Rogue Squadron- Aethersprite Guide

Welcome to Rogue Squadron, pilot! In this series, we will be looking at the ships you can fly in Fantasy Flight Games X-Wing miniatures game. We’ll take a look at a chassis and what makes it unique along with some upgrades and squadron combos. Strap in and get ready to fly.

I’m altering the deal. Pray I do not alter it further.

A few weeks ago I couldn’t decide on a four ARC list to present so I did a mini review on several variations of them. This proved interesting and more insightful to the chassis than just reviewing a single squadron build. The squadron builds aren’t going away but at least for the new ships we’re going to take a deeper dive at them.

Lock S-Foils in Attack Position

On first glance, the Jedi Aethersprite interceptor feels like a ship that should be rather generic. Two attack dice, three agility, four health. It’s an A-wing, a M3-A or a TIE Advanced Prototype. Quick but fragile and works best in swarms. But upon closer inspection, we see that the Aethersprite is a cut above those others.

Flown exclusively by Jedi, the Aethersprite is the only ship with all Force pilots. The chassis leans into this fact by tying several abilities to Force use. One being the purple Evade action. Other ships in its class are all naturally evasive so needing to spend a Force can feel like a mark against it. But without a Talent slot, you’re not going to be wanting to Evade every round to trigger Juke, so it ends up not being much of an issue. When you absolutely need to avoid taking one damage, you have the evade as an option.

The built-in chassis ability also requires making use of that native Force. Fine Tune Controls makes these ships the only ships in the game able to double reposition and come out unstressed without any outside assistance. This makes them especially squirrely to pin down. They have an astromech slot so can increase their blue maneuver options if they want to make good use of their red S-loops or K-turns but unlike A-wings or Interceptors, they don’t need a blue 2-turn to stay relevant. To top off their maneuverability, beyond the generic Jedi Knight and Barriss, all of the pilots can double reposition and then still have Force available to modify their dice during engagement.

But what really makes the Aethersprite truly standout from the interceptor class of ships is that it’s really two different ships. The Delta-7B title turns them from fragile and soft hitting interceptors to hefty power hitting superiority fighters. They can be A-wings or they can be X-Wings.

Notably, they also have access to the unique Calibrated Laser Targeting which makes good use of their maneuverability and native Force by adding a Focus result to attacks in Bullseye. You would think this would be a great thing to slap on a non-Delta 7B ship but sadly it is just too expensive. The 7B is so much better.

Red Five Standing By

The Aethersprite comes with 9 different pilots between the two released packs. All have a role to fill, though some stand out more than others. Below I’ve ranked them along with some notes on them.

1. Anakin Skywalker (I6)
   1. At I6, Anakin is one of the few it’s worth considering taking CLT over 7B. 7B is still better but he at least has the best chance to make use of CLT.
   2. With four red reverse maneuvers available, Anakin has a lot of choices how best to turn around and get his ability to trigger. This almost turns him into Nien Nunb.
   3. R4-P17 works well on him as it has the same timing window, allowing you to use the droid to boost/barrel roll into range to trigger his ability to ignore the stress.
2. Ahsoka Tano (I3)
   1. Unlike the other Jedi, Ahsoka can spend her Force to do any action, not just a boost/barrel roll. And she can do it while stressed. And, if not stressed, she can then still do Fine Tuned Controls for three potential actions.
   2. It’s important to note that Ahsoka can use her ability on herself or others. I missed that she could use it on herself in the initial reveal and dismissed her.
   3. Works great as a support ship, giving stressed ships an action but also works great on her own.
3. Obi-wan Kenobi (I5)
   1. I5 with three Force is Obi-wan’s main advantage. But when he, or a friendly ship at 0-2, is about to get focus fired, he can give them multiple Focus to use. This can turn a dead ship into a living ship.
   2. It is rather odd Obi-wan is an I5 considering he was never known as a great pilot and didn’t enjoy flying.
4. Mace Windu (I4)
   1. Unlike all the other Jedi, Mace’s ability is about Force recovery rather than an ability that costs him a Force to use. This means he’s one of the few Jedi who should seriously consider taking a Force Power.
   2. R4 Astromechs are Mace’s friend.
5. Luminara Unduli (I4)
   1. If you face an opponent who’s great at gaining Bullseye, Luminara is going to have a bad time. Fortunately, most people and ships struggle with that.
6. Plo Koon (I5)
   1. At I5, Plo Koon feels like he should be higher in the ranking. He’s supposed to be a great pilot. Unfortunately, his ability is rather situational. It’s a great support ability, which does fit the character, but unlike the other Jedi, it only supports and does nothing for himself.
   2. One role he could fit is as a support to a Seventh Fleet Gunner carrying ARC by taking their Weapons Disabled token and allowing them to use the Gunner every round. He doesn’t need Delta-7B for this role so can be cheaply loaded out.
   3. With the coming Geonosian fighter that passes out tractor tokens, he might find a place as a good counter.
7. Saesee Tiin (I4)
   1. Saesee would be better if he didn’t require you to change a dial to the same speed and difficulty. For most ships, that doesn’t let them turn banks into turns or switch from a straight to a K-turn. He might be broken if he could do that though so maybe for the best.
   2. R4 Astromechs on him or his allies works well. For the Jedi, 1 and 2 speed is now blue so they have lots of choices.
8. Barriss Offee (I4)
   1. Barriss has a pretty nice support ability. Unfortunately, she only has one Force. That means if she uses Fine Tuned Controls, she can’t use her ability. This either limits her as a support or on her own.
9. Jedi Knight (I3)
   1. I3 is pretty good for a generic. They’re even decently priced unupgraded. But the other Jedi are just better with more Force and cool abilities.
   2. I would like to try flying five of them sometime. That would be a pretty mean swarm.

All Wings Report In

What’s the ideal number of Aethersprites to buy? Two.

One from the standalone pack and one from the Guardians of the Republic. There are some three Jedi lists below but for the most part, two with something else works out better as a list.

Master and Apprentice

• Anakin Skywalker
  • Delta 7b
• Obi-wan Kenobi OR Ahsoka Tano
  • Delta 7b
• 104th Battalion OR Wolfe
  • Seventh Fleet Gunner

If you want Anakin and Obi-wan or Anakin and Ahsoka working together, you don’t have many choices for how else to load them out. Fortunately, an ARC with Seventh Fleet Gunner is a nice support that can’t be ignored by your opponent. Alternatively, two V-19 as damage sponges are one of the few good uses for them.

Sense 4

• Mace Windu
  • Heightened Perception
  • R4 Astromech
• Luminaru Unduli
  • Heightened Perception
  • R4 Astromech
• Saesee Tiin
  • Sense
  • R4 Astromech

All of these Jedi are I4’s which allows you to change up activation order. Mace or Luminaru can shoot at I7 to snipe down an I5 or I6 before they can shoot and Saesee can look at a dial and then change friendlies to get into a better position.  All have R4’s so that if they dial a two, they can change their dial to any of them.

Battle Swarm

• 3x Jedi Knight
  • Battle Meditation
  • R3 Astromech
  • Delta-7B

This is a fun idea for maximizing actions for a group of three Jedi Knights. With Battle Meditation they can chain actions allowing all three to end up with Focus and double Locks. Practical or competitive? Not really. But fun.