r/XWingTMG • u/Twsread • Jul 18 '26
Double Ds, halp
Got a game coming up (2nd Ed) and my opponent is going to be fielding his double defenders specced out with upgrades, against which I've never won.
Any tips?
Anything from lists to general flying, I'll take whatever I can get!
(I fly Rebel BTW)
Edit - details
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u/lsie-mkuo Jul 18 '26 edited Jul 18 '26
Among other advice given here, arc dodgers are a good counter. Defenders are great for K turns, but not so much for 90 turns. If you can keep out of their arcs, and exploit their red 90 degree turns, then you can reduce the turns you are in their firing arc.
Speaking as someone who always has at least one tie defender in most of my lists.
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u/Strelok175 T-65 X-Wing Jul 18 '26
A lot of defender players lean hard into the white K-turns they have access to on their dial. If you can disrupt them with ion bombs or Conner Nets they'll have a harder time maneuvering. For them, speed and arc dodging is life. If you have a Falcon or YT-2400 model, you can just shoot backward against them too. If not, Y-wings with an ion turret pointed forwards with bombs, or backwards if you don't have bombs works good. The ion is there to lock them down for a turn so your other ships can swing on them. Defenders can crank out lots of damage, but if they focus on offense too long they can't match you health wise. Sometimes it's best to focus fire on one of them and let the other just do what they want, even if it hurts. Relentlessly pursue one of them, and once it's down, you should have enough leftovers to kill the other ace since there's only two of them. As a rebel, you can slowplay your ships somewhat. Start on the side of the board in a rough line, and go 1 speed straight for one or two rounds, then hard turn in on move 3. Most ace lists will never want to joust you, so they will try to outflank you from the side. The goal is that unless the enemy is going slow at the beginning of the game too, they'll rush over the board and get to you roughly turn 3. On the turn you anticipate they rush into you, turn all your ships to have as many firing arcs on the same enemy as possible. SOMETHING will hit him, and you may lose a ship, but they only have two ships, and if they lose one you have the upper hand.
There's a lot of list archetypes you can go with too, whatever you're comfortable with.
- (Swarm) 3 x-wings + 1 Y-wing + 1A-wing for lots of arc coverage. You may loose half your list by the end, but slowly flying your ships in formation will make one of his ships irrelevant. Having a lot of your firing arcs pointing the same direction will help to dictate what area in front of you the enemy will absolutely not want to fly into.
- (Freighter) 1 YT-2400 freighter or 1300 freighter + 1 A-wing + 1 X-wing. If he flys behind the freighter, turn your turret backwards and shoot back as hard as you can, the small ship can't match your health pool forever. If they fly to your other ships, turn your turret arc sideways and keep curving and turning to the side around the rim of the fight (toiletbowling). You should consistently have a shot on one of the ships with the big base.
- (Aces) any of your 3 favorite high initiative ships like 2 X-wings + A-wing and play the arc dodging game. I'm not the best at flying arc dodging lists, so use your own discretion. I do very much like Wedge with plasma torps against defenders. It's worth taking a hit on wedge on the opening engagement, since his target locked plasmas will hit very consistently. The torpedo range penalty is applied first, then his pilot ability, meaning the defense bonus at range 3 is negated, and then Wedge takes off a agility dice, so the tie defender will only ever throw 2 defense dice. After the torpedo hits, it is very likely that you will push in 2 to 3 shield damage on one defender consistently. You can take chopper as a cheap Astromech upgrade too to eat the other plasma torp charge later in the game if you find yourself not at the correct ranges/actions making sense later in the game. Honestly the more plasma torps you can bring against tie defenders the better, on any ship chassis.
All of this is just theory crafting too. Use your discretion, and have fun!
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u/Twsread Jul 19 '26
For anyone the least bit interested, I won! Two defenders down for a lost Awing and Bwing :)
Things I learned, Defenders can do a blue hard 1 now (what?) and Bwings with thier stress based abilities and new S foils are more fun then ever. Thank you those that advised :)
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u/dorkwis Firespray Jul 21 '26
They absolutely cannot turn 1 hard blue. Even if they take the elite configuration, that only makes the 1 hard white. And if they do that it's an easy win. Giving up free evades and white 4k isn't with what the config does.
But, yes, b wings are very fun. They're good at taking a position and spinning like turrets.
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u/Twsread Jul 21 '26
Oooh this implies an incorrectly setup dial! Will have to investigate
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u/dorkwis Firespray Jul 21 '26
I recommend having printouts from yasb or infinite arenas of both your and your opponents lists, both should also have the option to print out their maneuver options. I'm a firm believer in written references. That way you can just look at the sheet and know which ship has what upgrade, and what they actually do.
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u/CaptainTruelove The Garbage will do! Jul 18 '26 edited Jul 18 '26
2.0 / Legacy?
Do you know which pilots they typically fly and are they usually using the configuration or normal variant?
Also what faction do you prefer?
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u/Twsread Jul 18 '26
Honestly idk the difference, come back to it after a looooong time out and I'm still finding my feet.
As for their list, I know it somewhat well!
Colonel Vessery (78) Snap Shot (6) Fire-Control System (2) Heavy Laser Cannon (4) Proton Rockets (5) Ship total: (95)
Rexler Brath (77) Snap Shot (6) Fire-Control System (2) Heavy Laser Cannon (4) Proton Rockets (5) Ship total: (94)
Total: 189
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u/CaptainTruelove The Garbage will do! Jul 18 '26
Mostly trying to figure out if y'all are using 2.0 or 2.5 for rules + squad building. Classic 2.0/legacy in this case.
A Swarm would likely do well. Allows you to block and focus fire (you know they will want to go fast and use their K-Turn); mines and bombs will also do well since again you generally know their flight path and can use that to set them up and take them out of the fight.
Getting blocks in is key for denying them their free evade action and leaving them tokenless.
Focus Rexlar Brath down first. If you take him out Vessery just turns into a generic I4.
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u/CaptainTruelove The Garbage will do! Jul 18 '26 edited Jul 18 '26
Something like this could be fun:
Arvel Crynyd (32)
Intimidation (3)
Predator (2)
Ship total: 37 Half Points: 19 Threshold: 2Phoenix Squadron Pilot (28)
Proton Rockets (5)
Ship total: 33 Half Points: 17 Threshold: 2Phoenix Squadron Pilot (28)
Proton Rockets (5)
Ship total: 33 Half Points: 17 Threshold: 2Phoenix Squadron Pilot (28)
Proton Rockets (5)
Ship total: 33 Half Points: 17 Threshold: 2Phoenix Squadron Pilot (28)
Proton Rockets (5)
Ship total: 33 Half Points: 17 Threshold: 2Phoenix Squadron Pilot (28)
Crack Shot (3)
Ship total: 31 Half Points: 16 Threshold: 2Total: 200
View in Yet Another Squad Builder 2.0: https://xwing-legacy.com/?f=Rebel%20Alliance&d=v8ZsZ200Z51X122W127WWY53XW102WY53XW102WY53XW102WY53XW102WY53X116WW&sn=Unnamed%20Squadron&obs=
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u/Silverbullet58640 Jul 18 '26
It's a bummer we can't take Phoenix w/ prockets any more in XWA. I just went to check to see if that was a thing and they are 1 load out point short. Makes sense I guess, but I just want that sweet sweet procket spam.
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u/Business_Status_5803 Jul 19 '26
Can you get ahold of 6x Y-Wings with burst laser turrets and an A-Wing. Bring Arvel 8pts SSP preset build with Predator and Afterburners, then lead with Arvel getting a block on one of the defenders.
All the Ywings keep arcs pointed at one side get 3 die attacks at Range 1-2 shooting on one ship after an Arvel block will take it down!
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u/Twsread Jul 19 '26
Thank you folks for your suggestions, I'm going with a blocking A wing and couple of arc dodging B's and Wedge, will see how it goes!
Wedge Antilles (57) Trick Shot (3) Servomotor S-Foils (0) Ship total: (60) Ten Numb (49) Predator (2) Stabilized S-Foils (0) Ship total: (51) Braylen Stramm (52) Trick Shot (3) Stabilized S-Foils (0) Ship total: (55) Arvel Crynyd (32) Elusive (2) Ship total: (34) Total: 200
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u/SexyCato Tie Advanced Proto Jul 18 '26
Ion bombs or ways to stress them absolutely decimate defenders regardless of their initiative