So now that I have the obligatory joke out of the way in the title let’s talk seriously. The Hardcell is a really tough little ship.
Hardcells are great, do you need a support ship? Not a problem they have that covered. Do you want something that can punch from long range they got that for you as well. They are also deceptively durable ships they are not going to take a huge amount of damage, but they can generally take at least one big shot without too many problems, and not all small ships can say that.
First the support option or the transport. Currently, the double officer slot is a little strange, but I think once the CIS gets more support type officers it will be very nice to have that double officer slot however there are a few ways to get that to work for you right now.
Hardcell Transport (47)
• Rune Haako (4)
• Hondo Ohnaka (2)
• Comms Net (2)
= 55 Points
It's simple it gets tokens from rune to put somewhere else and Hondo for more tokens all while still being able to use its squadron value of 2 to help push squads. It’s not absolutely amazing, but it gets the job done.
Hardcell Transport (47)
• San Hill (3)
• TI-99 (4)
• Slicer Tools (7)
= 61 Points
So this was my attempt to try and make San Hill work, and it was actually okay. I ran it with a group of 6 Vultures. I activated all of them during round 2 but from that point on it was all in the squadron phase. This was helped by getting the slice in round 2 to make it that much more difficult for my opponent to kill my squads before the squadron phase in turn 3. While in range of the TI-99 effect San Hill is pretty much useless. However, once outside that effect San Hill lets you get the drop on your opponent’s squadrons when you slicer their primary carrier. I will say again not amazing, but it seemed to function as intended. If you want a screen that will get work done this is a good ship to help that happen.
Hardcell Transport (47)
• Tikkes (2)
• Intel Officer (7)
• Comms Net (2)
= 58 Points
This one is also a bit odd you are going to be spamming con-fire command to get more dice to make the intel officer a bit more impactful while using Tikkes and comms net to pass off most likely a con fire token to fuel a Intensify Firepower, but for the 1 point more then munition resupply, Tikkes, and comms net give some flexibility and that is nice. The intel officer is a little strange but 3-4 dice backed up with IF is pretty solid damage and intel officer a salvo or redirect can be pretty annoying causing tokens to get burned much sooner than they should of, or you are having far more damage stick. Is it worth the points though? I am inclined to say yes as it makes for a really mean and annoying support ship, but your mileage may vary. I ran this with Mar Tuuk so most of the time I was getting 4-5 dice and that made the intel officer on the redirects pretty mean.
Really the support is mostly for the fleet command, however particularly when running IF you could take these as a naked ship that will do nearly as much work for you in combat as the battle refit while still keeping its squadron value of 2. It’s a very solid pick, so why take the battle refit?
So the battle refit gets a little bit more range changing the transport's blue dice into reds and gets some extra power when it comes to hitting squads. In addition, it also drops an officer slot a support team, and a fleet support slot for a defensive retrofit, offensive retrofit, and turbolaser slot.
In most lists, I think taking a battle refit will come down to 2 questions am I willing to pay 8 points to get access to another reserved hanger deck, 5 for the ship, and 3 for the upgrade, and/or do I want access to dice fixing on this ship in the form of LTT or TRC. If you have access to IF in your list the dice fixing won’t be a huge problem, and the extra range just does not seem to matter all that much. Now there are a few cases like taking slaved turrets with Mar Tuuk to get a hardcell to throw 6 dice at long range, but in most lists, these are the two questions you need to ask yourself.
I really don’t have a whole lot to say about the battle refit build wise you are going to have something in the turbolaser slot, and sometimes you might have a reserved hanger deck. However, if you are running a pure Hardcell spam list you might want to take a more durable option as a flagship.
Hardcell Battle Refit (52)
• Wat Tambor (5)
• Early Warning System (7)
• Linked Turbolaser Towers (7)
• Foreman's Labor (5)
= 76 Points
Let’s talk about titles, First Forman's Labor.
it’s a simple clean title if your defending hull zone has shields you can exhaust this to reduce the damage by 1. It’s simple and clean if you are running this you probably want an engineering command or token to push shields on what should be your front hull zone. This makes it a bit more ideal for a battle refit, but it can go on a transport that is not worried about pushing tokens around. This makes a deceptively durable ship just that much more difficult to kill.
Beast of Burden is a bit more complex.
Frist when you activate you exhaust the can and you can spend 1 or more of your defense tokens to choose up to that many defense tokens on friendly SHIPS (notice the plural) at distance 1-3, and ready those tokens. So beast of burden lets you ready a lot of defense tokens if you need to, this is because each friendly ship can ready an equal number of tokens that you spent. So if Beast of Burden spent 2 tokens each friendly ship can ready 2 tokens it is pretty insane value. Now if your opponent is focusing down one ship at a time you won’t get that often, however, when you pair this with two Battle Refits with TRCs you can get some really fun and cool things going.
The Hardcell its a great ship the only reason I don’t think you will see one in every CIS list is well spoilers every CIS ship is very good. However, if you need a cheap ship or a fleet support upgrade in your list or want to cram in as many reserved hanger decks as possible into your list these are the ships you’re looking for.
Both the battle refit and transport have the roles they play, I do think the extra red dice from the battle refit is a bit overvalued, if you are not doing something special with reserved hanger decks or a turbolaser just take a transport and slap Foreman’s Labor on it for the same cost. What do you think of the Hardcell? What is your favorite way to run them? Have you tried or played against Hardcell spam if so what did you think? Until next time have a great week!
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