Lets go back a few weeks before LVO begins
My search for a list began. I’ve mostly been playing BoY Vader, Dark Curse, and trying various 10pt combos like Iden Interceptor + Vizier or Morna Kee + Moff Gideon. I found a couple Scum lists that interested me as well, and a CIS list of Jango, Aurra, Druge I just love flying.
The Scum list was quite formidable in testing. It consisted of Manaroo with Gar Saxon gunner for 4 dice shots. The new 4pt Fang Fighter, Tor Phun. The 4pt initiative 5 Rogue-Class Fighter, Durge. The Minging Guild Tie Lapin with ion cannon. And the always efficient and annoying to play against Kanan in the HWK. This was a 5 ship scum list with some big hitters in Manaroo and Tor Phun, and even Durge lining up the HLC, while having some control with Ion Cannons on Lapin and in one variant – Durge. All while neutering your attacks against the 3 agility or else high health ships with Kanan. It could take awhile to kill a single ship if you dont focus down Kanan. And if you do get Kanan, you now just have 4 ships to deal with. It was at the top of my list of LVO candidates.
The CIS list of Jango, Aurra, Durge is a list I love to fly. Its had some close games against tough lists in the couple test games, but I felt like it was not as good as Kanan, Boba, +1 friends lists. Durge lives longer, and can be an objective getter better than Kanan, but Kanan just protects those expensive ships, and that is key. So, although I love flying it, I dont think it is S-Tier for a tournmanet of this magnitude. Perhaps I may bring it to a Store Champs in the near future.
After some BoY Vader games, not to mention the Golden State Games tournament, I began to get away from BoY Vader. Sure, for 6pts his offense was the best value in the game, but you begin to see his negatives after multiple games, like jam just completely kills this ship. My brother played a test game with just two Tie Whispers in the list, and they were able to neuter my Vader the entire game, making him a two dice gun. The OG Vader can get around this by focus to clear the jam, then lock, and Vader defender doesn’t need tokens to put in the hurt.
The other negative of BoY Vader, was when your coordinator ship dies, or gets out of range, he is very weak when turning around with a red maneuver. So when in the scrum, you are either weak, or taking a turn off to setup a lock. These two negatives were all solved with OG Vader with pattern analyzer. Just a single squad cost ends the negatives of BoY Vader while just having a slight reduction in offense power having to reroll blanks instead of instantly turning to a hit. My locals I play against constantly also moved from BoY Vader and onto OG Vader for reasons above, not to mention elusive gives you that 1 or 2 extra health per game as well, so health was equal to BoY Vader pretty much. With the single point increase, that means Iden Interceptor drops down to the new Second Sister from Hotshots and Aces II. She is a Tie Interceptor that can take a Shield Upgrade and now can be Evaded with 2 force every turn. Really tough 5pts to take down, and not a big step down from Iden Interceptor.
So, we all began playing OG Vader / Second Sister / Vizier / Dark Curse
We tried various Second Sister builds, and I think we all landed on something different. Rick liked Malice + Predator, while KC, my brother, and I like Extreme Maneuvers + Marksmanship/Ruthlessness, and some tried Sensitive Controls while others didnt. We all agreed Shield Upgrade was mandatory though. After a few more test games, KC and I thought Sensitive Controls is probably the right call needed for Second Sister. Being initiative 4, she is sometimes the lowest initiative, moving first and you just want to get 2nd Sister somewhere safe, EM + Sensitive controls can get you there. You can essentially pick any spot within range 2, even almost directly behind her, and she can get there.
A couple weeks before LVO began, I wanted to test Feroph vs Vizier, to see if I even cared about Vizier’s ability. Originally we added Vizier to give BoY Vader those extra actions he can’t take, or to help on he k-turn/talon rolls. Playing against Rick, KC, and my brother, I noticed the coordinate for Vizier was either semi-wasted like giving Dark Curse a focus, or actually hurt them cause they would give OG Vader a focus, who doesnt really need extra actions and then Vizier would have to give up his perform action step. That means, when you want to grab an objective or jam or evade, Vizier is just a basic generic Reaper. Feroph’s ability is always on whenever an opponent doesnt have a green token, making Feroph a little tougher to take down than Vizier. And just 1 round of life longer, means another round my opponnent has to focus on Feroph instead of my other ships. And I still had emergency coordinate when I need it.
Two online Tourneys started a couple weeks before LVO and now I could test a few options.
In Sector Series, I flew OG Vader / Second Sister / Dark Curse / Feroph. First two games went perfect, and Feroph performed as I expected, a little tougher to take down since I am evading every round instead of coordinating like Vizier. The jam was crucial as well, and going against any BoY Vader list, I was gonna be jamming a lot. Feroph is locked in as far as I was concerned.
The other online tournament was the Kyber Cup. Two gents from Vancouver needed a last minute replacement, so I volunteered. They said I could run Scum or Empire. Perfect. Two weeks ago, I started running Vader Defender, Juno, Second Sister, and an Academy for fun casual games. I just wanted to see if I drop Dark Curse down to Academy, does bumping OG Vader up to Defender help?
I went against the OG Vader/2nd Sis/Dark Curse/Vizier list and beat it somewhat easily. Maybe not easily, but comfortably. Vader Defender vs any X1 Vader is a trade I will do, as Vader Defender comes out ahead 90% of the time. This was important as just about every empire list has a version of Vader. I liked Juno as a glass cannon. I could just passive sensors, and see what other Vaders do, then lock and boost in engagement. This tactic also helped against other initiative 5’s when you lose ROAD roll. I did a test game vs a rebel list, and Juno was superb vs Luke, and I won that game, this time easily. So for Kyber Cup, I went with Vader Defender, Juno, 2nd Sister, and an Academy. Do I really want Juno? Kyber would give me a couple good games to figure that out.
Matchup 1 in Kyber was Boba, Hondo, Kanan list. I did a test game a couple days before vs KC. I approached in my mind to go all-in on Kanan no matter what, and then first engage had 3 of my ships have really good shots on Hondo, so I switched strategies to see what happens. Kanan’s ability is just too strong. I did like 2 dmg to Hondo, and now had to switch to kill Kanan cause I was never gonna push through damage this way. The game was close, but I ended up losing that game. Mostly because I did not go for Kanan in that first engage. Mistake.
For Kyber match, the game began and Vader, Juno, second sister all went hard for Kanan pushing for range 1 shots. I took him out fairly quickly, Juno even survived on 1 health for the trade on Kanan. From there, I took out Hondo, and the game was easy from that point as Boba wasnt going to kill Vader and the game was Assault, with my tie fighter doing donuts in a corner all game with an objective just ticking the clock 1pt at a time. Win.
My second Kyber match was against Boba, Koshka, Kanan. Same strategy was used. Go hard for Kanan, I got Kanan just as I did in previous game, but I screwed up by Second Sister clipping a rock, and because she did, she could not boost out of Juno’s way who was on 1 health, and ended up bumping Second Sister. I lost both of those ships this round. That was the deciding factor, otherwise I’m fairly certain I win this match.
Third game was again against Boba + Kanan list, but this time Mandalorian. I knew my opponent was good, as I played him two years ago in top 16 of the GSP Alpha Qualifier tournament where he was running Jango/Zam, so I knew he was quite experienced with this archetype. I didnt change my strategy though. Go hard for Kanan. Juno lived on 1 health and ran away preserving points while Vader and Second Sister did the rest of the work. I won fairly easily in this game.
So after three Kyber matches, and a few test games, I was liking Vader Defender quite a bit.
Never cared much for the Vader + 5 Tie Fighter archetype, so I’ve never put Vader Defender on the table in 2.5 edition. I didn’t have time to test my Scum list, so I was fairly certain I was flying Empire at LVO. I was really likeing OG Vader/2nd Sister/Feroph/Dark Curse as I had some 15+ games with some variant of this list, and was most comfortable with it. I packed this up in my bag the day before flying out to LVO, but I also tossed in Vader Defender and Juno in case my mind changed. My brother drove me to the airport, and we talked Vader Defender + Academy vs OG Vader + Dark Curse the entire drive. He convinced me Vader Defender was the right call, and we also agreed Juno needs to be swapped for Feroph. He throws the same amount of red dice, but also brings high health and ability will make him live longer, brings jams and coorinates when I need them, and is also a medium base that will help in Assault, and Reapers can pick up crates in Salvage with no negatives. Feroph was clearly better than Juno. So while I packed OG Vader and Dark Curse for LVO, before I even got on the plane, I had decided on Vader Defender. My list was set. Although I had zero test games with the exact list. I had quite a bit of experience all the ships.
My LVO List:
Darth Vader (TIE Defender) (9)
Malice (4)
Juke (6)
Heavy Laser Cannon (4)
Captain Feroph (4)
Seventh Sister (9)
Second Sister (5)
Extreme Maneuvers (5)
Ruthless (1)
Shield Upgrade (8)
Sensitive Controls (0)
Academy Pilot (2)
Ship Cost: 2 Loadout: (0/0) Half Points: 1 Damage Threshold: 1
Total: 20
NEXT: LVO Swiss Heat 2
Pilot Skill Zero 