urbanjedi wrote:
After playing this squad, I have even more respect for Dan and his 2010 champs run. For me, this squad was agonizing to play as anyone who knows I am very aggressive and want to get in there and kill stuff and this squad is much, much more reactive. But, I did set out to do what I wanted which was to show that WOTC stuff (and rebels) are still quite competitive. I can also say that I combined fire more in the tourney, than I have in my entire life as the rebels can't hit a darn thing. Needless to say, I won't be playing a squad like this again anytime soon.
Awesome.
The squad is definitely VERY reactive. My play style varies wildly depending on what kind of squad I'm playing; if I'm playing a very defensive squad with characters like GOWK or Zannah, I'll be super aggressive. If I'm playing a glass-cannon type squad like this one, I play very reactively. It's also interesting that you brought in the MTB and Mice multiple times. I almost never did, just because that's not the way I played the squad. The way I ran it, if I got into a position where I HAD to win initiative, I was doing something wrong. It's a nice option since you have so much Cunning damage, but I would generally just make sure I was safe at the end of the round (which I could do since it outactivates most squads) so if I didn't win init, no big deal. That's why my favorite Reinforcements choices for this squad were either the 10 Mice (to outactivate, but more importantly to build protective walls) or a Gamorrean BG and an R7 (to take advantage of a huge amount of Override and the BG means often that I can lose initiative and not lose any characters). It's a weird squad because you really need to outactivate, and play very cagey while they still have attackers left and then when they're done activating you need to rush out, drop a lot of damage, and then move back to safety. You have to be very careful about the order in which you do things, because it matters a lot. And yes, combining fire is very important.
I think it's funny that your goal was to prove that Rebels could still be competitive, because I was planning on doing the exact same thing soon. The thing that has surprised me is how little Bastila there has been. Out of 34 squads played this weekend, only 3 were Bastila squads, and none finished really highly (Richard L. did the best getting 7th in a field of 23, Matt also got 7th in a field of 11). In PA there were actually NO Bastila squads. Bastila has made Rebels (at least Rebels like this) Tier 1.5 because she's a miserable auto-loss for them, but hardly anyone is playing her! Graham benefited from this also, as Lancer can definitely be a pain for the single Lancer squad (it's much less of a problem, though). If you can go through a tournament and not play against her, Rebels are still good. If you have to play against her in the top 4, though, good luck.