So I have now decided to tackle the Interdictor, now that Rebellion in the Rim is out and the objective fully spoiled and gotten some play time messing with the experimental technology with the new objectives. Let’s just say there are a lot of cool and fun interactions with some of these new objectives, and that I think increases the power of the interdictor. The Interdictor has been on the rise even before Rebellion in the Rim dropped, but that was mostly just as a super durable ship, now I think it will get a chance to really shine not just as a tough ship, but as it was most likely designed to as an objective enhancing ship, and I think it will fill that role quite nicely now, whereas before it was so so. I want to talk very briefly about the interdictor ship types and then we will dive into builds.
combat retrofit
Okay so this version of the ship is just bad, why well because you are mostly paying to get the experimental retrofits and this one only gets one. It has a higher damage potential than our other version and has 2 anti-squadron dice, so it does the pew pews a little better but does interdictor things worse, and once you factor in upgrades our other variation is on par if not better than this guy for slightly cheaper. In fact the combat has fewer upgrade slots than the suppressor, I mean it it traded its experimental slot for like a turbolaser slot or something, it might have a place but for a very very marginal increase in fire power and range, the loss of the Experimental retrofit does not justify the point increase in my opinion. I sometimes get tempted by the two anti-squadron dice, but you are best to just stay away from this guy.
I often ask myself is there anything that can be done to “fix” the combat retrofit outside of a point change or change in upgrades available, and well I can think of 4 options: A cheap title that gives an extra experimental slot if you only have one, an experimental retrofit that triggers when you attack squadrons, an experimental retrofit that helps/triggers off of red dice, an experimental retrofit that gives you a bonus if you only have one experimental retrofit equipped. Until something like that happens this ship variation is just going to sit out on the sidelines at least in standard play, I can see an argument for campaign play with Rebellion in the Rim as you can start with your one experimental and don't have to worry about wasting time getting your second.
Suppressor
This is the ship variant you should stick to until some sort of fix comes in for the combat. It has more blue dice to take advantage of its Ion cannon slot, it also has 2 experimental retrofit slots and with D-caps the extra range the combat gets from its red dice is very minimal. All upgrade slots are the same between the combat and the Suppressor the suppressor actually has more slots because of the double experimental retrofit, it’s just a no brainer really.
So now that we know that we are going to be using the suppressor variation of the ship let’s look at builds, and while I do that we will also talk about flying interdictors.
Support/Interdoctor
Interdictor Suppression Refit (90) • Wulff Yularen (7) • Projection Experts (6) • Disposable Capacitors (3) • Grav Shift Reroute (2) • G7-X Grav Well Projector (2) • Heavy Ion Emplacements (9) • Interdictor (3) = 122 Points
So This builds Idea is really to just spam engineering and passing out shields with projection experts to keep ships alive that is this ships job, while I have had some fun with this build with a Dominator list it is really not my favorite, as personally if you want a ship that dishes out shields to your ships I think the empire has better cheaper options:
Arquitens Command Cruiser (59) • Projection Experts (6) • Redundant Shields (8) = 73 Points
Gladiator I (56) • Projection Experts (6) • External Racks (3) • Seventh Fleet Star Destroyer (5) = 70 Points
Victory I (73) • Ordnance Experts (4) • Linked Turbolaser Towers (7) • Assault Concussion Missiles (7) • Harrow (3) • Projection Experts (6) = 100 Points
The Interdictor has some advantages over these as the ability to take Targeting scramblers, it’s more durable , and it can regain the shields it lost in one go with token+dail, however by the status phase the arquitens will also have regained two shields as well with a token+dail, and so will the Victory. It’s not bad just not my personal favorite way to run them mostly because I would very much rather have engine techs on the interdictor for reasons that will be made clear shortly.
Interdictor Tank
Interdictor Suppression Refit (90) • Captain Brunson (5) • Engine Techs (8) • Disposable Capacitors (3) • Targeting Scrambler (5) • Grav Shift Reroute (2) • Heavy Ion Emplacements (9) • Interdictor (3) = 125 Points
This is the build that has started to bring the interdictor back into play. It is a very tough nut to crack and its job is to not die. With Brunson, and targeting scramblers on this guy its defense tokens are just bonuses to a very tough defense. So why do I prefer engine techs to projection experts especially with this build? Well targeting scramblers can only trigger if the attack happens at close range and there are plenty of ships in the game where being at close range is no more dangerous for the interdictor than medium or even long, so closing that gap from medium to short with engine techs can actually boost your survivability. In addition double arcing is supper important for the interdictor to really get the damage to pile on Engine techs makes that even easier. This is the variation of the Interdictor that I have enjoyed playing recently, and it has brought the Interdictor back into relevance, it does have some objective shenanigans it's nothing when compared to this next guy.
Objective Interdictor
Interdictor Suppression Refit (90) • Captain Brunson (5) • Engine Techs (8) • Disposable Capacitors (3) • G7-X Grav Well Projector (2) • Grav Shift Reroute (2) • Heavy Ion Emplacements (9) • Interdictor (3) = 122 Points
Really there is only one slight change with this build, but the new objectives that came with Rebellion in the Rim the interdictor has more options, and a lot of good choices but with this guy we have a particular plan in mind. So having only 1 G7-X Grav Well has always felt a little lackluster, but with our new red Objective Surprise Attack we know where our opponents Flagship is going to be so we can place our grav well token there and well with the raid tokens for 3 rounds they are going to have a hard time getting speed up before you are able close and get shots off while they are stuck as speed zero. Yellow will be Rift Ambush use G7s to shrink deployment zone you get to place all the obstacles place the gravity rift then move it to be in the path of an enemy ship use the speed one bump to make the ship overlap the gravity rift and it will be stuck as zero go in with a Ozzel officer Demolisher or some squall enabled squadrons and another bad day at speed zero. Our blue in this list is sadly the weakest but you have some strong options to score points with Doomed Station, or get really gamey with Hyperspace Migration or we can do more area denial with minefields etc.
We have even more options than just this example of objectives that the interdictor will really shine with. So you are going to see a lot more interdictors built to take advantage of objective play, to gain a potentially insane amount of point, so be ready for it.
I have also seen a very odd interdictor build that supports a bunch of small ships and its job it to strip tokens, I don't think it's that good, but when I saw it in play it really helped this list burn though the other lists tokens, so something to think about.
Interdictor Suppression Refit (90) • Emperor Palpatine (3) • Disposable Capacitors (3) • Grav Shift Reroute (2) • Targeting Scrambler (5) • Overload Pulse (8) • Interdictor (3) = 114 Points
Interdictors are not known for there damage output, there ion cannon slot is their only way to increase their damage. Really if you are going for damage you have two optoins: Heavy Ion Emplacements simply the best albeit expensive pick and Ion Cannon Batteries a slightly cheaper pick that is slightly less effective. Other Ion cannons really should not be in the running to replace these guys, but maybe in the right build a utility ion cannon could work, but once a ship has nowhere to redirect damage you will be surprised how fast an interdictor can take down a ship, hence why the shield drain is so good.
something to remember that you have the highest engineering value in the game, 5. However in most cases the 5 engineering will just feel like 4 with a benefit that you can remove a damage card with just a token so that is nice. It is most potent when spent with a dial and token for a total of 8 engineering. Your repair commands can be powerful, but to take full advantage of that power a token should always be involved as a native 5 engineering in most cases will not be that much more useful than a native 4. Again this is not always the case but in most circumstances the 5 engineering best benefit is to increase the value of your tokens, where most ships could only gain one shied you can take off a damage card, pair that with a dial you can recharge 4 shields, whenever you use the repair command a token should be involved in some way, to really leverage that extra power you have, and not waste a point of engineering.
So that is where I think the Interdictor sits right now. It’s in a good strong spot and does what it is meant to do. It can do some fun shenanigans with the new objectives in fact I think an objective manipulation list with an interdictor is a viable strategy. I have always wanted to make objective interdictor a thing, and now it works and it makes me so happy, it will probably be my go to list until I find something more interesting or people get sick of playing against it. Until next time, have a great week.
Comments