Rogue Squadron- Primed Target

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 “Snap Wexley” (Heroes of the Resistance Expansion) (33 pts) (PS 8)

After you execute a 2-, 3-, or 4-speed maneuver, if you are not touching a ship, you may perform a free boost action.

Title– Black One (Heroes of the Resistance Expansion): After you perform a boost or barrel roll action, you may remove 1 enemy target lock from a friendly ship at Range 1. You cannot equip this card if your pilot skill is “6” or lower.
Elite Pilot Talent- Veteran Instincts (Millenium Falcon/Slave-1/Shadow Caster Expansions): Increase your pilot skill value by 2.
Astromech- BB-8 (TFA Core)- When you reveal a green maneuver, you may perform a free barrel roll action.
Modification- Integrated Astromech (T-70/Heroes of the Resistance Expansions)- When you are dealt a Damage card, you may discard 1 of your Astromech Upgrade cards to discard that Damage card.
Tech- Primed Thrusters (Heroes of the Resistance Expansion): Stress tokens do not prevent you from performing boost or barrel roll actions unless you have 3 or more stress tokens.

T-70 X-Wing “Nien Nunb” (Heroes of the Resistance Expansion) (37 pts) (PS 7)

When you receive a stress token, if there is an enemy ship inside your firing arc at Range 1, you may discard that stress token.

Elite Pilot Talent- Stay on Target (Hound’s Tooth/YT-2400 Expansion): When you reveal a maneuver, you may rotate your dial to another maneuver with the same speed. Treat that maneuver as a red maneuver.
Astromech- Targeting Astromech (ARC-170 Expansion): After you execute a red maneuver, you may acquire a target lock.
Modification- Vectored Thrusters (ARC-170 Expansion)- Your action bar gains the Barrel Roll action icon.
Tech- Pattern Analyzer (Heroes of the Resistance Expansion): When executing a maneuver, you may resolve the “Check Pilot Stress” step after the “Perform Action” step (instead of before that step).

T-70 X-Wing “Blue Ace” (TFA Core Expansion) (30 pts) (PS 5)

When performing a boost action, you may use the Hard turn templates.

Astromech- Targeting Astromech (ARC-170 Expansion): After you execute a red maneuver, you may acquire a target lock.
Modification- Integrated Astromech (T-70/Heroes of the Resistance Expansions)- When you are dealt a Damage card, you may discard 1 of your Astromech Upgrade cards to discard that Damage card.
Tech- Primed Thrusters (Heroes of the Resistance Expansion): Stress tokens do not prevent you from performing boost or barrel roll actions unless you have 3 or more stress tokens.

Lock S-Foils in Attack Position

There are a lot of places these ships can go that others can’t. And they can do it with a fair amount of action economy. Better still, they aren’t your usual shield regenerating X-wings so you have a good chance of catching your opponent unprepared.

Snap Wexley is your most action efficient going forward. If he chooses a 2 or 3 speed green maneuver he can take BB-8’s barrel roll, then move, then get a free boost, then get his regular action. This allows him to get into the action or run away from the action pretty quickly. If he needs to turn around, his Primed Thrusters still allow him to make use of his free boost (since both T-rolls and K-turn are fast enough to trigger it). Then, again thanks to Primed Thrusters, next turn when he picks a green maneuver to clear his stress he can still use BB-8’s free barrel roll.

Nien Nunb’s goal is to get in close to a target. With Stay on Target he has a lot of flexibility in how he does that. If he’s fighting PS8+ aces, he know where they are so just has to dial in a maneuver to end up at range 1 in arc if he needs to clear a stress. If he’s fighting anything lower PS then he can use SoT to adjust his maneuver. With Targeting Astromech these red maneuvers give him a free target lock. Pattern Analyzer allows him to take his regular action as well. This means he can boost or barrel roll to get into position to avoid getting stressed or just focus for an accurate attack.

Blue Ace can reach the most unusual places thanks to his ability to boost with a hard turn. He can essentially make a hard one reverse maneuver by taking a T-roll and then hard boosting. This can help him keep his target in arc by pointing in a direction they just can’t avoid.

Now, this list is still three X-wings, none of which are PS9+. True Aces can still avoid them. Likewise, none of them have Autothrusters so turrets won’t care what fancy maneuvers they can take.

Variations

There are a few small tweaks you can consider with this list without significant change. Dropping Targeting Astromech from Blue Ace in exchange for R2-D6 with Veteran Instincts will make him a more useful PS7. He can get better mileage out of sneaky hard boosts the higher PS he is. Though he does love free target locks and going from five to seven is only a so-so increase.

Changing Targeting Astromech on Nien to R3-A2 would similarly remove some free action economy but would introduce some control abilities to your list. Nien can make good use of R3-A3 since he can ignore the stress he would receive if he can get to range 1. If you did that it might also be beneficial to change Stay on Target to Veteran Instincts so he’s now PS9.

Removing a point somewhere, either by dropping Black One title or Nien taking VI, would allow you to give Blue Ace Pattern Analyzers instead of Primed Thrusters. It’s a toss up which of those Techs are more useful for him. PA let’s him take a red maneuver and take any action. PT limits him to just boosting when stressed but it also allows him to get a non green maneuver after getting stressed and still use his unique boost.