Newcastle Regionals January 2018

After I wrote out the report for the Bathurst Regionals, I decided I had better go back and complete reports for the Newcastle Regionals earlier in January. Who knows, I might even get inspired and go back to Australian National from August 2017.

My list was my fairly standard double mc30 torpedo with H9s, APTs, OE. One is Dodonna’s flagship with Admonition. In this list I had 1 CR90A with TRC and Jaina’s Light, and 3 medium transports. I had a bid of 6 points, and a reasonable fighter wing with 2 VCX, Jan Ors, and a couple of X-Wings.

The plan was to win initiative, out-activate enemies, and smash things before flying away. The Squadron ball is there to frustrate bomber balls and maybe claw some points from squadron heavy lists. One of the transports has Bright Hope and Torryn Far for those lovely blue re-rolls.

My first opponent was Shaun, flying 2 ISD, 2 Goz, 2 Tie Fighters with Motti. I won the bid and chose Dangerous Territory. I outdeployed and out-activated, was reasonable confident of victory. I could easily get a 7/4 by killing the Goz and Tie Fighters and running away. I decided to aim to a 9/2 by killing the Motti ISD as well – there was no way I could kill both.

The ISDs were fitted with Tractor beams, which made the whole thing a little bit tougher – And Shaun knows what he doing with those Dual ISDs. The Motti one slowed to let the other one swing around it, and the next thing I knew I was in big trouble. I managed to escape with the loss of my Toryn Farr transport. I took out two Gozantis and the Tie Fighters, but failed to bring down the Motti ISD. My rolling was awful – I think I got one APT to work from 4 torpedo attacks, and the ISD got away with one point of hull remaining – my fighters scrambled for a last minute attack, but fell short. I could have activated more squadrons, but that would have left a heavily damaged Admonition in medium range of the other ISD – not a good position. So I saved the flag, failed on a 50/50 kill the ISD, and came away with a 6/5 in my favour.

Shaun and his speed 3 ISDs outrun my X-Wings - now and forever!

Admonition and the other warships speed away from a very angry non-Motti flagship ISD...


Round Two: Jeremy

The second game was against Jeremy, flying Sloane, ISD, 2 Goz, 2 Raiders, bunch of Tie Fighters. I won initiative by 1 point, and chose his Minefields. I figured I’d use my VCXs to move the mine enough to let me through – as it was I caught a few mines.

We had a limited squadron war in the middle of the board while other things jockeyed for position. I lost a few X-Wings while things moved into place. On the key turn my Admonition destroyed a Raider, then Jeremy’s raider fell short of killing Jaina’s Light, which unleashed Torryn assisted flak (and no obstructions!) to inflict heavy damage on the Tie Squadrons. My other Torpedo frigate killed two Gozantis (one side arc, one front with CF), and then it was all over bar the shouting. 

In the end I scraped an 8/3, I think by about 3 points.

Round Three - Michael

The third game was against Michael. He was flying an ISD, double Arquitens, 2 Goz, four squadron Jendon / Maarek + friends mini ball.

We were at Table 2, going into the round 3rd and 4th. Table One was next to us, so we were often distracted by the professionals beating each other senseless.

I won initiative again, chose his Capture the VIP, and went to town.

This game did not go quite to plan, as my Torpedo frigates notably failed to kill Arquitens in one go even with CF and CF token. Frustrating in the extreme. I just rolled abominably.

I lost my non-Admo torpedo frigate, before my CR90 managed to pull off the miraculous shot and and take out the heavily damaged Arquitens and destroy a Goz. I lost bright hope, and spent a lot of my Squadron ball to kill Jendon, and then take out the other squadrons. The other Arquitens eventually succumbed to Admonition.

I just had range from Jaina's Light on the damaged Arquitens - I CF'd, and needed to roll at least one hit so I could TRC the other to stop the evade. It worked! I cheered like crazy when that Arq finally went to pieces...

Admonition zones in on the other Arq, while Maarek Steele lies in wait to finish off the flagship...

I took out the Arq, knocked out Sabre squad, and go Jan Ors in place to stop Maarek in time. Whew.

I also stole the VIP token with double strategic on turn 2, so ended up with another 50 points.

All in all, I think it was 8/3, but not enough to take out the tournament. I ended up on 22 tournament points, while the winner was on 28 or something stupid (a bye and two 10s).

I do miss my torpedo list. Perhaps I will come back to it someday.

This list was the heady days before wave 7 finally dropped... ah. Memories!

Bathurst Regional 2018

Bathurst Regional Tournament 

February 2018

(First Wave 7)

Task Force Orange went to Bathurst in strength - two players attended our Regional Comp - and we met a third there who we quickly recruited to our team by giving some sage advice about Gunnery Teams in Akbar lists (whether this advice was welcome and / or helpful remains to be seen...).

Theo took a nested babushka doll of B-Wings in a MC80 appearing from nowhere via Raddus in a MC75.

I decided to do something different. I took a corvette farm list. 7 Activations, 8 squadrons, no bid.

My list was 4 CR90As with TRCs, one with Cracken and Jaina's Light. 3 naked transports made up the numbers, activating my 5 X-Wings and Jan Ors via my 2 VCX freighters.

Simple, right?

My thinking was thus: Strategic Adviser means that all those six-activation lists would now have seven activations - all except my list, which does not have a large base ship to put the strange looking character aboard.

So, for the first time in a long time, I did not bring Dodonna, Torpedo Frigates with APTs and H9s, and a sizable bid for first player.

Instead I went planning on going second, winning objectives, and thoroughly confounding the meta.

I also do not own any Wave 7 boxes (or Wave 6, and probably 5 - I haven't bought a new ship since flotillas, and only the Rebel fighter pack II).

My first opponent was Damien - flying Mon Karen, Salvation, Tantive IV, and a flotilla, with Hera, Z-95s, Biggs and Wedge. Rieekan was his general.

We rolled for initiative, Damien won and chose to go first.

My missions were Most Wanted, Fire Lanes, and Sensor Net.

Damien immediately rejected Sensor Net, and decided against Most Wanted. Fire Lanes it was!

Deployment - I probably should have placed the fire lane tokens further apart, but this worked for my purposes.
My biggest mistake was putting the middle Corvette so far forward, and facing the enemy. I should have deployed it facing sideways.

At the start of Turn 2 I had won the three objectives, and moved the left most token well towards the right. My flotillas were off on the far right, while my Corvettes are readying for a Salvation killing attack...

A closer view of the central part of the battlefield. My centre-rear corvette has turned towards the winged Mon Karen, preparing for a game of "chicken."

I think I must have missed the start of turn 3 photo - I think this is the start of 4. My left most Corvette dropped speed to 1 to avoid starting turn 3 in blue range of the Mon Karen, but then lacked the speed to escape. From this position that Corvette put the finishing touches to Salvation, then was wiped out by Mon Karen and the Tantive IV. 

The fighter battle had been quite desultory on both sides, with terribly rolls a-plenty. Lt. Blount did not roll a single hit until turn 5. Biggs nearly died in turn 3, but lived long enough for Wedge to arrive and take his extra hits.

This is the start of turn 5 I think... Mon Karen is planning on getting away before the Corvettes can rip it apart, while my Jan assisted VCXs are busy throwing the fire lane tokens under the enemy ships and squadrons. In this turn I manage to take out Hera and the last Z-95.

At the start of turn 6 things are pretty clearly in my favour. I managed to kill Lt. Blount, and finish off the enemy flotilla with a nice ram.

At the end of this game I had to keep shushing the bystanders and others who walked by to make comments. Ours was the last game of the round to be completed - apparently seven activations and a bunch of fighters takes a long time.

I won 16 of the Fire Lane tokens, Damien won 1, with the other being evenly contested.

I took the game with a margin of 420 vs 118, difference of 302 points, earning me a nice 10/1.
I lost a Corvette and a number of Squads. Damien lost all his squads, Salvation, and the Flotilla.





ROUND TWO!



The next game was against Dan, flying Thrawn on ISD, two flotillas, the red-dice little thing (Arquitens! they are called Arquitens!), and four rogue squadrons - the names of which I forget. But Morna Key does a thing, and the other one does something else, and IG-88 ignores escort, and the other one did something as well. I don't remember exactly what - but they were nasty.

We rolled for initiative, I won, and decided to go first - was that a mistake? Perhaps. I wonder which of my objectives Dan would have picked as first player.

Either way, Dan had fire lanes and no strategic, so I decided to do a repeat of the last game in a slightly different way.


My attitude to this game (Armada) is that it is mine to win or lose. That's not meant to mean that my opponents are indifferent, it's just my approach - every victory I earned, every loss was due to my failure - probably not a healthy attitude, but that's the way it flows.

In this game I think I played pretty well until the very last round - I think it was pretty flawless up until then - with one obvious exception. I flew my VCXs out first activation to move the Fire Lanes tokens into my grasp, and then failed to move an X-Wing and Jan Ors to support the most vulnerable one - One of the Rogues activated with a squadron token and took 4 health off my VCX - now I was in trouble. If I had guarded the VCX early this would have been a different game. Lesson learned. Do not risk the VCX - it has 8 hull, but it isn't invincible.

I think this is part of the way through turn 2... The fighter battle is getting started, and my Corvettes are heading right to cut off that Arquitens.

At the start of turn 3, my Flagship has the flotilla on the left nicely double arc'd - failed to get an accuracy on either roll, but the Gozanti burned his Evade - which would prove helpful in later turns. 

One of the Rogues has gone down to the X-Wing Wing, but the middle VCX is hurting bad - thanks to Morna Key and IG-88. And the ISD has no ship targets, so plenty of double blue dice flak on the squadrons makes a big difference.

A closer view of the Squadron fight...very few of those pilots would make it back to the carriers....

This is the start of turn 5 - The Arquitens has succumbed to repeated shots from 3 corvettes at relatively close range. One of the Corvettes is badly damaged, but survives the game.

The right Gozanti died to some nice medium range shooting and fortunate rolling of accuracy.

My squadrons have been butchered wholesale, with just one X-Wing and a VCX facing off against IG-88 and another Rogue.

The middle fire lanes token is under IG-88, which is why he lived this long...

The Cracken flagship has given up his easy job of guarding a token and is rushing headlong into a place to engage the last flotilla. I sped to 4 when it could have slowed to 1 and stayed well out of trouble... sigh.

At the start of turn 6 and I have (or so I think) a dilemma on my hands. I want to kill IG-88, destroy the flotilla (which is double arc'd and has no evade) and get my VCX out of the way to put the fire lanes token where my top corvette can get it.

I should have activated a flotilla, ordered the VCX to kill IG-88 and then let the ISD or Gozanti activate. Instead, I make a stupid error, and have the flagship give a squadron order, do the VCX thing, kill the flotilla with guns, and then move at speed four right into the front of the unactivated ISD.

This was a silly error. I had a massive activation advantage, the flagship was (relatively) safe in the ISD side arc, and worst of all I had forgotten the ISD was Avenger. I landed in its front red range, took six dice, and couldn't evade the double because my green evade was locked down and the red was not available. Good bye, General Cracken!

I still won the game, but my chance at a nice 8/3 was dashed.
352 to me vs 240 to Dan. 7/4.
I won the Fire Lanes tokens, but not by nearly enough.



ROUND THREE

I was probably better off not getting an 8/3, as that would have made me equal second for tournament points heading into the last round. Instead I was third, going up against fourth.
At the top table were Nick W and Courtney. My plan was for those two to beat each other to a pulp, allowing me to slip out of third with a big win and take the day. Part one of my plan went swimmingly - the top table got a 6/5 to Courtney, leaving them equal on 24 tournament points.

My opponent on table two was Shaun - flying his two ISD, two flotilla, two Tie fighter list with Motti - it is his favourite list, and one I have faced before - with a few new upgrades (strategic adviser, intensify firepower, etc).
At the last regionals in Newcastle I came 1 hit short of destroying his Motti ISD and came away with a 6/5. This day would be different. Very different. Oh yes. Oh yes indeed. Indeed yes.

Perhaps.

Shaun had a bid of 3, and chose to go second.
This surprised me, because although I was happy to go first in my last game that had been my choice. It surprised me that someone would be happy to go second knowing that I would well and truly have first / last.
Shaun's objectives was a choice of Blockade Run, Ion Cannons, or Dangerous Territory.
I chose dangerous territory, thinking that a few hits on Flotillas wouldn't make much difference, and Jaina's Light could always pick up the third. We'd be even on 45 points each, which isn't a problem.

Then I'd just chop down that Motti flagship, run away, and call it a good win.

The photo above is the start of turn 1.
The Corvette on the left is there to threaten the flotilla and make its way into the back field to threaten the flagship much later in the game.

This game I made my big mistake pretty much straight away. 

I flew my Jaina's Light forward (after all the big ships had activated) with the plan of getting into blue range of the ISD, activating first, double arcing, then running away. If I had angled to the right it would have been easy. Instead, I turned left, meaning I could not possibly get out of the front arc. I had a nav command, so decided to turn as tight as possible to the left, trying to get out of blue range if not the arc - and then clipped the Gozanti that was in exactly the wrong place.

The ram left my flagship in Medium range of the front arc of an unactivated ISD II.

Cracken died. 

Horribly.

Horribly.

And just like that I was behind. What should have been (to my mind) a relatively simple win suddenly became a torturous uphill battle.

Shaun knew he couldn't win the Squadron fight, so his ISDs flew away - X-Wings simply cannot keep up with ISDs going speed 3 - they take a single click of Yaw at 3 and swing their big butts out of the way. I had maybe two turns of getting solid fighter hits on the ISD, then it was gone.

This is turn three (I think) - the last time I will get any of the fighters to hit that ISD. I managed to knock all the shields off it and put a bit of hull damage on, but my Corvettes simply could not keep close enough to do significant damage. Try it at home. If the Corvette goes first, it ends up flying into the front arc, or too far away, or into a double rear / side. If the Corvette waits until the ISD goes first, then there is a good chance it will move out of red range and escape being shot altogether.
And the ISD is recovering 3 shields every turn thanks to Comms netted tokens and orders.

In short, I fell short. 

I had to give first activation to one of my flotillas one turn so it could escape certain death by flying into the ISD side arc...

The game ended with Shaun on top, 6/5.
I lost Cracken's ship and an X-Wing. Shaun lost two Tie Fighters.
And that was that.
The ISD took (I think) about 9 hits to the hull, but was recovering shields like crazy.



The tournament ended with me in 4th place and Shaun in 3rd. We both had 22 Tournament points.

Courtney and Nick both had 24 points, but Nick won on MoV.


I really enjoyed the list, the day, and the various games.

It was my tournament to win or lose, and on this occasion, I lost.

*shakes fist*

MOTTI!

Australian Armada Nationals

Last weekend (24 & 25 September) I participated in the Australian Armada Nationals. There were 34 players gathered in Sunny Queensland, with about a dozen making the trip from interstate.

ROUND ONE - NICK'S ACKBAR LIST

This is the setup from the first game - I am flying my "Tora Tora Tora!" list, with 2 Mc30c Torpedo Frigates with OE, APT, and H9s. One is Admonition. I also have 2 CR90As with TRCs, one carrying Dodonna. There are two nekid Flotillas, commanding 3 X-Wings, and one Jan Ors. I've been flying a variant of this list for a while now, typically on VASSAL, but also against my regular sparring associate, Theo.

My list has a 16 point bid, which was enough to get me initiative in all my games (with some good luck in game two...).

My opponent in Round One was Nick W, about whom I have had blog reports in the past. Nick won a number of regional competitions (I think NSW, ACT, and VIC), On this occasion he was flying 3 AF2Bs with ECM and GTs, one with Xi7, another with Enhanced Armament, and the third with TRCs. Ackbar was on the lone Flotilla Bright Hope, with four A-Wings.

I chose Nick's Dangerous Territory.

End of turn 1, and Nick has turned one frigate to my left, and two to the right. My ships are racing towards the front of the mini-conga, with Admonition dashing forward for an early turn 2 strike - unfortunately my side arc was just out of black range - I should have taken a last section yaw click to turn a little.

End of turn 2, and Admonition, having fired its front arc only, is now in a great position with double arcs on the front Frigate. The other Mc30c is lining up waiting for targets to fly into torpedo range. My far right Corvette is avoiding side arcs and is heading back to the centre of the map.

A slightly zoomed in section.

End of turn 3 - one of Nick's firgates is gone, the other damaged from the torpedo frigate, and double arced by Dodonna's ride. I'm working hard to get viable arcs on Ackbar's Flotilla, but it is hard work.

 End of turn 4 - the middle frigate is still alive, but will soon succumb to the incoming TRC90. Dodonna has Bright Hope in front arc, but will fail to get the necessary accuracy. Amazingly, Nick's A-Wings are cutting down the Jan Ors supported X-Wings, due to some awful anti-squadron fire.

End of turn 5 - one of my flotillas is chasing Bright Hope planning to ram it to death - but it was too little too late.

I didn't take an end of turn 6 photo - I lost my X-Wings and one flotilla, but took out two Assault Frigates and two A-Wings. All-in-all, it was a good result for me, with an 8/3 victory.

ROUND TWO - ANDY'S RIEEKAN CORVETTES

My second game was against Andy, the Queensland Regional Champion. He was flying 4 TRC90s, with Rieekan on a Quantum Storm Flottila. He had 3 YT2400s, Dash Rendar, Han Solo, Jan Ors, and an X-Wing. We both had a 16 point bid, and I won initiative on a coin toss. I chose to go first. We played his Most Wanted. He chose my Admonition and one of his Corvettes as the target ships.

Andy's first deployment was Rieekan's flotilla, giving me my first target - Admonition was gunning for the flagship.

End of turn 2, and my non-Dodonna corvette has sped from the far left to the centre-right, heading for one of Andy's corvettes, that is making a similar move to the flank.

 End of turn 3, and Admonition is in striking distance of the Rieekan flotilla, as well as the target corvette. Andy's other corvettes are heading into the side arc of the other corvette, which is waiting with baited breath...

End of turn 4, Rieekan and two corvettes are gone. Admonition is on the run, pursued by Andy's Rogues. My Corvettes are hunting Andy's remaining two vessels.

End of turn 5, and Admonition is nearly away... only one of Andy's Corvettes remains, and is double arced by my own TRC90 at close range.
During turn 6 that last corvette went pop, and we played out the squadron phase to see what would happen. One of my X-Wings made it into range to tie up some rogues, but Dash Rendar made it to range, rerolled a blank to get a crit/hit, and as Admonition had burned all its defence tokens we turned to the damage deck - anything but a structural damage to live - and I drew a structural damage. Sigh.

I took out all of Andy's ships, lost a few X-Wings and Admonition. After scores were totaled we got to 9/2 in my favour.

I went into round three with quite a nice score -I think I was 8th overall...

ROUND THREE - TRISTAN'S SCREED SCRAMBLERS

 Game three was against Tristan, aka "Trizzo" of PAWCast fame.

He was playing Screed with a Flotilla, Interdictor with Targeting Scramblers, VSD1, and a kitted out Demo. Six Tie Fighters made up a token squadron component.

I chose first, and selected "Most Wanted", a fateful decision! Tristan chose my Admonition, and his flotilla as the targets.

End of turn 1.

Tristan had deployed well back in the zone, and with only modest speeds. I did something similar, and allowed my ships to take some engineering tokens early on, which I normally do not do.

The Interdictor had the ability to move terrain, so during setup I had spread it out as much as possible. This was my first real life game against interdictor.

End of turn 2.

I was gearing up for a non-Admonition early run against the flotilla and the victory, but Tristan suddenly turned on the speed and threatened Admonition a bit more than expected. Admonition ended up making the first attack run.

End of turn 3.

Admonition has jumped in to double arc the Demolisher - A Wonderful Thing! Dodonna is on the CR90 on the back left, and the other CR90 is ready to line up for support. My Squadrons have been launched at the Victory, while Tristan's Squads stand back, waiting for their chance to pounce...

 A slightly zoomed in version of the last photo. Admonition is in prime position, but will utterly fail to roll anything close to the needed hits to take out Demolisher at the start of turn 4. Targeting scramblers had a little to do with this, but not much. It was truly some woeful rolling.
Admonition activated, and I should have moved it well away at speed 4 - instead I turned hard and ended up in the side arc of Demolisher. I thought about activating the Corvette to dash in and at least obstruct the shot, but decided to leave it in wait to finish Demolisher - a poor choice. I didn't end up with a double arc on Demo anyway, and Tristan rolled exactly enough to finish Admonition on 5 dice - thanks to Most Wanted. Sigh.
But, then Demo sailed forwards into the other Mc30s side arc, as did the Victory, and I was able to put some serious hurt on both. Demolisher blew up, and the Victory was badly damaged.

End of turn 5. Turn 4 photo was not taken I think.
The  Corvettes have managed to take out the flotilla, and are angling to put hurt on the victory. My Flotillas are flying hard to avoid getting into blue range of the victory and the Interdictor. My Squads continue to shoot the Victory, while Tristan's Ties try to finish off the torpedo frigate.

 End of round 6 - only the Interdictor and the Ties remain. I have lost Admonition, and that's about it.
After calculations, it's a 7/4 to me. I should have been more careful with the Most Wanted Admonition, but it came out nicely in the end I think.

*Some weeks later the nasty thought occurs to me that perhaps I did not use the Admonition ability to rescue this particular vessel - it is a nasty and pernicious thought - but I have no evidence against it apart from that maybe I forgot using it.*

GAME FOUR - KEN'S CRACKEN CORVETTES

At the end of three rounds I was in third place overall, and setting up to play on Table 2: the Penultimate Table! My opponent was Ken, also from PAW. Of the four players I faced, three were folks I had played against in Tournaments before, and all from Parramatta.

 Ken was flying Cracken, with a list quite similar to my own. He had one less Torpedo Frigate, and one more TRC90. He also had six A-Wings. Otherwise, very similar. His flotillas had more upgrades then mine, and he had a 12 point bid. I chose to go first, and picked "Hyperspace Assault." Perhaps I should have gone with "Most Wanted", but the previous game had burned me out a little on that one.

Ken deployed facing away from me, and I placed my corvettes sadly out of the way, but with my Torpedo Frigates ready to dash in and blast away. It has been my experience playing Cracken that he is a pain in the neck, and an early death for the occasional gunner of the Millenium Falcon is the best way to handle this fleet.

Ken put his Admonition into Hyperspace, and we went into action.

*I ran out of steam writing up this report some weeks ago, so the following will be a bland recital of dull facts.

Torpedo Frigates rush forward hoping to catch some corvettes. Ken's A-Wings decline to engage my Squadrons, and gear up to fight Admonition.

Start of turn 3 I think, and I have a choice - Ken's Admonition has jumped into range of my Dodonna Corvette (double arcing but facing away), while my Frigate on the right has side arcs on the rear of TWO of Ken's corvettes. Who to activate first?

I decided to rescue Dodonna and let one of Ken's Corvettes escape - which it did. I then activated the Torpedo Frigate, which completely failed to kill a Corvette in the rear arc even with H9s. I did not get a critical, even with rerolls. SIGH.

The dice deserted me, and I did not get them back in a hurry.

This is not the last turn, but it is getting close - my Admonition has survived the A-Wing barrage, and is positioning to kill Cracken, the wily dog. My Dodonna Corvette is swinging back into battle range, while Ken's Admonition is hunting my Transports.

I managed to kill Cracken, and Ken took out my normal Corvette. I got angry at this point and threw Dodonna into the battle unnecessarily in order to kill another of Ken's Corvettes - this brought me into Admonition range, and the rest is history.

When we totalled points, Ken had won with a margin of exactly 60 points - precisely enough for a 7/4. Which was exactly enough to get him into the Final Battle with Luke. I ended up fifth in tournament points.


It was a good game with Ken, who is always a fun player and great sport.


I quite enjoyed the Tournament - disappointed I did not make the top table, but very happy to be in the top tiers of a great competition. And beating Nick is always worth the price of admission... tee hee hee.

Andy, you still owe me that drink - I will not forget.


This blog-post was held in Comms Blackout pending the outcome of Worlds, lest we provide spoilers for Luke's A and Y wing spam list - Our National Champ did very well at Worlds, missing out on the CUT by only a small margin, and coming in the top 5 or 6 overall.

Well done Luke!


Regionals season is starting again in a few weeks in Australia - I am hoping to make it to Canberra for ACT regionals - and then we'll see where Nationals is in 2017.