I have been chasing a squad I'm both comfortable with and happy to play for a while. My favourite pilot, Jake Farrel has had a hard time finding wingman or wingmen that fit. I did find some success with Jake and Rey upon the release of Heroes of the Resistance. I literally opened the box, cobbled together a Rey with Finn build and went on the win the event (3 Rounds into a top 4). A few tweaks later and I had something I was happy with that I played through until ACT Regionals 2017.However by that time people were ready for Rey and the hurt she could lay on you and I went a disappointing 2-4.
I spent the next little while messing around with Imperials; Bombers with Tie Fighters; Expertise Echo; Whisper/Soontir/Omega Leader... Nothing really stuck. At the Aus Open I was gifted a super nice Fantasy Flight Games Acrylic Weapons Disabled token so I decided to give Miranda a bit of a run so I could use it. I settled on a Miranda, Jake, Biggs list that served me fine but wasn't perfect.
Three D6 store champs rolled around and I decided to pair Miranda with Dash. I wanted the Engine Upgrade more then an extra red dice so elected for Mangler Cannon over the Heavy Laser Cannon (HLC). I loved it, not having a range one doughnut of safety to worry about gave me options had I hadn't previously had flying Dash. With Rey and Lone Wolf backing up the Mangler Cannon it still did solid damage and Miranda was big threat that drew attention away from Dash. I finished in 8th after the Swiss to make the cut, along with the other Dash Miranda player at the event.
My Top 8 game can be found here if you are interested but in summary Dash did all the work. In my top 4 game I made an absolutely careless barrel roll, I had more then enough room to not be in arc and messed it up. That put me out of the running and avoided a Dash Miranda v Dash Miranda final.
I stuck with Dash Miranda for the Australian Teams Championship (ATC), but my Miranda play was letting me down, I was winning off the back of Dash or I was loosing. After the ATC I decided to put Miranda away and pulled out Dash's partner in Crime from a couple of years ago Corran Horn. I played a lot of Corran when he was big but never really with Dash. HLC Dash never really suited me, but Lone Wolf, Rey, Mangler Dash was a great fit; both to my play style and to Corran because it left enough points for Corran to also take an Engine Upgrade which is how I always ran him.
I got off the super shaky start with the list and then really didn't have a lot of time for games. Plus I was in the middle of what amounts to moving house, so the times I got to play, it was pretty much the only list I had all the bits out for. I kept playing it.
A couple of weeks out from Summer Slam there were two tickets left, I hadn't really expected to make it because I was doing Imperial Assault Regionals the week before up in Wyong at Rebel Outpost but with two tickets left I decided to ask the wife if I could go up. I said it was probably only going to be the Saturday. She was fine with it so I picked up a ticket.
I got a few more games in with Dash Corrin and was feeling more comfortable getting the team work but Corrin is of course super vulnerable these days. I watched the stream of QLD regionals which was pretty much dominated by Kylo double Rho Boats. I thought what happens to Corrin Dash in that match up? Can Corrin kill Kylo 1 v 1? Maybe I thought, what would points be at in that situation? I'm down 52 – 53 is the answer with Dash coming in 1 point more then the double boats. This got me thinking about tweaking the Dash build to drop him by a couple of points, I looked at swapping the Engine out but it had served me so well, on a whim (inspired by lengthy conversations with Jeff after the ATC about ways to wreck Miranda and Nym) I looked at the Ion-Cannon, its a point cheaper then the Mangler.
I thought about it some more, was I crazy for considering it? I didn't think so; it gives Nym a hard time, it gives Miranda a hard time, it means if I trade two Rho boats for Dash I don't lose at time (it goes to a 50/50 final salvo but that's way better then a loss). I thought about other ships in the meta, really the Mangler is only doing 1 to Ventress and X-7's anyway and the threat of being Ion'ed off the board is there. Wookies again probably only take one anyway and it helps me stay out of arc. 3PO falcons, same story, they still take one and have to worry about the board edge.
Plus backing up that Ion-Cannon is a ship that can shoot twice with re-rolls on turns when he is in a good spot. What better way to make sure he is in a good spot then force your opponents ship to do a 1 straight white that you know is coming.
I then looked at ways to get some stress out there because a stressed and Ion'ed ship really isn't doing much of anything against arc dodgers. I had the 2 points for Flechette Torpedoes but after checking their text and realising they don't work on Nym or Miranda I felt the 2 point bid was going to better V's Nym. I also thought about swapping our faithful R2-D2 for R3-A2 which I would only use sparingly but could be huge coupled with the Ion-Cannon. However with no practise games to see how bad I would miss R2 I elected to play it safe and stick with the regen bot.
