Ft. Worth System Open

This past weekend I attended the Fort Worth System Open. It’s been awhile since I’ve been to a big event. Seeing a room full of grown-ups decked out in nerdy Star Wars shirts, who traveled hundreds of miles to push around tiny plastic spaceships puts it all into perspective. Collectively, we X-wing players have our priorities straight.

It felt great getting to hang out with all my X-wing compatriots. I was one of fifteen from Houston’s Apollo Squadron to show up. Out of that fifteen, five made the Day Two cut. Sadly, despite having 33% of the Day Two slots, we couldn’t pull off a win. I ended up 49th overall which isn’t too bad. I soothed my pride with the knowledge that my first loss was to the world famous Duncan Howard who went onto win the whole tournament.

Aside from hanging out with my Apollo squadron mates, I also had the chance to see all of the X-wingers I only see at big events like this. Some cool guys and gals scattered around Texas and nearby states. I also had the chance help introduce Dee Yun, grand marshal of the event and host of the Fly Better Podcast (aka Mynock Squadron), to Texas BBQ. Shout out to Hard Eight in Roanoke. Not the best Texas BBQ I’ve had but definitely on the positive side.

My List

5x BTL-A4 Y-Wing “Grey Squadron Pilot” (Wave 1) (40ts) (I2)

None

• Payload- Proton Bomb (Wave 1): Bomb. Charges: 2. During the System Phase, you may spend 1  to drop a Proton Bomb using the 1 straight template.
  • Proton Bomb- (Bomb Token) – At the end of the Activation Phase, this device detonates. When this device detonates, each ship and remote at range 0–1 suffers 1 Crit damage.
• Turret- Ion Cannon Turret (Wave 1): Adds Rotate action. Attack 3 (Range 1-2): If this attack hits, spend 1 Hit or Crit result to cause the defender to suffer 1 Hit damage. All remaining Hit/Crit results inflict ion tokens instead of damage.

Round 1

• Darth Vader (Predictive Shot, FCS)
• Maarek Steele (FCS, Snap Shot)
• Major Vermeil (Grand Inquisitor, Tac Officer)

Sadly, round one I paired against a fellow Apollo Squadron member, Jonah Sanders. I see him and his father Ross at a lot of events around Houston and it’s always a pleasure. Which is why it sucks to play against one of them here. That meant one of us was starting the tournament off with our lone acceptable loss. Nevertheless, set up each determined to cause grievous simulated harm to the other’s squadron.

For most matches I went up along the left side, aiming to force my opponent to come to me and risk being ioned off the board or having no choice but to fly into my bombs. Never ioned anyone off the board but I did ion plenty of people throughout the day into bombs. My first attempt during this game left my Y-wings at range 3, and therefore out of ion range and resulted in losing one entire Y-wing in the first round of shooting. But that was the plan. Draw him in and now he has no place to go but into close range for the following round. Ioned Maarek and Vermeil and then nuked them with bombs. Vader never got ioned but he did get whittled down slowly.

Round 2

• 2x Trade Federation Drone
• 3x Trade Federation Drone (Struts, Discord Missiles)
• 1x Trade Federation Drone (Struts)
• 2x Techno Union Bomber (Struts, Plasma Torpedoes)

Sigh. First round I had to knock out a fellow Apollo Squadron and round 2 I had to face Duncan Howard flying an eight ship droid swarm. This was one of my biggest fear lists going into the tournament. I don’t have a good counter to Discord missiles unless I want to waste shots or bomb myself. Still, I didn’t expect things to go quite as bad as they did.

I managed to kill a Vulture in the first round of engagement for very little damage in exchange. But the following round I lost a Y-wing and took heavy damage. Several droids got ioned but thanks to his vast array of available droids all moving at the same initiative he kept them from falling into my bomb trap. Duncan knows his stuff.

Even though I lost, I think I held my own. I still had three Y-wings alive, heavily damaged but alive, at the end and had destroyed at least two droids. Had we had just a little more time I probably could have gotten a few more droids. Not enough to win but enough to feel it was a good fight.

Round 3

• Braylen Strom (S-foils, Autoblaster, Hull Upgrade)
• Ten Numb (S-foils, Autoblaster, Hull Upgrade, FCS)
• 2x Blue Squadron Pilot

This was the round that went exactly as I hoped rounds to go. I felt bad for my opponent. But he took his B-wings right into position to all get ioned and then land on five proton bombs. It was a massacre.

I had been worried about the four B-wing list that all had s-foils for the double tap. Especially the one that flew Blade Squadron so they could initiative kill me. I could foresee losing two Y-wings before they got to fire in the right set up. Then falling into the bomb trap isn’t as bad when you’re only eating three protons instead of five.

Round 4

• 2x Grey Squadron (Ion Cannon Turret, Protob Bomb)
• 3x Blue Squadron Escort (S-foils)

Another list I thought about taking was a combo like this or five X-Wings. I opted for Y-wings for the concentrated bombs and ion effects. But this match showed the advantage of combined arms. My opponent, Justin, flew it perfectly, setting up a broad envelopment formation.  Then I made a very critical error. I banked when I should have continued puttering forward. I then misjudged positions, K-turned and ended up dropping a bunch of bombs on nothing and putting myself in a position where I had my ion cannons facing the wrong way. Not to take away anything from Justin, but this was definitely a case of me giving myself the loss.

I do want to give a special shout out to his paint job on his ships. They looked great and felt like an elite united squadron.

Round 5

• Fenn Rau (Outmaneuver)
• 2x Zealous Recruits
• Serissu (Autoblaster)

This was another match that went like round 3. He flew right against me along the board edge and almost everyone got ioned into bombs. Fenn Rau ended up flying off the board trying to escape even though he wasn’t ioned. Any other maneuver would have resulted in him melting to proton bombs though, so it was worth trying.

Round 6

• Boba Fett (Maul, Proton Bombs, Slave One)
• Fenn Rau (Outmaneuver)

Sadly, this was one of the most unfun games of X-wing I’ve ever played. I can’t blame my opponent for his tactical choices. He did not want to end up like the guys in rounds 3 and 5. Which meant he danced around the board trying for range three shots and then running away. It was absolutely the tactic to use. It was just a boring game to play. We were both dancing around, me trying to pin him down and him always taking that Slave One escape route. He ended up winning thanks to slowly plinking a Y-wing down to half points.

Conclusion

I went three and three during the event. One of my losses I definitely had a solid chance to win. The other two went to time. I feel I could have won those with a different tactic than I employed at the time but those are hindsight tactics that could just as easily resulted in getting tabled.  Regardless of results, it was a fun weekend and I enjoyed each of my opponents.

Five Y-wings can be a devastating squadron but I don’t think I’ll fly them again. It’s not super fun and can result in an NPE if your opponent allows it. Normally, I employ crazier lists that involve more flying shenanigans. But I had had little time to think about it due to the previous week’s travel, so I opted for something “safe.” It gave me a safe result of middle ground 3 to 3.

Side Events

Also at the System Open there were multiple side events going on. Friday I enjoyed a great game of Aces High. Sunday I played in the second chance World’s Qualifier. Lost in round three but it was a shot in the dark. It was an Extended format which I hadn’t realized.  I only had my Hyperspace Rebel stuff. Threw together Wedge, Luke, Norra, Arvil list which was fun but would never hold up in the long run. The match I lost was one of the best games I’ve played in a while as it really came down to the last second. Sucked to be knocked out but it was the best game to end the weekend on.