Big boys games this week. Regional. That means game face on and sh%t gets real. An Epic post work drive from to the South West with 186th squad mate Alex Birt and Firestorm Squadron’s Dom Flannigan and Nic Harris. The joys of it being my turn to be designated driver… Still hotel booked for Friday and Saturday evenings means that we should be vaguely fresh for playing lots of X-Wing on Saturday.

After going 6-1 over 2 events last weekend I can’t not bring Boba Fenn with me. There are a few lists that I have felt completely at home with, and this is the one that tops them all. Sure I’ve had huge fun with Star Vipers, Falcons, T-70s… but the raw aggression and firepower of this list more than make up for anything those lists had to offer, I think I may love it even more than the Twin Sprays.

Boba Fett Fenn Rau Andrasta Conord Dawn Protector Veteran Instincts Push the Limit Engine Upgrade Autothrusters Harpoon Missiles Proton Torpedoes Dengar Bomblet Generator Glitterstim Ion Canon

Kirton is a bit of a drive from where I’m based it Hampshire, but it was a good trip down with the guys. The Venue for the event was in a school hall, full of 101 pilots all hoping for dice! I normally try and take photo’s during games for Instagram and the blog but I didn’t for this one, I just wanted to focus on getting the right engagement, rather than the right photo, so there’s a lack of pictures with lasers and explosions this week.

The way I’m approaching this week is looking at my match ups and assessing my target priorities, it’s something people talk a lot about in the game but it’s a really helpful process to break down and evaluate.

Game 1: Alex Boulton

Vessery with Tie D and Ion Cannon

Lt Karsabi with wired and a Heavy Laser Cannon

Rho Squadron with VI and a tractor beam

All at Pilot Skill 6, all with guns that you don’t want to be hit by. The most worrying ship for me here is Karsabi, that heavy laser canon is a huge threat, it can chew through Boba fast and Fenn is very unhappy when it is pointed at him. Target 2 is Vessery because of the damage output of his two shots a turn. and Finally the Tractor beam, as it carries the least threat.

The opening went badly. The harpoons from Boba bounced (not the only time they would do so on the day) but the protons from Fenn hurt Karsabi badly, however the HLC back left Fenn on one hull, which was not great. The following turn Alex parked Vessery on a rock and Fenn took FULL opportunity of it, the god-roll of 5 paint with a focus on a token less defender saw him drop to one hull. Then Boba went to work and hunted down a ship at a time. The bomblet did for Vessery then Boba’s guns did for the Rho’s.

100-67 win.

Game 2 was against Ryan Coyle:

Vessery X7 (Expertise)

Ryad X7 (Push the Limit)

Alpha Class Nu Mangler

Target number one here is the Alpha because it’s by far the easiest to kill and that mangler is something I really didn’t want hitting Fenn. It came down to Ryad vs Fenn and with half an hour on the clock I was fully prepared to run if need be, and dialed in to run…

But Ryan and I both misread what the other was going to do. I expected the hard three in and he expected the K-Turn, so I went in with a 2 bank and he came at me with the 1 bank. Which ended up with the Defender at range one with a focus token and 4 health vs Fenn with a lock and a focus. At which point Fenn did the thing that Fenn does and without the X-7 evade being there Ryad went pop.

100-59 Win

Game 3 against Matt Fisher.

Matt tends to fly top tier lists a lot but for this event had opted for a classic. 4 Y-wings with TLTs. The Y-Wings are still very good against certain things and Matt had a good day of it going 4-2 with them. However Boba and Fenn is not something they are going to be strong against. Target priority was simple. Pick a ship and kill it.

One never fired as range one shots from the Spray and the Protectorate shredded it, Boba lost shields when there were only 2 Y-wings left, glitterstim and the re-rolls did their job in the early engagement, then Fenn went hunting cutting down the remaining two ships with his usual abusive consistency.

100-0 Win

All of a sudden I was in a strange place to be. 3-0 at a regional, my best performance at a regional on the cards… Which took us to round 4.

Game 4, Dave Cook

Palp Shuttle

Quickdraw (VI)

Ryad (Push the Limit)

Target one here is the Palp shuttle. Quickdraw is hard enough to kill when Palpatine is not on the table, and Quickdraw is a ship that is giving me and almost nervous twitch at the moment… The amount of times I have got him down to one or two hull and then failed to land a killer blow is beginning to get to me. Badly. (Like 7 times in the last few weeks or something stupid.) So he’s target 2, then Ryad is the lowest priority.

The turn the shuttle died was perhaps the most staggering turn of damage I have ever seen. In the opening engagement there was a major hull breach on it, and then the following turn Fenn put 5 damage into it: 3 direct damages and 2 other face up cards. Then Quickdraw put 3 natural crits into boba, leaving him on one hull. Dave and I both took a moment to reflect on the utter carnage of the turn.

I went on to lose this one, and it was my heaviest defeat of the day, Dave flew it right, Boba died to a console fire (choice of either that 50/50 roll or a 4 dice attack from QD)….

Loss 28-100, but what a game it was!

Game 5

And thus we come to the game I dread most of all, anyone who has read this for a while knows that RAClo (Rear Admiral Chiraneau with Kylo Ren crew) is probably my least favourite thing in the game. I have never beaten it with a firespray, to top it off my opponent Anthony Yeates is running it with VI Quickdraw. As soon as we deployed this was already a loss in my head. As far as counters to two ship builds go this is still one of the most effective in the game.

BUT…

RAC has to die first, if I focus on Quickdraw I take more and more damage from the Decimator, and with Palpatine crew on the Decimator that means crits hit me faster than I can deflect them.

In order to avoid the threat of a bomblet Anthony swung his Deci in a hard 2, narrowly landing on a rock when Fenn had a lock and focus on him, and Boba had a shot too. They put an irrecoverable amount of damage into the 0 agility ship. Then the Quickdraw show began, and I almost lost my mind.

A range three shot from Quickdraw on Fenn Rau hits twice. Fenn has 4 green dice, Autothrusters and a focus… of course he blanks and loses his last hull before he gets the chance to use that target lock to shoot back. There goes the 100-0 win… But it’s ok, Quickdraw is on one health and Boba on 8.. I can’t lose this right? Right? That’s impossible…

Boba hits Quickdraw 3 times, for 4 attacks in a row, and the SF rolls paint on each of the 12 dice he rolls… in the meantime Boba drops to two health. I can feel the veins in my skull beginning to throb as the Tie S/F just refuses to die.

A final turn and Anthony makes a rare wrong call as he misreads where Boba is going. He has to barrel roll which means no focus token, then the target lock lets him down. Finally Boba does what he should have done in the previous 4 turns and kills the ship.

This was one of those games that I needed a bit of luck to win, and I got it. And then nearly lost it as Quickdraw lived the most blessed of lives… but the 100-67 win was there and I finally vanquished 2 demons in the same game.

Which mean 4-1 and the 67% target had been achieved all be it with a somewhat terrible MOV…

Game 6

The final round of swiss was against Ross Pearson, flying VI Poe and Dash. Whoever won this would be guaranteed a spot in the cut. It started so well, an then came the key moments.

That bit of bad luck. Two health Fenn boosts and focuses, sitting at range one of Dash so safe there. Poe comes in and hits him twice, one bit of any paint and Dash is taking a 5 dice attack from Fenn, of course he blanks out and dies. (then Boba RUINED Poe…) That bit of bad Judgement. Dash is on 2, Boba is on one. But I’m moving second and shooting first. The board looks a little something like this.

The thing I did which I should not have down was this:

Had I done this the next turn would probably have looked like this:

It’s EASY to blame dice when you’re relying on them. Yet again I put myself in the position to need the dice to work for me and to not work for my opponent. A little patience and I would have been in a much stronger position. It still would have meant taking the risk for the win, but 4 vs 2 with Lone Wolf and a focus needing to do 2 hits is much better odds than 4 vs 3 with Lone Wolf and a focus…

I lost, and finished 29th out of 101 for the day, Ross went on to win the whole event. A nicer guy you will be hard pushed to find, well done dude, a great showing. By such fine margins are games decided.

Initially I was bitterly disappointed to not make the cut, but after a bit of time to reflect and look at the day I was really pleased with how it went. I made the 67% target at a regional, my best showing at one yet and I made very few mistakes during the day, and I did it flying two of the ships that I love the most.

Again a solid performance by James Finlayson, another regional cut, but his first time being King of Swiss! He has SO MANY SPARKLY DICE!

While the cut was going on there was a side event, 3 rounds of play to pass the time for those of us waiting on our friends who were playing in the cut. Round one was against Dave Cook again, this time his list (Whisper and Kylo Shuttle which we shall dub “the bad idea”) didn’t fare very well against Boba and Fenn, and the 100-0 win came up pretty hard and fast.

The next game against Sam Crosby (Running Thweek, Fenn and a PS1 Scurrg) was a lot tighter, and I think is the first time I have got full use out of an Ion Cannon, firstly to pin his stressed Fenn in place then to shuffle the Scurrg off the board) My Fenn dropped but Thweek vs Boba with Boba moving second ultimately only goes one way. 100-38 win.

The last of the three rounds was against fellow 186th member Andy Brazier with Quickdraw, Omega Leader and Blackout. When Fenn takes Omega off the board in one shot you know it’s going to be a savage game. Quickdraw went next in exchange for Fenn and then Boba took out the Silencer. 100-67 win.

Great job by the guys from Kirton Games for putting on a top event, and as ever the X-wing community was on point in providing the best atmosphere going.

As often happens I got a couple of awesome messages on Sunday morning:

Then as we stopped for breakfast on the way home I got this message:

All in all I was pretty pleased with how the event went. I played 9 won 7, a 78% win ratio. Which means that the tracker is now looking like this.

Tournament Games 30 Overall Win Ratio 73% +/- +2%

Next week: HOMECOMING

If you’re looking for X-Wing tournaments then head over to the 186th Tournament Calendar.