SSD Expiation Evaluation Part 4 Ship Types and Builds

So this will by the last article about the SSD at least until I get to play with it a few times. So in this article we are going to look at ship types and list builds for them. We will be looking at this mostly from at 400 point games, but we will still discuss the ships that can only be played in larger games, as well. So lets dive in and look at the ship that we have know about for several months now the Star Dreadnought Command Prototype. Star Dreadnought Command Prototype

So when I first saw this guy I was a little disappointed, as I really had a hard time asking myself why would I take this over just 2 ISDs? So lets answer that question. The first thing I saw about this ship that was a bit of a let down was that its front arch was just as good as a regular ISD-II, sure it can attack 3 times from it with Gunnery teams, but two IDSs can attack 4 times. So what does this have over two ISD-II, well it has two fleet command slots, 3 officer slots, one more than two ISDs would have, also it has a pass mechanic so it has as many activations as two ISDs, unless you though in Strategic adviser, and that leads us to something more we don't really know, will it be able to take Large ship only upgrades? While I do believe that an FAQ will drop ether at the same time or shortly after the SSD gets released I don't think the SSD will be able to take large ship only upgrades, mostly due to the fact that Pryce exists, and her on an SSD I think could be pretty broken set her for turn 1 have a bid and with how big you are and your ability to first last 3 ships because you can attack 3 times, yeah just seams kinda broken, but time and play-testers will tell, so I am going into this assuming that size class restricted cards wont be FAQed to get on this guy, its entirely possible that some cards get FAQed to be able to be placed on this guy, and not others but time will tell and that is why I am planning to reevaluate the SSD after having some play time with it. So moving forward why take this over two ISDs well its actually cheaper. So lets look at a bare bones ISD-II. An ISD-II is 120 points, it really wants leading shots so that is another 4 points, then it wants some sort of turbolaser, probably XI7s so 6 more points, you could leave it there, but its hard to take any long range ISD without gunnery teams, unless you want to have Advanced gunnery as your objectives, and With an SSD though cool you really want Gunnery teams, so we will put Gunnery teams on this IDS for another 7 points, that brings us to a total of 137 points and for two of them that would be 274 points and for and SSD kited out the same way we would have a 237 point ship so a savings of 37 points and we just get one less attack is that worth it? Well I will let you decided, but lets talk how to outfit this guy.

So with all SSD variations you want your ISD to really bring the pain as it will probably be your only ship dealing damage, and to get as much value out of this guy you need Gunnery teams, and sure you would get some insane value from the Advanced Gunnery Objective, but lets be honest your opponent is never going to pick that, so unless you are running a token farming list, witch I dont think an SSD can pull off your taking Gunnery teams.

We are going to need some rerolls now I this guy I am not so sure about Director Krennic, but I think he has a place, leading shot seams like a good choice for that guy, because as we are slow going ship Quad battery turrets seams like a good choice, and I think that will be a pretty standard load out for this guy Gunnery teams, Leading shots, and quad battery turrets, its cheep its easy and effective. Lastly as we have 3 officer slots, Damage control officer would not be a bad pick for one of the slots really boost your survive-ability as you have two contains. Brunosn is also not a bad pick ether, as you are so big you are probably always going to be close to an obstetrical.

With the fleet support slots this ship might want to be a heavy support ship as well so I think this version of the ship wants to be the ship that has 1 to 2 friendly so help get the most value out of our upgrade suite. So lets look at a few builds with this guy.

Heavy Support [ flagship ] Star Dreadnought Command Prototype (220 points) - Moff Jerjerrod ( 23 points) - Annihilator ( 8 points) - Wulff Yularen ( 7 points) - Agent Kallus ( 3 points) - Darth Vader ( 1 points) - Gunnery Team ( 7 points) - Quad Battery Turrets ( 5 points) - Leading Shots ( 4 points) - Intensify Firepower! ( 6 points) - Entrapment Formation! ( 5 points) = 289 total ship cost

Arquitens-class Light Cruiser (54 points) - Skilled First Officer ( 1 points) = 55 total ship cost

Arquitens-class Light Cruiser (54 points) - Skilled First Officer ( 1 points) = 55 total ship cost

399 total points

So this list leverages our ability to take two fleet command upgrades, to support the Arquitens by letting them con fire to get extra dice, and not worry about nav commands because of JJ and entrapment, and gives them dice fixing power with intensify Firepower. You get the nav token from taking a nav command on the first turn and the rest of the game you will be spamming con fire to get extra dice, and the token for Intensify Firepower. The annihilator title paired with agent Kallus helps us in the squadron game, I would love to take quad laser turrets, but I am not sure what would be dropped to take it. Skilled First officer is taken mostly as Vader fodder, for insurance against really bad rolls from the Arquitens.

I like this list because it leverages all the advantages of the SSD the two fleet command slots, the token generation from commands the 3 attacks with gunnery teams, and the 3 officer slots. It is a heavy support ship that will help the fleet keep squadrons in check, and provide both dice fixing, and help with maneuverability. It seams solid however the biggest downside is that I cant get Intensify off until turn 3 unless I discard it, but I have Vader for turn 2 if need, so I think its a soiled list that brings as many advantages from the SSD as it can, it will probably still struggle against squadrons, but the SSD will help a lot with them, and If I could find a way to get quad laser turrets on the SSD I think it would bolster that, but I just cant seam to find what I would like to drop for that.

Father and son

SSD Command Prototype (220) • Moff Jerjerrod (23) • Gunnery Team (7) • Leading Shots (4) • Quad Battery Turrets (5) = 259 Points

Imperial II (120) • Strategic Adviser (4) • Gunnery Team (7) • Leading Shots (4) • XI7 Turbolasers (6) = 141 Points

Total Points: 400

So this one is simple its bare bones ISD and SSD, you deploy the SSD as close to a board edge as you can so the board edge is protecting one flank and the ISD II in the other flank of the SSD, its simple in theory, some may ask well why don't we take triple ISD, well anyone that has flown triple ISDs or flown against it may have notice that in most games one ISD ether has trouble getting into the engagement, or is left training the other two ISDs as a finisher, this lets us bring all of our firepower to bear at once. Is it amazing, probably not, but will it be intimidating to see on the other side of the table, yeah it will. The support Frontloader [ flagship ] Star Dreadnought Command Prototype (220 points) - Moff Jerjerrod ( 23 points) - Executor ( 2 points) - Taskmaster Grint ( 5 points) - Skilled First Officer ( 1 points) - Gunnery Team ( 7 points) - Expanded Hangar Bay ( 5 points) - Quad Battery Turrets ( 5 points) - Leading Shots ( 4 points) - All Fighters Follow Me! ( 5 points) = 277 total ship cost

1 Colonel Jendon ( 20 points) 1 "Mauler" Mithel ( 15 points) 1 Maarek Steele ( 21 points) 1 Dengar ( 20 points) 1 Morna Kee ( 27 points) 1 Gamma Squadron ( 10 points) = 113 total squadron cost

Total point cost 390

So we talked about frontloading in the past, but lets just have a refresher. Frontloading is packing as much power as possible into one activation, to deal as much damage as possible in one activation, and this list does that very well. So lets say probably best case scenario, we are going up agitates a corvette spam list, turn one we take a squadron command and gain two tokens one form the SSDs ability and one from Grint, this also leads us to an interesting question though how will squadron deployment work with the SSD? As you can really forward deploy your fighters and strike with them turn one, so it is possible that fighters may receive the ruling that they must be deployed within distance 2 of the deployment zone, as the SSD will most likely have a unique deployment rule, that lets it deploy outside the deployment zone due to its size, witch as said would let us really push our fighters forward turn one. I am just going to assume that we are not going to get a turn one jump with our fighters, so they wont get to attack round one. However now that we have two squadron tokens thanks to Grint, executor and the SSD ability next round we will be able to All Fighters follow me to boost our slower squadrons speed, and still activate all of our squadrons. Once we have these tokens we need to maneuver In such a way that we can catch ships, then again best case scenario, we have 3 ships in our front arch in medium range, because of how long our base is this should be doable. and a squadron command, against a corvette swarm it is not unreasonable, for us to kill 4 ships in this one activation, 3 from the front arch shot of the SSD, and an additional one from our squadrons, that is a huge swing at the top of turn 2, so you see where this is going of course this is an ideal situation, but I don't think its unachievable, it will be a list that is very dependent on its ability to position to catch ships, as it will always be hopelessly out activated, and its list like this that make me think Pryce will never be allowed to be on this ship.

STAR DREADNOUGHT ASSAULT PROTOTYPE

So now we move on to the Assault prototype, and well this one has one more dice in each of its archs other than the rear than the command SSD, and it dose not have the fleet support slots, this ship is your big mean ship that just wants to kill stuff. Its not so concerned with supporting a few other ships than it is about other ships supporting it. The thing that first stood out to me on this guy was that he has two ion upgrade slots, I really want a smaller ship that has two ion upgrades slots to enter the game and bring some more good Ion cards with it that is not this ship, but it is interesting, it also has two turbolaser slots, so yeah this is wants to kill kill kill, and just needs the support to do it, so lets look at some lists.

The One Hit Wonder

[ flagship ] Star Dreadnought Assault Prototype (250 points) - Admiral Piett ( 22 points) - Ravager ( 4 points) - Director Krennic ( 8 points) - Agent Kallus ( 3 points) - Wullf Yularen ( 7 points) - Gunnery Team ( 7 points) - Quad Laser Turrets ( 5 points) - Point-Defense Reroute ( 5 points) - Spinal Armament ( 9 points) - Quad Turbolaser Cannons ( 10 points) - SW-7 Ion Batteries ( 5 points) - Heavy Ion Emplacements ( 9 points) = 342 total ship cost

Gozanti-class Cruisers (23 points) - Darth Vader ( 1 points) - Comms Net ( 2 points) = 26 total ship cost

Gozanti-class Cruisers (23 points) - Hondo Ohnaka ( 2 points) - Comms Net ( 2 points) = 27 total ship cost

total point cost: 397

So this list is strictly designed to get as many dice as we possibly can from this ship as possible, more dice more damage. So this ship is very obviously going to spam con fire commands so we have one extra dice from the command+ one from the token then we wullf the token back spend it again on the same shot as the FAQ says we can do that, so we have 3 extra dice so far then we have one from spinal for 4 dice, and finally if we roll an accuracy on all of thoughts red dice odds are we will we will get another red dice for a total of 5 extra dice witch brings us to a total of 10 red dice, that's pretty crazy at long range, and we will get to reroll the ten dice with Krennic for our one shot wonder huge amounts of damage shot. With how long the SSD's base is don't forget we will very likely get this shot off turn one and this shot can kill almost any small ship in the game. It is kitted out as best it can be to take care of squadrons with Kallus, Quad battery turrets, and supporting flack from the Gozantis we should be able to take out squadrons. Point-Defense Reroute is a bad, card, but it gives us something sometimes when we are attacking squadrons, and I really don't know what to do with the points otherwise.

All the Commands

[ flagship ] Star Dreadnought Assault Prototype (250 points) - Admiral Piett ( 22 points) - Executor ( 2 points) - Wulff Yularen ( 7 points) - Admiral Chiraneau ( 10 points) - Agent Kallus ( 3 points) - Gunnery Team ( 7 points) - Quad Laser Turrets ( 5 points) - Quad Battery Turrets ( 5 points) - X17 Turbolasers ( 6 points) - SW-7 Ion Batteries ( 5 points) - Leading Shots ( 4 points) = 326 total ship cost

Gozanti-class Cruisers (23 points) - Suppressor ( 4 points) - Darth Vader ( 1 points) - Comms Net ( 2 points) = 30 total ship cost

Gozanti-class Cruisers (23 points) - Vector ( 2 points) - Hondo Ohnaka ( 2 points) - Comms Net ( 2 points) = 29 total ship cost

1 "Mauler" Mithel ( 15 points) = 15 total squadron cost

Total point cost=400

So this build takes a simple approach the SSD can do reliable damage, and its command dial will be ether con fire or maneuver, the Gozanti's pass out tokens to fuel Piett, and the executor title lets us stack engineering tokens and once we have two of them its as good as a full on command, so if played properly you can get off in essence 3 full commands on most of your turns. I feel that it also has strong answers to the squadron game with vector letting mauler sit back then pounce from pretty far away, and the n Chiraneau to keep getting value out of mauler, meaning your opponent can't ignore Mauler so they will have to spend a few squadron activation's on dealing with him then you support mauler with flack, and you got a pretty good shot at winning the squadron game, and then both chiraneau and Kallus are Vader fodder, chiraneau seams like expensive fodder, and he is but he is cheaper than a 12 point jumpmaster, and dose more for me against ships because of Vader.

Imperial white Shirt Frontloaders

[ flagship ] Star Dreadnought Assault Prototype (250 points) - Grand Admiral Thrawn ( 32 points) - Ravager ( 4 points) - Director Krennic ( 8 points) - Wulff Yularen ( 7 points) - Admiral Ozzel ( 2 points) - Gunnery Team ( 7 points) - Boosted Comms ( 4 points) - Expanded Hangar Bay ( 5 points) - X17 Turbolasers ( 6 points) - Quad Battery Turrets ( 5 points) - SW-7 Ion Batteries ( 5 points) = 335 total ship cost

5 TIE Bomber Squadrons ( 45 points) 1 Dengar ( 20 points) = 65 total squadron cost

Total Point Cost=400

So this is very simpler to our other front loader list, but is more focused on decking out the ship than having high quality squadrons. There is not much more to say other than that, other than you will only be getting your squad commands from Thrawn, and so will only be able to push 5 squadrons, so you will always push your bombers unless you need to move your Intel so your bombers can bomb. Pretty simple list.

The next two we are not going to spend really a hole lot of time on as they are not playable in 400 point list, but they are for fun games, however I don't really know if there will be an official 'epic play' game system yet or if its just pick a point amount and have fun. So the point value I have chosen to build the one list for each of the next ones is 800 points, why well because that seams epic, and you still can't fit more than 1 “epic” SSD and a commander at 800 point game.

Executor I-Class Star Dreadnought

So if the SSD Star Dreadnought Command Prototype is a heavy support this version of the SSD takes that support to a whole new level with 4 fleet command slots seams kinda fun, if a little odd. So its roll is really the same as the Command Prototype just on steroids, however this ship dose tell us something about the future of armada, and that is the empire will never have a commander cheaper than 20 points as this guy clocks in at 381, I was thinking they would just say this version can't be used in 400 point games, but that is not the why they went they made it literally impossible to take, so we will not see Imperial commanders cheaper than 20 points, but lets look at fun 800 point list with this guy.

Super Sloan Support

[ flagship ] Executor I-class Star Dreadnought (381 points) - Admiral Sloane ( 24 points) - Executor ( 2 points) - Emperor Palpatine ( 3 points) - Taskmaster Grint ( 5 points) - Wulff Yularen ( 7 points) - Skilled First Officer ( 1 points) - Gunnery Team ( 7 points) - Boosted Comms ( 4 points) - Quad Battery Turrets ( 5 points) - Leading Shots ( 4 points) - Intensify Firepower! ( 6 points) - All Fighters, Follow Me! ( 5 points) - Shields to Maximum! ( 6 points) - Entrapment Formation! ( 5 points) = 465 total ship cost

Imperial Star Destroyer Cymoon 1 Refit (112 points) - Avenger ( 5 points) - Director Krennic ( 8 points) - Gunnery Team ( 7 points) - Spinal Armament ( 9 points) - X17 Turbolasers ( 6 points) = 147 total ship cost

Gozanti-class Cruisers (23 points) - Darth Vader ( 1 points) - Comms Net ( 2 points) = 26 total ship cost

Gozanti-class Cruisers (23 points) - Suppressor ( 4 points) - Hondo Ohnaka ( 2 points) - Comms Net ( 2 points) = 31 total ship cost

1 Maarek Steele ( 21 points) 1 Colonel Jendon ( 20 points) 1 "Howlrunner" ( 16 points) 1 "Mauler" Mithel ( 15 points) 1 Valen Rudor ( 13 points) 1 Ciena Ree ( 17 points) 1 Soontir Fel ( 18 points) 1 Black Squadron ( 9 points) = 129 total squadron cost

Total points 798

So this list seams fun as it has a lot of cool interactions, with executor, grint, wullf you can push all 8 of your squadrons. Emperor Palpatine, has cool interactions with Avenger and Sloan, you also have suppressor, so you should be exhausting lots of tokens, you can also get most of your fleet commands to trigger most of the time so that is fun, is it a good list I don't know, I don't play 800 point games, but it does seam like it could be fun.

Executor II-Class Star Dreadnought

So this guy is you end all be all SSD he hits hard and even has a fleet support slot to boot. He is the end all be all of SSDs not much more to say about this guy he will hit very, very hard, and support your fleet at the same time so I'm not sure what is not to like about this guy, he means nothing, in 400 point games, but lets look at an 800 point list with this guy.

[ flagship ] Executor II-class Star Dreadnought (411 points) - Moff Jerjerrod ( 23 points) - Ravager ( 4 points) - Skilled First Officer ( 1 points) - Wulff Yularen ( 7 points) - Captain Brunson ( 5 points) - Damage Control Officer ( 5 points) - Gunnery Team ( 7 points) - Quad Battery Turrets ( 5 points) - Quad Turbolaser Cannons ( 10 points) - SW-7 Ion Batteries ( 5 points) - Leading Shots ( 4 points) - Intensify Firepower! ( 6 points) = 493 total ship cost

Arquitens-class Light Cruiser (54 points) - Skilled First Officer ( 1 points) - Enhanced Armament ( 10 points) = 65 total ship cost

Arquitens-class Light Cruiser (54 points) - Skilled First Officer ( 1 points) - Enhanced Armament ( 10 points) = 65 total ship cost

Gozanti-class Assault Carriers (28 points) - Darth Vader ( 1 points) - Comms Net ( 2 points) = 31 total ship cost

Gozanti-class Assault Carriers (28 points) - Hondo Ohnaka ( 2 points) - Comms Net ( 2 points) = 32 total ship cost

1 Captain Jonus ( 16 points) 1 Ciena Ree ( 17 points) 1 Valen Rudor ( 13 points) 1 Colonel Jendon ( 20 points) 1 Maarek Steele ( 21 points) 1 Morna Kee ( 27 points) = 114 total squadron cost

total point cost 800

This list is just a fun chuck your red dice type list, that is balanced with a well balanced squadron screen. I don't have much more to say about about this, just a fun big red dice list.

What do you think if the ship types, and what are the ship builds have you come up with? Like I said there is still a lot we don't fully know about the SSD, but this is my impressions of what we do know, we wont be talking about the SSD any more on AMM until its release, and I have gotten some play time with it. If you have any suggestions for content please let me know, also tomorrow will be the last day that we have game night until January 8th. I will probably still do AMM In the mean time but they will be much shorter, I will also be announcing prize support for The Second Utah Open before the month is out so keep an eye out for that, also if you have not cast your vote for what weekend you want to have this tournament please cast your vote on the Facebook page its in the announcement section. Thank you again for what each of you do for our community, and have a wonderful week!