The UK Team Tournament this weekend sees 48 teams of three battle it out in the first big Tournament of 2nd edition and I’ve drawn rebels as my faction.

My favourite event of the year, the UK Team Tournament, is fast approaching and Rebels is my chosen faction. The format is a team of three players, each playing a list from a different faction, currently Scum, Imperials or Rebels. I guess it’s just fate that whichever faction I choose for UKTC seems to be the flavour of worst for the month. That being said I feel there are legs somewhere for rebels to shine, we just might not be looking in the right places.

As soon as the points dropped I was playing 2nd edition thanks to YASB and other online resources to proxy dials and cards. I had already decided I wouldn’t be going to UK nationals this year so it was an easy transition to get the ball rolling. This decision was partly helped by spending my tournament funds on picking up new edition stuff.

As a side note I was a bit surprised about the howling from some corners of the net about the cost of the conversion kits. The cost of the latter end of the year was magnified for me by ABBA announcing new studio recordings. Oddly no one on the ABBA fan sites was complaining about paying for new ABBA studio recordings. ABBA 2.0 is coming, which was announced at the same time as X-wing 2.0, a very exciting week for me.

Talking about ABBA cash grabs, I didn’t watch Mama Mia 2 though, as whilst I like the band and the stage show, if I want to see ABBA songs murdered by people who can’t sing Ill either watch the X Factor/Pop Idol or go to a karaoke evening.

Why are they perceived as bad?

Not ABBA, Rebels!

In Isolation most stuff looks good and has potentially really great synergies but it seems to be in the mixing it all together that the wheels are falling off.

Arc 170: they just feel too expensive.

A-wings: I’d say only the green squadron pilot looks iffy for the cost of getting a pilot talent. This could be down to the fact that there is not anything super useful in the talent spot at the moment and it’s over costed.

Attack shuttle: unless going on a ghost its just a cheap way of getting a three attack die ship with Zeb or Sabine.

Auzituck: Sad times. Dial is marginally better but without wookie commandos to mod the offence the output is low if you just reinforce.

B-Wing: Braylem Stram for 50 points seems good value as a back of the line sniper for 50 points. My only gripe is that they are still slow rolling, (offset a bit by the linked focus barrel roll) and feel a bit too expensive compared to the X-wing.

E-wing: I don’t think Corran is dead but any decent builds start to cost more than Super Natural Luke and comparatively Luke feels better. I like the I4 as an ordnance option with an R3, Proton torps and FCS but again could Super Natties Luke be a better investment?

HWK: Kyle and Jan Orrs are good but you are paying over 50 points for them tooled up.

K-wing: the Wardens have potential.

Sheathpide: AP5 and Fenn Rau stand out but I don’t like Fenn’s price point.

Rebel Tie: Rex is still worth considering but would be nice if he was a bit cheaper.

U-wing: I’ve found these to be quite tanky and consistent in 2.0 and the medium base suits them. Some pilots are garbage like Magva Yarro but others have their uses. I quite like Bodhi but you need a Phoenix squadron A-wing tax to make it work. And Tax is theft.

VCX: Not floating my boat at the moment.

Yt1300: Han and Lando are good, personally I like Lando more.

Yt2400: not as consistent but still good. Both Dash and Leebo have viable builds but you are looking at a two-ship list in most cases.

Y-wing: I’ve looked at them but they feel a bit toolbox/jack of all trades in the extended format. Good price point though. Dutch and Norra stand out in the named pilots.

Z-95: all good value. Blount is great at 30 points, Talas decent crack shot and/or missile caddy and Craken still has a place although feels pricy compare to other options in his current points threshold.

Perhaps the Stand out ship in the rebel faction is the workhorse X-wing

Blue Escort/cavern Angel: great value

Red Squadron Vet: if wanting crack shot.

Two tubes: works with the U-wing tubes

Jek Porkins: Surprisingly good. (scum and Villainy touted him as a possible sleeper hit).

Leevan Tenza & Kullbee Sperado: Nah

Garven Dreis: change to needing an eyeball result to spend a focus has nerfed him and Ten Nub, numb, Nib, whatever?

Biggs: Biggs is back although a seasoned pro will whittle him down first.

Thane Kyrell: a Situational ability that will on occasion be very good. The choice between him of Jek Porkins is interesting.

Wedge: Not an arc dodger. Great value for hitting peeps in the face.

Luke Skywalker: If taking Luke I find it hard not to deck him out to have Super Natural reflexes and proton torpedoes as Standard. It is like flying BB8 Intensity Poe but having the whole dial open to the pre-barrel roll or boost. And you can reliably hit with four dice.

That’s enough good stuff to stick together right?

Only thing is it seems to be hard to glue it all together without either going for some crazy chain of action economy between ships or feel that you are missing a ship somewhere. I’m not overly fond of the approach of being super synergistic or two ship builds in 2nd edition. Lando with perceptive co-pilot, ten nunb and Bistan as a base may work as you can reliably attack two targets if needed but the 2nd ship needs to do a lot of work.

Working out the meta: “You know what’s good right?”

Although you could say, “no, not just yet,” some of it is quite obviously good. Boba Fett, Fenn Rau, Palob, Guri, Fang fighters in general, Vader, Redline, Whisper, tie fighters, Tie bombers and so on. From a rebel point of view, it doesn’t roll off the tongue so easily. As mentioned before, mushing it together isn’t as easy as say two Delta Defenders and Soontir.

Part of the issue with a big reset is working out whether the squads you and your opponent are playing with are any good and whether mistakes with the flying or target selection plus dice variance are more contributing factors to victory or defeat. Sifting through misinformation too is a problem. The Tie Reaper, for example, was given a thumbs down in a 2.0 poll but having looked at some builds with it, it is proving effective.

Rebels sit in an uncomfortable position of not having a good enough swarm vs Imperial or scum swarms and also struggling in the triple ace style match up. The rebel aces are not quite the same as Imperial or scum aces and they cannot quite field the quality in numbers of the other two factions.

Initially, I tried a lot of five ship lists then reduced to four ships but found four ship builds wanting comparatively. The main basis I have tried is two X wings, a U-wing, Z 95 and an Awing. At times swapping out the U Wing for either another X wing, Auzitcuk, or B-wing or switching the A-wing out altogether or to a Z-95.

Then I read this article about the four K wings. Only having two, I spiced them up a bit and added Super Natties Luke.

Luke’s Galaxy Note 7 Mini

Luke Skywalker: Super natural Reflexes, Proton Torpedoes, R5 Astro mech

K Wing Warden Pilot: Barrage Rockets, Proximity Mines, Proton Bombs

K Wing Warden Pilot: Barrage Rockets, Proximity Mines, seismic charge

Total points 200

The K wing is not something that I had a lot of love for but now playing multiple K wings, I have a third on its way to me. The K wings are very fast on a medium base. Proximity mines are quite good at closing fire lanes and dropping in someone’s face with more reliable damage output than in 1.0.

R5 on Luke is quite useful as it’s not too bad if he forgoes his action to discard a damage card due to his force tokens and pilot ability. My only comment after playing a number of games with the list is that R5 tends to only be used if I’ve been careless with Luke and not optimized him well. Luke does feel like a ticking clock once he engages.

Tweaking it may lead to trying three K wings and Jake Farrell, although that may wait till after UKTC. All this Slamming has also made me look at putting two gunboats down with some friends at a later date.

Is that a good list?

It’s okay. Certainly fills a hole in a team format competition and play time is limited this close to switch to other options. We know 4 K-wings is good as a list as well as individually Super Natural Luke. I reckon combining some of the better bits of rebels may yield something. I even considered swapping Luke out in the above build for either a naked Wild Fringer, 2 Blue Squadron X-wings or a VCX.

It will be interesting to see what other rebel players put on the table at the first big X-wing tournament of 2.0. One has to temper that with the format allowing for good and bad matchups but it will be interesting all the same.

Looking forward to the weekend.

P.S.

There is a Q kit going on at the FFG games centre on the same day. One of our guys is going there whilst on holiday. Apparently, you had to get an invite or something?

Closing Thought

I’m pretty sure there was no such thing as a ‘mini’ version of the Note 7.