It’s been a little while since I attended some organised play, so this weekend it was off to Cardiff for the Firestorm Games store championship. It’s a great venue to play, plenty of space and always draws a big crowd. In this case we had an attendance somewhere in the 40s, which is pretty big for this level of event to say the least! And with 6 rounds of swiss scheduled, followed by a top 8 cut, it felt very much more like a regional event.

I spent most of the week leading up to the event trying to decide what list to take. I’d more table time with Boba-Zuckuss than anything else recently. But after that little bit of experimenting with Krennic and co last week it was tempting to go with that. I was hesitant, given my lack of practice with it, especially the TIE Phantom; I’ve played since just before wave 5 and I can count on one hand the amount of times I’ve played a Phantom. In the end, it took a bit of a nudge from one of my local group, but it was decided. Krennic it was.

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Whisper (46)

Veteran Instincts, Sensor Jammer, Advanced Cloaking Device, Director Krennic

Omega Leader (21)

A Score To Settle

Scarif Base Pilot (30)

Advanced Ailerons, Emperor Palpatine

Total Points: 97

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There are a couple of upgrades I’d consider adding to this (Lightweight Frame, or Comm Relay for example) but I was always under the impression Whisper needed a decent bid so decided not to break with convention for now at least.

I very nearly didn’t make it in the end, as apparently there was a power cut overnight, rendering my alarm clock useless. Luckily, the ridiculous heat seems to be waking me up early in the mornings anyway at the moment and I found myself awake before my 6am alarm would have gone off. Although it did now mean I was knackered, and playing a ship that requires a lot of thinking. It was going to be a hard day.

Vagabond Squadron turned out in force, with us accounting for almost a quarter of the players in the end. One of us should at least do well, right? I sit down for game 1 and I’m already paired against one of our own, Simon Greenaway. He’s running Captain Kagi, The Inquisitor and Valen Rudor. It’s a nice little list and Kagi is super annoying; I should know, I ran him a lot when Palp Aces was first a thing. Unluckily for Simon though, he has nothing above a PS 8, which gives Whisper free rein to terrorize his ships relentlessly. Rebel Captive on the shuttle was a little bit of a pain, but I decide to leave him for last. I end up popping both TAPs in the same turn, and there’s no way Kagi can fight all my ships. Starting off with a 100-0 is always nice, especially when you’ve been suffering with list indecisiveness.

On to game 2 and it’s another Vagabond pairing, and this time I’ve drawn Toby Harris. He has a really cool list using Gunner/Krennic Vermeil, a non-Palp Omicron and Juke X/7 Vessery. I get the initial approach a little wrong, not overly so, but when you forget your triggers (Krennic lock/shield strip) and your dice decide not to turn up for the occasion it just compounds the issue. One by one my ships start disappearing from the board and I can’t hit anything to save my life. Whisper even whiffs a range 1 shot into the Lambda! I just about get half points on the Omicron and that’s it. This game was literally a textbook example of everything that can go wrong will go wrong. Bad move choice, bad dice, forgotten triggers, and an opponent outflying you. But the REAL reason we both agreed is that Toby was using the large alt-art Krennic card and I only had the regular one. Size does matter folks. 14-100 Loss in this one.

The one saving grace about the loss to Toby was that it was quick – due to time issues there was going to be no official lunch break, so with 30 minutes still until the end of the round I was able to wolf down my food. And get some air, as it was absolutely sweltering.

Game 3 saw another interesting list on the opposite side of the table – I was matched up with Krissie, flying 3 tooled up Y-Wings! Horton and one of each generic. Two TLTs, and one Autoblaster. Really don’t want to get too close to that one! We circled the board for a while, before eventually turning in. Whisper was putting in some good damage, though Omega Leader was taking some damage from the TLTs. Almost managed to throw her away when I totally forgot two of the Y-wings were carrying Prox Mines! Crap! Thankfully the only one that got me landed on the Reaper who had enough health still to take it. If one had snagged Omega it would have been byebye. She survived the fight on a single hull point, with Whisper having to do all the legwork at the end to finish things. Fun game, really enjoyed this one, and another 100-0 win for me.

Next up I’m playing Katherine, who tells me that she is a new player and would need me to explain my cards and such. I have no problem with that whatsoever, always nice to see new people joining the game. And in some ways it helped me too as I would verbalise everything step by step which reminded me of all my triggers as we went along. Katherine was playing the standard Rey-Lowhhrick build, which I was quite happy to see as again there was nothing above PS 8. My only real worry was avoiding the Tactician on Lowhhrick with Whisper. I did get tagged by it once, but by that point the game was already effectively over – the real deciding point came when Rey did the s-loop only to land on the moustache rock which had gone unseen due to all the ships and the tiny size of it. Unfortunately this left Rey parked with no shot when she should have had a range 2 in arc shot on both OL and Whisper. Instead, Rey lost all her shields and took a Major Hull Breach. Combined with being Jammed by the Reaper as well, Rey never got a token to defend with again and I quickly whittled her down. Then it was just a case of fighting through the C-3PO and reinforce on Lowhhrick. It took a while, but I got there in the end. My third win of the day, and once again 100-0. Sadly I forgot to grab a picture of this one.

Next up was Paul who had brought the much-maligned Lothal Rebel-Fenn Rau. This is actually the first time I’ve had to play against the list, no idea how I’ve avoided it for so long. I had a plan in mind with how to deal with it, and I got my opening exactly how I planned. I managed to split up his two ships, I used the Reaper to draw him in for a chase and then abruptly turned in instead of continuing to run. I got the Lothal locked with OL. Everything had gone to plan. And then the dice abandoned me for the second time on the day. Omega Leader died straight away despite the no mods, as Paul just decided to roll pretty much all hits on every attack as I blanked and blanked. And then Fenn finished the job to rub salt in the wound. Whisper then served up her second range 1 whiff of the day, this time into a 0 agility ship, even worse than missing a Lambda. I played it out with a smile on my face because you get games like these from time to time and you just have to accept it and remember you get other games where you can’t miss. The Reaper got Fenn down to 1 hull but that was the closest I came to any points, so a 0-100 loss.

Last game of swiss (man 6 games is a long day for something below a regional in terms of level), and for the third time today I get a squadmate. This time it’s Anthony Yeates. With PS 10 RAC and PS 11 Quickdraw. Oh ffs. Not only that, but Anthony tells me he has played 12 games against Whispers with this list and none of the Phantoms have ever fired a shot. Bloody Kylo crew… I have it in my head that this is basically unwinnable so play the game fairly care-free and loose. And then I get an amazing start, killing a full health Quickdraw in a single turn! Omega puts two damage in and then the Reaper, from range 3 rolls up hit, hit, crit. Quickdraw blanks again and the crit comes up direct! Massive luck there but I need some help here, especially as Whisper has been blinded once already. One more Kylo crit and she dies with 3 shields still on board. And then I catch another break as a range 1 from RAC only scored 3 out of 4 hits on my uncloaked Phantom, I’ve taken an evade, Palp for one, and roll another and dodge the shot! Which lets Whisper light the Decimator up at range 1 like a Christmas tree. I’ve broken the Whisper curse! I then use the Reaper and Whisper to alternately block RAC while OL keeps putting crits in which help stop me getting Kylo’d again. And then RAC dies. Somehow I’d done it! Another 100-0 win (4/4 wins with that score today, wow). TO Tris is on hand to witness the aftermath and awards me, appropriately enough, a Wispa bar for breaking the curse. And then it turns out it’s the first 100-0 game of the round which also earns me a £10 store voucher. Huzzah! I thusly turn this into a shiny new Gunboat as I don’t actually own one.

So I’d finished 4-2 which was the best I could have hoped for going into this given my lack of experience/preparation with the ships. I’ll certainly take that. But it really has been a day of extremes. Either winning 100-0 or getting crushed. I’m hopeful my MOV is enough to get me into the cut, as after the game with Toby I decide I obviously need some Giant Krennic in my life.

Incredibly, I’d finished with the highest MOV of all the 4-2 finishers in 6th place so I was in! One game away from Giant Krennic. And standing in the way of that would be Ryan, flying Dash-Poe. I lost the initiative roll, and Ryan passed it to me. I wasn’t unhappy with that as I would have taken it given the choice anyway. Poe was the real threat here and would be difficult to corner given it was BB-8/Intensity/Primed Thrusters Poe, but the opening gave me a good angle on Dash so I decided to focus him down instead. I have to say here that for the third time today, I felt I was in a game that was decided by dice and not flying. And this time it wasn’t mine that were bad. Ryan’s were absolutely awful. Dash couldn’t roll any hits (Jam and a Damaged Sensor Array kept him starved of focus), and Poe put three range 1 shots into Omega Leader with full mods and never got more than two hits. I traded my Reaper’s two shields for Dash, if you can believe that. Poe was still very slippery, but at least Krennic was helping me strip shields when I had the shot with Whisper. With Poe down to just his hull and with virtually no damage to my entire list, Ryan conceded. It was hot, humid, and his dice had screwed him repeatedly so I can totally sympathise with his frustration. It was the first time we’d ever been paired up, so I hope next time isn’t so lopsided. Another 100-0 win. And a second game I forgot to take a picture of. Balls.

Top 4 is a rematch with Toby. We round up all the Krennic cards for this matchup and have 5 on the table between us. Damn, I’m still out-Krennic’d! I get a much more sensible opening this time and the game is much more even than before. He goes all in on my Reaper so I lose Palp early, but I get his Vermeil not long after. I then misjudge a K-turn with Omega which I thought would put me a little further than it did; instead of being alongside the shuttle, I’m just still in its arc and the FO is obliterated. But I still have an almost full health Whisper versus a wounded Vessery and the Lambda. If I can finish Vessery there’s no way the shuttle will get me on its own. I get the Defender down to two hull but then Toby pulls off a phenomenal block to leave me parked at range 1 of his shuttle. He blanks out totally but target locks into 4 hits and Whisper dies. I’d had two potential decloaks on this turn – to the left and then the 1-turn in, or decloak forwards and do the k-turn. Having done the K earlier in the game I figured it was missing the surprise element so elected not to do so again. Turns out it would have been the perfect move. Alas it was a 50/50 gamble and on this occasion I just guessed wrong. No shame in that, and I’m more than happy with the day’s run.

Sadly after getting 4 players into the top 8, and 3 into the top 4, Vagabond fails to take it home as Matt Fisher defeats Toby in the final. I would have loved to have stayed to watch but it was already after 10 and I had an hour and a half’s drive to get home.

Big shout out to everyone I played, and to Tris and Dan for putting on another cracking event. Firestorm is always a good day and if you haven’t been there before I’d highly recommend it!