Armada: Playing someone else's list

Same ship, different commander.

This is going to be a quick guest article written by Iskander4000.  He actually used a variant of my Ackbar list in the last Vassal tournament and I wanted him to speak about his experiences using someone else's list (mine).  How often do you find yourself doing that?  For me, I'm a Tuner Spike archetype if we're going with geek/MTG terms, so I'm not very creative in terms of finding out "new" stuff.  I am, however, pretty good at taking something a idea that already exists and fine-tuning it into something better.  That's about as min-max as you can guess I think.

Anyways, here's the article.  Please enjoy!

Hello there! This is Iskander4000, writing at HERO’s request. One of the things I love about Armada is how flexible the system is—on the board, two fleets may look identical but everyone has their own way of refining and flying their lists. A few weeks ago I stumbled upon this post (http://lkhero.blogsp...r90-to-mix.html) and decided that I would use the list in the holiday Vassal tournament. The only change I made was that I took out Intel Officer on Home One and added Raymus Antilles. How did it work for me? Read on…

In the Sullust tournament I went undefeated and took second using 2 AFs along with a mix of As and Ys. I really liked the firepower the battle line can bring, along with the flexibility and speed to separate if needed. I also like that A wings can be used both defensively and offensively. I’ve been playing around with an MC80 and an AF and trying to figure out what other ships to bring. Another AF adds a lot of firepower but you don’t have much room for squads. Same thing with 2 Corvettes, plus having 2 of them doesn’t match my playstyle. One Corvette added flexibility and left points for squads, but it lacked the punch needed to put up a fight in Wave 2. Right before the Vassal tourney I stumbled across HERO’s list. Turbolaser Reroute Circuits seemed to be the answer I was looking for! With the deadline to sign up for the tournament looming fast and no time to playtest, I went ahead and used the list verbatim (except for Raymus).

My first opponent was not able to make the match and forfeited, but I did get a scrimmage in. This was against a list of smaller ships, and I was able to split up my battle line with good results. We didn’t finish the game but I was on my way to victory. I took a 9-1 win in the second round against a Rhymerball/Dengar list. By this point I was seeing that HERO’s favorite officer upgrade, Intel Officer, wasn’t working for me. I prefer having control over my own ships instead of trying to control my opponent’s. This is why I took Raymus; unfortunately he does not work well with Engine Techs! ET wants you to spam Navs, and Raymus wants variety. In the third round I got clobbered 10-0 to the eventual winner, Truthiness. He ran an Independence/B-wing list and having never faced that, I don’t think any list in the world would have helped me. Oh well, it was a good experience.

I really liked the list but I wanted to make it work for my own playstyle, so I decided to deconstruct it and put it back together. The CR90 with TRC and Jaina’s worked out as expected, but I wasn’t using Leia much. For the AF2, Intel Officers went away. This had the added advantage of reducing its point cost, which was convenient since my opponents often targeted the AF first. All other upgrades were kept (XI7 and Gunnery Team…so good). For the MC80, I was making good use of Ackbar, XI7, ET, and Leading Shots. There were some times when I wished I had Advanced Projectors instead of ECM, but I think for now I’ll keep ECM. Raymus had to go, and with no other way of changing my plans on the fly, I decided to add Support Officer. Finally, I decided to do the unthinkable. To save points and increase power on my flagship, I dropped everyone’s favorite MC80 title in favor of Defiant. Defiance, excuse me. With the points I saved I was able to add Tycho.

This is my current list, 396 points. I call it “Tough Little Ships” (ahem). Played it once against a 400 point Wave 1 list with good results (Support Officer came in very handy) but not yet tested on Wave 2.

MC80 Command Cruiser (106 + 72)
+ Admiral Ackbar (38)
+ Support Officer (4)
+ Electronic Countermeasures (7)
+ Leading Shots (4)
+ Engine Techs (8)
+ XI7 Turbolasers (6)
+ Defiance (5)

Assault Frigate Mark II: Assault Frigate Mk.II B (72 + 20)
+ Gunnery Team (7)
+ Electronic Countermeasures (7)
+ XI7 Turbolasers (6)

CR90 Corvette: CR90 Corvette A (44 + 9)
+ Turbolaser Reroute Circuits (7)
+ Jaina's Light (2)

Squadrons: Dash Rendar (24)
Squadrons: Tycho Celchu (16)
Squadrons: A-wing Squadron (11)
Squadrons: A-wing Squadron (11)
Squadrons: A-wing Squadron (11)

***

OK, I'm back again.

I'm glad that someone took one of my lists and made it their own, and then openly sharing with me their experiences and how they eventually went another route.  I'll tell you folks one thing:  One of the terms I hate people use is the term "netlist".  Most of the time, it carries a very negative connotation and I don't think it's fair to players who utilize this strategy.  Before streams, there were replays, before there were replays, there were strategy guides, and before that, there were books.  All of this information comes from someone who wants to share their success and what "works for them".  So is it a bad thing when another player wants to emulate or copy someone else's success?  Of course not!  That's why one of my biggest pet peeves is when someone belittles another person for netlisting, saying that they're not creative.  Let me tell you folks one thing from personal experience:  Being creative has nothing to do with being effective.  If creativity is the key to success, then the term "starving artist" wouldn't exist.  At that point, you might as well damn every source of teaching material out there, god forbid anyone learns from anyone else.  Good day sir!