Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Episode 41: Order Route 66! (Featuring Conner Elmstrom, and Daniel Leon)
76 Plays3 days ago
A long time ago… in a windy city, far, far away… Your hosts Andrew Kouba and Nick Sperry are joined by special guests, winner of the Windy City Conquest, Conner Elmstrom and champion of the Golden State Conquest Daniel Leon! The 4 of them discuss their approach to list building, their tournament experiences and how the meta has been reshaped by XWA Legends and Relics.
View the Windy City Conquest: https://rollbetter.gg/tournaments/2565
View the Windy City Conquest: https://rollbetter.gg/tournaments/2566
Sign up for the Liberty City Conquest: https://rollbetter.gg/tournaments/2567
Thank you to our sponsor, Infinite Arenas! Go to Infinite Arenas for all your X-Wing compatible gaming needs, including card printing, custom pilot builders, card packs, and more! https://infinitearenas.com/
312 was honored to have the support needed to provide a high-quality stream of Worlds to the community. We couldn't have done it without our biggest supporters on Patreon! Support the channel, get cool swag: https://www.patreon.com/c/312Squadron
Check out our Merch store: https://streamlabs.com/312_squadron/merch
Hey, join the conversation, hop into our Discord! https://discord.gg/xknEegJw67
You can follow us live for weekly content on our Twitch channel: http://twitch.tv/312_Squadron
Like our page on Facebook for updates on future and current things: https://www.facebook.com/Squadron312/
Catch replays and edited content on our YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@312squadronChicago
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction of 2026 Conquest Champions
00:00:02
Speaker
You are listening to the 312 Squadron Podcast, and we are excited to introduce our first two 2026 Conquest Champions. We have Connor Elmstrom from the Windy City Conquest, and then Daniel Leon, our winner of the Golden State Conquest.
00:00:19
Speaker
So without further ado, my name is Andrew Kuba. My name is Nick Sperry. My name is Connor Elmstrom. And I'm Daniel Leon.
Discussion on Conquest Series Improvements
00:00:28
Speaker
So kicking it off to you, Nick, how were these events? I know this is kind of the first episode we've done about our conquest series, but ah last year's ran so well. How is it going this year?
00:00:40
Speaker
ah Just terrible. I can't believe these guys won. I can't believe it. It's a disgrace. It's been great. It's been great. I think the format lends itself to have more participation this year, and we've seen pretty steady, consistent participation from players in the first two.
00:00:59
Speaker
And also the the best part about these is that you have a field of of names that you would expect to be competing in final table.
Challenges with Event Timing and Format
00:01:06
Speaker
And then, you know, they don't make it to final table. You get a really nice array of of different players um of high skill levels like the two that are joining us today that have been able to go undefeated the whole day and walk away with a trophy. And so it's, ah it's been fun so far, keeping it in the US time zones has been a little bit easier to manage, I do feel for those who do play overseas, but they've been able to make it work since it's in the middle of the weekend. Yeah. And, you know, honestly, knock on wood going a little too well, things have gotten very smoothly. However, I know that one big and rising piece of feedback is that we have tended to be just over the the cusp of having only two undefeated players. We typically have had three now, these first two. Again, we've had three. So one undefeated player has missed out on being able to play final table, yeah which never feels good. i I can probably sympathize if I were one of those players who played perfect the whole day and didn't get to make top two. I would be salty. So we're going to look into doing a top four moving forward um as long as the numbers you know push towards needing one so that no undefeated player is is is taken out.
00:02:16
Speaker
um however those who have sat not been able to play um in the first one witty city it worked out because tony our world reigning world champ had to leave for over an hour and we couldn't wait over an hour for to to play final table just really drags the day along so he he dropped but then for our last one max i did reach out to him about getting in some extra swag just you know for congratulations on a really good day for him but Otherwise, great. How
Reflections on Tournament Formats and Experiences
00:02:44
Speaker
did you guys feel? like Connor and Daniel, how did you guys feel about it so far? It's been pretty good. I really do like the idea of doing a top four rather than a top two and me from Pacific Northwest and you kicking out another person from the Pacific Northwest. Definitely. Yeah, I feel great either. It was all intentional, you know, it's a scheme for months about that.
00:03:05
Speaker
It puts a little extra pressure on you to perform. Yeah. i mean, last year or I was a 4-0 player as well and did not make the final table. So I've been on both sides of it now, and I can definitely say that that there's a feel bad. You did everything you could that day, and it is what it is at that point.
00:03:23
Speaker
There's definitely a feel back as as you walk away from the from the computer like, oh, what what else could I have done? What else could i have done? And then I don't think I even watched that final because was just, I was like, i need a distance for a little bit of chill, a calm down kind of thing. I watched the final later on after that. But yeah, that was when my broken Goren list, I think at the time, which doesn't even work anymore. So it was it was just one of those things to where I think we got a point change like the next week after that too. So then I was like, we're not going to keep playing a dead meta. Like it's, there's no point in trying to make something work out of that. But yeah. It's definitely a field bet.
00:03:53
Speaker
I do want to call you out, Daniel, because I I promised you guys you and the winner of that event a top two for you to have a chance to win a trophy. And then you guys decided to play the play the game without me even knowing.
00:04:05
Speaker
So that one's on you lasted like i was gonna scream it and everything and then he messages me like i lost i'm like what are you talking about it would it would have been very anticlimactic like he he had a sealed in like the first three rounds and then you know me early ggs like it was it was no point in time like the life the fact that both of you guys were like oh yeah that thing that nick wanted to do for us and stream it we'll just like not tell him when we're playing and play and then just message him say like we did it i'm like Okay, well, that wasn't the agreement.
Adapting Event Structures for Fairness
00:04:35
Speaker
Classic, right? classic excellent Yeah, classic. yeah It wasn't meant to be, I guess. But yeah, that's not going to happen anymore. i've Personally, i mean, selfishly, I've i've wanted i've liked the the five rounds in a day in terms of time and the commitment for everybody. It works really well. But because the numbers don't support only doing five rounds, I'm willing to do six.
00:04:55
Speaker
Um, it's a really, really long day for me and and all the players are it's almost as long for them as well. So we're all in this together. I'm just doing so much more on my end. That's just something that I need to be less stubborn about and I'm willing to do for the next two. So for those of you that have seen or been frustrated by the fact that we, uh,
00:05:15
Speaker
had a couple of times now where we haven't allowed the the third 4-0 to play and cut. That won't happen anymore. However, I'm now looking forward to all the 3-1s complaining to me that they missed the top four because one of them will make it and the rest will miss. So I'm really excited for that. It's going to be great. Yeah. I mean, I think that's an easier pill for them to swallow, though. Yeah, but if one of the three and ones wins the turn the championship, that people will there will be some complaints. X-Wing players love to complain.
00:05:44
Speaker
Sure, but it's going to happen either way, right? so They'll be happy that one of their own was lifted up. they'll be A thousand percent. That's how I feel. i just i just know when people say they won't complain, I'm like, it's okay, you will, but it's going to be fine. I understand. Yeah, that's the the Cinderella story.
00:06:01
Speaker
Guys, I know pattern analyzer is down, but I just love to take a quick look at the event pages and kind of what stood out to you guys. um You know, ah Connor, I want to start with you in terms of your experience that day and like what you
Connor's Tournament Strategies and Reflections
00:06:13
Speaker
matched up against. if Is there anything that you, you know, going into the tournament really didn't want to face what you were worried about and how did that?
00:06:21
Speaker
I'll be very basic with saying this, but this is the post-Worlds fight, so everyone going into this was all just dragging their heels saying, I don't want to fight standard Loda of Fen'Rao.
00:06:32
Speaker
Or any of the other meta that was coming out of Worlds. So, at least for me, my first thought was, well, let's just play something that just says absolutely no to a light ace and just bring uh decimator red mulcher with vader honestly have a good time with splitting apart any kind of swarm list with death rain by throwing out what did i have on it it was diamond boron missiles trajectory simulator expert handling thermal detonators and delayed fuses shout out to keys for absolutely just showing me at the initial part of death rain and giving me the love that i have for this ship now oh yeah he's the death rain master he is the death rain master and in fact i actually faced him in i think round three as well i won but honestly his death rain was was just absolutely dancing on me i also want to shout out to christian with his rack build he did really well at worlds got top 16 i don't remember what placement but because of that ship i'm like you know what i should just play this thing
00:07:34
Speaker
i just i don't want to i don't want to keep letting fen rao get away with whatever he wants let's just make him sad and upset from there on i just really like the idea of bringing custom senior fell crack shot predator i've been playing it a little bit here and there and obviously in 2.0 he's everyone's favorite he's a wonderful little guy he dies to oh no i just rolled blanks even though i had an evade focus or something like that and then wampa I mean talking few other people I think everyone was mostly just bringing oh let's just bring what's fun you know I don't have to take it as seriously we just got out of worlds I can play something a little bit more relaxed as well I know some people were still bringing like oh I still want to win conquest and make top eight but either way the first match was with guy named Brian Dorge this is discord name he was bringing standard loadout Kylo recoil ember and long shot I don't
00:08:29
Speaker
think that this match went well for him but it was a really fun match basically i just cornered kylo and he didn't really have many ways to escape and then from there on i don't imagine recoil and ember and longshot are going to be able to do much with a full health rack full health death rain and sooner fell right behind there was a moment i think where recoil almost trapped sooner fell but he just rolled bad and you know sooner fell rolled well because three green tyranny right yeah uh round two was tough i think there was like one round i think in there this was versus this is ssp vader with afterburners ion missiles and hate this boe soon true fail this is whisper with targeting
00:09:13
Speaker
Computer, Fire Control Systems, Fifth Brother, and then Academy Pilot. Just a very AC ac list. I think I threw so my Soontrafel into the mix of Vader and Soontrafel and got very lucky.
00:09:25
Speaker
They happened to get the initiative. I was able to kind of slip past them and just... kind of avoid them for the most part so vader and suture out of position while real moshirnu and death rain were just coming in hot i think there was a slight error where boe ran into a rock and it was somewhat game over from there round three ah versus keys uh this was an interesting one the matchup what was the scenario there's chance engagement Yeah, I think Josh knew going in this was going to be a tough match. He was even kind of saying it too. A big problem that he was running into was the fact that he had to send somebody towards the middle.
00:10:04
Speaker
And if you've ever played against Josh, he throws Death Rain in to just give you ion bombs, throw you out of position, and then allow whatever his two aces to do to just play a more late game position while Death Rain just kind of throws you off.
00:10:20
Speaker
He kind of did. It was interesting. His death reign also survived for longer than expected. i don't know if you guys remember, but he hit the edge of the table twice, but never flew off the board.
00:10:32
Speaker
Wow. it was Gentlemen, it it was I saw God that day. It was it was yeah it was wild, um but it just wasn't quite enough just because... TIE Defender Vader, you know, he hits well. He's got Afterburner's predictive shot, Malice, and Soonerfell standard loadout, obviously, is also a menace, but there just wasn't really enough damage that he can put into Rack, and my Soonerfell and Death Rain were just kind of hanging out and...
00:11:00
Speaker
making sure tie defender vader was also having a hard time too there i do also want to point out at least for these next two games this is always the question with larger major tournaments is how much luck goes into when i think i want to admit that at least my last two games there were some heavy dice favored towards me at least with josh and against dr jaren don't want say it didn't fly well but i do want to say that my dice were really nice Yeah, and for Decimator, it's like purely attack variance based to literally ride or die with your attack variance.
00:11:32
Speaker
Well, it's interesting to you say that, like I brought ruthless specifically because I know that's like, you know, oftentimes you're just going be reinforcing if you're not in anyone's arc or you don't care about the damage you're going to take, you target lock and then you don't spend the Vader. you have a semi double mod. But ruthless is there in case you're like, god whatever, death rain. You ready to take some damage for the glory of wrath?
00:11:51
Speaker
yeah and i i don't know there's like a lot of i think the reason maybe rack gets ignored sometimes is because it's like you realize like you're spending 19 points for a ship that mods kind of mediocre like it's not exactly enough to justify it but Back in that heyday near the end of AMG, they had the Darth Vader and Death Troopers. It was enough to be like, yeah, but you also do so many other things to your opponent's list that I think, okay, Vader is a menace. Death Troopers are a menace and can throw a lot of lists off their ability to turn around, all that good stuff.
00:12:27
Speaker
um And I think I still see Death Troopers on the board sometimes. Yeah. And I mean, that's sort of what Kris Jenner brought to Worlds as well was, hey, what if I just coordinate and make Real Mature New an absolute menace to engage and you have more as an opening piece And don't get wrong, like, Rack is a great opening piece if they have no way to to counter it.
00:12:46
Speaker
um But there's certainly some Joust lists that Shiranu is not exactly too happy to go into the mix. And he plays a lot more KG. I don't know if this is the the best claim, but I know that there's plenty of people that will fly a Decimator straight into the your opponent the heart of your opponent's list, thinking that everything is going to go absolutely okay for it.
00:13:06
Speaker
And that might be true. No, don't do that. You only have four shields. like Remember, the 2.0 damage deck exists and you will be taking crit. You've got four shields. Why I took Novice Technician, but it's still not enough sometimes to be crit kills. Suddenly you have a giant cow that's got weapons failure and hull breach and you're like, well, that's that was that was sad to watch. Yeah.
00:13:30
Speaker
I guess I'll just die now. There are 12 3-1s. Wow. Amazing. yeah There were some really good players in this tournament. Yeah, I was going to say. Definitely stacked lineups for both of the conquests. So in the top 16, you had FO, Scum, Empire, CIS,
00:13:49
Speaker
rebels in there as well um you had a republic list and then you go down and you have resistance so it looks like you have was that it's i just read i think every faction yeah um for windy city again it is worth noting that this was post worlds before right before points change so if people are listening back and wondering like well wait in a minute that's isn't it you know it's it's Things might, you know, we'll look at Daniel's win in his event for a Golden State. we'll We'll go over the differences there. But I do see some of those gauntlet lists in here. There's a lot of like five, six ship lists just as a theme
Diverse Factions and Unique Tournament Lists
00:14:25
Speaker
throughout. You see some that have three.
00:14:28
Speaker
ah you know like Josh he has his his death reign list with Soontir and Vader as we were talking about earlier you have the three ship scum that Cam brought but as you said Connor there's you know lot of big names that have continued to play in these events which is which is great you know I it's it's really important that we have our quote-unquote reliable regulars that show up and play in these I consider both of you and Daniel to be and in andrew when he's able to play you know he's able to play often as well in these it's it's important to have those players
00:14:59
Speaker
I do want to point out too, I didn't even realize Snaggletooth got fifth place with the five Ace Bulba Labs with Predator and Peruvian Planing and Hall Upgrade. That's, huh.
00:15:12
Speaker
I think that his only loss was on our stream, um I believe. he he like He just like noped out. it has It was going really badly. His opponent was just pummeling him with Dice Variance. and Yeah, it was it was the I think he was going up against Katsu Mando Boba.
00:15:28
Speaker
yeah ah If the dice just go out of place for that, it just could feel so disrespectful. Like, okay, I guess I just won't hurt Boba at all, and it won't really matter.
00:15:38
Speaker
my god, that's so that's such a mean list. to see this. Oh, it's standard loadout Boba, too. l337 child contraband that's an interesting loadout for mando as well it's not using that host worlds disrespectful false transponder call it's probably hidden underneath razor crests uh mando optics childs all that good stuff uh or going with the um ah was a job of the hut and contraband well sorry job the hut and over two modulators that's so dumb
00:16:11
Speaker
Yeah. Daniel, you ah you played in this event too.
Daniel's List and Strategic Challenges
00:16:15
Speaker
You brought a list that probably edge just didn't seem like it really worked for you. So I was just playing around with some some scumminess. I brought Armored Dangerous Finn, Armored Dangerous Armored Dangerous Bossk, and then I brought Yotai. So the setup was really clean, but I don't think I wrapped my head around trying to play two big bases. I don't think I bumped a whole lot, but I also to't have a lot of opportunities to bump now I think about it.
00:16:38
Speaker
It was supposed to be cheeky in your face and then throw a bunch of dice at you and and it just didn't often work that way. I just went 0-2 and dropped because it was it was not a good day and I just chose not to continue that frustration overall.
00:16:50
Speaker
That was the the last of Cheapfin and I don't think you can make all those... are all four of those ships fit in the same list now so there's a lot of really good 15 pointer or sorry 15 point scum stuff right now in the current meta that i love to fly and i still look at dengar going well he's pretty fun though yeah honorable mention is you know of course we talked about tony earlier but he did bring him back his his bombers because he could right after worlds same points and went undefeated with them so again he couldn't he couldn't play it was unable to play in final table but he uh clearly that that that list even now i'm seeing a slightly different version of it still have some success so yeah it's cool it's cool to see it's a cool archetype that he was able to build much more interesting than the uh gauntlet swarm
00:17:40
Speaker
i'm ah I'm a big hater. Yeah, I was going to say, you're still haunted by that even post- ah I've never even played it. and i just yeah just Oh man, yeah the fact that we almost had that play play that mirror match on Final Table would have been brutal to do commentary for. my god, I'm so glad that it happened. but I mean, it does take a mental stamina to to fly the TIE Swarm like that, right? For sure, 100%.
00:18:01
Speaker
ah hundred percent <unk> we're We're talking trash about it, but it's it's probably not fun to watch and play against. But as the player, there's a there's a there's a toll for going five plus rounds with it.
00:18:13
Speaker
So, yeah. Oh, yeah. There's no doubt. wouldn't I would never suggest that it's not taxing the list to play. Yeah, it's still boring. I think it is dull to me. I still think it's an integral part of X-Wing, though. I mean, the swarm is part of the game, and I'm happy that it's here. I do want to point out there's an evolution now with these TIE Swarms, like we talked about. As I scroll down the Windy City, I see...
00:18:38
Speaker
I don't think I see any vulture slash hyena swarms. So I think this the swarming meta that should, that or swarming faction should be CIS, is not right now. yeah ah Preview to the neck to the to the next event that you won. Max did bring that. Maybe we segue over to from Windy City to Golden State now. yeah yeah as In our top, let's see, how many 3-in-1 players did we have in this one? We had...
00:19:05
Speaker
10 three in one players in this one and our top factions included CIS which is Daniel winning the event we had rebels in there we had Republic in there we had scum ah and we had resistance and FO was the last three in one So I ah believe I we missed out on First Order didn't make the cuts.
00:19:27
Speaker
And what was the other faction I didn't mention? I feel like there's one more or sorry, not kind of in top three and ones are better. Empire is not in there either, which is really surprising that, that you know,
00:19:37
Speaker
top 13 players of of this event and the latter. we don't have Empire. But yeah, the third place, ah Max, you know, he went undefeated with a CIS swarm. Let's see how many ships, seven ships, I think in this list, DBS thirty two c with Kraken energy shells and struts, and then three precise hunters with heavy laser cannon, and then you have a TFS-081 and 311, AO-D1 Discord missiles and 311 with energy shells.
00:20:07
Speaker
And then you had the Iron Assembler and a Trade Federation drone, both had energy shells. Iron Assembler also had Minish and its failsafe. You have to ah avoid the energy shells, discords and heavy laser cannon stuff. Dice. That's nasty.
00:20:21
Speaker
Just that's nice. On your opponent's throat. and hope for the bus Yeah, I remember. I remember people when I was doing my little three one two points, people were were joking with me because I allowed some of the vultures to take HLCs and here we are. So I'm not saying that three one two points, but there's a little bit of indication here that it it can be done.
00:20:41
Speaker
it can be done, at least for now. Yeah, if you're flying them together, you're going to least get one. Even if you're flying into a small base, you're at least going to get one HLC off. So it's just almost like, hey, this is a great way to threaten an opening and say you don't want to openly engage this because I can just throw dice. You may kill one of us, you will not kill all of us.
00:21:01
Speaker
For TotoLover, his first two rounds was against IG Swarms or id Triple IG, which we'll talk about in a little bit. But like, man, that's just a lot of robot on robot violence right there. that sort That's insane. What are the odds? Your back-to-back games are against triple robots. That's insane. That's crazy.
00:21:20
Speaker
I can't believe you wanted my game on the stream for your first run rather than whatever the hell this is.
Challenges in Streaming and Tournament Experiences
00:21:25
Speaker
Yeah, I know. That was that was an interesting that event. Like I ended up having a couple of repeats on stream. I try not to do that, but I was just based on the matchups. You know, i look at I look at the list. I'm like, oh, that might that might be interesting. And then they end up playing against the same faction, the same list or someone who already played on stream.
00:21:43
Speaker
So as you get into later rounds, you're like, shoot, you know, you're trying, you don't necessarily want to stream like a salt mines game. I'll stream folks who have like a couple losses, like one or two losses in the middle of the middle of the rounds. But you just it's there's there's a whole calculation of the mental calculation I have to do with how I how I put stuff on stream, but they were all very entertaining game. And thanks for letting me hold you hostage on on stream more than once. It was really fun, honestly. the Both games were, despite the first one going the way it did, it was wonderful to was wonderful to talk to Eric. Yeah, he he was a great opponent, despite everything escalating the way it was. Daniel, how did, so you brought, talk to talk to us about the list that you brought, and how did the event go? You don't have to do a round-by-round bat rep, but you can certainly let us know what you were, what you didn't want to face, what you were looking challenge-wise. How did how did it all go that day for you? Sure, so I guess leading up to to building the list, I tried to do bunch of hyena swarms. And tried to do it in NCX, I tried to do it in 312, and as Nick can vouch for, I was very frustrated with, like, this this should should be working more efficiently than it is.
00:22:52
Speaker
We had a smaller ship count meta after the point changes, but I felt like a shift on that at least. I'm sure there'll be people that disagree, but that's okay. But I thought it could have done much, much better. And then I was like, okay, I need to give the hyenas a break. This is not working. I tried to my hyenas with HMPs.
00:23:07
Speaker
ah just It just was was not working for me. I didn't even realize that Joel had built a skill in Ace... Aaron Shawlman, Swarmish list until you just mentioned it here with Connor. So I was completely unaware of that one.
00:23:19
Speaker
i was like, okay, let's go with let's go with more ships and try to just stack them up. Okay, so what's kind of sturdy? Okay, let's start. Let's start. Let's get away from the cal calculates because I was like, I'm not gonna do a Kraken carrier. um'm I'm not gonna do anything with calculates. Let's try to do something with just focus. Because the calculates, I think, were just letting me down overall. There were so many times with the hyenas and Kraken that I'd be like just blanks in the blanks or just no pain at all. And not that this list gets away from any of that, but having having a way to spend more than one focus result or eyeball result, it just added a lot of value. So then i started I started building it and I had a list very similar to what Joel had with Sikko and Aces and Pervium.
00:24:03
Speaker
And I think I added shield upgrade or hull upgrade. I can't remember which one was at the time, but just try to make him more tanky. Cause at that point they're the same health as an X-wing, but worse dial, actually a similar dial. And I think about it, but the action economy of a focus reposition focus much, much better than X-wings obviously. And the ability to,
00:24:25
Speaker
discard ship crits. It just goes so much longer. I did like one or two games with that and before I was like, hold on, I think i i need ah I need to find a way to generate just more red dice. Because I think we were talking about it during something in 312 through chat, if you will, as Nick is aware of. And we were talking about just more red dice, more red dice, right? And I was like, hmm. I started playing around with that and I landed on the snapshot. And I was like, I'm giving up three hull because I think I did hull upgrades because as a belly rub, a Bell-Balab, you don't care about You're fine when your shields go down.
00:24:58
Speaker
you You actually prefer that because that's when the crits can get discarded, right? It's like, great results, bring them on, bring them on up until um'm I'm out of the program, room then stop crits. So I think it was going whole upgrade. I'm giving up whole But i'm giving I'm gaining the advantage of throwing more red dice.
00:25:13
Speaker
And then the intimidation factor came in because I was like, okay, snapshot is limited to just three from this point change. I don't know if it was before, like when XWA started out, but I don't think I've ever seen multiple copies of snapshot running lately in a quite some time anyway. So I can't remember when it became limited. I think it was pretty early on when they said this should be limited to three.
00:25:32
Speaker
Fair enough. But the intimidation on Watt came into play because i was like, I can't run four snapshots because it's not legal. What can I do for this last belly rub? What can his talent be? And i was like, hmm. Intimidation does work with snapshot. Like if if I get in there and I get a bump with Watt and then I have the other ones throwing just two dice, which two dice versus anything minus greens is is not bad. and It adds up over time. It's an attrition game because obviously we trade a lot in this game too about like what what what can my points trade? Like I often look at it like at first opening engage. Okay, I traded one shield for one shield. Okay, that's not too bad. How do we optimize that next turn, right? But the intimidation, activation, taking off shield or taking off hull, it just adds a lot of value overall. I add a fourth Kiko and Ace before i I change over to the Tri-Fighter, Tri-Fighter, because when he doesn't blow up in the first engage, he adds so much value. Or when Nick calls me out for rerolling three greens, I mean, who knows? Who knows how this game works, right? Yeah, why don't why don't you walk us through that one? Because that was a shocking moment when you did that.
00:26:41
Speaker
What happened there? So skipping ahead to that, that was round three. He already had one hole down, so he only had two hole remaining. So if he was full health, I think I... This is DIS for anyone that's wondering. Yes, this is DIS versus a robot with three hits coming in. I rolled two eyeballs and one blank, and I decided to reroll them all. I think math-wise, if he had one hole...
00:27:04
Speaker
if he ever had a calculate right or debate one of the if they get to calculate he he had one calculate yes and so health wise he had one hole down so he only had two hole remaining so i needed all three i think if i if these full health i think i do leave that eyeball result yes but i needed more squiggles and it's better to get a chance to get three squiggles on three dice versus two squiggles on two guys, but you had a guaranteed evade. Yeah, but I think he still dies anyway, honestly. Like, it that's just I don't know. I that hurt that really hurts you. there That was crazy because you rolled it into thirty three blanks, which is like rough. I was like, why did you pick up all of his eyeball results? He has a guaranteed evade there.
00:27:43
Speaker
But it was a wild moment. I've never seen something like that on defense on offense. I've definitely seen because you got to it's just different, right? Like you're on ah offense. You're not like losing points like you could defensively. Right. But yeah, that that game was wild. Luckily, I felt pretty confident in his his next move and then was able to just knock off the tie and call that a win. There's a chance that I just lose that one if he does a couple things different, but that game was back and forth, back and forth. That was probably a very entertaining game to watch overall. It was. I will say on that one, i I don't think I flew very optimally because I don't think I took advantage of the Watt intimidation on...
00:28:17
Speaker
whatever his blue IG was for like three rounds, I think I should have done much better to close out and make best use of that block that I got on with Watt a couple of times. I will say though, during the tournament, and I think only this only happened one more time before I even entered this tournament, there was two activation snapshot kills. There was one on Braylon and then there was one on Daylon in round two.
00:28:42
Speaker
The Daylon one felt much, much better than the Braylon kill because Braylon with just one agility. I don't, I expect to land some of those snapshots and I expect because B-Wings only do certain moves. They don't, they're not doing anything too tricky overall, but Braylon, he was about to roll out and then be able to just dodge and just probably live and survive that game. But the Daylon one, he was in an offensive position.
00:29:07
Speaker
And if I didn't kill him there, I'd probably lose another, Bell Lab that turn and that game started to swing Joe's way so but killing a three agility ship with snapshot felt chef's kiss on that one it was uh I will say this list does not like to see the three ship rebels that we've been seeing lately YC-1300 dash and then insert whichever flavor of Nora that you want because it's just it's it's it's a menace I don't remember Wynn's name but um
00:29:41
Speaker
Between Wynn and Buddy, they've they've been kind of working on on this this scheme about how how this list
Strategic Maneuvers and List Adaptations
00:29:46
Speaker
can be optimized. And I don't love it as facing against it. I'm not going to lie to you. It's very scary.
00:29:52
Speaker
I think I only got lucky against Wynn for round four because I was able to... 50-50 call where Lando was going to go and got the block with Watt. And then so it shut down his action economy and it made him flee like for the majority of the game after that. Because I think one round I did like eight damage. Wow. Into Lando. And he yeah he had he had to figure out, OK, how do I save Lando? And then so I turned everything on dash after that as as Lando was running away. But.
00:30:20
Speaker
I think I know i've I've played against Buddy with my list and he did a bunch better job like orbiting. So I had to figure out, okay, so where do I try to get ahead of him to try to like force this block or force these snapshots?
00:30:31
Speaker
Because otherwise I'm just trailing to eating range three shots and just hating life essentially. And then there's Nora, obviously, to be in the way and to just like, okay, I'm a horrible target if you want to shoot me because I get this plus one agility. So Nora plus snapshot usually doesn't matter because there's there may be somebody at range one. So then it's just auto evade kind of thing. so Nora's ability has come in in very, very clutch against my list. I'm sure many, many other lists, but especially, i can't speak for everyone's list on this one, but especially against mine right now, it's it's really, really hurting overall. So I don't love to she see three chip rebels. And then during the final and against JJ, man, that was... a
00:31:11
Speaker
I've played Klan Rins before, and it's much better playing as a Klan Rins versus against a Klan Rins, for sure. But I think I had to get a little schemey, get a little tricksy on that game. and just I think our Rock placement, he probably thought it favored him, and I thought it probably favored me. And then we got that just that messy middle, as Nick will attest to. that it just it just It was not fun for either one of us to try to, like, okay, how do I maneuver around this?
00:31:38
Speaker
And Connor, I know you played against JJ as well, too, that day. I felt the same way. That's really a fascinating. I was like, why did he give me this this rock formation? Han loves this. Ketsu doesn't care. Let's do this thing. But I think as the game went forward, I realized, like oh, after I engage, it's also really difficult. like Mando had such a hard time moving through and not like getting blocked. and I think, as Nick will remember, because of that, it kind of put Ketsu in really awkward spot and unable to get out of just...
00:32:09
Speaker
three small ships right in front of her and uh there were too many obstacles and not enough yeah yeah
00:32:22
Speaker
yeah Oh my god. Yeah, no. I think it still was, well, it became one of those things where I should have probably realized, like, yeah, you know, I can still probably joust with Ketsu and be okay, maybe take a good bit of damage, but I think Han and Mando maybe wanted to be in a different position, so I forced them to have to answer multiple different locations. Instead it was, hey, you're just really just answering one area, which a rebel joust list loves to hear. Yeah, yeah. I want to give JJ so that list I'm really intrigued by. I might bring that list or a version of something similar to it um to the game store next next time I'm able to play the clan. He's been playing the clan run list with Sabine for a long time. through before 50 points yeah yeah there's been a few people who've been playing it's it's a pretty good combo it it is i have a lot of ex i i had a lot of success playing the clan runs together you have to really really be aggressive and he's really good at that i would just straight up joust people but in a way where i would range control i would go just fast enough that i couldn't trade range three shots and i would just
00:33:28
Speaker
drive them down people's throats the next fall the next round. Then you'd get blocks. ever You'd get your rerolls. They wouldn't get nearly as good of mods. They'd be shooting range one at whatever clan run they're not blocked into. You have your Concordia. You have your Beskar. The only thing that can be tough is when you get so close you start stressing yourself and then you can't really get turned around and so you're starting to take shots behind you going into you at range two range three as you're trying to get back around so when you are aggressive you just need to carve out a lane to be able to come back into the fight they are incredibly powerful though super fun to play one of the most engaging lists that you'll you'll play because of uh because of the fact that they all feed off of each other being at the same initiative their abilities sabine in the A-wing is always a good time. But then you have two heavy hitting B-wings with eight health each, right?
00:34:18
Speaker
that so That's a five ship list with like serious firepower and it's going to take a while to whittle down. So if you're playing it smart enough, the clan wrens come in from one side, Sabine coming from behind. and then the B-Wing slow roll. And so your opponent is faced with, do I acknowledge these slow rolling heavy weapons on one side or the fact that I have these really fast freaks of nature coming up my flank trying to to just like ram into me?
00:34:44
Speaker
And the way he set up, he's was He was was he's trying to make that strategy work. I thought he did a good job. At the end, in the final table, it didn't work out. But um what he did with you, Connor, I think he was a great example. His setup is turn zero and how he moved everything kind of through the middle of the board and the other B-wings coming up from the top.
00:35:03
Speaker
He created a choke point that made it... Exactly. and All of his dice were on. I think even... He got even kind of unlucky shooting into Ketsu as well, if you remember. There's ah one aspect of that list also that you guys didn't get to see, because Ori also brought the list, and he's been flying it for our team in the 3-1-2 team league on occasion when the wild card happens.
00:35:23
Speaker
But hopeful comes to a surprise and is a great gotcha because sometimes you'll just end up focusing and then somebody dies. You're like, oh, no one of your guys died. But that's OK, because we'll boost in for range one with a clan Ren volunteer.
00:35:37
Speaker
It's great. long as you're not stressed. Yeah, they they tend to stress themselves a lot, right? They do. they do It's one of those things where you don't quite know where they're going, you just focus as your action. And then maybe if something dies, you just kind of shoot right in. I will say I probably got fortunate against JJ that his Gina was not as offensive as he probably would have hoped that she could have been.
00:35:57
Speaker
ah Connor, i I don't know if you can speak differently about that part. but say No, it was the same. Like Gina just rolls. All she has is a target lock. So she just didn't roll very well with that single mod for me. Well, what happened to you? i can't even remember your game. no it's okay so you did a couple double taps but like the the double taps were or not that critical and then plus if you're if you're turning you know any results into crit result with the proton cannons as as a as a belly rub i'm like whatever i'll just shrug it off unless it's like a pilot crit obviously but like but like it's it's it's it's one of those things to where yeah it could have been three hits coming in from the primary attack and then you know four coming in from the proton cannon but That's not the result that he was getting, unfortunately. I find it interesting that you named your list Dumb Lowell, but didn't name it The Plight of All Aces, because just being snapshotted to death is very funny. I named it Dumb because like this probably shouldn't work, and it's probably going to do poorly kind of thing. like it's It is dumb that like you should...
00:36:58
Speaker
I was not expecting it to have this kind of evolution that it that it had overall. I think it's such a it's such a list that has continuous firepower and has decent medium beef, especially with the Imperium as well. Honestly, my favorite part about it is targeting Matrix. And I know that's kind of a weird one to say, but you have one ship that you know is going to take a good amount of damage in the opening.
00:37:19
Speaker
so you have to you know he has to spend the focus at some point exactly but for to defend themselves so then when it finally comes to the offensive game where you're shooting an i three you're suddenly going cool i can spend my focus result on my offense to give a strain and then the rest of my list can just pummel this one person it's great with yeah like it's it's targeting is really cool day st81 is such a great ship i hate how good he is i don't hate but i he's so good i love him so much I think there's a mental block in my head about like, I have to keep him safe. Like he's the Anakin in my list about like, I can't put him. He's such a good closer. Like, yeah, I can't keep him just like, just throw him into the fray. He's got to be on the, on the outskirts. he he may delay his engage one or two turns, maybe intentionally, maybe just try to preserve at that point. But, uh,
00:38:07
Speaker
Truly the the Von Rigg of the CIS. Exactly, exactly. Targeting Matrix, yes. it's I didn't love it whenever we got first the Legends of Relics back, but it's definitely grown on me as probably the second best card in there, first being Seekers, which I'm sure we'll talk about in a little bit.
00:38:24
Speaker
Against the stream game that I had for the triple IGs, targeting Matrix into the double tap is ludicrous. I don't love that. That was very challenging for me to face. And I think if the game shifts just slightly one way or the other, i just lose that one horribly, horribly overall.
00:38:42
Speaker
But yeah, that double tap is something that I can't do in the engagement phase. But him doing it, it adds so much value to... Because they're going to be double calculated anyway. Like maybe they don't want to spend three ah two eyeballs and just get like, OK, I'll strain you. And then boom.
00:38:58
Speaker
Now here comes my SLC. And then you only roll one agility. So suck it. Let's talk about targeting matrix. Big difference maker. I see it a lot. um I think the the power to be able to spend results to to assign strain tokens and how that can impact a game.
00:39:14
Speaker
it's pretty significant, right? What are your guys's opinions on targeting matrix and kind of where it's at right now cost wise? Do you feel like it's too common? I don't know if it's too common. But I definitely I was looking actually back at your list epi or not at your list, but what you faced against and you mentioned that your three ship, the three ship rebel list you had a hard time with.
00:39:32
Speaker
Lando had targeting matrix. So the idea being that, Hey, if I don't want to spend the focus, suddenly my other two ships can just give a one, two punch into you because you're strained is is pretty oppressive.
00:39:44
Speaker
The IG list also used a two because they have one of their ships provides a double, a way to double tap. So, Hey, look at that. I can targeting matrix with the first attack. And then with the second attack, I can just make you hurt because they assigned you a strain, which is just absolutely neat to me. Right. and then you can follow it on to the the second and third or fourth shots, depending on how you you it's pretty, it's pretty ridiculous. i I don't think it's, I think it will go up in the next points change, whatever that will be. I don't think it's too common right now.
00:40:13
Speaker
I think one of the limiting factors of targeting matrix is what chassis would you put it on? Cause it's a, it's a, it's a modification, right? So not every ship has a second way to get a modification or it maybe they want something to do better in that first one. But if you have an extra four points left over, like I would have in my bubble list, or like we just mentioned in the IGs or the Lando, then you're you're fine with like, I'm just gonna fill that spot. If it comes up, it comes up.
00:40:43
Speaker
but you're not leaning into it. And I built Snapshot and into into the list, obviously, too, which it does not work with. I only cheated one game with that, Nick, be just to be clear. And that was during 3-1-2. And my opponent agreed with me. I'm blanking on the name of the opponent. I'm sorry about that. But we agreed to that before we actually like started the game. like Does this work? And we talked it through. He agreed, and that's how he proceeded. I think he only came in to play like once or twice anyway, so I don't know if it was a huge decider in the list.
00:41:09
Speaker
But since then, I haven't i haven't tried to press it like... snapshot targeting matrix. But if it did, you know, I was the only one that wasn't wondering about everyone else was like, I hope he doesn't use snapshot and targeting matrix. I'm over here like I never I think I only brought it up once and that was after somebody mentioned the chat is like, yeah, you can't use it. But I wasn't over here like suspecting that you were you were using it. You definitely can't be modifying your dice though, right? Because that's spending a result as as a modification.
00:41:36
Speaker
Snapshot is like, Nope. Well, yeah, that would be crazy. My initial argument for it was because the target matrix comes in after the neutralized results. So that's where I was like, is it a snapshot is is during the attack, right? But that's fine. It's fine. It does not work.
00:41:52
Speaker
Yeah, I don't want to play it. I don't want to play a game that allows you to do something like that. i' I'm Gucci. Yeah, it would kind of turn like every ship into a pseudo Rex. It's like 1.0 ask stuff right there. exactly good Okay, now we're resolving everything and by the way strain. Yeah, yeah, yeah and now I get to shoot you with my primary modded attack. Yeah. yeah I do love the idea of me first seeing this list and then immediately having a heart attack because I didn't realize that snapshot doesn't work with targeting matrix. I'm like, Oh God, he can do that. Yeah.
00:42:28
Speaker
That's insane. just keeps getting away with it. Yeah. I will say, of all of the new upgrades, Burst Laser Turret is, I think, far and away the the biggest winner that people are taking. wow you think so?
00:42:42
Speaker
It's just a better turret. I agree. yeah It's so good. Yeah. And then with the list, especially with the prevalence of Y-Wings, I see that as one of the predominant carriers, but it's also... Really good if you're taking the um ghost. Yeah, you can take it on there. like Any ship that has a turret. Yeah, Burstley's turret is by far and away, I think, of the new upgrades, the biggest winner. Number two is Targeting Matrix.
00:43:08
Speaker
So i would add for all the reasons we just said. And then number three is the Unhinged Astromech. ah See, I'm going disagree. I'm going to with Seeker Missiles. Yeah, I'm to go Seeker Missiles at number one, honestly. I think maybe the differences between Seekers and Burst is that Burst has so many different ships that just want that specific upgrade. Because like you can bring in a swarm of stuff that likes it. You can bring in a really big chassis that can double tap, ah like Hera with veteran turret gunner. But like with Seekers...
00:43:39
Speaker
Yeah, they're they're they're they're pretty... They suck. But there's only a few specific ships. or there's There's a good amount. Don't talk kill me. But there's a few specific ships that really, really love it, and then everyone else is like, yeah, this is kind neat. Yeah, I mean, it's i also ten views it reminds me of 1.0 with the all-in-one kind of get-everything-you-need opportunities. and they're They're not priced cheaply. They shouldn't be. cheaply. I also I just I people who know me well enough with my opinions on this game know that like I am not a fan of double mod wing. I like easily double mod wing and it's you know, I tend to not be like fans of things his five X wings down the table and hope for the best.
00:44:24
Speaker
That's definitely what I do. Yeah, exactly. i mean, you gotta you gotta bring lists that can give you the most opportunities to be able to do more with your firepower more, you know, double mod when you can see your missiles are just like, hey, don't worry about doing anything else. Just here is everything you need all in one. Sure, it's only three dice and most non-force users, I think force users, you know, like Ahsoka and the A-Wing is a good example who really can take advantage of Seekers in a different way than like what she used to use with concussion missiles. Most of the time you spend two charges and then you you've you've spent a couple charges for the eyeball modifications.
00:45:00
Speaker
um Stuff that can reload, do some of the newer SFs can just like... reload every turn, still shoot, have a calculate, have an evade sometimes, like very good in that case as well. I don't know, is anyone using automated loaders?
00:45:13
Speaker
I'm so curious about that one or Gravitic Well. I know Gravitic Well is good. i tried one once on H2P and it didn't it didn't even trigger, so. I tried it on Death Rain once, but I was just kind of like, I think he's fine. He'll be alright. I mean, sometimes you'll get the primary off to be able to reload in the same round, and then you'll be able to turn around next round and throw a missile if you have it, but it rarely happened to the point that I'd rather just have loadout for something else.
00:45:38
Speaker
uh data-wise for seekers this game this tournament was weird though because there's there's there's two midnights that show up with it and then there's for some reason there's two lists with z95s that have secret missiles on it so what a weird tournament that way yeah i'm kind of surprised too because i remember when the points first came out there was a fear that was being run around with the inquisitors instinctive aim seekers as well yeah it's scary i still wonder if that list will peek its head out in a tournament randomly and just win it just because i didn't think that all fit yeah you can do instinctive aim seeker missiles and just bring five inquisitors and look at that what if you just evaded or what if you just did your barrel focus what if you just had great time on target what if you had three green what if you had three red it's kind
Meta Evolutions and New Upgrades
00:46:24
Speaker
of scary honestly but it hasn't really shown up as much because i guess there's still only four health you know still could go badly like
00:46:32
Speaker
and seekers doesn't allow you to push like epi your list can throw four red at range one that's scary and honestly if you get in the right position you could throw many range ones you just pummel somebody kick them in the dirt but i guess the idea with inquisitors is the reason maybe why it hasn't shown up as much as that it's just a whole lot of consistency dice for a while whereas and it's not really throwing anything else at range one and it's still pretty low initiative so yeah You've got figure out a way to get your target locks in there somewhere too. yeah
00:47:04
Speaker
Yeah. yeah I do agree that Burst Laser is probably going to go up. And I feel a little bit bad too because if you look at the general meta for Resistance, it feels like that Y-Wing list is kind of I don't want to say this boldly, but it feels like that's the only list I i feel like I see that's doing really well with Resistance.
00:47:24
Speaker
Yeah, as someone who's ah playing resistance in like the 312 in the NCX League, taking the like Kai and the other one, like the two let's two seven point Y wings are like feel really good with the burst laser. There was a friend of mine that brings Chewie.
00:47:41
Speaker
um Goes by WazdClick, Mike Blossom. He'll bring Chewie and a bunch of Y-Wings knowing that they'll die, and then Chewie just shoots again. Yeah. pretty fun watch.
00:47:53
Speaker
And honestly, yeah, it's like you know you know you're going to lose them. Sometimes your opponents ignore them. They're yeah good at objectives, and it's just a good value. want talk about one upgrade, honestly, that I wish I saw more of. Targeting Relay.
00:48:05
Speaker
After a friendly ship acquires a lock on an enemy ship, it rains 0 to 1 of you you. may spend one charge and gain one stress token. If you do, that friendly ship may gain one calculate token. That is it's so neat to me, and it's it's not too pricey either for three points, but there's just not a lot of factions that really like the upgrade.
00:48:22
Speaker
But there is one faction that likes the upgrade, and they're named First Order with TIE Barons. So you bring, oh, this has been a fun list. You bring like four of them, all with Target and Relay and Proud Tradition. So if you're ever at range one, you can just target lock, stress yourself with that target lock to get a Calculate, and then do your primary action. But because you have Proud Tradition, you don't care that you're stressed.
00:48:45
Speaker
Yeah, it's so fun. Awesome. I was going to say the other FO1 I've been having a lot of fun with is Kylo Ren with the TSJ1A targeting computer ah in the in the Whisper, where you can jam your opponent, and then if they don't have green tokens, you can turn one crit into two hits. Then you spend your force to make those face-up damage cards. Yep.
00:49:10
Speaker
Rude. That's so rude, yeah. yeah It's only a one time charge though is part of the reason I don't bring it. is like You only need it once. You only need it once though. The games where I get it off, it is devastating. like
00:49:28
Speaker
and It should only be one charge. No, it's it's broken if it's more. You can get that back. I guess the problem is like like Whisper Kylo like needs to... He's only got so much loadout, but you're spending... Because he's 14 points, so his loadout should be a little bit lower. He should be able to get everything he wants.
00:49:45
Speaker
And I'm still running that, oh, we should be bringing a missile, instinctive aim, and an advanced optics, but the only way you can store all that is taking an ion missile. So just like ion missile, instinctive aim, advanced optics, brilliant evasion, configuration, you're good to go.
00:50:00
Speaker
Just shoot ion missiles at I-6. Or at I-6 opponents that get in your way. Make them regret their life. I've ah faced that RT-71, the target lock into boost. And that's that's a pretty nasty thing whenever you don't. If it catches you off guard, you're like, oh, oh, you're you're not where I thought you would be kind of situation.
00:50:20
Speaker
I think it's it's it's got your wing for now, but as we continue to see the meta evolve from the the upgrade pack, I think it may get some more play. I think I've only seen it traditionally used on Rebels so far, but I think Resistance will find a way to get a niche on it as well too.
00:50:35
Speaker
yeah i agree with that you know the one thing that's kind of surprising about this recent conquest is that no one you know cis better than i do epi but is there a reason why g gravitic well isn't seeing as much play with the nantex because i feel like it's not just sun fact that enjoys the idea of gravitic well there's a few others that enjoy it too but i don't feel like i see enough of it i think that it's just the cost of what Nantex you're bringing because you're right. It's Sunfac and it's... Chartek? Chartek, that's right. Yeah. Because the other ah the other two or the three, no but no one really plays them overall.
00:51:10
Speaker
um But Tertek being able to... Why would you disrespect a man that is Bureaucrat? That's true. Or Gorgol. Exactly. Gorgol. Exactly. But just I think it's that initial shock value or face value of bringing Sunfak at 13 points, and you're just going to kind of park him behind a rock for some... Because the times I played against Gravitic Well, it's Trickshot Gravitic Well, so he's rolling plus one dice because he's tractored, and then plus one dice because of the...
00:51:41
Speaker
trickshot so falcon just go yeah or like a little satellite exactly they just kind of orbit around which they can't orbit quite like a falcon or quite like a like a bowtie arc would but it's still i think something wants to be in your face eventually when he closes the distance and then ensnare you and then make your life miserable overall so see the problem that shirt has is that t eighty one exists and he's also 10 points that's true later from like one exists yeah has one more hole but it's not the value it's not the value there
00:52:19
Speaker
say I wanted to also talk about the third most picked up upgrade card from the new pack, which is the Unhinged Astromech and what it's doing to ARCs. I mean, it's a lot more fun to fly, but I want to go across the pond to the UK Games Expo 2026 of this list that I had the pleasure of playing against i don't know if this player invented the list but they won the uk games expo with it category and it is a seven ship republic list that is two torrents or three torrents with dedicated just the gold squadron trooper
00:53:00
Speaker
two arc 170s that only have unhinged astromech
Strategies Against Beefy Lists and Meta Fluctuations
00:53:04
Speaker
and then warthog which allows ships to not be removed from the board until the end of the engagement phase so even if they get destroyed they can still take their shots it's a heck of a lot of hull to chew through this is my fear currently with those kinds of lists i don't really i have ah such a hard time responding to it honestly and it ah kind of brings me back to like the 2024 worlds when everyone is bringing like the arc lists with so much beef it's like i They just look at you down from the table and they say, I am inevitable. And then they come at you with all of that beef and just the inability to remove them.
00:53:44
Speaker
it is, yeah. I mean, this was like one of the first games I played. Like I said, this is this is kind of the list in Europe, but I think it's going to start coming across the pond. I've seen it in in NCX and um think I'm starting to see it more in 312.
00:53:58
Speaker
It's one of the first lists too, where like you sit you set across from it and you're like, i don't even know. how to tackle like this it's so easy to hide warthog behind just all of those ships yeah and that's and it becomes a goron situation where it's like in order for me to get to the goron the juicy goron i have to get around your stupid list yeah and the thing was empire just doesn't have this much hull you know to to get past it they have the greens they They have the greens. and Well, and the thing is too, with these lists, all of them have ah the dedicated so they can reroll all of their defensive dice.
00:54:36
Speaker
Yeah. It might be one of those things where over time people get back into rock placement theory a little bit more. Cause I was remembering like the 2024 worlds, a lot of it came down to like, okay, so if you don't have the right rock set up or your opponent doesn't give you a whole lot to work with, this is what you do in round zero. And a lot of that stuff was more, comp you know, the meta is a a fluctuating thing, right? yeah it's It's just based on what other people have discussed openly, what other people think that they're seeing.
00:55:07
Speaker
And doesn't necessarily make it true. But at least with this list, if it continues that way... And yeah, I agree with you. It's probably going to come across the pond at least more in North America over time.
00:55:19
Speaker
It's going to be devastating a little bit. I don't know. i'm so I'm scared of it. I don't play this list that can do enough damage to something like that. It's such a beefy list. It's demoralizing sometimes, right?
00:55:31
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, the hard part is it is... not being able to initiative destroy these ships is i feel like really impactful disrespectful than dedicated honestly yeah or maybe except for maybe heroic but it's a little different i guess that's fair yeah because can't resistance can't put heroic on some their low cost points as much anymore just because it's talent based and only so many ships have enough points they really can jam in heroic into their list and So it feels a little bit better now. Now it's like, oh, okay, yeah, Poe's got heroic, and then you got everybody else or whatever.
00:56:07
Speaker
Then meanwhile, over here, you have these six-point guys, with all with dedicated, that are just going around the board, so they always have some kind of side arc. And your ship that you're just trying to get a little bit more damage into is like, dedicated.
00:56:19
Speaker
Yeah, dedicated. yeah Yeah, no, no, no, no. I'm going to go ahead and re-roll that with dedicated. Uh-huh. That's so bad. Yeah, you have, like, two to three elusives, you know. It's so During an engagement, yeah. But, you know, that's the thing, too, is, like, we have these Conquest series, and I have only played against so many ships in the Republic, because most of the time i still feel like people are still playing their Republic aces, you know. Maybe they're bringing a lot with Seventh Fleet Gunner. Maybe they're just bringing four solid aces. And I think it just comes down to, you I'm saying all this fear, not really have...
00:56:51
Speaker
I just haven't really faced that list often enough to know what to do. And so I think maybe as more familiarity happens, it'll eventually maybe get easier and maybe it'll be a little bit more addressed.
00:57:03
Speaker
Because, yeah, it's scary. It has a lot of health. But, you know, there's still some good joust lists out there. oh yeah, for sure. I mean, as Rebels proved, at least with the Conquest series, like, hey, you can you can still bring a good Rebel joust.
00:57:17
Speaker
Clan Ren volunteers, man. They're pretty good. Mm-hmm. I just wanted to call that out. are there Is there anything else i like that we wanted to tackle about the the new upgrades or any changes in the meta that we've seen?
00:57:29
Speaker
It's sad that Roiling Anger doesn't see play. thought we were going to see some more of the new pilots, but I don't think they had a big splash so far. I'd love Encarno Jacks. Has anyone seen Quinlan Vos getting played at all? Quinlan?
00:57:42
Speaker
I think I saw it on NCX like a couple times, and it just exploded. Yeah, well, an Ada is an Ada. Sorry, I didn't want to interrupt you guys just because you you guys have been playing in the trenches more than I have, so i wanted to let y'all's conversation flow without interrupting.
00:57:57
Speaker
I haven't seen one Quinlan Vos. Yeah, same. I actually had to look through the the document and all of them were like, ooh, who's this guy? well How'd you get in here?
00:58:10
Speaker
How'd you get in here? Well, because the New Republic, I'm like yeah, it's just Ursa Ren. Who's this guy? but like yeah Tamara Ravora. I'm not sure I've seen Tamara yet. Again, my exposure to games is is tournaments and streaming right now, so it's not really a sample size that's indicative of what people are truly playing consistently. Tamara's... interesting because like it helps out a lot of problems that first order has well mean all a lot of problems they have a lot of ways to target lock already but like they have a lot of ships in their general area that really need to do other things or can only single mod so like you could bring quick draw you could bring kylo you could bring up salon shuttle and tamara can help them out but like tamara's only real issue is that you're spending nine points for essentially two red and maybe a proton rocket
00:58:57
Speaker
yeah and then you're going to be target locking most of the time with her anyways and the problem for first order is like nine points could be spent on something that has like good coordinate or decent dice and so it makes it kind of tough to bring her sometimes or to want to do so i'm like yeah i can do this combo but i'm essentially spending what is if i'm bringing quit you're on nine plus 14 points just to get a single re-roll yeah Get it. It's a very expensive quick draw.
00:59:22
Speaker
Yeah. Also, I think as X-Men players, we we tend to be slow to adapt in a minute until somebody sees success and then we're like, OK, boom, let's jump on that kind of thing. and yeah there hasn't been that breakout yeah exactly there hasn't been breakout yet of any of these new pilots yet uh i for one think that thweeks is uh a lack of play needs to see more actually do mean that a little bit seriously either i do have the dream you know what i'm bring that to the next one thweek is cool he's only 12 points and he's hard to catch he's so cool love him That's true. I remember when they announced the pilots, I thought I would be seeing a lot more the week. I did too, honestly. Yeah. Is there a way for him to do more
Potential of New Pilots and Strategic Adjustments
01:00:02
Speaker
damage? Sorry to interrupt, but like, I think maybe people are trying to figure out a way. Yeah, sure. He might be slippery, but is he like, is he like targeting? I think is the only
01:00:11
Speaker
thing you really want to do just because like you throw him into a weird spot on the board kind of in the same way that t81 like is kind of more of a flanker you play him kind of like echo where you just make him hard to catch or put people out of position i guess maybe the problem that thweek has is more that mandalorian in the new starfighter exists and so does dalen oberos for 10 points there's a lot of the same things for two less points and nearly identical initiative at least for dalen and then i5 for mando week is interesting though i do want to see more honestly i'm kind of surprised i don't see more of l9b2 the tri fighter he's so cool As a CIS player, I've i've tried it a couple times. it just it did not go well for me. But I'm not saying it's dead dead. But it is it is more difficult than I would have ah initially imagined, I'll say with that. That's valid. Yeah. yeah Well, T81 allows you to kind of make a mistake sometimes. It gives you a little bit more breathing room to be like, oh, shoot, my opponent thought well about a good kill box. OK, I just need to do this. And maybe I only take like one less shot. And I still have some mods and rerolls and stuff.
01:01:19
Speaker
So it's, yeah, it's you're spending one more point for an I6, but like as a faction, they're not really hurting for I6. Yeah, there was one appearance with Thrawn, apparently, in in the Golden State, so that's pretty fun.
01:01:32
Speaker
It's pretty fun to see. Yeah, I know Captive is another that I've seen a little bit. Captive can be oppressive to play. I've seen it online. I've never played against it, I should say, but I've definitely seen it on stream, like, this seems awful.
01:01:44
Speaker
it It can suck, because like if people have been bringing it with Raid Machirnu, with Vader, and Captive, and suddenly now you can make Rack just be this oppressive ship that can fly in and not be cagey like they don't even really have to worry to some extent they can rack can now joust without any worry whatsoever and that can really that can suck because you're like oh i guess i'll just kill his friends and then hope he doesn't hurt me please don't hurt me rack let's talk about my personal favorite pilot that came out of this uh corner jacks oh my goodness he's so fun i still feel like you should be bringing like senior fell probably instead he's i6 and honestly there's still some decent interceptors in empire overall but there's just something about karner when his ability goes off and you have a very good shot going in Because his ability can happen on anyone else's shot as well.
01:02:41
Speaker
It's just simply being in his front arc at range zero to one So you can even force bump, or you can just get behind somebody. it is It's wall an enemy ship at range 0-1 in your front arc. It's it's it's such a fun ship.
01:02:56
Speaker
The only issue I really have with it is that um I feel like you have to bring Palpatine just to make him work, because spending the Force for defense or offense can sometimes feel bad, because then you're usually only going to get a single modded shot, and at least with Palpatine on the board, you have another way to spend Force.
01:03:13
Speaker
So... But also, kind of like we were talking about with Ada's, you're throwing a three-hole ship into games zero to one. So you're like, I just hope he lives. I i flew that really well, and I got a panicked pilot game. That's not very fair at all. think The game hates me. That's what it The game hates me. I flew that so incredibly well. What are you talking about, game?
Reflections and Future Event Planning
01:03:36
Speaker
punished for my skill exactly well guys i i think we're i think we've gotten to a point now where we can start to wrap up the convo here i appreciate you guys jumping on to to talk about your conquest victories and to talk about the new content i think there's the jury still out honestly i'm probably about half of of what's come out from legends and relics i know there's a few pilots we just discussed we'd like to see more of there's a few things that are getting played all the time that we'd probably like to see maybe get used differently i think that's a very diplomatic way of saying it whether that means there's a points change or whether that means you know there's limitations or or slots that are moved around etc but yeah we're starting to see some things take form here and what's nice is that i don't think anything is remotely close to being solved you never want a meta to be completely solved anyways it's yeah still pretty early on here And so the next conquest, I think will really solidify some of our, our takes, whether they're, they're the right ones or they're really bad takes on kind of where things are going.
01:04:36
Speaker
And so that next conquest is going to be Liberty, Liberty city conquest. Let me pull up the date here. I have so many different dates I'm keeping track of. So let me pull up our doc. Yeah. What's your calendar look like, Nick? Is it all just all over the place? It's awful. Yeah.
01:04:52
Speaker
It's it's ah I'm glad we were finally able to do this. Andrew was pushing, we were able to to nudge me on recording as I get. We should we should do that. So that's going to be Liberty City Conquest is going to be on September twenty sixth That is Eastern time zone.
01:05:06
Speaker
So excited to host that one. If you all are interested in signing up for Conquest, you can see the link in the description. Also, our streams are always sharing information on joining VR streams as well.
01:05:18
Speaker
All right. Anything else you guys want to say before we wrap it up here with our little outro? I know you just mentioned the conquest. and Are you still on the fence about modifying the rules ought to to mention a top four or is it numbers dependent kind of situation?
01:05:30
Speaker
It's numbers dependent, so it'll it'll I will update it for it to mention that it could be there could be a top four, though. Yeah, it's just going to basically be a day a day of decision. We always have a late last minute joins and last minute drops.
01:05:44
Speaker
But yeah, that will be certainly on the table. So we won't have to deal with for an undefeated player not making cut going forward. Just want to shout out to honestly the XWA website and getting the find in an event and run an event.
01:05:57
Speaker
and what's been going on with that honestly this has been such a a huge thing to me to have a place where i'm like oh okay cool so there's a tournament in colorado there's a tournament going on and Oh, interesting. Like there's you can see all the regionals squad champions ships like really easily. And I really love that, honestly.
01:06:15
Speaker
Yeah. Shout out to shout out to us. Shout out to Greg for putting that together. i Just just Greg doing his thing, really coming in clutch once again, helping beef up the technology and improve it.
01:06:28
Speaker
if That site isn and is tremendous. It's a tremendous asset. this whole game wouldn't be where it is without Greg these days, honestly. Yeah. He's been a huge part of it. Yeah, like absolutely. Well guys, thank you to everyone for listening to this episode and continuing to listen and support us at 312. You can find all this new content, the legends and relics and the the pertinent documents, print and play, et cetera, at our new and improved x-wing dot life website. can link in the description and go over there. If you aren't already following us on Twitch, YouTube, and Facebook, I think you should. The links in the are also in the description. 312 produces some awesome swag for their patrons. If you guys want to support us and continue to allow us to be able to do exciting things like travel to stream events, like the Denver Regional coming up, or... the Nova Open Regional coming up in a couple months in Worlds. ah You can go over there and support us and get rewarded with some really awesome exclusive swag.
01:07:25
Speaker
Both these guys know and that both of our Conquest champions know what it's like to get cool swag from 312. So just saying. Lastly, Infinite Arenas is our sponsor. We are very proud to be sponsored by Infinite Arenas. You can head over there to get your fix of X-Wing compatible components, including accessible card printing, physical game assets, and support for the new Legends and Relics pack, and much more, including the Squad Champ kits. You can head over there. Thank you to Infinite Arenas once again.
01:07:53
Speaker
My name is Nick. My name is Andrew Kuba. I'm Connor. I'm Daniel. And we are signing off. Thank you all. Congratulations again, gentlemen, on your conquest. Yeah, congrats.
01:08:04
Speaker
Thank you much. Thanks.