Hello there, we made it to blog number two!
Todays blog is in two parts
First we have my week one and two XTC games.
I’ll also be telling you about my trip to Belfast last weekend for the Tauntaun regional event.
As it’s five games I’m going to split it over two blogs.
In this one it’ll be the social side and why I recommend going.
The next blog will cover the games.
XTC week one
So, onto XTC week one and Team Wales are against U.S. Islands who I believe came 2nd last year.
I’m playing someone called InnKeeper_one_six
Now I watch X-Wing online so the name sounds familiar. I put a message up in our team chat asking who this player is?
What I’m actually asking is for an actual name.
The response from one player is “he won some event earlier this year”
Me “ok, but what’s the players name?”
“It’s Anthony Marchand”
Me “ok, any good?”
“He’s the World Champion!!”
Me internally “oh great, I go 1&3 at Mando’s last weekend and my next game is against the World Champion, no pressure then lol”
So we arrange our game for Tuesday night ( UK Time )
Now we had a great chat before the game and Tony is lovely and was really pleasant to play. Unfortunately I put my phones power cable into my laptop and then had the phone next to my ear for the game and didn’t realise it wasn’t charging and it died as we just finished the game.
So sadly I didn’t get to chat to him about the game and what I could have done better.
I messaged to apologise and he was fine about it but it was a shame to end a fun interaction that way.
So onto the lists and the game.
Tony is flying Moralo who can fly off the board and come back on.
On Monday I get my templates out and spend 40 mins working out how I can position Ani so that he can stay in the corner round 1&2 to stop Moralo getting in behind.
With this prep work done I’m hopefully ready to counter High Level positional play from Tony
He’s also got Kath and a bunch of Tie fighters.
There is an interaction that allows Kath to roll an extra red dice if a friendly ship is range zero of the defender.
So my expectation is that the Ties are going to block me and from Tony’s point of view hopefully draw fire while the other two ships murder my list.
We are playing Assault. I think the Tie’s are a trap, kill them if they are my only target but I’m going after Moralo and Kath and I need to stop Moralo getting behind me.
I think I was so nervous playing the World Champion ( as lovely as he is ) that I forgot to take a Turn Zero picture but you get the idea from this.
Moralo is coming down the left flank and I expect him to turn off the board to come back into my left corner, so Ani dials in the block into the corner I’d worked 40 minutes on. Moralo didn’t go off the board!! He just went straight.
The Arc’s start up the right flank and Obi goes five straight and boosts.
Tony has cleverly created a kill box for Ani, oh crap.
Luckily Ani tanks the incoming shots and survives, Tony gets two objectives and bags 4 points, I have one objective but Obi is back in Tie Murdering mode and halves a Tie giving me 4 points, so we are tied and Ani is ok but what to do now.
Tony was surprised I didn’t boost into range one with Obi and kill the Tie but I wanted the option to hard one left but I think he was right, I would have controlled two objectives and could have then come around the top of the asteroid.
I don’t want Ani to get chased by Moralo and Kath but I also don’t want to fly into a mini Tie swarm and a rear shot form Kath.
I decide to go fast, luckily I don’t get blocked so no extra dice for Kath and I slipped Moralo’s arc but I’m still taking a lot of shots.
Ani halves the Tie in front of him and Obi kills the Tie he’s fighting, giving me 5 more points for kills and I get 2 more when we tie on objectives, I’m on 11.
Tony gets two objectives for 4 points but Ani amazingly is not halved or killed and somehow I’m 11-8 up.
What now. Regen Ani and try to get him out of there. Luckily Moralo and Kath are flying away from Ani but they’ll murder my one green defence die arc’s.
Ani finally gets halved even with the regen giving Tony six points but I’ve grabbed 4 points on objectives but at 15-14 to me the game feels on a knife edge.
I’m pleased with this turn. Obi is safe and scoring points. The Arc’s are scoring the middle but able to attack the Tie’s and Kath and Ani kills a Tie and I stretch the lead to 24 – 16
I’m really nervous, at Mando’s I was ahead and still lost games and I’m playing the World Champion.
Turn Six is a big turn as Obi dives in, barrel rolls to avoid Kath’s arc and then halves her.
Ani has done all his regening tricks and is on one health.
But I’m now 33 – 18
Can I turn this into a loss?
I’m so nervous I forget to take a picture of Turn Seven but I’m 42 -33 up. Tony is coming back into the game.
But I now have the option to run and if you look at Turn Eight that’s exactly what I do. Wolffe is halved, Ani and Obi are halved. If anyone dies I’m suddenly in trouble
I don’t feel great about it but it’s the correct thing to do and I finish the game 50 – 37 for the win.
As I said at the start my phone sadly decided to die at the end of the game so I couldn’t discuss with Tony but once I had restored power I messaged him to explain and say thanks for the game and he was a true sportsman and congratulated me.
Team Wales lost to U.S.Islands 5-2 overall but I was feeling much better than I had at Mando’s but oh how things were about to change.
Conclusion: I was so concerned about Moralo taking my bottom right corner I failed to see the kill box Tony was creating. I need to be more aware of my opponents best options.
Tauntaun Regional
Conor Holmes runs the Tauntaun event each year ( this is year three ) and this year it’s a regional.
I attended two years ago and had an amazing time apart from flying home during the storms. It’s the scariest flight I’ve ever been on as we literally landed at a slight sideways angle due to the high winds coming into Bristol. We were the last flight out of Belfast as many flights got cancelled.
But I was back this year and Conor had kindly invited me to stay at his house along with Dom Flannigan ( who has won the previous two events ).
Now I’m going to leave the actual matches to the next blog as there are five. What I want to talk about is the event and hospitality of Conor and the locals.
I arrive at Belfast City Airport and get a message from Conor to come to the Bullhouse East. When I get there ( thanks Sean Oakley for the lift from the Airport ) I find Chris Black playing Dom over a pint of beer. What a great way to spend a Friday afternoon.
Then we are off to Conor’s house to meet his wonderful family.
Conor has invited about 16 of the players to his house for food and drinks, the barbie is on and his fantastic wife produces a spectacular spread of delicious food.
What a fantastic night and great start to the weekend.
Next morning as is tradition we all went for breakfast at The Pit Stop Cafe
We all descended on the venue and five intense matches followed. Our TO for the day was the lovely Nicki Burnett who ran the event superbly. As it’s relevant to Week Two of XTC I’ll reveal that things went rather well and I finished 5th with a 3&2 record.
We finished the day with the worthy winner being the wonderful Chris Black. After a huge amount of prizes got given out we retired to the other room at the venue to play pool and to order in pizza
Like STO, Welsh Open and the Cornish Nationals the Tauntaun event has become one of the ‘GO TO’ events of the year.
Conor and the team put on a fantastic event and I’d recommend going if you possibly can, you won’t be disappointed, the social is amazing.
XTC WEEK TWO
So onto Week Two of the XTC and we are playing Team Austro-Czech-Hungarian which as you can see is a combined team. I’m paired into Mano from Hungary.
Now I’m sorry to say I was feeling fairly confident going into this match. I’d just beaten the World Champion and come 5th at the Tauntaun Regional.
Mano is running double Firesprays and Grievous and we are playing Salvage. He has three ships who like to boost barrel-roll and I have two Arc’s who don’t care.
Well from the title ‘Hero to Zero’ you can probably guess what’s about to unfold.
Here’s Mano’s list
Mano and I arranged to play on Wednesday night and I ran a few practice games on Fly Casual.
My plan is to isolate a Firespray and kill it. Arc’s will pick up boxes.
Turn Zero I set up as I normally do with Ani on one flank while the Arc’s and Obi take the other flank. I should be able to grab the two boxes on the right while Ani hard one barrel rolls and plays catch me.
Now does this look familiar. Ani is in a corner with three ships heading towards him.
Obviously after Week One I’m not going to turn in towards them, that would be silly. Five straight from Ani?
Oh crap, I went for the 2 straight as I didn’t want Grievous chasing me but guess what, Grievous is chasing me and I have two Firespray’s closing in. Bugger. We are still tied at 2-2 going into Turn Three. So now I set Ani the five straight.
Oh crap, my catchphrase for this game. I turned in, barrel rolled to get the bullseye for Ani into Grievous.
Both Arcs tried to bank and bumped but luckily Mano also bumped his Firespray’s. Great flying by both of us lol.
Sadly the bullseye was just out. I did get some damage into Grievous but I lost half of Ani and it’s 10-4 to Mano.
My confidence in this match seems a little misplaced
I decide to get aggressive with Obi to help Ani and target Aurra. I manage to keep Ani out of arc and attack Aurra with my squad but I’m not getting enough damage and between the two Firesprays Mano kills Obi and it’s suddenly 26-8. I’m also not happy with the position of the Arc’s
Honestly I’m panicking now, Mano is playing well but I’ve made some terrible decisions and I’m letting the team down. I turn one Arc in towards Grievous to stop him having free run and to hopefully halve him, sadly I can’t do a lot with Wolffe so Grievous has an outmaneuver shot.
Mano has got his Firesprays turned in now and I start getting the boxes knocked off my Arcs. Ani tries to halve Grievous. It’s 36-23. My win condition is to halve or kill anything.
I knew Ani was in trouble and was simply hoping I could get points out of Aurra and that Ani would survive a shot from Grievous. He did not and Mano is at 49 to my 23, the game is gone but points count for team comps so we go into Turn Eight but there was nothing that could be salvaged and Mano won ( deservedly ) 54-23
Conclusion: Mano played well but his positioning was limited by the boxes. I don’t have that excuse. I should have got Ani out of there Turn Two, definitely Turn Three.
I over committed with Obi and that put me so far behind I was chasing the game. When I’ve been aggressive with Ani and Obi before it’s worked BUT they have both jumped on an isolated ship.
Well, they say you learn more from your losses than your victories.
At the time of writing Team Wales have won the round 4-2 and next week we have a rest before coming back to face Team…..Germany. A nice easy team then. They are all very strong players and they are all lovely to play and spend time with so it should be a great match.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Well on the plus side I didn’t cheat lol.
My next competition is on the 17th October at Newport ( https://facebook.com/events/s/exile-squadron-squad-champions/4502308053382651/) and after flying Republic I’m itching to get back to First Order.
I’m also doing Cornish Nationals ( https://facebook.com/events/s/cornish-nationals-2026/1651960719310250/ ) and it would be good to get some practice in with another list to decide what I want to take so maybe this is my chance.
Would highly recommend both events to you.
Well that’s it for now. Thanks for reading
Pew Pew StevieB
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