This was a Top 4 game in the X-Wing Vassal Tournament, Season 6. The format for season 6 was pretty straightforward: Extended lists, players are locked to once faction of their choice but can otherwise freely change lists as they see fit, and (for this match) 12 round games. I went 5-1 through Swiss (albeit including one late drop for a regrettable win-by-default) and made it through the Top 8 to reach this point.
My list
Oli Aces
with a twist. I'd run Oli Pocknell's exact version previously at Gold
Squadron's first Space Jam tournament and made cut with it (ironically,
losing once in Swiss to Oli himself in a straight mirror match). I'd
also used it in my last couple Swiss games. I've played a lot of
Imperial Aces going all the way back to 1.0 Palp Aces lists, so this is
always a bit of a comfort zone play for me. I wasn't inclined to use it
again here, however, my opponent had played the same list in all of his
games (a 199 point CLT Jedi list). My other go-to lists were a 200 point Whisper/Imdaars list, and a 198 point Whisper/RAC list (an updated take on Dalli's Hot Rod list),
and while I think they might have been able to contend well, the Oli
Aces list seemed like a slam dunk. Seeing as my opponent would be
playing at 199, I swapped Passive Sensors out for Fire Control System on
Vader. Make no mistake, I am fully in the Church of Oli when it comes
to a firm belief that Passive is the right call, but with no i6's in
sight and a guaranteed bid advantage, making the swap this time seemed
like a no brainer.
I won't go into too much
depth about the list itself because it's well documented and relatively
self-explanatory. Whisper is a premiere endgame piece and a constant
threat, Vader is an i6 flamethrower that has usually helped clear the
field of threats before he's used his afterburners and is able to be
pinned down, and Grand Inquisitor is a flanker/bait piece that has just
enough firepower to viably threaten an opponent who ignores him (and,
occasionally, can piece together an endgame win).
Against 4 CLT Jedi that rely on near-perfect board knowledge to line up CLTs and avoid arcs, the list is a heavy favourite...
Opponent's list
My opponent changes it up and brings his own triple ace list at 198
points. 7B Anakin with R2 Astromech is arguably too expensive at
current prices, but that certainly doesn't mean it's not a tremendous
ship that can absolutely devastate my i5's and give my own grown-up
Anakin a giant headache. The CLT users are less scary, and if I can
avoid the bullseyes, not really scary at all, although this will depend
greatly on the initiative roll's result. The real problem here, though,
is sitting in Obi-Wan's astromech slot, waiting to go crazy. C1-10P's
Erratic state means Obi-Wan will be dishing out a jam token after every
maneuver he makes, interfering with GrInq's token stacks, impairing
Vader's flexibility by knocking off his target locks, and most
importantly, devastating Whisper by threatening to rob her precious
evade token and leave her dangerously exposed to being knocked out of
the cloak/recloak cycle.
It's a well chosen
list that would have caused severe issues for any of my standard lists,
all of which feature Whisper, and one of which also includes a Decimator
that absolutely needs to reinforce constantly or die quickly and with
little damage output. Clearly I needed to splash a TIE/x1 or TIE/ln
swarm somewhere along the line in Swiss to throw my opponent off the
trail!
Opening strategy
Step one was to discard almost everything I'd learned from studying
my opponent's list and previous games. Step two was momentary panic. I
combined these two steps in the interest of efficiency and allowed
myself a 15 second period of cursing and head-shaking.
Step three was to pray to the dice gods that I win the initiative roll. I don't. I'm going first against
a bunch of arc dodgers that can now relatively freely line up bullseyes
and become viable 3-die threats. Step four, more panic.
With
that done, it was time to look at the list again. Anakin and Chopper
are the big problems, and so target priority is relatively easy to
determine as a result. When facing Force using pilots, I tend to just
assume that, within reason, every green die they roll is going to mean
an Evade symbol. Therefore, the ideal first target here is probably the
92 point sole 3-die attacker that happens to roll one less green die
than the other two ships. R2 makes him function as a pseudo-8 HP ship,
but if I'm able to pile damage on him quickly, the shield regeneration
doesn't get a chance to happen, and I can take out the most dangerous
piece of my opponent's list and grab a big lead in the process. I would
be happy to trade any of my ships 1-for-1 with Anakin and go from there.
That said, the big orange 6 on Anakin's card, as well as that bit of text after the words Fine-tuned Controls,
means it's highly unlikely I'm able to pin him down reliably and kill
him with any sort of speed, barring a significant misplay by my opponent
or some seriously wild dice. If I'd won the die roll, it would be
difficult but doable; having lost it, it's a real long shot.
Fortunately, Obi-Wan is a bit less likely to get away from me (at least
while Vader still lives), so realistically he's probably going to end up
being the first target assuming Anakin slips through my fingers.
Basically,
my target priority decisions here aren't so much who I'm targeting as
they are who I'm not targeting. In the context of this match, Plo Koon
is simply something I need to tolerate and mitigate, but I'm not wasting
shots on him unless I have no other option.
My
opponent will likely be thinking similarly against me: ignore/mitigate
the Inquisitor, shoot Vader opportunistically, but catch and kill
Whisper first if at all possible. Knowing this, I'll need to be very
careful with Whisper, cloaking judiciously if I'm going to be in
multiple dangerous arcs, and preferring positions for survivability and
escape paths rather than prioritizing damage output at all costs.
Whisper can shoot and kill her way out of many situations, but this is a
list that can viably threaten to kill Whisper in one round of shooting without even getting to range 1.
Deployment
With arc dodgers in general (and especially with cloaking ships), I
want as much open area as possible. That means small rocks, especially
as I don't have any real love of gas clouds or debris, and in fact both
can do pretty annoying things to my ships. My opponent brings big rocks.
Normally,
with this list, I like to corner the rocks as much as possible to give
me as much open space as possible to reposition. Unfortunately, that
will work against me here, as my opponent has a significant advantage on
me in his ability to leverage repositions. Therefore, I adjust my
approach, looking to use the rocks to make a relatively large area that I
can use as one big pivot. If my opponent chooses to go through the
rocks, even better for me, as those will limit his ability to maneuver
freely and get bullseyes. Lining up bullseyes isn't trivial, and it's
much more difficult when you have to consider asteroids as well.
All
that said, I don't know that there's any approach here that gives me an
advantage. Basically I need to give myself an area for Whisper to
decloak without limiting her options, and otherwise just hope to arrange
the rocks in the least disadvantaged array possible.
I
place the big rock right in the middle (1). If he chooses to corner
rocks, this at least gives me a small pivot to work with, forcing him to
identify his main force and/or flankers a bit more clearly. My opponent
is on board with this, though, and places another large rock at range 1
of the first one (2). I make a triangle with my next pick (3) and he
confirms his interest in making a big tight clump with his next rock
(4). This gives me a bit of a choice of where I want the battlefield to
mostly happen, as my next rock will mostly determine which side of the
board has the biggest open area. I want Whisper to be able to get to a
decent position quickly, so I place my last rock (5) at range 1 of my
other two rocks. My opponent places his last (6) opposite of the large
rock, giving us a big asteroid wall running down the center. He might
get cute and fly one or more straight through the narrow lanes running
between the two sides (I certainly won't be doing that), but more likely
I can anticipate one or two ships coming around one way, and the rest
going the other.
Whisper gets placed first.
I like to set her up in a corner, and I am reasonably certain that my
opponent will line up his main force across from her (and she will
therefore be moving away from those ships), so whichever corner I place
her in should be the opposite of where I want her to be. The north
corner is a bit more open (my opponent's last rock wasn't quite range 1
of the other rocks), which lots of space to decloak in multiple
directions, so I place Whisper at the south corner. Inquisitor goes in
the middle, where he can feign attacks in either direction.
My
opponent places Plo in the top right corner (facing south) and Obi
lined up across from Whisper. This strongly suggests that Plo will be
the flanker, which is ideal for me, as it means I don't need to worry
about making any difficult choices in what section of the board to
position my ships to attack. I put Vader up in the top corner, across
from Plo and also facing south. I can feign an attack on Plo from here
(and actually pursue it if for some reason that looks advantageous), and
this leaves me with hopefully some ability to choose how Vader enters
the fight. Finally, Anakin does indeed go down beside Obi, across from
Whisper.
Turn 1
I don't see any advantage in committing early to this board. While
being bold and running Vader and/or Inquisitor up super fast to try to
flank the Jedi might be unexpected, my opponent's list is much better
than mine at quickly changing targets and reacting to a unexpected board
state. I mostly need to make this something resembling an honest joust,
so for now I don't want to show my hand. Non-committal banks for
everyone!
Activation
- "Whisper": 1 bank left, cloak
- Grand Inquisitor: 1 bank left, focus
- Obi-Wan Kenobi: 1 bank left, spend 1 charge on C1-10P (1 remaining), gain an evade, stress
- Plo Koon: 1 bank right, focus, spend 1 Force to barrel roll right backward
I'd
wondered if my opponent would try to rush forward fast with Ani and Obi
to catch Whisper off-guard, but he plays it safe. One Chopper charge is
burned so that the jam functionality can be turned on prior to the full
engagement; this is a pretty standard approach to using Chopper. Plo
also plays the game of non-commitment.
- Darth Vader: 2 bank left, barrel roll left backward
- Anakin Skywalker: 2 forward, spend 1 Force to barrel roll left forward, boost forward
Turn 2
This turn, I need to get everyone in position to
hopefully all shoot at the same target next turn, ideally while still
offering at least a passing threat to Plo in order to force my opponent
to advance a bit more cautiously with him. Whisper has two options: she
can candycane (decloak left, 1 hard right) and catch Anakin in case my
opponent tries to get aggressive with him this turn, trading shots
1-on-1 with Anakin since Obi's current state means he can't get close
enough to shoot this turn. However, this limits my options next turn to
decloaking into a corner, decloaking forward into an Anakin that can
threaten to sloop and double-modded attack me, or decloaking right and
getting completely enveloped by opposing ships. I choose what I feel to
be the safer option, sending Whisper back towards my other ships. This
also feigns an attack on Plo, which is probably not something my
opponent is terribly scared of, but keeping him guessing at least a
little bit seems decent.
All that said, looking
at this now, there's a decent argument for candycaning, trading shots,
and then next turn decloaking forward and then going as fast as I can
past Ani and Obi, with the goal of turning and shooting them in the back
while they get engaged by my two other ships. It would have been
interesting to see how that went; Whisper taking unexpected damage,
losing her evade, or having her forward decloak blocked all would have
thrown big wrenches into the plan, but if none of those happened, it
might have at least forced my opponent to make some difficult choices,
and any choice your opponent makes is an opportunity for them to make a
mistake.
Systems
Whisper decloaks left backward, gains evade
Activation
- Whisper: 4 forward, barrel roll left backward
- Grand Inquisitor: 1 bank right, focus
The Plo feint is as convincing as I can make it without actually
being committed to it. If I'm lucky, my opponent sees this and bails out
with Plo to try to drag me around the asteroids. If that happens, I
don't have to worry about him coming in from behind.
- Obi-Wan: 2 bank right, clear stress, spend 1 Force to boost forward, lock (an asteroid)
- Plo: 2 forward, spend 1 Force to barrel roll left backward, focus
At
the very least, I've slowed Plo down. If I'd gone aggressively towards
Obi/Ani, I expect Plo would have boosted and/or barrel rolled forward.
Instead, he's now positioned defensively to leave himself the option of
bailing out or going across the top of the board and potentially getting
nuked by my whole squad.
- Vader: 3 forward, focus
My
position is ever so slightly awkard here, as Vader's no longer
convincingly threatening Plo, thanks to the asteroid. I considered
barrel rolling left to continue to threaten a quick charge at Plo, but
then I wouldn't be able to do what I actually wanted to do and move
south towards Obi and Ani. The last thing I want to be doing is chasing
Plo Koon of all ships around while Ani and Obi kill me from behind.
- Anakin: 1 bank right, spend 1 Force to boost forward, lock (an asteroid)
Anakin dials cautiously to avoid the candy cane.
We're still well out of range, so Whisper recloaks and we move to turn 3.
Turn 3
I probably can't put off an engagement much longer,
depending on how aggressively my opponent wants to be here. Since he
didn't spend his second Chopper charge on Obi, I expect a fairly
cautious advance from Obi and to sit in a position where his next turn's
blues get him where he needs to go. I can't really pursue the Plo feint
any longer, so now I need to position to not get bamboozled by Obi and
Ani. They seem poised to come at me from the south west corner of the
map, but I've watched enough of my opponent's other games to know that
he likes to move in cagey and unpredictable ways, so either Obi or Ani
(or both, but I expect only one) might try to cut the corner and come
through the inside corner of the southwest asteroid. My arcs need to be
positioned to not lose shots if that does come to pass.
I
do choose to hold Vader back here. This lets me at least mildly
threaten Plo, perhaps punishing him if he comes in too aggressively. The
alternative, advancing as quickly as possible, opens up a full Plo
backdoor right away, and the last thing I want to do is accidentally
stumble into Plo's bullseye with my i6; a 3 bank from Vader and a
straight-plus-barrel roll from Plo might lead to exactly that. I'm not
above taking a pot shot at Plo, so I'll give Vader a chance to do that
here. The rest will be turning to threaten Ani and Obi.
I should add that, like an absolute pro, I accidentally
flipped my dials mid-planning and so had to change my precise maneuvers
to cover my butt. The broad strokes are roughly the same, except Vader
was going to bank instead of going straight and Inquisitor was going to
go wide with a hard 3. I prefer the changed maneuver for Vader, as it
happens, so all's well that ends well. But I wouldn't have minded
Inquisitor being able to cut in to the west on the next turn, which was
one of my reasons for wanting the hard 3.
Systems
- Whisper decloaks left backward, gains evade
Activation
- Whisper: 2 hard right, activates passive sensors
- Grand Inquisitor: 1 hard right, focus
- Plo Koon: 1 bank right, spend 1 Force to barrel roll right center, focus
Plo
wisely barrel rolls, avoiding the potential for Vader to 1 forward plus
barrel roll to try to shoot at him. He's still not fully committed to
the flank, but now that I'm pointed south toward Ani and Obi, he doesn't
need to leave his options open anymore.
- Obi-Wan: 3 bank right, spend 1 Force to barrel roll left backward, spend 1 charge on C1-10P (0 remaining), gain evade, stress
Obi
moves in and decides to not cut the corner. I'm assuming my opponent
landed the bank and didn't like the look of his angle, which is probably
correct; barrel rolling right would have committed Obi to a 2- or
3-forward the following turn, which I would have then been able to block
nicely with the Inquisitor.
- Vader: 1 forward, focus
A
barrel roll right would have been nice for next turn's positioning, but
it would have cost me one of Whisper's decloaks, and I wasn't sure
which one I wanted yet. Besides, having three viable decloaks for an
opponent to consider is never, ever a bad thing.
- Anakin: 3 bank left, spend 1 force to barrel roll left forward, boost right
Anakin
stays wide but comes in almost a bit too aggressively. He ends his turn
about 1/10th of a ship base out of shooting range with Whisper, which
would have given Whisper an early lock and an exchange of fire that
almost certainly does no damage to Whisper while having a decent chance
at knocking a free shield off of Ani. Alas!
Engagement
- Whisper acquires a lock (asteroid)
No shots, but this will be the last round for that. Whisper recloaks, C1-10P flips to Erratic, and we go back to dials.
Turn 4
So here's the thing that I just noticed while putting
this together. One of the spectators pointed out here that we'd missed a
round and it was actually turn 5. Honestly, it sounded right to me, I
was deep in my dials and didn't want to distract myself by digging
through the chat, so we ticked it up to 5 and carried on.
Don't
ever do that. Announce your round number in chat every time you go back
to dials, and double check the log when this happens.
So there was no turn 4. My laziness and a spectator cost us a turn. X-Wing is weird sometimes. Nothing to do here but move on.
Turn 5
We're
definitely engaging here, so my only real hope is that I can do it as
unpredictably as possible to avoid my opponent from just annihilating
one of my ships (namely, Whisper). I have to be careful not to leave her
isolated and/or at range 1 from Anakin, because getting one-way attacks
from Ani on Whisper are exactly how I will lose this game if I'm not
careful. Whisper's decloak right (i.e. southwest) spreads her out and
distances her from Plo, but I don't know how to approach from there
without risking Anakin just doing a 1 bank, barrel roll, and shooting me
unanswered. Going forward leaves Whisper exposed and makes everyone
else's positioning tricky, not to mention giving Ani and even Obi
options to arc dodge her. Therefore, I choose to decloak left. I can't
quite tell if this will block Vader; if it does, I'll need to barrel
roll, which is awfully annoying.
Inquisitor
also has two choices: set up to attack, or try to sneak a block. I'm
reasonably confident that a 5-straight from Inquisitor blocks Obi's
2-straight and 2-bank, and the angle might be right that it blocks the
3-straight as well. That block is too appealing for me not to try for.
It will cost me the Inquisitor's token from the Chopper jam, but that's a
reasonable price for a chance to mitigate Obi's attack and, if Ani
dodges me, get some early damage through.
Systems
- Whisper decloaks left backward, gains evade
Activation
- Grand Inquisitor: 5 forward, lock (Obi-Wan)
- Whisper: 1 bank right, barrel roll right backward
I'm
happy with Inquisitor's final position, less so with Whisper. I'm not
100% that she's not blocking Vader (as it happens, she wasn't), and if I
leave here there, she'll almost certainly end up in Plo's bullseye.
It's not ideal but the barrel roll feels like the right call here.
- Plo: 3 bank left, spend 1 force to boost forward, lock (Whisper)
- Obi-Wan: 2 bank left, spend 1 force to boost right, jam Inquisitor (removes lock), barrel roll left backward
Obi
calls my block and avoids it, but it does prevent me from getting shot
at by him this turn, so the end result is reasonable. Plo advances
predictably and commits to Whisper, but with the bullseye dodged, this
is okay, as the attack is unlikely to cost me my evade token, let alone
do any damage.
- Vader: 3 bank right, spend 1 charge on Afterburners to boost right, lock (Obi-Wan), spend 1 force to focus
Tough
choice on who to lock here. Obi-Wan is a sure thing, while Anakin might
just arc dodge me and leave me with a piddly 2-die shot on Obi at range
3. I play it safe and lock Kenobi.
- Anakin: 3 bank right, spend 1 force to boost forward, lock (Whisper)
This
is a surprisingly aggressive play. What I expected (and dreaded) was
Anakin boosting right and barrel rolling left, dodging all of my arcs
and taking a free range 1 on Whisper. Instead, he boosts in to offer up a
range 1 exchange with Whisper and leave Vader the option to shoot him.
Had I locked Anakin with Vader, I imagine he might have chosen
differently, but who knows?
Engagement
A difficult choice for Vader. Neither the range 3 shot at Obi nor
the range 2 non-Advanced Targeting Computer shot at Anakin are expected
to accomplish much, with both sub-50% chances to do any damage. Given
that they both still have shields (and therefore the chances of getting
an ATC crit through are almost nil), I decide to shoot at Ani, where at
least I have a chance of getting rid of some Force and saving some pain
for Whisper.
- Vader attacks Anakin (range 2), no damage
Natties into natties. Well, it was worth a shot.
- Vader attacks Whisper (range 1), spends lock and 1 Force, Whisper spends evade, 2 shield damage
- Whisper attacks Vader (range 1), spends 1 Force, 3 shield damage, Whisper gains evade
- Plo attacks Whisper (range 3), spends 1 Force, 1 hull damage
The
Whisper attack is reasonably lucky. All things considered, this isn't a
crazy outcome. I'm ahead on points (temporarily, thanks to R2), and
Anakin has to at least be a little more cautious (but so does Whisper).
Whisper doesn't really have a choice whether to spend the evade on Plo's
attack, as doing so almost certainly dooms her next turn.
Whisper recloaks.
Turn 6
This is an interesting turn. Grand Inquisitor is pretty easy, he'll
be turning in and grabbing a token, possibly as a sacrifice to Chopper.
I don't see a safe way to engage with Whisper here, so I'll be looking
to decloak, get distance, and recloak. I could go straight, but
decloaking right and flying forward might set up the block on Obi. It's
not guaranteed, but it's a reasonably likely block on two of Obi's hard
turns, which might give Vader and the Inquisitor a chance to make
something happen.
Vader's position is
annoying here. I don't see a way to pursue Anakin without risking
getting arc dodged and/or mobbed by all three opposing ships, since
Anakin can K-Turn or sloop relatively safely here and potentially shed
his stress in the process - if I hard turn Vader right and Anakin sloops
right, it's curtains for Vader from there. My lock is on Obi, so I
might as well continue on him. This will make my next turn a bit
awkward, but as long as I don't have to spend my lock, I should be in
reasonable shape to press that attack.
Precisely
how far forward to go with Vader is tricky. Too far and I risk getting
blocked or dodged by Obi, too close and I risk getting blocked or
murdered by Anakin and Plo. Getting a bit more distance now also
hopefully gives me a clear Tallon or K-Turn next turn, so I go with a
2-forward and hope that works.
Systems
- Whisper decloaks right forward, gains evade
Activation
- Whisper: 4 forward, cloak
- Grand Inquisitor: 1 hard right, lock (Obi-Wan)
- Plo: 3 forward, spend 1 Force to boost forward, focus
- Obi-Wan: 2 hard right, bumps Whisper, jams Whisper (removes evade)
Success! Unfortunately, Plo has Whisper in the bullseye arc.
It was something I couldn't tell for certain beforehand based on the
angles, but I figured it might end up that way. It's a tolerable risk,
as long as it's just Plo shooting, as with the cloak and Fifth Brother's
Force point, Whisper is highly unlikely to die from Plo's shot alone,
even double modded and with CLT.
- Vader: 2 Forward, barrel roll left back, spend 1 Force for focus
I
was reasonably sure that I wasn't at range 1 when I landed my 2 forward
(and checking now, I was right, it was just barely range 2), and even
if I was wrong, it meant Obi-Wan would be shooting Vader back at range
1. Barrel rolling deprives Obi-Wan of any shots and only costs me the
single Force point to grab the focus.
- Anakin: 4 K-Turn, stress
I
expected either of the sloops, or something forward and an R2 charge.
This is mostly fine, although Whisper is going to really need to count
on green dice.
Engagement
- Vader attacks Obi-Wan (range 2), spends lock and focus, no damage
The worst possible outcome. I lose my lock and my focus, and Obi-Wan doesn't even spend a single Force. Bad luck for Vader.
- Anakin attacks Whisper (range 3), spends 2 Force, no damage
Sometimes five green dice really do work!
- Grand Inquisitor attacks Obi-Wan (range 2), spends 1 Force for extra attack die, spends lock, Obi-Wan spends 1 force, takes 1 shield damage and 1 critical hull damage (Panicked Pilot), Obi-Wan gains 2 stress
A
much better outcome. Panicked Pilot is an awful crit for Obi here, but
all things considered, he got off easy in this exchange. 60% of the
time, he's down to 1 hull, and 30% of the time Vader and the Inquisitor
just kill him (not counting crit damage).
- Plo attacks Whisper (range 3), adds eyeball, spends focus, Whisper spends 1 force, 1 hull damage
Whisper
survives the round, and therefore I'm not dead on the table! The lesson
is that green dice are very reliable and you can always trust them to
keep your precious ship alive, and when they don't, you're fully
entitled to complain loudly and vigorously.
Turn 7
My aggressive Obi-Wan trap sacrificed a bit of long-term
position for short-term gain, which is why it hurts that Obi-Wan didn't
get quite as torched as I'd hoped (although the double stress impairing
Obi-Wan takes a lot of that sting off). This feels like a turn where
none of my options are particularly attractive. This is the real tricky
thing with ace match-ups when you're going first: you sometimes have to
play reactively to the board, but you're still moving first. So my
challenge here is to pre-react (act, I guess?) in the least disastrous
way possible. Doing damage this turn will be a nice bonus, but mostly I
need to avoid getting blocked and absolutely keep Whisper alive. Unless a
golden opportunity comes, Whisper's job now is to preserve points (and
if she can survive some attacks in the process, bonus).
Staying
cloaked isn't really an option because Whisper needs the evade token
too badly. Therefore I can decloak forward and hard turn, or decloak
left and bank. I go with the latter, hoping that my opponent will call
me on the former and try to catch me in the corner. This also has the
added benefit that if my opponent for some reason completely abandons
the pursuit of Whisper, next turn she can possibly candy cane in for
some greedy attacking. This is highly unlikely, but I feel like I need
her damage too badly to completely give up on it. This might be irrational!
With
Whisper vacating that space, I can park Grand Inquisitor right there
with a hard 3 and block Obi-Wan. It doesn't accomplish much, since the
stress is already depriving him of his action, but it's still one less
gun threatening my ships. I also don't anticipate Plo to continue to go
straight, so this might keep me out of that bullseye. I considered a
tighter turn with a boost to block Plo, but the truth is I wasn't
certain enough about Plo's maneuver to feel comfortable setting a block,
and I didn't want to sit somewhere without a token. That would mean a
reposition linked to a focus, which would further mean that I can't turn
around the following turn. I don't feel comfortable here sacrificing my
next turn (or more) of Inquisitor relevance for a potentially failed
block, where I can instead do the larger 3 turn and have some
interesting options to threaten my opponent next turn.
Vader's
hard turn is likely to be blocked, whether by Obi or the Inquisitor,
but even if it isn't, I don't see Anakin and Plo being caught in Vader's
arc. It would be trivial for Anakin to barrel roll out of it if he goes
straight, and he'll be safe already if he banks towards the east. I
could hard turn and then barrel roll, but that potentially results in
Vader being shot at by all three enemy ships (which is bad). I go for
the K-Turn, in the hopes that I've eyeballed it well enough that I'll
just barely have arc on Obi-Wan. Spending the lock last turn hurts a lot
here. This is the only turn where I can still be certain that not all
three opponent ships can turn on me (due to Obi's stress), so it's as
good a time as any to do this.
Systems
- Whisper decloaks left forward, gains evade
Activation
- Whisper: 3 bank left, cloak
- Grand Inquisitor: 3 hard right, evade
Inquisitor's
token choice here is barely relevant given that he's highly likely to
be jammed. I wouldn't know who to lock here anyway.
- Obi-Wan: 1 bank right, removes 1 stress (1 remaining), bumps Grand Inquisitor, jams Grand Inquisitor (loses evade)
- Plo: 2 forward, lock Grand Inquisitor
I
expected a bank from Plo, but this makes sense as it threatens Whisper
if she stays in the corner, and threatens Inquisitor if he doesn't. This
would be a decent exchange if not for Chopper costing Inquisitor his
evade.
- Vader: 4 K-Turn, stress
- Anakin: 3 Forward, focus
This
looks awful, and in fairness, it's not great. But it's also just the
Grand Inquisitor. While he's not as disposable as usual, given Whisper's
current state, the fact that he's got a big range 1 shot on Anakin
isn't awful.
Engagement
- Vader attacks Plo Koon (range 3), spends 1 Force, 1 shield damage
Vader
misses arc on Obi-Wan and only has Plo. Plo opts not to spend a Force
here to avoid taking any damage. Reasonably lucky outcome.
- Anakin attacks Grand Inquisitor (range 1), Grand Inquisitor spends 1 Force to remove one red die, Anakin spends focus, Obi-Wan spends 1 force to recover Anakin's focus, 1 shield damage
- Grand Inquisitor attacks Anakin (range 1), 2 damage (including Stunned Pilot)
- Plo attacks Grand Inquisitor (range 1), Grand Inquisitor spends 1 Force to remove one red die, Plo spends lock, 1 shield damage
A
hot Inquisitor die roll very nearly swings the game! This was a great
exchange for me. Plo beats the odds on damage (54% chance of taking 3
damage, and he outright dies 27% of the time) and forces Anakin to
really start considering his R2 Astromech. More importantly, Anakin is
now permanently at half points, regardless of R2.
Despite my misjudging of Vader's arc post K-Turn, this ends up being a pretty good turn.
Turn 8
My opponent is where I was last turn, looking at the aftermath of a
killbox that failed to kill and trying to put together the pieces.
My
opponents are all poised to potentially continue the pursuit of
Whisper, so I don't feel any sort of comfort level turning her back in.
We can walk through this a bit. Leaving aside the ability for my list to
close the game, losing Whisper costs me 35 points. Trading for Anakin
would put me ahead, as he's sitting on 45 points himself, but if Anakin
actually turns on Whisper, the chances are that he pushes through 1
damage and initiative kills me before Whisper shoots. No other trades
are attractive: half of Obi is less than half, and Whisper killing Plo
in one shot isn't viable enough to plan around. The risk reward isn't
quite there, so Whisper will continue to run away. I still want to leave
the door open for her to re-engage safely if at all possible, so I
choose to decloak forward and hard turn (rather than decloak left and
bank or go forward). This gives me a decent angle to decloak and
re-engage next turn, and a lot of range from Ani and Obi, where a bank
instead would leave me pointed to the east and therefore two turns away
from re-engaging.
I want the Inquisitor to
get shots here because if I can get rid of Anakin or Obi (ideally,
before they start working on Vader), the direction of this game really
turns in my favour. I go with the 2 Tallon Roll to the left because I
don't think my opponent will block it, given the positional sacrifice
he'd need to make to do so, and because even if my shots this turn
aren't ideal, it probably leaves me with good position for next turn,
assuming my opponent continues south on the board. A K-Turn works here
too, and might be more optimal overall, but then if Obi-Wan then just
banks into Anakin, I'm likely caught in the bullseye. My hope is that
the Tallon Roll is off-book enough that my opponent doesn't have arc
coverage over there.
Vader is the tricky one
here, I think. He needs to remove stress in order to target lock and
become relevant, but his blue maneuvers here are all really dangerous.
Plo has full choice to block any of the banks left or straights that he
chooses, which means I need to figure out which ones hurt my opponent
the most and then assume he blocks them. Since my banking in could
threaten the vulnerable Obi or Anik, that suggests he'll be parking on
my 1-bank and 2-bank left. The least convenient block for him is on the
3-forward, so in all likelihood, I'm conceding shots here in the
interest of reasonable position and hopefully better options for next
turn. I still have one charge on afterburners if my position ends up
looking dicey.
The Vader banks to the right are open, I should add, but getting chased by these Jedi does not seem like a path to victory.
Systems
- Whisper decloaks forward, gains evade
Activation
- Whisper: 3 hard left, cloak
- Grand Inquisitor: 2 Tallon roll left backward, stress
- Plo: 2 hard left, lock (Darth Vader)
- Obi-Wan: 1 bank left, removes stress, bumps Anakin, jams Inquisitor (jam token)
Obi does indeed bump Anakin, so my Tallon roll avoids the CLT shot
and potentially Obi's arc altogether. Plo does the hard turn which
blocks Vader's banks, by the looks of it. Checking now, though, it's
actually a failed block on the one bank left, which would have had Vader
sitting just out of arc on Plo and able to really inflict some pain on
Obi or Plo. It's a real shame to miss out on it, but even though the
result would have been great, I think the 1 bank in was still too risky
to try and would have been the wrong choice.
- Vader: 3 forward, removes stress, spend 1 charge on Afterburners to boost left (0 charges remaining), barrel roll left center, spend 1 Force to focus, spend 1 Force to lock (Obi-Wan)
My 3 forward left me
sitting smack in front of a range 1 Plo bullseye, so the afterburners
charge decision was an easy one. The barrel roll into a potential range 1
shot on Obi might be a big winner, assuming I have arc. It's going to
be close, but I'm confident enough that it's in that I do something I
don't usually do and burn down to 1 Force with my actions.
- Anakin: takes 1 disarm token, recovers 1 shield, 2 forward, spend 1 force to boost left, focus
My
worry over the turn had been that Anakin was going to K-Turn and kill
something, but my opponent feels the pressure and takes this time to
recover a shield.
Engagement
Vader misses arc on Obi by a hair.
This
would have been a big turning point in the game, as Vader was all but
assured to get a crit on Obi, and 65% of the time Obi dies here if Vader
shoots him. Missing this arc is a heartbreaker. If Vader could have
barrel rolled backward, it would have been a done deal, but
unfortunately Plo was just far enough back to block it.
It's close enough that I don't feel incorrect for trying for it, as this was a real golden opportunity, but it hurts!
- Grand Inquisitor attacks Anakin (range 2), no damage
A
shot that's not expected to do too much, and it doesn't. Checking the
numbers here, spending my single Force point for the extra red die
increases my chances of doing 1 damage ever so slightly (37% to 41%).
That said, now that Anakin is no longer at a point where a single damage
kills him, I preferred to save my Force for the next turn and accept
that this shot likely wasn't doing much.
Turn 9
Whisper
is still being hunted, so disengagement and retreat will continue.
Noting that we only have 3 rounds after this one, I choose a bank rather
than a straight maneuver, again so that I can potentially re-engage in
one turn instead of two.
Inquisitor
has very little pressure on him right now, so I just need to clear
stress and point my gun at something with double mods. This was
essentially what I was hoping the Tallon Roll would accomplish, so at
least something is working out well!
Vader
has a tricky decision. Obi-Wan is going to block something, but the
question is what? Realistically, I figure my opponent has to be
expecting a white or blue maneuver, since we both know that Vader is
going to lose his lock before he activates. However, if I don't turn
around this turn, then next turn I'm likely pointed in the wrong
direction, and with very little time to get back into the fight. I'm up
on points right now but I'm not confident enough in the margin or the
board state to take my lead and run for time. If it were even one turn
later, perhaps, but for now, the chance of actually killing Obi and
getting a lead with breathing room is too tempting.
So
I choose the risky option and K-Turn with Vader. I think it's the less
likely choice for Obi to block. If he does, then I'm basically committed
to running to time, which as the current leader, isn't awful. If he
doesn't block it, then I have a range 1 shot at Obi with single mods.
Systems
- Whisper decloaks forward, gains evade
Activation
- Whisper: 3 bank left, cloak
- Grand Inquisitor: 2 straight, removes stress, boost left, focus, stress
Would
love to lock Anakin here, but there are far too many ways for him to
just dodge Inquisitor's arc and not even sacrifice moving towards any of
his other viable goals (hunting Whisper, turning on Vader). At least
the focus token lets me use Inquisitor's ability and not be forced to
use up all of my Force in the attack, should I still have a shot at
something. That said, in hindsight, the better action is still probably
to grab a lock here.
- Plo: 2 forward, spend 1 Force to boost left, barrel roll left forward
- Obi-Wan: 1 hard right, jams Vader (removes lock), lock (Grand Inquisitor)
Plo
has a range 3 unmodded shot out of bullseye on Whisper, which is fine.
Obi blocks most of Vader's slow maneuvers, but leaves my K-Turn open.
- Vader: 4 K-Turn, stress
- Anakin: takes 1 disarm token, recovers 1 shield, 1 bank left, spends 1 Force to barrel roll left backward, focus
Anakin
indeed dodges the Inquisitor's arc. He's no positioned to attack any of
my ships next turn. Initiative 6 Aethersprites are fun!
Engagement
- Vader attacks Obi-Wan (range 1), Obi-Wan spends 1 Force, no damage
- Plo attacks Whisper (range 3), no damage
Nothing
wildly unexpected here. A damage on Obi would have been nice but the
odds don't favour it. Whisper was as safe as houses; her dying to that
shot (0.4% chance) would absolutely have been grounds for a table flip
and X-Wing retirement.
Turn 10
This
is an interesting turn as well. As I mentioned earlier, I'd watched a
number of my opponent's previous games, and so I knew that he was very
comfortable in switching targets opportunistically (and unexpectedly),
making good use of the Aethersprite's hard 1 turn plus one or two
repositions to get into novel, advantageous positions. So while this
would normally look like a pretty strong board position for me, my
status as player one and the Jedi's ability to effectively attack a wide
area of the board mean that I still need to be alert for surprises.
So,
knowing that, and noting Plo Koon's target lock on Vader, I'm on high
alert for a full ambush on Vader to grab half points on him. If my
opponent anticipates a blue bank towards the east from Vader, he is more
than capable of blocking it with Obi and turning hard on it with Anakin
and Plo. If that happens, Vader is very likely to lose at least both
shields, if not a hull (and therefore half points). Therefore, I
conclude that I need to use discretion, and bank west, away from the
Obi-Wan block and hopefully out of danger from Anakin and/or Plo Koon. I
won't have any shots this turn, but I might be able to get a lock on
something without getting jammed, and then be set up to consider a
Tallon Roll or a hard turn on the following turn to do some damage.
This
means I'm light on offense this turn, so I make another decision: I'm
going to come back in with Whisper. I've established a pretty clear
pattern of cutting and running with Whisper now, and I've noticed in my
opponent's other games that he prefers to focus his attacks on viable
targets rather than chase runners. I don't think he's going to continue
to chase and throw long range attacks at a cloaked, tokened Whisper. I'm
calling him on turning on Vader by candy caning into him. If I'm wrong,
I probably lose, but my feeling at the time is that I'm just not
confident enough that I won't lose points on my other ships before time
is called to concede that Whisper is done contributing.
Grand
Inquisitor can hard turn here and shoot at Obi (unless Anakin offers
him a better shot). I don't think he's in a great deal of danger on the
whole, so I don't see any need to do something fancy.
Systems
- Whisper decloaks right forward, gains evade
A very small misjudgement here given my plan; right backward was probably more correct.
Activation
- Whisper: hard 1 left, spend charge on Passive Sensors
- Grand Inquisitor: hard 1 left, remove stress, focus
- Obi-Wan: 2 sloop right, stress, jam Vader (jam token)
- Plo: 5 forward, spend 1 Force to boost left, lock (Whisper)
I
was wrong. Plo was perfectly willing to keep chasing Whisper, and I
reward him with a reasonably certain kill shot (72%). A barrel roll left
would have at least given me a shot back at Plo (and half on Plo would
keep me up on points if I traded for Whisper), but I was too confident
that he was turning in on Vader and wanted Whisper to still be able to
decloak forward on the following turn.
An incredibly costly misjudgement of my opponent.
- Vader: 2 bank right, remove stress, barrel roll right forward
- Anakin: 1 hard left, spend 1 Force to boost left, focus
I
was wrong on Plo but right on Anakin. I barrel roll with Vader to get
out of range 1 of Obi and force a reposition from Anakin. The jam is
annoying here, since I don't want to spend 2 Force just to get a focus
token, so I need to hope for favourable dice (and a nice shot from
Inquisitor to recover some value from this turn).
Engagement
- Anakin attacks Vader (range 2), 1 shield damage
- Inquisitor attacks Anakin (range 2), spends 1 Force to add one red die, spends focus, Anakin spends focus, 1 shield damage
- Obi-Wan attacks Vader (range 2), spends 2 Force, Vader spends 1 Force, no damage
A decent exchange for me, although I probably needed more lopsided dice results to stay afloat in this game.
- Plo attacks Whisper, Whisper spends evade, one hull damage, and Whisper dies
Highly likely outcome, but Plo rolling triple natural hits still felt deflating. I'm now behind 76-97.
Turn 11
The
clock is no longer on my side. I have two turns to finish Ani or Obi
and not lose any more points in the process. Desperation and a bit of
tilt from my Whisper misplay are both factors now.
I
can't really afford to not shoot anymore, since not shooting means
losing. Vader is obligated to Tallon roll, rather than spend a turn
regrouping and hoping to have a shot on Turn 12. Sadly, this means
another 2-die attack from Vader.
Grand
Inquisitor also needs to get into the fray, but I still need to keep
Vader from getting torched. I'm concerned about Anakin doing a hard one
and blowing up one of my remaining ships, so I'm going to risk losing a
shot by setting a block with Grand Inquisitor. I dial up the 2 bank, and
presumably a boost left after that will block some of Anakin's scarier
options.
Activation
- Grand Inquisitor: 2 bank left, boost left, focus, stress
- Plo: 1 hard left, spend 1 Force to barrel roll left forward, boost left
- Obi-Wan: 2 bank right, bumps Grand Inquisitor, jam Vader (jam token)
Not
the bump I expected, but I'll take it. That said, in hindsight, I
probably should have expected this. I was thinking Obi was doing a 3
forward, but that too would have been a bump on Inquisitor. Following
that thought process through informs Anakin's plan (i.e. he's unlikely
to be doing a hard 1 because that's where Obi will be staying), and
probably should have had me leaning more towards Anakin doing a K-Turn
or sloop.
- Vader: 3 Tallon Roll left backward, stress
- Anakin: 3 bank right, spend 1 force to evade
Anakin
plays it safer than I expected, but then I should have probably
anticipated this given that my opponent is up with only two rounds of
combat remaining. I think my bad Whisper call the previous turn was
shaking my confidence in my reads on the opponent.
Engagement
- Vader attacks Obi-Wan (range 2), no damage
- Obi-Wan attacks Vader (range 2), 1 shield damage
We both have a 1-in-5 chance of doing damage here. I don't, he does. Variance is fickle!
Turn 12
It's
my last turn to get points, and I don't really have any reliable ways
to do it. The good news is that I just need to get another half points
on any one ship (i.e. get half on Plo or finish off Obi/Ani). The bad
news is that I just have no means of reliably doing so if my opponent
decides to deny me the chance.
I more or less
have to hail mary here with whatever I can. There's a chance my opponent
also tries to get some last minute points here to cover in case I do
manage a coup of my own. That first hull on Vader for half points has to
be at least somewhat tempting.
I don't know if
I can catch Anakin with Vader, and if Obi blocks Vader (which is
likely), I won't get my target lock and will therefore have little
chance of killing him anyway. I can't go for Obi with Vader because if I
bump Obi, we're range 0. So half points on Plo is the option I choose,
hoping that the asteroid Plo is next to prevents him from bailing out
too aggressively. Plo certainly still has outs (hard right, barrel roll,
boost, for example), but I need to hope that my opponent wants Plo to
get some last minute points.
What I'd like to
do with Plo is a 1 hard right and then barrel roll left and focus. The
problem there is that I'm pretty certain the hard 1 is blocked (and
checking now, after the fact, it turns out I'm right, it just barely
would bump). With that denied, I choose a 2 bank, with the option of
doing a reposition after if I like the angle more once I've landed it.
The only other concern here is that if Obi isn't blocking Vader, it will
be because he's trying to kill the Inquisitor.
Activation
- Grand Inquisitor: 3 bank right, evade
The
moment I land, I notice the easy access Obi has to turn and bullseye
me, so I evade. I'm hoping at this point that Anakin has K-Turned or
slooped, and dreading that he's going to 3 bank right and nope out of
the whole thing.
- Plo: 2 hard left, spend 1 Force to barrel roll left forward, boost left
Plo
skirts around the rock and gains ground. Vader has no chance of
catching him now, so all hope rests on the Inquisitor and Anakin's dial.
- Obi-Wan: 1 hard left, spends 1 Force to barrel roll right backward, jams Vader (jam token)
My
opponent lands the block I anticipated, but then barrel rolls out of
it. He must have anticipated that I would do a 1 bank left, as thats the
only blue maneuver he's now blocking. This means that Vader could have
safely done a 2 bank and tried to pursue Anakin!
- Vader: 2 bank right, no action
There's no barrel roll that gets me a shot on Plo.
- Anakin: 3 bank left, spend 1 Force to evade
Other
than the lack of target lock, I have about as good of a chance as I
could have asked for. In hindsight, knowing that Vader could have been
on Anakin here, that would have certainly helped, although my chances of
killing Anakin would still be a long shot. If he blanks out completely
and I roll three hits, I win, but any paint and I lose.
Engagement
- Grand Inquisitor attacks Anakin (range 1), spends 1 Force, 1 shield damage
Anakin rolls double evade. I lose 97-76.
Closing Thoughts and Lessons Learned
The moment I lost the
initiative roll, this was going to be a really tough one to win. Triple
Ace lists generally win by exploiting superior boardstate knowledge and
repositioning so that they are frequently attacking without defending in
return. When you can't do that (and your opponent is playing the same
type of list, and they can do that, it means you've essentially
spent points in listbuilding that are going wasted. So with the
initiative roll lost, my list immediately becomes far less efficient.
That
said, for the most part I think my decisions were reasonable, and I
stayed in this one pretty well. I missed on a couple key arcs that would
have made a big difference, but I think they were close enough that I
can't feel too bad about having a horrible eye or anything like that.
Unfortunately, the game was tight enough that it only took one tactical
misplay, my ill-fated Whisper turn-in, to cost me the game.
So
then, strategically, my failure here was to really accept the points
situation and how it was driving my opponent's decisions (and not just
my own). I think I anticipated a bit more defensive play from an
opponent who was behind on points, and therefore motivated to play more
offensively. And I think I was too worried about how close the game was
to accept that there wasn't a lot of time remaining in the game, and
that I could worry less about being shot and more about surviving, and
still win it.
Those two high level
misconceptions directly lead to my Whisper call. I still don't think it
was a gigantic blunder, to be clear, though. I really felt that I had a
specific read on my opponent and his playstyle, and if I had been the
one playing Plo, I can tell you that I would have been turning
him back to the main fight and letting Whisper run away. My Whisper hard
turn looks like a stupid mistake with the benefit of hindsight, of
course, but I'm at least comfortable that it wasn't thoughtless and
there was logic behind it, even if the logic was imperfect.
Which
means the biggest lesson here is that it is crucial to adapt and adjust
the plan to the circumstances of the game. I recognized that I was
ahead, but perhaps failed to fully account for the fact that my opponent
was behind and would be adjusting his strategy accordingly. And I was
overly worried about losing points and missing out scoring more points
to pad the lead, and as a result I ended up unnecessarily risking points
in hand. I needed to do a better job of recognizing that my risk
tolerance should have been very low, and that the potential gains of
turning in Whisper were not worth the cost of what would happen if I was
wrong.
Overall, a very close game against a
skilled opponent flying a list match-up nightmare. Losing sucks, but I
think I can sleep at night with this one.
As always, thanks for taking the time to read this. Please feel free to
share your thoughts and observations in the comments below!
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