In-Flight Report Republic Hot Takes
Republic Ships
It's finally here, our first look at how the Clone Wars will kick off. I'm starting with the Republic because Clones are cooler than droids and it's my blog. If you think Droids are cooler start your own. Maybe a small hint of who I will most likely be playing most of the time as well.
Starter Fleets
It seems FFG is trying a new entry point into Armada which I approve. It hasn't lowered the cost of entry unfortunately but at least you get a little task force sized fleet to immediately start playing with...you just have to find someone with another collection to play against. In reality the start of a game now costs ~200 USD since you would buy 2 starters to get a actual battle/game going.
BUT if you only want to play one side, this is a far better deal since it starts you out at ~200 pts (if I was to guess) and will allow you to expand as you want and not have a useless Victory or Neb B just hanging around.
For Veteran Players two of these should provide a full list until the hinted at waves (hopefully the leaked Venator & Providence) arrive in Q1 of 2021. Let start the ball rolling looking at the Cards and ships themselves though beginning with the first Star Destroyer-esque ship we see in the Prequels, the Acclamator.
Acclamator Assault Ship
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| Click to make it even bigger! |
Starting off it would appear we have the Acclamator I & II. Unless FFG has drastically changed thier formula I expect them to share many of the same stats with only some differences in upgrades, dice, and fleet building rules* (something new!).
Generic Acclamator Stats
7 Hull
4 Front Shields
2 Side Shields
2 Rear Shields
Both are Command 3 and we can Presume Engineering 4, though the Squadron value is usually the one that changes so we'll have to wait and see if that is similar.
Speed 3 with a interesting Nav Chart and decent enough defense tokens
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| how does this thing even fly? |
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| Looks about like a Victory SD Arc lines |
Overall, the survivable of the Acclamator looks about the same as the Vic. That one brace will get locked down a fair mount but she doesn't actually have many shields to redirect to either and has a bit less hull. though the salvo may end up getting locked down instead of the brace sometimes. It'll be situation dependent though.
Otherwise, that nav chart looks terrible. Or at least it looks like a new way to wrap my head around flying a ship. As much as this look like they want to be carriers they're going to need to navigate if they intend to move around the battlefield in any respectable fashion and keep their much more survivable and dangerous front arc pointed where the Droids are. They haven't been on the table yet though so maybe I'll be wrong.
Acclamator I - 66 pts
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| Pretty Art |
Cmd 3
Squadron 3
Engineering 4
UPGRADES
Officer
Weapons Team
Offensive Retrofit x2
Ordinance
Turbolaser
DICE
Front Arc - 3 Red, 2 Black
Side Arcs - 2 Red, 1 Black
Rear Arc - 1 Red, 1 Black
Flak - 2 Black
This strikes me as better VSD I, or at least something different that is similar to the Vic. Initial thoughts looks like a decent carrier with the double Offensive Retrofits and the Weapons Team. Boosted Comm/Expanded Hanger Bay/ Flight controllers anyone? I imagine LTT will be a staple of this ship as it will always have a red dice for shooting except for Flak. And this might actually be a decent platform for Ord Pods or Ex Racks....Lets be real it Ex Racks.
It also only costs 66 pts so it's quite the steal (7 pts) compared to a VSD 1 currently. And it does have the Clone and Transport Fleet Building Rules. We only know of one card that exists but this implies there are more of these coming. And Clone Gunners doesn't seem terrible nt he ship if you're looking for a gunship Acclamator I. I have no idea what the Transport keyword may do but perhaps there are other upgrade cards like enable boarding or the like but only with the Legions of Troops available on Transports? I'm not sure but I'm hoping we find out Friday.
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| At the cost of a ConFire token you can throw an accuracy down on that 9 damage Ex Rack Roll |
Acclamator II
Unfortunately we know less about this ship since it hasn't been competed spoiled. I'll list what we know for sure and speculate some at the end.
Cmd 3
Squadron 3
UPGRADES
Officer
Weapons Team
Defensive Retrofit
Ordinance
Turbolaser
Dice
Side Arc - ??, 1 Black
Flak - 1 Blue, 1 Black
Keywords
Clone, Bombard, Transport
Lots of unknowns here but this looks to be the more survivable ship with the defensive retrofit. You can keep that Brace for the time you need to spend it, or ECM Salvo to kill the attacker before it double arcs you. Perhaps this will be your flagship while the Acclamator I plunges into the battle with it's black dice and the C70's skirmish. If I was a betting man I would replace the black dice with blue dice and maybe swap out a red here or there. Though it could also go the 2 Red, 2 Blue, 1 Black route and have a rainbow of dice. I'm banking on these being the VSD II to the VSD I and costed appropriately.
We get another new keyword, Bombard. It'll be interesting to see what upgrades that enables or how to plays into objectives. First thing that popped into my head was an upgrade allowing black dice to be used at long range? Might be an interesting use of the ship and enable some longer ranged firepower.
My guesses:
~74 points
Engineering 4
DICE
Front Arc - 2 Red, 2 Blue, 1 Black
Side Arcs - 1 Red, 1 Blue, 1 Black
Rear Arc - 1 Red, 1 Blue
Overall, both of these should be interesting and I imagine will see play even after larger ships are released or at least I will. I've always loved the look of these even after the Venators came around. Just something very Republic about them before they got all Imperial-lite.
Consulur Cruiser/C70
Initial Impression is these are the CR90s of the Republic. The skirmishers that hand around the edges and harass and annoy you with tiny pricks of damage. There looks to be some interesting differences between the two though and that will probably drastically change the way they fly. Without further ado, the Consulur screenshot.
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| First ship seen in the prequels! |
Generic Consulur Stats
4 hull
2 Front Shields
2 Side Shields
1 Rear Shield
Cmd 1
Squadron 1
Engineering 2
Again, and interesting Nav chart and defensive tokens. Both remind me a lot of a Hammerhead corvette which doesn't lend oneselves to surviving two hits in my experience. Not having two evades will probably hamper the TRC70 spam as well. At least one version comes with the support team so I expect to see some Engine TEch C70's zooming around boards in the near future.
The Arc lines of the C70 look very much like a CR90 as well. So perhaps a little time spent with some small stat changes to the CR90 could reveal how survivable of similar to a TRC90 it will be?
Consulur Class Armed Cruiser (37 pts)
This looks to be the C70 we can see on the starter splash page and in the digital trailer. It looks to be a cheaper knife fighter/flak boat of a small ship. Here's what we know
Dice
Front Arc - 2 Blue, 1 Black
Side arc - 1 Blue, 1 Black
Rear arc - 1 Blue
Flak - 2 Blue
Keyword - Comms
Upgrades
????
That's it. I'm not sure what comms might do or how it'll tie in with the upgrades, but my gut says this is the C70 that'll stay next to your larger ships and provide deterrence to close range attacks and flak for the swarms of Vulture droids sure to head your way. The upgrades will really drive what function this ship can achieve otherwise.
Here is some rampant speculation below on upgrades
Officer
Support Team
Ordinance
Fleet Support?? (may be too wild)
Consulur Class Charger C70 (45 pts)
Here is the Clone powered Corvette the Republic will be suing until the Arquitens come around. It seems we know practically everything about this ship at this point, so it'll be good to start putting it on the table. However, I'm sure there are other Clone cards that'll help point this ship in the direction it wants to play. Hopefully Friday will tell.
Dice
Front Arc - 2 Red, 1 Blue
Side arc - 2 Red
Rear arc - 1 Red, 1 Blue
Flak - 2 Blue
Keyword - Clone
Upgrades
Officer
Support Team
Offensive Retrofit
Turbolaser
Now I'm sure we'll see CR90 disciplines take to this ship like rabid dogs but it sure looks like a different beast to fly with that nav chart. Also, I think LTT, and you'll be able to use it on every attack, may lend itself here more to keep that Evade useful for staying alive. But I'm sure that's a fight in the making there. Whatever works for you I just imagine the turbolaser slot will be full with dice fixing until the Republic can get ahold of a fleet command.
Squadrons
Finally, I'm going to dive quickly into squadrons since we have know a fair amount just from the dials shown.
Right off the bat we will be getting 4 squadrons. The ARC-170, V-19 Torrent (plus the 4 from the starter), Aethersprite and the Y-Wing. They all look to have their own different roles and there are some thematic and interesting keywords combinations here. Also, interesting note is that the spread has 7 braces and a single scatter. Perhaps their won;t be as many scatter aces as the Imperials have. Lets dive in.
V-19 Torrent
So you get 4 of these with the core and 1 Squadron pack will net you 2 more, so 6 total.
This looks like a slightly different X-Wing. Escort, Speed 3, and 5 hull are familiar and 12 vs 13 points. However, it swaps two blue anti-squad dice to 1 red and the Red bomber dice to a black non-bomber. It also gains swarm. Initial impression is these looks like a decent swarming squadron that will take a while to chew through. Also, if your opponent doesn't bring squads the black dice should reliably net your one damage. I also like the combo of Escort and Swarm. I'm thinking of jumping my Jedi ACe into the middle of the fray and then following up in that same activation with some V-19s. The Jedi enables the swarm for the red dice or for accuracy fishing and the escort will keep the Jedi safe.
Aethersprite
The other Republic Squadron we know a fair bit about.
So this answers the question of how the force will play in Armada, a keyword that gives a force like ability. This looks very similar to an A-Wing and may fill a similar role though it looks far more survivable. Speed 4, 4 Hull, 3 blue and a Black with a Blue Anti-Ship. That should hit pretty hard against Aces and generics alike especially combined with the new keywords. Adept 1 means you can reroll those blue for accuracies or damage depending on what you need and even reroll the blue dice against ships. That is very nice! Counter 2 is awesome as well as rerolling those dice since its an attack with Adept 1! finally dodge 1 will hopefully offer a higher chance of survival than the 4 hull would suggest. This does come at a Premium cost though. A generic Aethersprite comes in at 17 points! That's as much as Shara and I bet she can stay live longer and put out more damage, but you can have 7 of these and only 1 Shara.
I want to send these in to blast some droid swarms then when they're close to dying after doing their counter I think covering them with some V-19s just might do the trick.There also appears to be an Ace dial in the starter set for the V-19 but you can only zoom in so far...
*Luminara
We have our first Confirmed Ace. Looks like she'll be Flying the Aethersprite and gets at least a Brace. I would be surprised if her other defense token isn't a scatter. She also has Adept 1 and Counter Two, though no dodge so her tokens are her only defense. Finally, we can't see it all her text but I'm pretty sure it says the following.
While an enemy squadron [at distance X] is attacking a non-unique [friendly squadron] the attack is treated as [being obstructed].
If true, this would be a very interesting ability and would play right into a swarm of V-19s covering her. Especially against Droid fighters, they lose half of their dice pool!
Y-Wings
We don't know much. 6 Hull with bomber and Heavy. Seems very similar to the Rebel Y-Wing minus the models. I presume it is speed 3 as well, though maybe they could change up the armament since it has a turret or increase it's anti-ship armament to a red and blue or something. The two squads we know seem to have more of a rainbow of dice at the moment so maybe that's a trend for the Clone Wars factions. Time will tell
ARC-170s
Here is an interesting ship. 7 hull With bomber and Counter. I presume counter 1 and probably speed 3 since it was the precursor to the X-Wing. Wild guess on a Red, 2 Blue for Anti-Squad and a Red bomber dice. Very X-Wing-ish. This might be your selection if you don;t want to commit to pure bombers of the Y-Wing but probably don't want to fight too many other fighters.
