We know that Guns for Hire isn’t far away, it’s been on sale at Gencon since Thursday and should be with the rest of the world in a few weeks.
We know that Guns for Hire is going to make the Kihraxz freaking awesome and the Star Viper all kinds of fun.
And if you read my last post you know that I am more than a little excited about the Harpoon Missile.
I’ve given the Star Viper a run out with the new title online and it was all kinds of confusing entertainment, those barrel rolls are cool. I don’t think that the Star Viper is going to have a strong presence on the top tables at tournaments. It’s a huge amount of fun, but I’m not convinced it’s all that good. The Khiraxz though, could be a bit of a monster.
I very much doubt the expansion is going to be out in time for UK Nationals in a months time but that doesn’t mean I can’t look forward to flying it and get some preparation in! Even in it’s current “under-powered” state I think the Kihraxz has definitely got bite. The combination of Homing Missiles, Guidance Chips, and Glitterstim is about as reliable an alpha strike as you can put together, add in Crackshot and it gets very punchy. The main issue that I have is the relatively low Pilot Skill, except of course for the mighty Talonbane.
The Kirhaxz has often been compared to a Scum T65 and that’s probably not far from the truth in terms of flying it. They’re less durable than a T65, the shield to hull balance is not as good, and as ever two green dice isn’t brilliant…
But they do come with “the best move in the game” a hard one. They miss the hard three for sweeping in, but if I had to chose between a hard one and a hard three I’d go for the one every time. They also come with the illicit slot which gives access to a whole host of toys.
My pre Guns for Hire list is very simple, it’s a missile delivery system. It relies on alpha striking a ship off the table in the first engagement then hoping the consistent damage output of the Kihraxz can make up for it’s lack of mobility. Better to burn all three munitions taking a ship off the table than burn two and leave a limping enemy. It’s an all or nothing list. At 98 points it should be able to outbid a fair few lists that feature in the meta at the moment.
| Talonbane Cobra | Black Sun Ace | Black Sun Ace |
| Crackshot | Crackshot | Crackshot |
| Glitterstim | Glitterstim | Glitterstim |
| Homing Missiles | Homing Missiles | Homing Missiles |
| Guidance Chips | Guidance Chips | Guidance Chips |
My Kihraxz are hunters, picking their moment to terrorize and bully a foe, hence their Nightlord’s inspired colour scheme. Ave Dominus Nox.
Get it wrong and it’s going to get horribly killed. As most of my lists are it’s going to be vulnerable to the big hitting turrets. Dash, RAC, Rey, those big turrets are going to really hurt unless I can get enough damage through on them early on. Arc Dodgers are also likely to be a problem unless you can smash them off the table early, but one good shot should be able to punish any ace that lands in a bad spot.
In a few weeks this can happen, which also weighs in at 98 points!
| Talonbane Cobra | Victor Hel | Captain Jostero |
| Crackshot | Crackshot | Crackshot |
| Glitterstim | Glitterstim | Glitterstim |
| Harpoon Missile | Harpoon Missile | Harpoon Missile |
| Guidance Chips | Guidance Chips | Guidance Chips |
| Vaksai | Vaksai | Vaksai |
| Stealth Device | Stealth Device | Stealth Device |
| Vectored Thrusters | Vectored Thrusters | Pulse Ray Shield |
A mere 7 upgrades per ship! The Stealth Devices will let the ships be that little bit more durable in the initial exchange. Give a hint of regen to the lowly PS4 Jostero and a re-positioning option to the higher Pilot Skills ships means that they should be more versatile. Obviously there are going to be loads of build options on the Vaksai Kihraxz but this is what I’m looking forward to running initially.
But all this is for the future, for this weekend it’s a trip to Worcester Wargames for five rounds of their 40th Anniversary Tournament, and some fun to be had with “old” Khiraxz. I’ve never been before so it’s a first visit, first and possibly last tournament with this particular alpha striking Nighlord’s list!
40 odd people turned up, and there was a massive mix of lists on show, a really diverse meta. Obviously the regulars were there: Dash, Nym, Dengar etc. but there were plenty of less standard issue lists around.
I flew against an 8 ship Z-95 swarm, 3 T-65s, Imperial Aces, a bunch of rebels and Dengar and Fenn, and I went 2-3 for the day, two games I lost by one hull (so frustrating!)…
But what are the lessons of the day?
- Homing Missiles, Guidance Chips, Crackshot and Glitterstim as a combo is utterly savage. Watching a Wookie evaporate under two missiles and a primary shot was somewhat eye opening, seeing 3 of 8 Z95s just disappear in the opening salvo was brutal. Dropping Dengar to one hull was agonizingly frustrating… These things punch through damage like almost nothing else I’ve flown.
- PS11 > PS5 Well duh! my final game against Luke with his VI Vader and Quickdraw with cruise missiles liquidated one of the PS5s in the opening shot, I was still able to kill Vader and Sabacc in his list before Quickdraw put the final damage through on me.
- 5 health is good, better than 4 that’s for sure, but 2 green dice, poor action economy and only one shield are an issue.
- There is no word more gratifying in the English Language than “Crackshot”, I mean you kind of feel like a douchebag when you say it, then stuff dies and you feel less of a douchebag so it’s ok.
- When all is said and done the Kihraxz is pretty handy… if only they could have a re-positioning option, or maybe regen, perhaps even both then they’d probably be REALLY good…
- Games don’t last long with this (which gives plenty of time for messing around with picture for Instagram.)
Admittedly I didn’t run into any “heavy meta” lists today, probably thanks to not winning my first game (One hull left on dengar… ONE HULL!) so I didn’t get to see how they’d fare against more competitive lists but they were so much fun, and will be even more so in a few short weeks.
I’m not entirely convinced how they will function as a squadron (but will blatantly be trying them anyway), this build is an all or nothing list and when it does all it is scary. I didn’t fail to get 4 damage on any of my missile shots, and only against the PS11 Alpha-striking Imperials did I not get to fire all three munitions in the list. However throwing one into a list (especially with harpoons) will carry a lot of threat. Hopefully there will be plenty of Vaksai in the future.
Next weekend is a bank holiday weekend. So that’s a triple header then…
REBELS AND A CERTAIN SCUM LIST WILL RETURN
If you’re looking for tournaments local to you head over to the 186th Tournament Calendar.
There are 16 lists of any given faction at the event. Each faction cannot include the same unique cards in both of their lists. So that means any named ship can only be used a MAXIMUM of 8 times. So with that in mind 6 Rear Admiral Chiraneau out of a possible 8 shows how strong he is.
Who have 10 different ships represented out of the 16 at their disposal, so 63%. Which means they are more diverse than the Scum, but less so than the Imperials. Miranda is the queen here, she in the most used named pilot in the competition, featuring in every team! Pleasingly not all those T65s are Biggs, one of them is Wes Jansen, as a prominent part of Alessandro De Bono’s Rebel Pick and mix list.
I hate to say it but I think Prince Xizor is criminally bad. His pilot ability is arguably one of the least useful in the game, along side Imperial Boba Fett. If he was a top level ship then keeping him alive with it might be good but the fact that he’s in PS limbo for an ace is really frustrating. If he was PS9 with an EPT slot that you could do things with then it might be useful. He’s not got enough damage output to warrant saving (unless you start to stack the points on him for a fire control system to get some consistency). The ability to boost and roll clearly makes him an arc dodger, he’s certainly not a jouster, but a PS7 arc dodger is pretty pointless (Jake Farrel and his 2 EPT slots aside) Odds are whatever you pair him with you’ll want to stay alive more than him… Veteran instincts is his go to EPT, maybe Push the Limit (although the limited green options on a Star Viper make this a risky choice). I suppose putting him at PS9 with his new barrel roll and auto thrusters is an option, but there are clearly better ways to spend points out there.
Next in line we have new boy Dalan Oberos. He’s a frustrating PS6. If only he was 7 then add VI and you’d have one of the most exceptional Arc Dodgers in the game, probably why you can’t! There is no way around it, this guy is designed to run stressed, and be a reactive pilot to what your opponent does. In their article FFG are pretty good with their build for him, Veteran Instincts, Virago, Advanced Sensors with Starviper MK2 and Autothrusters is strong. I think this is likely to be the “standard” build for him, at least initially. Wired could be useful, but at PS6 his ability is going to rely on the gamer being very good at predictive flying.
The third pilot in the line is probably the most used of all the Star Vipers out there. Guri, the free focus ship. Fits in well with a lot of lists out there and now she’s going to be three points cheeper I can see her being very well used. In a Mindlink list she is a natural focus battery, but is a strong ship all around. Fire Control System and a free focus every turn is potent, but if you put Expertise on her you get a very strong attacking ship, albeit with a low Pilot Skill, that should have a free focus every turn for defence. I do think she is still the most useful all-round pilot the Star Viper and now she is only really 27 points I expect her standing to increase.
Finally we come to the ship that has probably spawned the most excitement of the new pilots in the Guns For Hire Box. Thweek. The ability to copy either an opponents pilot skill or ability could be game changing, there’s enough chat online already without me throwing in my two cents to that conversation, suffice to say I can see Thweek being a very popular, if not necessarily strong, ship. Certain abilities are going to be hugely useful, but some games you’ll get nothing you can really use. However Thweek is a tool box that gives you options and that is not something to be ignored. With title and autothrusters Thweek weighs in at a mere 27 points, which is a good level, if only he had an EPT slot! (which is why he doesn’t)
The concept of
This on a certain Emon Azzameen is going to be very very strong. You do have to trade in consistency in firepower but you will get consistency in bombing, and that tasty firepower. At PS6 Emon is a bit in no mans land for pre-move bombs so I wouldn’t put the bomblet generator on him. But with Cad and Extra Munitions on him he gets 4 proximity mines. My personal build for him would be:
But if you want to continue Emon’s theme of throwing bombs all over the place then Sol Sixxa with Veteran Instincts some Cluster Mines and a Bombadier isn’t a bad place to look. 40 points of a pain in the neck.
Now I’ve already seen plenty of people on facebook using it, but the there’s a rumour that wave 11 has a fix in it for what is one of the best looking and least used ships in the game. The Tie Punisher. All we need is an FAQ to stop people arguing over the wording of just how many bombs the Minefield Mapper actually lets you put down… But regardless, the Punisher is definitely the best place for this mighty card. Just as the Warden Squadron K-Wing has become a controlling fixture on tables everywhere this card can elevate the Punisher to a legitimately competitive ship.
99 points gets you three Cutlass Squadron Pilots with a lot of toys.
