then danced a bit with Maarek and the striker. Maarek landed on an asteroid early on and this really hurt his chances, since he missed out on a round of damge. I eventually killed him, and then finished off the striker.

I ended with 4 damage cards on Tuck #2. I lost 1 shield from #1 (the 3PO tuck), and all shields from #3.

Match 4 was Expertise Dengar and Bomblet Nym, both with very common equipment except that Nym had Advanced Sensors instead of Accuracy Corrector, to allow him to land bombs and maneuver better. This took about 40 minutes. Nym raced into my auzitucks and got behind one, but the other two finished him off after he got only one bomblet off (dealing 1 damage to the front ship and 2 to the middle one, and autoblastering the middle one for one damage). I then struggled for a while against Dengar's arc-dodging but eventually got him.

2 shields left on #1, no shields left on #3, and 3 or 4 damage cards on #2. I'll note now that #2 took an inordinate amount of damage today, usually it was the only one with damage cards. But that's probably the result of how I flew my formations.

At this point I'd scored 4 perfect victories, and my place in the top 8 was secure no matter what happened next round.

Match 5 was against Expertise Dengar and PTL Fenn. This player moved Fenn down to the center-east of the map, while Dengar wiggled back and forth (1 turn and barrel roll) in the north-west. He was basically waiting to lunge forward with either ship and tear into me. Very dangerous, and I knew that it'd hurt whichever way I was facing for the first engagement. By round 3 or 4 I had to choose, so i turned North to Dengar, and this worked very well for me. I plowed damage into Dengar and eventually brought him down. Fenn was wicked though and between the two of them he did managed to finally kill Tuck #2. After some dogfighting and I think some solid bumps, I finished Fenn.

Lost Tuck #2, #3 had one damage card, and #1 was untouched.

After this we all got our regular prizes distributed, including some pretty acrylic bomb tokens for the top 8 players. I'll try to remember to post a picture. They also had small ships available, and lego star wars ship kits. The gorgeous blue firespray was given the the player in last place, and one of the two Guns for Hire were raffled off. We also got a much-needed dinner break. I think it was sometime after 5 pm and we'd last eaten 3 matches ago.

After food, we had more matches to play to narrow down the top 8 to top 4 etc. The player who killed a tuck on Match #5 actually had to bow out to get home, and the person who stepped up to take his place was my next opponent.

Match 6 was against Lowhhrick with Selflessness + Draw Their Fire, Kanan Jarrus + Rey and Recon Specialist + Doral Turret, and Ezra with Adaptability and "Chopper". All PS 5s. This fleet was potentially trouble because Lowhhrick and Kanan were amazing at defending each other, and Rey + Recon Specialist could reduce my attack power by 1 on all 3 shots I made each round (until he used up his Rey tokens, or missed an opportunity to focus because of stress). I knew Kanan had to die first. It took a while but I poured damage into him, stressing him a couple times but not to a ton of effect.

Lowhhrick didn't do a lot of damage, instead having to focus on defending Kanan, and having trouble getting turned around. I stressed him at one point and it shut him down a lot, since he didn't have the liberty of doing green for a while.

The turn Kanan was going to die, he decided to deploy Ezra, who I'd honestly for gotten was there. She did a bit of damage but wasn't a huge threat. I put a bunch of damage into Lowhhrick and killed him surprisingly fast, then popped Ezra a couple turns later.

Tuck #3 had 4 damage cards, #1 lost 2 shields, and #2 was untouched for a change.

I should point out that now we were in the top 4, and it was down to 3 Decimator fleets (all RAC) and my Auzitucks. This weird arrangement was apparently because all the bombs, autoblaster nyms, and other shenanigans had favored the huge HP of the Decimator. Plus the decimator players were very skilled pilots, and had some devious tricks up their sleeves that were really screwing up other players, as you'll soon see in the two I fought.

Match 7 was brutal. He had RAC with Ysanne + Rebel Captive + VI + Engine Upgrade + Gunner, and Rexler with TIE/x7 + VI. Rebel Captive's stress hits before Expertise, so this took a lot of bite out of my tucks. Also clearing that stress was often difficult, since a boosting decimator is a fast-moving target and I had to really scramble to keep up. Rexler was a threat too because his ability bypasses Breach Specialist and gets crits through. However, he died so fast it didn't matter, so that went well.

However, hunting down and finishing that Decimator was a long, brutal war with a tragic casulty near the end. I don't remember the blow-by-blow, but there's a reason this player got so far; he's an excellent flyer and the fleet is extremely well-constructed. Gunner was a real problem for all the chip damage it forced through, Ysanne was a problem for constantly shedding damage, stress was a massive problem, the hyper-mobile large ship awas a problem... it was a tough fight.

I got a reprieve near the end when he took and  together and it took him a while to shake them; he ran away for a while trying to get rid of the loss of damage potential, and I had to chase him down with my remaining two tucks to try to end it all. Finally I got him in range, survived his attacks, and fired back with the lethal blow. What a relief!

By the end of the match, I'd lost #1 (both a war hero wookie and C-3PO), taken 4 damage cards on #3, and had one shield left on #2.

Finally Match 8. This one was recorded and I can try to track down where they're posting it if anyone is interested. I kept screwing up and rolling the dice on the table instead of into the container where the dice camera was watching it (I've never played on camera before).

This player's fleet was brutal too, but not as bad for my fleet as the last RAC had been. RAC with Palpatine + Kylo Ren (Crew) + Engine Upgrade etc; and Quickdraw with all the quickdraw stuff (I don't remember exactly what).

So this fleet likes to give you or something else horrible, then guarantee you take a crit with either RAC or Palpatine's abilities. This was ruinous for so many other fleets. There's just one problem with that: Breach Specialist laughs at Kylo. It's just normal damage to an Auzituck! Especially once I get the foe down to one ship, Breach Specialist will be used every time to make sure I don't take the crit. From there I just have to make sure I get my actions (don't plow through obstacles, bump, etc), and by this point in the night I was flying quite well.

My opponent, however, couldn't believe how powerful Breach Specialist is. I both get to use the Reinforce token to shed damage, and then I get to discard it to turn crits face-down. This wrecked the core feature of his fleet.

So RAC flew to the south and approached from that end, and Quickdraw and I exchanged fire at range 3 in the center of the map. Not a lot happened, but I think the next round was lethal for Quickdraw. Just too much firepower and not enough luck. I then turned south with two tucks to battle RAC, and north with #1 to plan for the future. #1 was taking a lot of damage, and I needed to keep him from dying, but I also wanted to head off RAC near the center-east of the map when he curved up. After not too many rounds I was able to finish him off (with one tuck at range 1 still waiting to fire, so it was a pretty sure thing).

I ended with 5 cards on Tuck #1, and the other two were untouched.

In the course of 8 games, I earned 1533 MOV (if I'm calculating correctly -- 200 MOV per game except where I lost 33 points on match 5 and 34 on match 7). Needless to say this created quite the buzz as the day wore on, and I continued to rock my matches. I think more than a few of the top players feel like the fleet (and the Auzituck in general) is overpowered, though they made it clear they're mad at the tuck not at me. ;)  They also speculated that we'll be seeing a lot of players fielding triple tucks in the coming months, after the show I just put on.

In terms of the fleet's weaknesses, I'd say stress and mobility are its main enemies. Also tractor beams, though nobody fielded those against me today. First, stress disables Expertise and threatens to prevent the next reinforce action. This is a big limiter on my choices, and it can really take some of the durability and bite out of the fleet. Second, that mobility takes a lot of learning. I flew like a complete retard when I first tried to fly 2- and 3-tuck fleets. You have to learn to fly slightly apart, and scatter in different (and unexpected) directions once they're behind you so that hopefully at least one tuck gets them back in arc very soon.

I also want to toot my own horn here for a moment. It's clear to me that this is not a faceroll fleet -- you don't just assemble it and start winning. I flew very aggressively, playing my favorite move of "gamble with just how close I can get to that asteroid without clipping it". I hit a few obstacles and landed on an asteroid only once all day, despite this aggressive flying. I also planned my maneuvers very carefully, laying out blocks and arc traps whenever I could. And I made some tough decisions about when to plow through an asteroid, bump on purpose, clear vs keep stress, and so on. I have some good experience flying this fleet (among others), and I do think I brought a lot of skill to the table.

That said? I probably performed above my ability today, thanks to this fleet being (probably) very, very powerful. It's exceptionally lean and efficient, and a good pilot can make it very hard to avoid damage or kill even 1 tuck. They are durable little bastards, and Expertise gives them a mean bite. I have won some tournaments at this store before, and I'm often not terribly far from first place, but today I performed wildly well. Some players weren't familiar enough with the fleet to know how to deal with it, but even the players who knew what to expect were sidelined by just how deadly and durable it is.

I want to thank Wampa948 on the FFG Forums for his excellent suggestion for how to tighten up my fleet. The end result is evil, and it was very fun wielding it today.

That said, now that I have Guns for Hire, it's time for a break from tucks. I want to put my Starvipers and K-Fighters on the table! It's so cool that someone got these two copies (at PAX?) and donated them as prizes today. If I can get off work at a good time on Wednesday, then I'll get to try it out!

And with that, it's time for bed. It's been a looong day of dial spinning, and I'm exhausted. I hope you all have fantastic weekends!