The next build is an attempt to jumpstart the great asteroid ignorer himself: Dash Rendar. Starting at 100 points, we’ve tried to keep the cost down to ensure that he can be paired with a respectable wingman. To that end, we’ve equipped him with Lone Wolf, Kanan Jarrus, and Bistan for a total of 132 points. That leaves 68 to put into a second ship.

Dash is the most expensive single ship in the game before upgrades. He is equal parts maneuverable (ignoring asteroids), offensively punchy (with 4 attack dice), and hard to ignore (at Initiative 5).

Lone Wolf and Kanan give Dash a ton of flexibility in modifying his dice. If he maneuvers with a modicum of intelligence, Dash should have a force charge and a single reroll to use for modifying either his attack or agility dice. Kanan also allows Dash to utilize his I5 barrel rolling and still have a flexible dial to rid him of the stress.

With a ship as expensive as Dash, the first goal is usually to stay alive. Which likely means using Kanan and Lone Wolf for defense. Bistan helps to balance that out. Dash fires at I5, so he has good odds of having his focus token on most rounds. Dash could then fire twice from the same side. This would help him control swarms to an extent, since he could potentially kill or maim two ships in one round.

Now, there is a trick to how the order has to work. Bistan requires that you have a focus token after your first attack. Therefore, if Dash is trying to trigger the double shot, Dash needs to fire at the less desirable of two targets first. If you’re aiming to eliminate a 2 hull B wing and also take a shot at the full health Norra next to it, reverse those. Fire at Norra first, modify those dice with Kanan and/or Lone Wolf if you need to and are in the position to do so, and then trigger Bistan to fire at the B wing. Feel free to spend that focus in the second shot or save it for defense. This reversal of priority is certainly unnatural, but also something that you need to be conscious of while playing Dash.

This does limit how you fly Dash, since you’ll often want to be taking a focus action every round. This will keep him from wanting to barrel roll often, which means he won’t want to land on asteroids very often. Because of the necessity of his action in this build, I’d recommend taking all debris fields so Dash can sit on them and still fire. I would also recommend that when you fire, measure to all your targets every single time. Because of the timing of the double shot ability, you want to take your time and determine which target you are ok with throwing unmodified dice at.

Use Dash to leverage the edge of a board, kiting around and taking double shots at pursuing ships. If your opponent ignores him and isn’t shooting Dash, then jump behind their firing line and unleash shots modified by a focus, force, and Lone Wolf reroll.

As with the Cloak and Choke Whisper build, don’t use Dash as a jousting ship. If faced with excessive fire, Dash needs to get out of the way. One hard turns paired with a barrel roll works well to put Dash into a good disengage position.

The penultimate question when trying to build out Dash is what type of wingman can you get to fly along side him. At 68 points remaining, that gives you a lot of choices: Jan Ors, Norra Wexley in either her ARC170 or the Y Wing, and any T-65 will fit nicely beside Dash. I prefer the defensive capabilities of Luke Skywalker as a way to draw fire away from Dash, but any of the above listed ships could slot in nicely

Breakdown

Pros: Cheap for a Dash build, hits like a truck with a pair of 4 dice shots. He has lots of mods, even if he were to lose his action. Kanan allows him to move freely and get into optimal position. He has 2 agility to back up that big base, and has some free modifications to help his dice be fairly efficient.

Cons: In a world where most ships are small or medium bases, Dash’s large base will seem huge. He does have a lot of dice modifications, but they need to be applied in a very particular manner to get the most out of them. A pilot also needs to really think about where and when to use those modifications.

Countered by: Any type of killbox. Dash can only take so many shots, even with multiple mods. He is also countered by good range control from someone who can start beyond range 3 and then jump into range 1. Any kind of stress giving mechanic doesn’t play great since it means that you’ll need to use Kanan’s ability constantly. Hotshot gunner, Darth Vader, and other token stealing effects could neuter Bistan’s ability.

Counters: Pursuing aces, especially of I5 or I4 who can handle most other things. Consistent 4 dice attacks are good against most things, but especially other large ships.