You know the score. We’ve gone through NOVA Day 1A, so now we’re back for Day 1B.

Information coming out of Day 1B was a bit harder to source, so there may be parts here that aren’t a 100% correct. Lists denoted with a ‘*’ are those with a slight question mark surrounding them (i.e. one or two upgrades).

At a broad level though, the lists are accurate enough to indicate the design and strategic intention of each fleet, and as always I’ll update my analysis if more information becomes available.

Day 1B

1. Ron Wismer* – 45pts

Third place from last year’s US Nationals has come back with a vengeance for this year’s NOVA Open. The name strikes me as very familiar so I suspect he’s around, and performing well, at a lot of major events.

MC80 Command Cruiser

Strategic Adviser, Defiance, Electronic Countermeasures, Engine Techs, Leading Shots, Enhanced Armament

CR90B

Admiral Raddus, Jaina’s Light

GR-75

Quantum Storm, Slicer Tools

GR-75

Bomber Command Centre

Hera Syndulla, Nym, Jan Ors, YT-2400, Lancer, 2x Scurgg H-6

Most Wanted, Fighter Ambush, Superior Positions

394pts

This is a really unique list. It doesn’t have the same kind of spotter capabilities we’ve been seeing with other Raddus builds, but I’m also fairly confident it doesn’t really need it given how side-arc focused the MC80 is.

Quantum Slice is there to mess with carriers and big ships. The other GR-75 can command squads and is really helpful for the BCC buff bubble it provides. Both provided spotting for the big guy.

Jaina’s Light is there to provide some spotting for Raddus and, primarily, to not die. Maybe it also occasionally throws some blue dice.

The MC80 is going to get dropped off, side to the enemy, and pump out a decent amount of dice plus potentially start commanding the squads (though obviously not really required to do so). It’s also hard to block or catch out of position given the power of Raddus and Engine Techs (which is very nice as it lessens some of the main weaknesses of the MC80).

His squadron ball is really distinct. You have three genuine Rogues: a Lancer, a YT-2400, and Hera. Plus two additional Rogues each turn thanks to Hera (presumably Nym and a Scurgg). Overall, the list has a really solid amount of bombing power. Nym, the 2 Scurrgs, and the Lancer provide a hefty base, but even Hera, Jan, and the YT-2400 provide .75 damage or better.

Fighter Ambush and Superior Positions should make Most Wanted the obvious choice if you’re first player against Ron (though apparently 4 out of his 5 Swiss opponents were wrong and decided to pick FA).

Now you can’t make an omelette without cracking a few eggs. So I’m not going to lie, just looking at the list, my gut reaction had me channeling my inner Shania Twain.

The list is quite prone to tabling should he have that CR90 end up in a bad spot pre-Raddus drop.

Its heavy bomber ball, even with Grit and Intel, can get tied up or seriously mauled by an interceptor heavy list. This is hugely problematic because that’s where the majority of its damage comes from. This flows into the fact that although the Raddus drop of the MC80 is nice, having flown Command MC80s for a long time I’m highly skeptical of it getting the job done if those squads don’t kick into gear.

The thing is, no one goes 45pts in a five round tournament by accident. Even if I personally am not that enthusiastic about the list, it’s pretty obvious Ron can fly it pretty well.

More than anything, this list strikes me as a meta call. It’s a skew list, based on the premise that low to no-squadron builds have been increasingly popular. If it makes the correct meta call (which it appears to have done!) it’s got good odds on doing an absolute number against those sorts of lists. Hera, the Lancer, the YT-2400, Nym, and a Scurrg, all throwing dice into a ship every round is going to murder stuff very fast if there’s nothing to stop them.

If there is something to stop them, I really feel this list would struggle.

2. Jeremy Gaudreau – 38pts

Jeremy and I have been intermittently chatting about Armada for over a year now. His original list lead to the list that would inspire mine in some of the bat-reps we did. What he’s taken to NOVA looks to be another iteration of that original design, though it incorporates a number of substantial changes.

Interdictor Suppression Refit

Grand Admiral Thrawn, Captain Brunson, Engine Techs, Disposable Capacitors, Targeting Scramblers, G7-X Grav Well Projector, Heavy Ion Emplacements, Interdictor

Quasar Fire I

Skilled First Officer, Flight Controllers, Expanded Hangar Bays, Boosted Comms, Squall

Gozanti

Comms Net

Maarek Steele, Colonel Jendon, Howlrunner, Mauler Mithel, Valen Rudor, Saber Squadron, 2x Firespray-31

Targeting Beacons, Planetary Ion Cannon, Solar Corona

388pts

I think I’m just going to start including photos of Gozantis and GR-75s to signify my standard assessment of their usefulness. Aside from two ship Imperial builds (usually an ISD, a Quasar, and heavy squads) they’re pretty much always worth it.

The Interdictor is an incredibly tough nut to crack. It has a good defence token suite. It’s going to be repairing every turn that matters (often with a token palmed over by the Gozanti). It has Targeting Scramblers to neuter close range brawlers, Captain Brunson to knock off double hits, and the Interdictor title to allow one of those to happen more than once a turn. With Engine Techs it has more of a capacity to close the gap / duck and run as needed; and with HIEs and DCAPs it can punch out a decent amount of damage.

It’s a classic grinding style points fortress, similar in strategy to Motti ISD-IIs. Sure, it won’t be able to blow a large ship off the park, but it is often going to be able to outlast them and just wear them down. If it does go down though it goes from points fortress to points pinata and the fleet is likely to get tabled.

This kind of Quasar is a lot more my speed. It goes all in on the carrier role and its upgrades reflect that. Commanding 5-6 squadrons at long range, and bumping 3 of them along beforehand is very nice. SFO is particularly good on Quasars for allowing a timely Navigate command to get the heck out of dodge, though I could be easily talked into putting Pryce on the Quasar to setup some especially brutal alpha strikes.

The squadron wing is basically a Sloane build with part of it chopped off to slot in two Firesprays. Between Colonel Jendon, Maarek, Mauler, Howlrunner, Valen, and Saber (pretty much all of them buffed by flight controllers) it can punch out a lot of AA. I just can’t escape the feeling though that there’s a fragility to the squad wing that could be especially difficult to deal with should it get bogged down in a protracted squad war.

With that in mind though, I actually really like the inclusion of the two Firesprays. One of the main problems for Imperial bombing power right now is that aside from double tap Maarek it can often feel pretty underwhelming. 8 blue bomber dice a turn (Maarek, 2 Firesprays, and a double tap) is really, really nasty if Jeremy can get it rolling. Honestly, if I was facing this list that’s the part I’d be throwing the kitchen sink at. If you can get Maarek and the two Firesprays to go down then the rest of its bombing power is fairly unintimidating.

What’s really interesting here is that I can’t actually decide if Jeremy wants to be going first or second. I really suspect he might be bidding for second, but I could be wrong. What’s especially interesting is that for legitimately the first time I actually like Targeting Beacons. Targeting Beacons usually has two main problems. Firstly, its benefit is pretty lacklustre for most ships these days. Secondly, it’s usually pretty easy to play around because of the way its designed (how they didn’t foresee the fact that first player would just put their two tokens as far out of the way as possible is beyond me).

Jeremy’s list actually covers off both of those. The Interdictor really wants to get its HIEs off, and it doesn’t have any re-rolls built into it, so being able to re-roll two dice (four off a double arc) is a pretty big deal. To put this in perspective, normally off a single arc it has roughly a 57% chance of getting HIEs to go off. With Targeting Beacons this goes up to 76% (and double arc goes from 82% to 94.5%). Getting this to go off at long range with DCAPs is extra tasty. Playing around it is made harder by the Grav Well projectors which allow Jeremy to funnel his opponent fairly well.

Really that’s what all of Jeremy’s objectives seem to play off, funneling his opponents with the Grav-Wells, and putting his fleet into a strong position.

3. Mark “themightyhedgehog” Goddard – 35pts

In future, if every person who makes Top 4 at premier events could go ahead and send me their fleet lists and tasteful photos of their fleets like Mark did:

Pelta Command

Adar Tallon, Fighter Coordination Team, All Fighters, Follow Me!, Boosted Comms

Nebulon-B Escort Frigate

Yavaris, Skilled First Officer

Hammerhead Torpedo Corvette

General Rieekan

GR-75

Toryn Farr, Bomber Command Center, Bright Hope

GR-75

Comms Net

Corran Horn, Luke Skywalker, Ten Numb, “Dutch” Vander, Dagger Squadron, Gold Squadron, 2x VCX-100

Most Wanted, Fire Lanes, Superior Positions

400pts

A very, very similar list to both Piotr coming out of Euros and Rikki out of Worlds but combined with the Royal Canadian Airforce squad ball (that was recently used to great success by Tokra).

The Torryn / BCC GR-75 having Bright Hope is a good call (something which was eschewed in Piotr’s list). It provides so much support to the fleet’s squadrons that it is vital to have the additional damage mitigation from Bright Hope.

As I discussed in my assessment of Piotr’s list I think having General Rieekan on the Hammerhead lifeboat makes the Pelta a far less glaring target in the list, and also allows you to position the Pelta more aggressively.

Yavaris not having Flight Commander is obviously a result of points constraints, but you have to imagine that this has a real and meaningful impact on the way this list flies (i.e. by forcing Mark to fly it a closer to the action)

The Pelta lays down some really solid range buffs for the fighter wing, and this rolls into Adar Tallon pretty nicely.

My comments about this squadron composition when discussing Tokra’s list should be taken to be the same here (indeed, if anything the squads are better here because of the aforementioned speed buffs).

I’m increasingly ambivalent about Most Wanted in squadron builds. Now, let me caveat that by saying that I know it makes sense in lots of ways (being able to make a high threat unit worth more, making a large ship a super points pinata) but it also seems like the clearly safest choice of these three objectives. Ideally your opponent should look at your objectives and regret their life choices. Fire Lanes and Superior Positions are obviously fantastic so they get a tick from me (though I’m a huge fan of the Ace Farm now, and could equally see Sensor Net in this list).

4. Jason Dedrick – 34pts

Jason is passionate about literacy, social justice, and positive outcomes for all learners.

He also has a pretty sweet looking LinkedIn profile picture.

I’d go ahead and endorse him for his skill in flying plastic spaceships but that might just be crossing some sort of boundary.

MC75 Ordnance Cruiser

Strategic Adviser, Hardened Bulkheads, Ordnance Experts, Electronic Countermeasures, Assault Proton Torpedoes, External Racks

MC30c Torpedo Frigate

General Dodonna, Ordnance Experts, Reinforced Blast Doors, Assault Proton Torpedoes, H9 Turbolasers, Admonition

Hammerhead Torpedo Corvette

Boarding Engineers, Garel’s Honour

GR-75

Slicer Tools, Bright Hope

GR-75

Comms Net

Shara Bey, 3x A-Wings

Most Wanted, Planetary Ion Cannon, Dangerous Territory

380pts

This list is the one which has the most question marks around it in terms of upgrade composition so take some of what I say here with a grain of salt.

First:

Shara and the A-Wings are on noble interception / opportunistic bombing as needs depends. They also give two additional deployments which is nice and generally worth it (it was pointed out to me that this was the reason for the inclusion of the two A-Wings in Markus’ list for example).

While it would be interesting to know what the objectives were for this list, they are largely irrelevant for a man with a 20pt bid. First / last with a MC-75, MC-30, or a Hammerhead remains, unsurprisingly, exceptionally strong. Update: I’ve been informed of what they are. I think they’re a good fit (Dangerous Territory in particular).

Overall, this is a fairly uncomplicated list. It’s looking to leverage all the benefits of first / last. It has a high bid to ensure first. It has high activations so it can do what it wants in the order it wants. It has slicer tools and some squads to delay heavy bombers. And most importantly it has some missiles waiting to deploy and it’s going to damn well use them.

What I do like is that the list makes good use of Dodonna’s ability, rather than just the fact that he’s extraordinarily cheap. He’s got APTs on two of the main damage dealers, and then the really nice Garel’s Honour / Boarding Engineers combo. You can very easily picture Garel’s Honour rolling in on a ship with the last activation, handing it the crit (and then fishing for structural damage with Dodonna), before activating first and making that crit flip again (potentially two cards if you’re able to land the structural damage first), unloading some dice and then ramming it again for another crit.

Speaking of ramming, RBDs is a good call on the MC30 just because of how vulnerable it is to being rammed to death. Better safe than sorry with your Admiral onboard.

Some of the other upgrade choices I’d play around with (but again its unclear if the upgrades are exact). Notably, I would drop H9s down to XI7s and put External Racks onto the Hammerhead. Makes Garel even worse, without meaningfully reducing any of the MC30’s power. A very solid list overall.

That’s Day 1B done. I’ll be back soon with a brief examination of the Top Cut.

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Until next time!

– Intel Officer Luke