Ruthless Strategists & Ordnance Pods & Yularen - Oh My!
It had been months since I'd been able to actually fly at one of our Armada open play nights at Game Nite, so it was so great to finally do so last night! I brought my Yularen fleet because I wanted to mess around with something different that I thought was uncommon and showed a bit of promise. I built this a long while ago (though I've changed it a bit since then), but just never got around to flying it. I won't be doing a whole batrep here, because while it was an interesting match, my opponent (also Chris!) and I were both flying things we hadn't flown before, some mistakes were made, and it wasn't that interesting to warrant an entire batrep. But as the title of this blog post implies, I did enjoy the hell out of a really fun and interesting interaction!
First, for context, my fleet is below:
Wulff Pack (123/399/400)
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Venator I-class Star Destroyer (90 + 26: 116)
· Clone Commander Wolffe (6)
· Ruthless Strategists (4)
· Ordnance Pods (3)
· Linked Turbolaser Towers (7)
· Resolute (6)
Pelta-class Medical Frigate (49 + 40: 89)
· Admiral Yularen (24)
· Clone Navigation Officer (4)
· Parts Resupply (3)
· Reserve Hangar Deck (3)
· Projection Experts (6)
Pelta-class Medical Frigate (49 + 22: 71)
· Bomber Command Center (8)
· Reserve Hangar Deck (3)
· Projection Experts (6)
· TB-73 (5)
Luminara Unduli (23)
Anakin Skywalker [yrep] (19)
Axe (17)
2 x V-19 Torrent Squadron (2 x 12)
4 x BTL-B Y-wing Squadron (4 x 10)
Precision Strike
Capture the VIP
Superior Positions
The plan is pretty simple: absolutely mulch any squadron opposition, then land as much damage as possible with 5 Y-Wings. Ruthless Strategists and Ordnance Pods are there for enemy squadrons. If there aren't any, then I will just have Wolffe push the V-19s and hand out some Raid tokens while the Y-Wings commence with the bombing.
Chris was flying four Hammerheads (all boasting Slaved Turrets and TFO), two GR-75s, and a CR90 with Commander Leia. So I'm out-activated all to hell. But it's a good first test because he also has 6 X-Wings, two of which are Biggs and Hera. That's no joke. That's 30 points of squadron hull to chew through, including four Braces and the advantages that come with a Biggs ball. That's against my 4 squadrons capable of combating enemy squadrons. So yeah, it's a good test of my fleet. Chris and I discuss how gross "Axe" can be at mitigating damage, and when combined with Admiral Yularen's squadron-healing ability, that's no joke. So it's clear that Axe is a primary target, which makes a lot of sense to me. I've got a one point bid and Chris is at 400, so after some consternation, I choose to go first. He's got a couple of objectives I hate, so I pick Capture the VIP. Even if I'm spotting him 50 points, I'm getting the first activation and he can't first-last me.
To be clear, Chris is one of the best players in the STL meta. So even if he's flying a thing he hasn't flown before or he's flying something that *shouldn't* make sense, I'm wary of him as an opponent. And with such a huge activation advantage and Leia-boosted command dials for his Hammerheads and CR90? Yeah, I've got my doubts about how this will go. I love Axe. I hate to see him go early. But I know how much Chris wants him dead, so I put a couple of squadrons within striking distance of his X-Wings and make sure Axe is at the vanguard of that little contingent. Chris comes screaming in, pouncing on Axe and absolutely flattening him. Poor little guy...but he did his job! He never fired a shot and he never got to save anyone else from damage, but Chris' X-Wings are now committed and within firing range of my Venator. So in turn 2, I unleash as much damage as I can. My squadrons are a bit flat (Luminara, for instance, only deals one damage during her activation, despite an Adept reroll on 3 blue dice and 1 black die), but the Venator absolutely hauls off. It doesn't have clean shots to Chris' ships (which is fine; it's basically what I expected, since my Venator will be lumbering around), so it flaks twice against his squadrons, uses Ruthless Strategists whenever possible, and then after it's done, it uses Ordnance Pods and triggers Ruthless Strategists again.
Now, I know I'm definitely, undeniably, absolutely, UNEQUIVOCALLY not the first person to think about how much damage this combination can deal. But I'd never seen it happen before. I had the first activation at the top of round 3. By the time my Venator had activated, over the course of 2 Venator activations, all 6 of Chris' X-Wings were dead. Each of them had only fired a single shot, and all it had accomplished was killing Axe and a generic V-19 (which I subsequently brought back with Reserve Hangar Deck and healed up to 4 hull with Yularen). That's 30 points of squadron hull I chewed through before Chris activated anything in round 3, to say nothing of Biggs' ball abilities and the Brace tokens he and Hera both had. Nearly 100 fleet points just gone, freeing my 5 Y-Wings to go wherever they wanted.
Again, Chris is an adept flyer. So I only won this match by something like 80 points after he got both of my Peltas, a generic V-19 and the VIP token. But I did get everything off the table except his flagship. And I later realized I hadn't been flying with LTT on the Venator; I'd just forgotten it. But I also mostly didn't miss it. All of this to say that the combination of Ruthless Strategists and Ordnance Pods is just horrifying. Combined with Yularen, Chris' X-Wings just really didn't have a chance. They either needed to remain outside of engagement range and thus out of the fight or they had to eat all of the damage pouring out of my Venator. It could be argued that it was a lot of effort from a big ship that was basically NOT shooting at other ships. But honestly, the fact that my Y-Wings were unimpeded as of the beginning of round 3 set the tone for the rest of the match. I wanted to see good dice rolls against his squadrons, but I didn't *need* them in order to put down his squadrons quickly.
Anyway, it was a mean thing to do, but a lot of fun, and I...
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