The Poe Chronicles are series of blogs done by guest writer Mark Myers recording his love affair with Hot Shot Flyboy Poe Dameron and his favorite droid BB-8.

I came out of Warfaire Weekend a little sad about my performance, but looking forward to a long run with Rey/Poe. I’d already played it quite a bit prior to Warfaire Weekend and, despite maybe a sub-.500 record with it, had felt like I’d been on the cusp of making it great. There’s nothing on the competitive horizon for me until January, aside from an occasional 3-round local tournament. That’s a great time to get in some games with a list I love to play! This is the core (Korr?!) of the list while I bounce around on various tweaks:

Rey (73)

Rose Tico (9)

Korr Sella (6)

Finn (10)

Rey’s Millennium Falcon (5)

Ship total: 103 Half Points: 52 Threshold: 6

Poe Dameron (68)

BB-8 (8)

Integrated S-Foils (0)

Primed Thrusters (10)

Black One (2)

Ship total: 88 Half Points: 44 Threshold: 4

Total: 191

The addition of Korr Sella to the Resistance crew pool makes Rey kind of 1.0 mechanically broken. Stress? Who cares, pile it on. Fat Rey has force, Rose gives her as many free locks as she wants, and the title lets her pretty much dial and boost casual with Korr clearing a pile of stress in one fell swoop. Korr also lets Rey fly over a debris, gain the stress from the debris and clear it immediately, 1.0 Kanan-style. The only problem is, as built, she’s ridiculously expensive. With the Poe I run, there’s not much room for a bid.

Poe usually gets Predator, just like with my Black Squadron list. I’ve experimented with Lone Wolf and Outmaneuver and they just never felt right. Confirmation bias is strong for me with Lone Wolf, as I feel like it rolls into a blank 90+% of the time. Just hearing “Lone Wolf” said out loud triggers a Pavlovian response in me to feel deep, unabating disappointment. In theory, Outmaneuver would be great on Poe if people are chasing down Rey. But…I don’t want them to chase down Rey. I actually want them to chase Poe, I think, so he ends up not shooting a lot. Plus, ships that can’t natively get Outmanuever to trigger on their own (like bendy-rolling, arc-dodger Guri) are too reliant on the opponent to make certain target priority decisions. HLC has been a consideration as well, but I’ve found myself either too seldom landing the bull’s-eye or too often hunting for it.

Regardless of the minor tweaks I might try, the list plays pretty much the same. Bring big debris (because Rey and Poe care little about stress), bait with one, hammer with the other. Depending on the match-up, that works wonderfully. Sadly, about the only match-up in which that works regularly is against 2-3 ship ace lists. Four ships is doable, but ships in those lists are less squishy and more beefy, making them more likely to suck up a big shot with a big shot in return. Five ships or more and Rey is now squarely in “how do I not melt in 2-3 rounds?” territory. She can be agile, for a big ship, but she can only dodge so many arcs for so long. Poe really needs to step up his damage contributions in those match-ups, while also not leaving himself open to being caught out of position and getting bullied.

This leads into the problem with this list…it’s Poe. Despite often having double-modded shots, he usually doesn’t pull his weight in the damage race. I can get an early lead, but then Poe finds himself in an uncomfortable position. He’s in too deep and the opponent can turn on him. He starts running for his life, constantly stressed and rarely able to turn around to shoot without putting himself in mortal danger. That might be fine if Rey can truly be the hammer, but then I’m down to one shot a turn and, despite all the mods in the world, variance doesn’t always work out. That’s an important difference between something like Rey/Poe and Black Squadron. The fewer shots you have, the more variance can play a pivotal role. I can’t have many engagements go below average variance or I fall behind.

I acknowledge that this Poe is pushing a boulder uphill. He can be super slippery for a few turns, but then his tricks are spent and he’s just an X-Wing. He could stand to come down a couple points. I feel BB-8 is over-costed on him by 2-3 points. Prime Thrusters is actually probably better for making him unpredictable than BB-8, but also feels over-costed on him by 2-3 points. His ability is great, but the stress penalty is steep. I’m trying to turn him into this amazing dodgy version of Poe you see in the movies, blasting down dozens of TIEs in the process. But, he can’t really be both things, dodgy and punchy, at least not for very long. Maybe I’m trying to hammer a round peg into a square hole? Probably. He’s fine as a 73 point Heroic/R4/title puncher. But, he’s Poe Dameron. He’s the best pilot in the galaxy. Fine isn’t the best.

I’ll admit, I’ve been very close to losing heart and giving up the list. It’s hard to play something you know is behind the meta curve and keep losing with it. And I do keep losing with it. A. LOT. The number of games I play with it, where I’m up early and/or feel I have the positional upper hand…then lose? It’s staggering. I’m a competitive player with, I think, an appropriately sized ego. I’m not intimidated by anyone I play. Games I lose, I usually feel I lost that game, rather than was beaten. I made a mistake which cost me the game. My opponent might have played better than me, but I make a distinction between that and being outplayed. Just because I was bad doesn’t mean they were good, they were just good enough. That might come off egotistical, but if I don’t approach the game with the mindset that I can win each game, it seems questionable whether I should be playing competitively in the first place.

For now, I guess I dust myself off, stamp down that ego a little, and keep plugging away. Rather than dwell on my mistakes, try to learn from them and find the joy within each game. I’m going to lose with the list, and that’s okay. The Resistance will not be intimidated.

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