Rogue Squadron- Juking X-wings

Welcome to Rogue Squadron, pilot! In this series we will be looking at different squadrons you can fly in Fantasy Flight Games X-Wing miniatures game. We give you the squad, what expansion pack all of the upgrades come from and then give you the low down on how best to fly it. Strap in and get ready to fly…

All Wings Report In

T-70 X-Wing “Red Squadron Veteran” (TFA Core/T-70 Expansion) (35 pts) (PS 4)

None

Elite Pilot Talent- Juke (TIE F/O Expansion): When attacking, if you have an evade token, you may change 1 of the defender’s Evade results into a Focus result.
Modification- Integrated Astromech (T-70 X-wing Expansion): When you are dealt a Damage card, you may discard 1 of your Astromech Upgrade cards to discard that Damage card.
Tech- Comm Relay (TIE F/O Expansion): You cannot have more than 1 evade token. During the End phase, do not remove an unused evade token from your ship.
Astromech- R2-D2 (Original Core): After executing a green maneuver, you may recover 1 shield (up to your shield value).

T-70 X-Wing “Red Squadron Veteran” (TFA Core/T-70 Expansion) (34 pts) (PS 4)

None

Elite Pilot Talent- Juke (TIE F/O Expansion): When attacking, if you have an evade token, you may change 1 of the defender’s Evade results into a Focus result.
Modification- Integrated Astromech (T-70 X-wing Expansion): When you are dealt a Damage card, you may discard 1 of your Astromech Upgrade cards to discard that Damage card.
Tech- Comm Relay (TIE F/O Expansion): You cannot have more than 1 evade token. During the End phase, do not remove an unused evade token from your ship.
Astromech- R5-P9 (Rebel Transport Expansion):At the end of the Combat phase, you may spend 1 of your focus tokens to recover 1 shield (up to your shield value).

HWK-290 “Kyle Katarn” (HWK-290 Expansion) (31 pts) (PS 6)

At the start of the Combat phase, you may assign 1 of your focus tokens to another friendly ship at Range 1-3.

Elite Pilot Talent- Juke (TIE F/O Expansion): When attacking, if you have an evade token, you may change 1 of the defender’s Evade results into a Focus result.
Turret- Twin Laser Turret (K-Wing Expansion): Attack (3, Range 2-3): Perform this attack twice (even against a ship outside your firing arc). Each time this attack hits, the defender suffers 1 damage. Then cancel all dice results.
Crew- Jan Ors (Rebel Aces Expansion): Once per round, when a friendly ship at Range 1-3 performs a focus action or would be assigned a focus token, you may assign it an evade token instead.

Lock S-Foils in Attack Position

This list came to me when I was listening to a recent Scum and Villiany podcast where the hosts talked about Juke and it’s synergy with Comm Relay. I had also recently read an article that talked about rethinking the Evade action and how it’s similar to shield regeneration. I put two and two together and bang, two really beefy X-wings. So natively, the two X-wings have six health. Add in Integrated Astromech and it’s effectively seven. Add in an Evade token, thanks to Jan Ors, and it’s effectively eight. Add the two shield regenerating astromechs and we have great potential.

Thanks to the combo with Juke, your tough X-wings also have some good offensive power. Three ships with Juke will ensure that at least two of them force an extra damage through on most targets and at least one against a target with Recon Specialist. That really starts to add up.

The lists weak point is obviously the HWK. It’s fragile and there isn’t much you can do about it. But if you play your opening rounds right it won’t matter. Start the group out slow, putzing along at speed 1. Have everyone Focus. Jan turns one X-wing’s Focus to an Evade. Second round turn the second X-wing’s Focus to an Evade. Now, both X-wings have a semi-permanent evade for the rest of the game. They want to keep it until forced to spend it to stay alive. From there on out, Jan can give Kyle an Evade to help keep him in the fight just a little longer and make use of his Juke. When necessary Kyle can instead pass a Focus to the R5-P9 X-wing to help with shield regeneration.

Now, this list has the classic weaknesses of a three ship non-aces build. It can be easily arc dodged, though the HWK’s turret helps with that some. It doesn’t have any autothrusters so turrets will be tough for the X-wings to handle. It should fare well against swarms though as they all have two agility vs most swarms’ two attack and the ability to regenerate.

Variations

I was really torn on whether to include Dorsal Turret and Moldy Crow title in place of Twin Laser Turret. Moldy Crow really meshes with Kyle’s ability because you can then use Juke and have a bank of Focus to trade to the X-wings. Granted, Dorsal Turret hasn’t been released yet so it would have to be proxied. But it is an alternative if you just want the HWK to be purely support and give up on any real damage potential.

Another major alternative is to drop Kyle in exchange for a Warden K-wing with TLT and Jan. You still get the X-wings their Evades and a TLT. The K-wing is a lot tougher than Kyle and doesn’t have a donut hole. You lose Kyle’s extra assistance and a use of Juke. The more shots you have that have Juke the better it is overall because the first one will almost always be against an opponent with a Focus token.