As you can see, we’ve got our MuseOn Con 2018 events posted below this email. If you want to attend an awesome weekend of minis, mayhem, and good ol fashion X-wing nonsense, MuseOn Con is the place to be!
Since it is a convention, the events themselves are free – you just pay to get in the door. So head over to the MuseOn Con webstore and get your tickets bought today!
Once you’ve got your ticket, RSVP on Facebook so we know how many people we have where.
The convention has it’s own prize system but we are working on some additional x-wing only rewards too, so stay tuned and get signed up!
Omaha was my first regional tourney and I had an absolute blast. Flew Super Kylo; Expertise QD; and an Academy pilot since Kylo and QD are my most familiar ships at this point in time.
Round 1: Walker – Expertise Rey; Strezra; Rex
This round is the fuzziest since I didn’t take notes but I set QD and AP in the bottom right corner and left Kylo out on the left flank. Walker moved his ships into the middle and I pushed some damage through on Ezra with him trying to wipe out the AP immediately, but in classic Pseudo-Soontir style refused to die. Next round of shooting I brough Kylo in on the flank and came within a micron of putting him on a rock. Then rolled all hits against Rex who was unfocused and rolled 3 eyeballs and got one-shot. From there I just chipped away at his ships while the AP lived for another few consecutive rounds of shooting before finally shuffling off this mortal coil.
Win 100-12
Round 2: Jared – RAC w/rebel captive and Cruise QD
RACDraw is a list very close to my heart so I know how much hurt it can bring. Rebel Captive was also a nasty addition as it instantly shuts down a big portion of QD’s damage potential. Jared ended up setting up across from Kylo on the left side of the board, so I did a couple rounds of 1 hards to try and assess how hard he was going to try and commit to coming in full speed. I got a little too cute and ended up getting Kylo boxed in and 4k’d to make space. At this point I made what could have been a game deciding mistake in shooting at RAC to double stress Kylo, but the idea of losing a round of “free” damage on the Deci seemed worse at the time. Meanwhile the AP and QD have moved into the middle of the board to joust his QD and I came super close to a block to put us both right at R1, but he barrel rolled out of arc to avoid any return shots. Next Round Kylo five straights to try and clear RAC but can’t get far enough away and starts to take some damage. Jared commits his QD to the slaughter and down he goes. But, over the next few turns of focusing down Kylo, it allowed my AP and QD to get behind and mitigate being out PS’d. RAC also got put in a tight spot and had to fly away from combat and doesn’t shoot for a couple turns. His QD eventually goes down and time is called after getting half on the Deci to win barely on points. Awesome match, but annoyed that I’m getting paired against my brothers.
Win 69-59
Round 3: Neil – QD and Crackshot HLC Rhos
I don’t have a ton of experience flying against this list but I knew my gameplan had to be to nuke the boats and try to save Kylo for late game. On the opening turn he used LRS to lock Kylo, which to me seemed like a good thing for me, as Kylo can very easily stay out of range or hit the gas to get behind them. I set up my opening engagement perfectly by slowly bringing Kylo up just out of range and then zooming past next turn to take no shots. The AP secured a block and QD was in perfect position to the start bringing the pain, but his green dice were on fire and practically no damage went through. Next round I set up perfect blocks again to allow for more carnage, but again, even with my mods netting full damage rolls, his evades came in big and practically nothing got through. At this point, he’d starting picking away at the AP and QD and they eventually died. He slammed away with his boats to prevent any other good shooting opportunities and Kylo just can’t live forever as the sole target. First tabeling at a tournament but Neil was a great sport.
Loss 0-100
Round 4: David (?) – Ghost Fenn
Just pile it on, Universe. I had also never faced this list so I wasn’t sure exactly what to expect. I learned pretty quick it was nothing good. The combination of HotCop on Fenn, the PS11 Coordinate, and the EU on the Ghost meant I got none of the shots I wanted and paid dearly for it. The AP went up in flames immediately, but I was able to take down Fenn with 1 or 2 shield left on the Ghost and a full health Kylo. I tried to keep my distance to avoid the Synced Turret and double taps and did a pretty good job of it, slowly plinking damage into the ghost. However, after a few turns I made a massive mistake and misjudged the distance on a rock and parked Kylo range 2 of the ghost. Went from full health to 2 hull remaining without doing any damage to the Ghost. At this point my frustration at my stupid mistake tilted me off axis and I forgot to trigger autothrusters and died shortly afterwards. I believe I managed to get half on the Ghost before poofing but don’t remember the exact points destroyed. Of all my matches I feel I learned the least from this matchup as the combo is just completely gross.
Loss 48ish – 100
Round 5: Justin K – Fenn; Tarn; Jess; Awing
To the salt mines I go to face a 4 ship list which is yet again another list type I’m not super great at. However, here I set up my best engagement to date. I spread my ships out with AP bottom right, QD middle and Kylo a little to his left after he set up the full formation top right. Turn one I hard right with the AP to regroup and brought Kylo and QD up into the middle of the board. He turns in, so I know he doesn’t care about the AP so next turn I turn him back into the middle and bring Kylo up into the top of the board and keep QD in towards the middle. I know for sure he’s coming for QD now, so I zoom the AP in, 3 bank with QD and bring Kylo down and in to set up a pretty nice killbox. Jess is at the front of the pack and has no shot on any ship, the AP can only get shot at by the awing behind her, and Kylo is entirely safe. QD still gets lit up and 1 rounded, but not before Killing Fenn and doing damage to Tarn. The next round, I send the AP into the middle of the pack to jam things up and 4k with Kylo, which he entirely didn’t expect and hard righted with the A wing and Jess to try and jam him up. I believe the AP completely blocked Tarn, so he stayed where he was and Kylo lit him up and kills him. The rest of the game he split his ships up and I never got a chance to really focus either down so time is called with 1 left on Jess and not shields plus maybe an extra damage on the Awing. Not a stellar win but I’ll take it.
Win 48 – 39
Round 6: Jason – QD and Harpoon Boats
This again. Gameplan hasn’t changed and I know I have to kill the boats to have a chance. Once again, he takes his LRS locks onto Kylo after setting his ships up a little fanned out in the middle and slow rolling. I zoom Kylo up the side of the board and he starts turning in to trap him. Here things got a little wonky as he mixes up his boat dials and sends one up facing his side of the board, shooting at nothing, and one straights towards me with the other. I wasn’t entirely sure where he was going, so I did the “Kylo decloak” barrel roll and hard one to juuuuuuuust barely be in range of the one who had accidentally come towards me. So it half worked in my favor, half didn’t. He gets full mods on the Harpoon and I see 4 damage coming my way and roll 1 evade. I pop title and it goes big, rerolling into all evades. Meanwhile QD and the AP take some heat, but his first boat is low. Next turn I speed in to get past the boat and join the fray with AP and QD. At this point I think he harpoons the AP which is destroyed, which procs his QD in the mayhem and there is a ton of red dice. QD rides the wave with a shield remaining and it’s basically now or never to strip his QDs remaining shields, which I do. Now I start running with QD but continue to take shots out the back as I speed Kylo out of engaging. He bring his last boat (with poon still unfired) in to try and chase down Kylo. I 4k to the board edge and then next turn speed in as fast as I can to ensure the kill before he can shoot. QD plinks another health of QD, and next turn rolls hit crit to maybe end it, but Jason natties two to survive. At this point, my QD is at 1 health, Kylo is at 2, and his QD is at 2. I end up close to the far right board edge with QD and he thinks he’s going off so he sloops around and I hard 1 to stay in the game and survive his butt shot. Next turn I clear the stress and get my focus back, but he manages to push damage through and QD is gone. There’s still 30 minutes left in the game and being out PS’ed there’s no way I can guarantee I avoid the shots so I know I gotta go big. Kylo has been moving up to the top left corner to stay out of range and I 4k again to the board edge while he moves his QD into the middle. Next turn I straight 2 to clear stress and then just stay where I am since I know QD isn’t the fastest. He 3 straights to be baaaaarely in range, which is my ideal set up. He rolls natty hit hit crit, and Kylo’s 4 dice natty 3 evades and a focus. My return shot is all paint and I spend the focus to ensure 3 hits back and his dice finally go cold and QD kabooms. Definitely the most intense match of my career thus far.
Win 100 – 51
I know I don’t have a snowball’s chance in hell to make cut because my MOV has been terrible despite going 4-2 but I’m super happy with the outcome because I had a chance to face some of my weaker matchups and learned a ton about my list and how to strategize better. Looking forward to the next one.
Thanks for the report James! You can find him on Monday nights in DSM at our home store, Mayhem Comics 🙂
Game one of the day. I go in with the mindset that if I can atleast go 4-2 with my list and have some fun then it’ll be a successful day. Setting up Im going against a 4 ship scum jank list. It has Thweek, Constable, Kavil with Dorsal, and Sunny. I line my bombers up in a line in the middle of the board. I put QD off to the left lining up with Constable. He lines up across from me, He puts Thweek in the corner (he Thweeked QDs PS11). I slow rolled up, tossing 2 of my TLs onto Constable and 1 onto Thweek. First round of combat Constable eats it as well as Sunny with all 4 poons being used. There was 1 dmg of splash onto Kavil. He lights up one of my bombers, but all 3 are still alive with an untouched QD. Next round I reposition and block thweek, with QD piling on the damage. He does 4 dmg to one of my bombers that did a 5k, with Kavil. Following round 2 bombers bite the dust, but Thweek does as well. It takes 2 more rounds but Kavil finally dies with QD only losing 1 shield and the 3rd bomber being at 4HP.
Win 100 – 40
*Game 2 – Poe/Nym*
After a pretty good game one, im going against a relatively straight forward list. A really decked out Poe with a Torp and a standard point fortress Nym with pretty much every upgrade in the game. I setup with all 3 bombers in the middle again, but put QD on the right where he places Poe and Nym. I slow roll for 2 turns and TL Nym. Turn 3 i turn towards the right side of the board where Nym is. Where his Poe currently is I feel that he is baiting me so I just focus and dont move the TL to Poe. Instead of running Poe turns towards me. At this point im facepalming to myself. I deal 4dmg to poe with the bombers. And deal 4 damage to Nym with QD using only the lock. He Deadeyes using his focus and deals 4 dmg to me with a crit. I specifically saved my focus for defense and proceed to blank out, losing all 3 shields and getting a stunned pilot (oh the irony). I proceed to deal 3 more damage to Nym with the return shot from QD. The following round, QD misses his back arc shot with 2 of my bombers barely being out of range since he did a 3 bank to sneak by me. Poe then proceeds to just do a 2 forward with a boost to try to get back into position. The following round I get Nym down to 3 with QD. However, with no focus QD dies to the TLT spam. I then proceed to launch a poon into Nym, killing him and avenging QD. His poe comes in and kills the bomber he wounded turn 3. At this point he turns poe and runs with 40min on the clock. After about 15min of positioning we look at each other and discuss terms to just call the game since both of us are hungry and I only have 1 poon left and with black one he can shrug off the TL and render it useless. We agree to call it and get lunch that was catered in.
Lose 50-60. (He had a ridiculous bid)
*Game 3 – Nym/Randa (YAY!…..not…)*
So after lunch I start setting up and my opponent sits down with good ole Nym/Randa. I place my bombers in the left corner with my opponent setting up in the far right corner. I place QD in the middle. I slow roll throwing all locks onto Miranda even tho Nym is the massive point fortress in his variant. I range control beautifully for combat with only Miranda being in range of 2 bombers and QD.. I then proceed to obliterate her back to the stone age with Nym taking 2 of the spash. The following round I fired by 2 remaining poons at Nym, and get him to 1. One bomber is at 2 with everyone else being healthy. The following round I finish off Nym with QD.
Win 100-0
*Game 4 (Speedy) – TLT K-Wings with Bombs (2 Ion and 1 Bomblet)*
This was a very very tough game. I dont remember alot of details as it was at this point my back really started to hurt and my head pounding with a tension headache (stupid accident). I setup in the middle left with him spreading his kwing with 1 opposite my bombers and 2 in the right corner. I then place QD in the middle. After slow rolling (Imperials 1 forward to victory) I threw 2 locks onto the left most Kwing and 1 on the kwing closer to the middle. He then proceeds to fly 2 kwings at each other. The Turn right before combat I switch all 3 of the bomber locks (bombers on the left switch to the Kwing going to the left and the 1 on the right switch to the bomber going right as the Kwings at this point are committed. Kwing 3 is going for a deep flank on my right. The following round I fire 2 poons at both Kwings. The left most kwing goes down to 4, while the right Kwing goes down to 3. After 2 rounds of pews and QD losing 2 shields and a bomber. I reposition and line up a long range kill box. Both of his wounded bombers are right next to each other. QD has an unobstructed shot at the bomber one 4 HP. I fire and get 2 hits and crit. He rolls blank evade. This kills that Kwing and brings the other down to just 1. The other Kwing is taking harassment fire from 2 bombers and is down 2-3 shields at this point. This was the turning point of the game. After several turns of long range fire, I was able to pull off the win.
Win 100 – 40 (edited)
*Game 5 – SolSixxa/Nym (Both with debris gambit, Justin Brown would be proud)*
So this game was just janky to be putting it mildly. Sol had minefield mapper and tlt while Nym had 2 poons and all the other goodies. Setting up in the middle. With QD off to the far left, he places both Scruggs in the middle and minefield maps and sets up 2 no go lanes in between 3 rocks. Creating an upside down triangle almost. I approach this spam of mines and lock both Sol and Nym. I move QD in from the left and Lock onto Nym. I was able to get Nym down pretty significantly as well as Sol, but with the Debris Gambit and the bomb obstruction I ended up only doing 4dmg to Sol and 5 to Nym. The following round he moves Nym onto the clusters, allowing me to get 1 more pass with QD. Sol turns away, but maintains TLT range and kills a wounded bomber. Nym wounds another bomber that had to turn away. The following round QD repositions for a better shot the next round. The wounded bomber dies to TLT fire. The next round QD finishes off Nym and the other bomber repositions with a 5k. He jousts me with Sol and i do 3 dmg on the approach. He attempts to block me, but i Sloop the opposite way he expects me to and I range 1 kill him.
Win 100-40
*Game 6 (Aaron Steede) – Oh hey look, another Nym/Randa….(I cry a little inside)*
After my good win against another Nym Randa list earlier, I was feeling pretty confident. This game I almost remember no details other than Miranda was alphaed off the board and my remaining bomber had 5 HP and QD was untouched. I remember setting up middle of the board and killing Miranda. I lost 2 Bombers to the return alpha and proceeding TLTs. If I let Aaron kill another bomber he would of made the cut as he missed it by 1pt. (sorry Aaron).
Win 100-40
Post-Swiss Thoughts
With my 5 wins I was able to claim 4th during swiss out of 95 people. I was also ecstatic that 3 of my fellow DSMXs were able to join me in the top 16. Shoutouts to Aamon, Justin, and Wayde for kicking ass and taking names (especially Wayde as he billy clubbed me and then Aamon in the end).
*Game 7 (Wayde “I dont know how to play on the tabletop because I play too much Vassal” Stover – Rey/Stressra/RexyPoo*
You can find a link to the match here:
After game thoughts would be to remember my Poon condition triggers. This cost me a damage on Rey, which would of been a 2 damage card shuffle, which would of been huge. (See 17:30 in the video for this). Besides that I felt I flew pretty damn well. I had 3-4 attacks that blanked out, which I cant curse the dice gods too badly as they definitely saved me in earlier games. The one that I do curse is the one at 24:45. Besides that, I absolutely loved playing against Wayde and was honored to be thumped after an absolutely EPIC comeback.
This was by far the closest game I have ever lost, and will be taking what I learned to Adepticon.
Thanks for the report Nick! You can find him on Monday nights in DSM at our home store, Mayhem Comics 🙂
Round 1
First my 5 SCARIF DEFENDERS went against @Kyle. I deleted his Palp shuttle and got his Blackout down to 1 but I did too many red maneuvers and the lack of focus tokens did me in.
0-1
Round 2
Second I went against Fenn, Dalan and Thweek who I deleted quickly. I killed Dalan too but didn’t have enough Strikers left to put damage in Fenn.
0-2
Round 3
Third was Norra Fenn Lowhhrrick. Had all 5 strikers blast Norra and did a grand total 1 shield. It was all down hill from there.
0-3
Round 4
Was no longer having fun at this point but lunch helped. For my fourth game I was on the very bottom table. If I couldn’t win there I was gonna call it. I faced Norra Shara and Thane flown by a very new player. I killed Shara relatively quick but he was a slower player being new, so when time was called he had Norra and Thane left and I had 3 strikers left. I knew I had to kill one to win on points and with the last roll of the game I took one out, don’t remember which though.
1-3 Holy shit, I won a game!
Round 5
The 5th game was the best part of the day. I went against the super sweet girl Starcie and her Thug Lyfe tlt Ys. Her energy and sweetness made the day fun again. I won despite flying a striker off the board.
2-3
Round 6
Last was against Aaron? from OCX flying Asajj/Bossk. Took Bossk’s shields down in the first round of combat. Next round 1 heroic striker pushed through 2 hits and 2 crits, both directs. Bye Bossk. Unfortunately from there Asajj did Asajj things and I could only get her to half before running out of strikers.
2-4 in the end.
Post-tournament Thoughts
5 SCARIF DEFENDERS are fun as hell but incredibly unforgiving. I need to put in a lot of reps with them. It was a great day with great guys and I can’t wait for my next opportunity to fly in a tournament of that size.
DSMX on top on top!
Thanks for the report Jefferson! You can find him on Monday nights in DSM at our home store, Mayhem Comics 🙂
We’ve got a battle report from Justin Brown reviewing his run at the 2018 Omaha Regional hosted by Sparta Games. Enjoy!
Round 1
Loss (Scum Swarm) 67-69
Ryan Kraus (made cut) Opponent’s List
Big mistake of forgetting to account for his bid of 3 pts when calculating a 1v1 of thweek (30 + 3) vs Inquisitor (31)
Early on I asked for how expensive his thweek was and he was 30 point. Based on this I decided I could leave thweek for last since I thought Inquisitor out-pointed him. However I forgot that he had a 3 point bid. This was a pretty standard game where I took out his scurrg and inaldra pretty quickly. Inaldra did get off 1 ion on QD which is what burned down most of QD. End game was a 2 hp QD and full inq vs thweek. There was about 10 minutes left in the game and then I realized that if he killed QD he would win on points unless I could take out thweek. Unfortunately with 5 minutes left he took out qd on a range 3 shots while inq took him down to 2 hp. However a Thweek that moves after inq is hard to pin down and he won on time. If I had realized my math foul up earlier, I had had a few opportunities to focus fire on thweek to potentially take him out. Because of my blunder, I was a little down on myself after this game because I considered this loss to be on me. However at least I knew I had a chance to submarine my way back into the cut.
Round 2
Win (Scum Swarm 2) 100-32 Opponent’s List
This was Nick’s opponent from round 1. He was a very friendly guy who had a very interesting list. I think the guy may have lost though in list building as no autothrusters on thweek makes for a sad thweek. Since the guy didn’t have a bid he decided to mimic Inquisitor. This meant that Thweek was my priority target because of how hard he could hit. Fortunately, I was able to alpha off thweek because of some cold green dice for him. Thweek never got a shot off. From here it was basically clean up. The guy was able to kill my shuttle though through 2 Sunny god shots with a mangler. (roll 3 hits add a hit turn 1 to a crit). I wasn’t afraid of any of the list other than Thweek. This win had me feeling a lot better. And it also got me out of the basement. (The lower tables in Omaha play in the basement)
Round 3
Win (3 btla4 TLTs and strezra) 100-69
John Steil (made cut) Opponent’s List
Don’t remember if this was the strezra he used or if it was something else.
From the road to adepticon series and reports from John’s opponents, I knew this list could do a lot of damage. Additionally, strezra can be extremely annoying to my list that doesn’t want to see stress. Yorr can help mitigate the stress, but if yorr goes before the stress dealer goes, then I’m in trouble. Unfortunately for John, I may have won this game on turn 0. John setup his strezra away from his y-wings and thus it was possible for me to try to alpha off strezra before I had to deal with his y wings.To do this I put QD in a position such that during the opening round of combat he could 3 bank onto a debris to try double tapping. For those not familliar with it the move goes like: 3 bank onto a debris, remove the stress with yorr, perform my action, and then palp a crit to remove a shield and shoot during activation phase. In this case I had TLed ezra so I was shooting expertise + TL in activation phase, and then again in the normal combat phase. I also had inq with a shot on him. So 3 shots and strezra was dead before she could do anything about it. I will say that it was extremely close to if QD was on the debris or not. I think his nub just barely fit and thus was declared on it. I don’t think John knew or expected this interaction so I did feel a little bad after ezra poofed. Additionally due to firing arc angle my shots were not obstructed even though I was still mostly sitting behind the debris. However John was a champ and battled back. The game came down to inq vs an almost dead y wing and chopper. I saved chopper til last as I didn’t want him removing his BTL title and running away/regenning while still tlting me. As expected inq was able to finish off the y wings without much trouble because of the token stack and autothrusters.
Round 4
Win (Rebel Regen) 100-32 Opponent’s List
This was a list that I really did NOT want to see. Both Miranda and Poe can be a nightmare to kill in the end game, and they both out-pointed my most expensive ship. Then in addition to 2 regen aces there was a strezra that could really hamper my aces. I think this is another game I won in turn 0. My opponent placed his miranda/poe/strezra up to joust my yorr and qd, while inq was in the middle of the map and in a decent position to flank his formation. The few rounds consisted of yorr and qd setting up for the joust while inq tried to close the gap to also shoot in the opening engagement. I also need to note that I had init so my inq shoots before miranda. This is actually fairly good for me as I can have both QD and inq shoot at miranda before she can regen. This means I have a chance to drop shields and sink a damage or 2 into hull before she can bring back up a shield. Now for the fun on my side. The opening round of engagement his ezra is not in range but all of my ships are in range of miranda. Poe shoots at yorr and does a shield or 2. QD then shoots at miranda and rolls all paint which with expertise turns into 3 hits. I think miranda calls 1 and gets it. Inq then shoots and clears the rest of miranda’s shields. Yorr follows up with clearing miranda’s shield and getting a direct hit in . At this point on my 9 red dice I think I rolled paint on every single one. Though on Yorr’s shot I think I used palp to turn a blank to a crit. At this point the guy didn’t seem happy but he wasn’t out of it because miranda can regen. Next round of combat I do slow moves with all my ships to hopefully keep my guns on target. (note I did a 1 bank with yorr, to spread my arc out wider, which is important for later) Ezra does a slow move too and I think coordinated a TL for Poe. Miranda slams out of inq’s arc to avoid getting shot by inq who had TL-ed miranda. Poe then strolls up and is sitting range 1 in arc of qd and yorr. I don’t remember the action but Poe ends up shooting yorr and doing a few more damage. Poe didn’t boost because Yorr blocked his boost straight and an angle boost wouldn’t have gained him anything. Now is where the guy starts to get even more salty. I roll 4 dice with QD and get 3 paint in, which turns into 3 hits from expertise. Poe I think rolls double blank for 3 shields. Inq then throws 3 red at poe and gets 3 paint which I focus for 3 hits. Now I think Poe evades 1 or maybe 2 to receive a damage card or 2 . (I forget which) Now my opponent made another mistake, ezra decides to shoot at QD when he also had a shot at yorr. He stresses qd with R3A2, trying to shut off expertise, but I pass the stress to yorr, which I don’t know if my opponent expected. Additionally, I let 1 damage go through on QD to shoot at Poe again. Now is when I realize I didn’t FCS after last time I shot poe and was kicking myself a little. However I was able to roll enough paint to kill poe. Guy was super unhappy about how hot my reds were and how cold his greens were. Not that I blame him, but I did have mods for all of my shots which helped. And he made a few tactical mistakes. Ok, Poe is dead but now here is where my 1 bank with yorr is huge. I now still have a shot on miranda with Yorr because of the bank. Yorr still has a focus and palp. So I shoot at miranda and with palp/focus get 2 hits and a crit. Guy c-3p0s 1 again and gets it yet again. So 1 crit goes through which is damaged engine. At this point the game is pretty over. I turn around inq and sloop qd and finish off miranda before she can run away and then its ezra against the world. Ezra does manage to get 2 hits against a 1 hp yorr at range 3 and I didn’t get the 1 evade I needed to stay alive. So I beat a rebel regen list in around 30-35 minutes and only lost my shuttle. I was feeling pretty good after this game.
Round 5
Loss (Imperial Swarm) 19-68
Ricky White of Scum and Villiany (made cut) Opponent’s List
This was another list that I didn’t want to see. It had vader crew which could deal with inquisitor pretty quickly and 2 gunboats which had highly accurate HLCs. I knew this would be a slug fest. I opened this game up pretty cagely and the opening round of combat consisted of 1 HLC shot on Inq which netted 1 shield after mods and palp on defense. The ensuing combat consisted of a HUGE cluster of ships around Yorr and lots of range 1 shots. Range 1 shots definitely favored me as that meant no HLC for the gunboats. Another key factor was that both my Inq and QD were able to avoid bumping and retain their actions to help push damage through and stay alive. Luckily I was able to arc dodge the vader bomber long enough that he was down to 2 hull before he had a shot on inq. Ricky decided not to vader inq (which would have been a shield) and kill the bomber. In the end the bomber died first. Next there was a lot more posturing for positions and some more good manevuer choices with inq to avoid bumps. I ended up trading QD for 2 shields of each of the HLC boats. Unfortunately time was starting to get short in the game. I had a pretty healthy Yorr, who was moving away form the battle and was full of stress, and a 3 hp inq vs the full agressor and 2 boats. At this point I think I made a strategic mistake in going after the agressor instead of trying to finish off one of the boats. The last 3-4 rounds are a little fuzzy but I was going pretty hard after the agressor and put inq in a position behind a debris. Again I made a mistake of not repositioning away from the debris, though I had a clear 1 hard away from the battle that I could have done. The agression on my part did allow me to get the agressor down to 1 hull. Now instead of doing the maneuver that would avoid the debris and taking a few turns to get back into position, due to not much time, I went over the debris. Ricky called my bluff and blocked me on top of the debris. I ended up still having a shot at the agressor with a TL that was saved from a previous turn. I also still had palp available. I saved palp for defense as I knew I had a HLC shot coming at me and I didn’t want inq to die. So I just used my TLed shot and ended up getting 2 hits in. Unfortunately, Ricky allowed Duncan to save him and rolled 2 natural evades for the agressor to stay alive and win. However there was 1 more turn in the game. For me I had to guess if Ricky was going to go right or left to try to avoid my arc. Instead he 4 straighted right inq with a barrel into a position that inq couldn’t get to without actions. Then as the last icing on the cake Ricky got another HLC shot onto inq and I blank out on defense, even with palp backup, killed my inq. This was definitely a very tense but FUN game. I enjoyed every minute of this game even though I lost. Thanks Calvin Tiberius for the incredibly fun game!
Round 6
Win (Rebel Swarm) 100-32 Opponent’s List
I don’t remember a lot from this game, other than the guy was very fun to chat with as we played. This was another opponent who’s greens weren’t great as Rex got 1 shot by Inq. From there I just picked apart his lower PS ships with qd and inq. My opponent never shot at QD as he didn’t want to get double tapped. The game took a while, but I don’t think I was ever in danger of losing the game because of good positioning by Inq and QDs focus/tl revenge shot potential. (edited)
Post Round 6
After my close loss to Ricky, I thought I had a minimal chance at best to make the cut. Because of this I decided to get a beer and drink it during my round 6 game. This is not something that I normally would do if I thought I had a chance at making the cut as I’m a pretty competitive person and wanted to have my head clear when playing. After the round 6 game I was sitting 4-2 and still didn’t think I would make the cut as I didn’t think my MOV was great. (didn’t know exactly what it was) So I decided to purchase and start drinking another beer. About half way through my second beer they announce the cut, and I discover that i’m the 15 seed, making it in by 2 MOV. I also was the 3rd highest 4-2 player. This was definitely a surprise to me, but a welcome one as it meant I got more of the orange stress which I thought were pretty cool. However, I’m now a beer and a half in and pretty much a lightweight! So lets see how this affects my last game.
Top 16
Loss (Double Casters) Got Ketsu down to 1 when inqy died.
Carson Wray Opponent’s List
I looked at the pairings and saw I was playing Carson Wray, who I knew was flying double casters. I right away didn’t like the pairing because of the tractor beams and assaj’s tankiness/stressing. I think the key parts of this game were the fact that Carson never tried to use Ketsu’s ability and instead pointed the mobile arc to the side of both assaj and ketsu. This meant that he had 2 180 arc ships that makes auto-thrusters hard to proc, and makes it hard to arc dodge. He also flew the list in a convoy style where assaj was in front (with LW off all game) and ketsu following right behind. I haven’t seen this sort of flying of casters before so it was definitely a learning experience. Next I felt like I got an opening 2 rounds that favored me, however his offensive dice were superbly hot and he was able to clear QD’s shields in 1 rounds (from 1 attack). That was a big turning point in the game. I was able to put a fair amount of damage into Ketsu even with her double glit and counter meastures but it definitely was time consuming. It was around 30 minutes left when I had inq/yorr against a nearly dead ketsu and full assaj that I decided I had to be aggressive. Ketsu had 3 hp left and had no tokens or consumeables left. I decided that I would palp offensively to try to finish off ketsu so I had 30 minutes to try to kill assaj. I ended up rolling (with palp modification) a hit and 2 crits. Ketsu then rolled 2 defense dice and got a natural evade to not outright die. Now I was hoping that 1 of the 2 crits was a direct hit. Again, unfortunately ketsu didn’t pull a direct hit and lived. Then between the 2 return fire shots inq died and I conceded. I think if I were to look at this matchup again, I would have tried to get half on assaj while I still had QD alive. I figure that Inq could have finished ketsu with palps help and then survived assaj long enough to win on points. However, this escaped me during the middle of the game. I did have 1 close call that might have convinced me to go this route in the middle of the game where QD was a MM or so off of having a front/back arc shot in assaj where assaj only had a focus token. Unfortunately I didn’t have that so then I took a range 1 at ketsu and died in return. (QD at range 1 of both wasn’t a good move, though I was trying to bump into assaj.) Overall, Carson was a good player and he flew a good match and beat me.
Post-tournament thoughts:
I know now that if I want to continue flying this list I need to come up with a better strategy for facing casters!
Thanks for the report Justin! You can find him up in the Quad Cities or on Vassal looking for games 🙂
We had an awesome time at Omaha this weekend with DSM giving a strong showing and Wayde Stover taking the win! Below are some pictures from the event for your viewing pleasure:
Round 1 DSM Selfie!DSM on DSM violenceSetting up a killboxWayde Stover for the big win!The DSM X-wing crew, looking good 🙂
We also will be posting some battle reports shortly and will have links available via our Strategy and Tactics page.
2018 MuseOn Con – Holiday Inn (Merle Hay Location, DSM) – Friday 5/18-5/20
Friday – Unsung Heroes Hangar Bay
Saturday – MuseOn Con Cup 2018, White Whale Tournament
Sunday – Fel’s Free-for-All
Des Moines Area X-wing 