Strap in, readers; This is a pretty long one. As such, I’m cutting back on the strategy and play-by-play aspect to focus more on the match-ups and what else I can remember of the day. It was almost a week ago, and 16 nearly-straight hours of X-Wing, so bear with me.

Last Saturday, I and 29 other players came over to Gardner Game Knights in Gardner, MA, for their Hyperspace Trial. Knowing they didn’t have the space, the marshal rented out a hall down the street for the SWISS rounds, holding the cut in the store afterward.

21-6 with my Circus, but coming off a disappointing showing in Annapolis the last time I brought them out. I was hoping to do well enough this time out to get the dice, and since we started with just 30 players, that meant 3-2 for the guarantee and 2-3 had a shot at them. Basically, I could do fairly badly and still achieve my goal. Nice! There was only 1 list that even came close to crossing my mind for this attempt. For possibly the last time in a while, the Circus:

There was a pretty wide selection of factions and lists, including some Falcons, a 4 U-Wing list, a few Upsilon and Friends lists, maybe 3 total Republic Y-Wings, and only 3 Nantex fighters total across 2 lists. Seems like people are experimenting, but not with much of the new stuff.

Game 1: Mike Gemme

After the almost-required round 1 re-pairing, I ended up across the table from 2/3 of the Nantex fighters at the event (and playing next to the third.) I knew I was in for a rough time, but figured if I could delete the I4s fast enough, I could focus my forces on Sun Fac and do some work. Unfortunately, Fel ended up caught alone at the top of the board by Sun, and while he didn’t take much damage there, he didn’t contribute much until too late.

Once we got into the scrum, I couldn’t keep shots on my targets, and Mike picked my ships apart 1 by 1. I half-pointed Chertek, but it took all 5 ships firing on him in a single turn to do it. Meanwhile, Sun just toyed with Fel whenever they were close together, and harried my other ships with his 2-dice turret whenever they weren’t. Time was called with a single full-health Academy left against all of Mikes stuff for a 25-175 loss.

Game 2: Josef R.



I underestimated how quickly the A-Wings would close in on me, and set up as I normally do. This meant the bombers were isolated behind a wall of obstacles from the rest of my squad when combat started in round 2. I traded well, taking shields off an A for most of the lead bomber. It died the following round, but Josefs speedy opening meant he had to split off as my TIEs converged.

Fel chased down the loner while my Academies gave my remaining Scimitar some breathing room. I had 3 A-Wings shield-less at this point, and the damage finally started adding up. I dropped 2 of them and half-pointed 2 others, while Josef was not able to seal the deal on the other bomber, killing just another TIE. I ended up with a somewhat close 139-103, but neither of us really knew who was ahead the entire game. Extremely tense!

Game 3: Justin Timmons

The classic TIE Swarm, along with the intimidation that there were 4 people from the same squadron between my opponent, our neighbor table, and the next table down from them. Of the games thus far, I felt I had the best chance against a list like this, despite the fact that he had his entire list shooting before most of mine. Justin played a ton of mind games with me too, first by setting up to joust most of my list, but then turning away from them and toward where Fel was heading. Luckily for me, I guessed what was up, and capitalized on his positioning. Fel was out of the fight, but my swarm was poised to strike.

A bad rock took my early lead from me, killing one bomber before it could fire twice and forcing the other out of position. Then the same rock impacted Justin, pinning his I1s on it for a turn, with the Academy hitting it twice, which helped even the odds back out. Fel, as is his nature, evaporated, but half-pointing more of Justins TIEs than he did mine was enough to see me through to the win. By 5 points. 97-92. Another game where neither of us knew who was ahead until the very end. After this game, we took a 1-hour lunch break, which did a lot of good with getting my head back on straight.

Game 4: Rich Pratt

I have a pretty good match-up against the Tavson version of this list, and Stridan isn’t as scary as his lower-init counterpart. My basic goal was to deny Quickdraw his ability by firing when he didn’t have shots, burn down one of the SFs as early as I could, then focus down the bus before using whatever’s left to kill the other SF. This went pretty much exactly according to plan, with all 3 QD shields down with no retaliation due to an interesting engagement strategy from Rich.

Due to the Batwings habit of being in the middle of everything and stressing my ships out, it ended up dying first just by being in the way of my TIEs. By the time it died, QD was on 1 hull and Backdraft had lost a shield or 2, while I had lost a bomber. The SFs were pretty squirrely, and I ended up chasing Backdraft with Fel while everyone else tried to corner Quickdraw. I managed to end the game 200-79 before the clock ran out for the first time all day. Must have been the lunch break.

Game 5: Jeff Lindeland

My, this list seems familiar! I think this is probably the better load-out of the 2 Stridan lists, but my game-plan was identical to the previous game: Deny QDs ability, nuke an SF, kill the shuttle, worry about the endgame during the endgame. Jeff set up to joust my forces, so Fel did his flanking rush in, and took a shield from Backdraft before anything else could fire. The subsequent engagement was a focused killbox on Quickdraw; Since I wouldn’t be able to deny the ability completely, I wanted to get through it in a single turn. Turns out, I got through the entire ship that turn, in exchange for a bomber. Good trade!



The shuttle was forced out, leaving me taking pot-shots on it while Backdraft ran for the hills, bringing his rear arc to bear on my squad. Fel stayed on him while the rest of the squad broke off to chase the shuttle, which continued its path around the scrap. Fel and Backdraft traded in my favor, with the Interceptor Ace surviving the exchange and distracting the Major long enough for my forces to bring him down, resulting in a 200-104 victory!

Holy crap, 4-1! I made the cut! This is my first major event top cut in Second Edition. actually my first since Idaho in 2017! I am beyond thrilled to find out that I’m actually in 3rd, with a simply insane MOV. The top 12 all had MOVs above 1000, which was crazy to me. The long day had taken its toll, and Patrick took off after the announcement, bumping me up to 2nd for the bracket. We all packed up and moved down the street for the remainder of the event.

Top 8: Chris Borzumato

Ah, the other Nantex. My goal here was to focus on the droids, removing his blockers and damage influx would be easier than taking down either of his named pieces. The opening engagement went my way, with his swarm banking in toward Fel and leaving Chertek far from my list. It went even further my way when Fel and a bomber deleted one droid, and the rest of my list took down a second, without losing anything on my end. I continued my path of destruction, taking only pot-shot on the Separatist heroes while nuking droid after droid from the table. By the time the last droid fell, I had 2 TIEs, a nearly-dead Bomber, and Fel left.

Both TIEs died this turn, but it was worth it to set up the shots I got the next. Sadly, those shots didn’t pan out, and it became Fel against a half-dead Seer and a half-dead Chertek. I was dead enter of the table, and Chris was somewhat forced to split his team up to come back in. Not wanting to screw with the Nantex, Fel chased after Seer, turning to Chertek only after the Belbullab had fallen. As the clock rang out, so did Cherteks time, granting me a 200-143 win and advancement to the top 4.

Top 4: Justin Timmons (Round 3 Rematch)

The TIE Swarm again. This time, we had both learned from the previous game, and set up in opposite corners. There was a mess of obstacles on my side with a nearly open field on Justins, which suited me just fine. We played hide and seek for 5 turns before I finally managed to get him to turn in, and it is possibly the best engagement I’ve ever had in X-Wing.

My entire force can shoot his entire front line, but his back line only has sights on my TIEs. This causes Justin to pour 6 shots into an Academy, which laughs off all 6 shots and helps his team nuke Wampa through the Iden charge. Down a TIE already, and facing an impossible second turn of engagement, I definitely would not want to be in Justins shoes here! The scrum is nuts, with damage going down on Del and Iden, as well as my lead Bomber. Del fails a K-Turn that forces him out of the fight, so I send Fel after him while the rest of my list continues the fight in the center.

Bumping ensues, and while Fel pursues his target, my TIEs put card after card onto the rest of the swarm. It feels like Justin can’t roll an evade to save a TIE, but the clock is ticking rapidly. The game ends with several dead TIEs and a dead bomber, but in a 147-56 victory for me.

I have never made the finals of any major event. No Regional, Nationals, Hyperspace, or System Open. This is my first time playing with the 2 hour time limit, and with over 14 hours of X-Wing after a 2-hour drive already behind me, I know this is going to be a slog. The other top 4 match was between my 1st round opponent Mike, and the #9 slide up Jill and her Imperial Aces. Due to her massive bid and the Rockets on Vader, Jill had deleted both Nantex before I killed Wampa (we really played around that long before engaging!) This was going to be interesting. I maybe got a little overconfident, due to having played this archetype several times before with the Circus and never having lost to it

Final: Jill McGlinchey

I have another absolutely insane opening round, putting 2 damage on Duchess through a scrap and 3 damage on Fel in exchange for a single crit on a Bomber. However, both wounded Aces zipped past my list on the 2nd round of engagement, leaving everyone looking at Vader for the next 2 rounds, with the Sith Lord bumped twice. I also failed a K-Turn with the wounded bomber, and subsequently re-stressed him facing away from the fight rather than allowing him to K-Turn 2 turns later and get back in. That bomber didn’t re-engage until 5 turns later! Vader, to his credit, dodged all but 1 damage from my ambush.

By now I have Duchess and Fel both at 1 hull, Vader back in front of my stuff, but am starting to scramble to get shots on anything. Jill does an AMAZING job of keeping her wounded aces out of arcs and protected, while I flounder to put damage on anything. Vader kills the bomber that’s in the fight, Duchess deletes 2 TIEs nearly on her own, and I still haven’t managed to kill anything. Meanwhile, that bad-move bomber is STILL out of the fight.

I finally bring down the Striker, but it seems to be too late, as Vader picks apart my already wounded Bomber and Fel takes down my final Academy. I’m left with a full-health Fel against a 1-hull Fel and a Vader that has lost a single shield, still has his Proton Rocket, and moves after me. Needless to say, I’m in trouble.

I managed to draw out the game another 20 minutes, hoping for a mistake, but despite 8 grueling games Jill doesn’t slip once. I never get another shot at her Fel, and Vader shoots me every single round. He never does any damage, but the threat is enough to force my Red Baron out while keeping him stressed. I finally end up getting away enough to clear stress, just to flip around the following round. That turn, with no tokens, Vader lands a Panicked Pilot on me. My Interceptor, now with 3 stress and facing 2 ships that move after him, finally concedes defeat, 77-200.

2 losses on the day, both to Ace-style lists, and my first 2nd place at a major event. I left my house at 7 AM on Saturday, and didn’t return home until 3:30 AM Sunday. 8 great games against even greater opponents, tons of fun, some really crazy dice rolls, and some awesome new dice to end the weekend. This seems like a fitting send-off to the Circus. I’m done with the competitive season, and with the lack of a player-base in my local area, I’m going to have to shift to teaching games to draw in new players again. I did break it out one more time on Monday, and came away with a win to finish out 36 total games with my Circus. 28 win, 8 loss record with a single list is nuts. I am extremely happy with my list, and though you may not see it for a while, this is not the last of the Circus!

As for my Second Edition tournament record, I’m now 67-25, with a 72.8% win rate. This is obviously good enough to make nearly any cut, and I’m looking forward to putting myself to the test during the next Hyperspace and System Open season. Maybe I’ll get lucky and get to travel to another event sometime soon, but I somewhat doubt it.

As for my question of the blog, What faction is going to win Worlds? Let me know your picks, including the ship that will take it there, either below or on whichever site led you here!

Next time: Something different!