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!
