Why bother with TIE bombers?

[Spellbound 27]

I've recently had some bad luck using Rhymer and 3 bombers, plus a couple babysitter interceptors and howlrunner.  I find they don't do enough damage, and wish instead that I just had like...9 bombers and rhymer!  Wouldn't that be something!

 

But of course, a single A-wing flying into the middle and it's all over.  And the bombers themselves are terrible at anti-fighter.  TERRIBLE.  So that wouldn't be good at all!

 

I decided to go back to basics, my advanced, howlrunner, mauler, soontir with demolisher and a Vic 2 and did fairly well, but during a tournament this past weekend I found that my little advanced could really tear up the field.  While I was depending on 4 bombers to roll lots of hit-crits, they weren't performing.  Mon Motha's evades were jut cancelling everything at medium range, and even at close range my rerolls would often turn up blank.  Four wasn't cutting it in place of serious damage, yet my advanced was doing alright on its own.

 

I postulated that the reason was, let's be honest, a black die is supposed to get a hit 75% of the time.  25% of the time, it gets hit-crit, the bomber's dream.  But damage is damage, and what I really need a bunch of fighters to do is use up the enemy's defense tokens so that my lumbering ships can get good solid hits that don't get evaded away.

 

So....why not just a bunch of advanceds?  They roll the same black die that a bomber rolls, and if rhymer is around they have the same range.  They have the same speed, same number of hits, but carry three squadron dice instead of the paltry 1 that the bomber runs.

 

5 advanced, soontir fel, and rhymer is 94 points.  If someone really tries to engage, that's a LOT of escort to chew through, which soontir fel is going to LOVE, and they can all hit out to medium range.  Even soontir has a 50% chance at getting a hit with his blue die, and his ability gets past gallant haven, which would allow you, if you wanted, to just swarm the enemy's fighter cloud and let their own attacks kill themselves as they chew through the advanceds (and once gallant moves away, that'll end real quick anyway).

 

I feel like the 3 points more you spend on an advanced doesn't diminish their offensive capability much, yet gives you the anti-squadron fire you wouldn't really need to invest many other points in.

 

Alternatively, you could add howlrunner instead of soontir fel and now all of your advanced shoot as well as fel.  The saved points allow for an extra TIE to make it an even 100, or you could just put the spare points elsewhere.  Actually I think I'd recommend howlrunner instead, since her ability works even if the enemy doesn't engage her.

 

What do you guys think?  A bit of love for the advanced?

[Sirdrasco 254]

A bomber allows you to resolve criticals, a 1 in 4 chance. I usually do Ryhmer and 1 bomber and 2 Advanced the rest are basic TIE's.

I use the basic TIEs to tie up his squadrons. Suddenly his ships are moving without fighter cover.

Now I hit the ships with the Advance first to strip sheilds, then with the bombers to get the crits.

Plus with Ryhmers attacks at Medium and Close range. I position them to hit them as they come in aligning with the VSD arc. So the targets hit by the VSD, Advance, and the Bombers all in the same round. I figure the bombers are worth it.

[Bitharne 175]

A lot of people's complaint about squadrons is that the main game centers around ships: so if you buy squads you aren't buying ships they are "wasting" points. This leads them to buy Bombers to act in the ship game, ironically wasting the points if their oppown t takes any actual fighters.

Basically, you have way too many Bombers. The most, at 300, I would argue is 2: Rhymer and a generic. Then you can fill with some advances if you want. I prefer balanced fighter buolds to give options myself.

[CDAT 243]

I just go with fighters to stop fighters and ship to deal with ships.I can see the value of Rhymer but do not see the value of the generic bomber.

[Spellbound 27]

The question is how do you feel about the advanced as an all-round good ship that does both reasonably well, and paired with rhymer to make them almost as scary as bombers, but able to deal with squadrons and keep rhymer safe at the same time?

[Madaghmire 7,277]

I look forward to combining rhymer with a firespray.

[Indomitable 215]

I look forward to combining rhymer with a firespray.

Bounty hunters... We don't need that scum...

[vhaele 3]

 

I look forward to combining rhymer with a firespray.

Bounty hunters... We don't need that scum...

 

Yes sir!

 

(One of my favourite lines in TESB - he doesn't sound like he's agreeing with the other officer, it sounds more like he's complying with an order to not need scum).

[Darth Ravenor 6]

Rhymer and 10 tie/ln is a nice bundle of joy. Yes the tie/ln only rolls a blue against ships.  If you bundle them all up and not allow room for an enemy to get into engagement with rhymer then any unengaged tie/ln can lend their dice out to med range against a ship. And you have 10 tie/ln to kill enemy squadrons if needed. 

[ficklegreendice 34,362]

Never underestimate the coin flip in great numbers

 

 

I agree with the gist of what's been posted, too many bombers makes you too rigid.

 

I've experimented recently with Rhymer, 1 Bomber, 3 Advanced, Soonts, and 2 Ties. They sadly didn't acomplish a whole lot against ships (that accursed Mothma works on rhymer), but thanks to the make-up I managed to fight Yavaris, 2 escort nebs, Wedge, a generic X, 3 A-wings, Dutch, and a Y until only the heavy squadrons remained.

 

good thing too, because I know for a fact that Yavaris demolishes VSDs with bombers (done it on several occasions ) but the poor girl doesn't have much she can do all her own against the Dominator

 

I can say I was quite pleased with the Advanced being essentially fast X-wings when supported with flight controllers. 5 health kept them from popping like fighters and helped hold the line.

 

Unfortunately, soontir's ability literally never triggered. I'll be replacing him with a generic Interceptor and promoting one of the ties to Mauler.

Edited July 15, 2015 by ficklegreendice

[Extropia 1,475]

Advanced are very solid, but i dont see them as a replacement for Bombers. They are significantly less effective against ships( ignoring criticals is a major difference), and cost more.

Obviously however they aren't so horrifyingly vulnerable against fighters.

 

I don't think they replace bombers at all. They complement them excellently, but so far my best results have come from mixed fighters with everything doing what it's supposed to (opponents efforts to foil this notwithstanding). 

 

2 Bombers (Rhymer + Generic), 1-2 Advanced and then season to taste with /LN or Interceptors is my favourite so far.

[Spellbound 27]

Rhymer with tons of interceptors sounds nice, too.

 

If you have 10 blue dice being thrown, half of them end up as hits.  If the enemy uses Monmotha to cancel them from medium range (and you could also use rhymer to attack from close range - close range is still WAY more than distance 1, so you're getting use out of rhymer, but keeping the enemy from canceling dice altogether), that's less tokens they have available for your other ships to hit hard with.

 

I'm also finding that since Monmotha is the auto-include for rebels, it's becoming worth it to take things like H9 turbolasers to get accuracy tokens.  Sure, you do less damage, but it's better than zero, which is what seems to be happening to me lately.  Pair with an Intel officer to make them make some hard decisions early on.

 

My standard fleet of a Vic II with demolisher, Vic decked out with anti-token wargear, is working well.  They can spend their tokens against demolisher, if he acts first, but then when the vic shoots they're at severely limited options.  And the next turn.... I have them!

[Bitharne 175]

People keep talking about Mon Mothma and Rhymer...I don't understand this. Tokens work on one attack. If you have your bombers and you're eating their tokens; how are you losing?

 

Are you getting into a spot where rhymer and your only other bomber (since the rest of your fighters are dogfighting) are tossing shots at a ship that none of your over ships are shooting? Well, then you're just playing wrong. Focus fire that shiz...squadron command will force them to make the hard choice of tokening a SINGLE bomb vs saving it for when you unload with 3 red and maybe 3 blue from your victory and/or re-rolling one of the many blacks your demolisher is going to dumb on their face.

 

If you don't squadron command, you can unload 4 reds they have to address THEN bombs later after they're defended against the ships.

 

Evades are great to mitigate the odd shot or two that lands a heavy hit, at range; but when you have a ship and 2-4 black dice with potentially a half dozen blue dice launched at you, then the evades do very little to defend the ship.

[CDAT 243]

People keep talking about Mon Mothma and Rhymer...I don't understand this. Tokens work on one attack. ..

I was also wondering about this. Also how do you keep your fighters alive? In the group I play his fighters maybe kill one of mine, but his ships (every one with two blue dice) kill my fighters in droves. So much so that I have stopped taking any TiE fighters as they do not even last one round of combat. When a ship can shoot you ship with its guns and the out of the same arc fire it anti-fighter guns at every single fighter in range, any with three health die so fast.

[ficklegreendice 34,362]

fighters aren't meant to live

 

either you get the drop on some poor fool and you drop a considerable offense of anti-squadron barrage + swarm (which is very significant for their cheap asking-price), or you burn them to engage squadrons and keep them from hitting more important targets

 

this is probably why I see a lot of interceptors, who at least can counter before they die, but having run 3 nebs with gusto I haven't had much more trouble with the more elite 3-health guys than the fodder

 

they're an offensive weapon, as characterized by superior speed over the greater part of the rebellion squadrons (everyone but the A-wing) and the one-shot health (lowest in the game)

 

 

getting one-shot is basically why I switched to some advances, but still kept 2 tie fighters and an interceptor around. Advances have more health and 150% of the cost, but Tie Fighters actually hit more reliably against squadrons due to Swarm, which makes advances pretty poor value in terms of just punching fools but with Escort they make great shields.

 

imo, the key to using fighters is as in most games, recognize they're disposable and hope they do something useful before they die. To facilitate this, laden the VSD with hangars and FC and take a squadron token early. 5 ties thrown at a body of squadrons are going to do some pretty painful damage before they go poof.

 

an alternative might be to keep the ties back and let the enemy squadrons slam into the VSD for one round. you'll take a beating, but unless they're packing yavaris + B-wings you'll live and once you've engaged with Ties the enemies can no longer shoot your ships.

 

lastly, obstruction may be your best friend. because of engagement rules and loss of dice, I've had many opponents just sit howlie on a rock and let her do her thing. If you can't get the jump on enemies for whatever reason, obstructions could help you out quite a bit.

Edited July 18, 2015 by ficklegreendice