In For Refits - Weapons Teams

Weapons Teams allow you to enhance the firepower of your ship.   More than weapon upgrades they really define the role of your ship on the table.  They are a good place to start for setting up carriers and gunnery platforms.



Sensor Team

Found in:  Core Set, Assault Frigate Mk II, Victory Star Destroyer

The Good:  A great way to get an accuracy for ships that don't have a lot of Blue dice.  Can let you modify blank die rolls into something useful. 

The Bad:  Requires that you spend a die to gain the effect.  

Best on:  Victory I Star Destroyers can benefit the most from Sensor Teams. They have a large enough dice pool to afford spending the die for the effect and can benefit from the Accuracy.

Combos with:  Quad Turbolaser cannons - if one accuracy is good, two must be better.

Verdict:  Not a card that I've seen on the table very often.  Accuracies are great and in many cases worth the costs involved with this card.  Players seem to prefer other methods of beating opposing defenses like XI7s or Intel Officers.  

Flight Controllers

Found in:  Victory Star Destroyer

The Good:  This upgrade will help any of your squadrons dominate the anti-squadron game.  It can make even bombers respectable when engaging other squadrons. 

The Bad:  Does nothing to help you destroy ships, which is what the game is all about.

Best on:  VSDs setup as a carrier. 

Combos with:  Toryn Farr lets you re-roll those extra blue dice as needed.  

Verdict:  I like Flight Controllers to boost squadrons with low Anti-Squadron value.  TIE Interceptors and Xwings already do fine at killing other squadrons, I like this upgrade for boosting regular TIE Fighters and Ywings.  Still, I tend to build my fleets focused on killing ships, which makes this a lower priority.  

Gunnery Team

Found in:  Core Set, Assault Frigate Mk II, Victory Class Star Destroyer

The Good:  Gunnery Team lets you get the most out of your best arc.  You can target two different ships or use anti-squadron attacks and a regular attack.  

The Bad:  Costs quite a bit for an upgrade that may not always be relevant.  

Best on:  Assault Frigate Mk II A.  Assault Frigates can really benefit the most from gunnery team.  They have huge side arcs where it is pretty easy to find multiple targets.  The A variant also has great anti-squadron dice as well.

Combos with:  Enhanced Armament or Expanded Launchers make a single arc really powerful, which you can then use twice with the Gunnery Team.  

Verdict:  I'm a big fan of Gunnery Teams.  If you can position your ships right it really let's you get the most out of the strengths your ship already has. 

Ruthless Strategists

Found in:  Imperial SD

The Good:  Allows you to kill off enemy squadrons even faster.  It's an upgrade that you can use only when necessary, but multiple times in one Anti-Squadron barrage.

The Bad:  You hurt your own ships in the process.  As with Flight Controllers, it does nothing to ships. 

Best on:  A ship with good anti-squadron dice that's paired with a bunch of bombers. 

Combos with:  TIE Bombers and YT-1300s who are good cheap sources of hull.  

Verdict:  This upgrade offers another alternative to help you win the squadron battle.  I actually like it better on Rebel ships paired with Y-Wings than the more fragile Imperial ships.  Still, if your TIE Bombers were engaged, it would give you some teeth if you fired in to help them out.  Compared to Flight Controllers, it doesn't need a Squadron Command, but does require you to spend one of your attacks on anti-squadron attacks.

Ordnance Experts

Found in:  Raider and MC-30

The Good:  Unlimited re-rolls of black dice for only 4 points!  This is great.  It's also useful for fishing for crit results for other upgrades.

The Bad:  It only helps black dice. 

Best on:  While this is good on most anything with black dice, it shines brightest on the Raider I that has lots of black dice for both anti-ship and anti squadron work. 

Combos with:  Assault Proton Torpedoes or any other Ordnance upgrade.  

Verdict:  This card is a staple of many fleet builds.  Any fleet that features lots of close range, black dice ships will generally feature these.  Great card.
Fire Control Team

Found in:  Liberty

The Good:  It's a relatively cheap offensive boost.  Allows you to put a big hurt a target.

The Bad:  It does require that you have a non-standard crit effect available.   

Best on:  Gladiators in fleets led by Screed or Vader. Also will be popular in fleets led by Dodonna.

Combos with:  Assault Proton Torpedoes can allow you to drop multiple face-up damage cards a turn.  

Verdict:  It's low price will ensure that this card gets some play.   It is competing with some other great cards like Flight Controllers, Ordnance Experts, and Gunnery Team.  Due to the price it will be easy to add to a fleet, but I think should only be used when part of an overall plan rather than filler.

Veteran Gunners

Found in:  Liberty

The Good:  Re-roll effects are great and allow you to make up for some bad rolls.  This will be helpful on red dice heavy ships.

The Bad:  It's one use per turn only.  You have to re-roll ALL of your dice, which could actually give you a worse result.

Best on:  I like this on Ackbar-boosted Assault Frigates.  It's really their only steady source of re-rolls. 

Combos with:  Admiral Ackbar.  Red dice are the most fickle.  You can get the most mileage out of them with these re-rolls. 

Verdict:  This card would be a no-brainer if you got to pick the dice you re-roll.  Having to re-roll all of the dice makes it more of an insurance policy than an every turn boost.  You can spend your accuracy results before the re-roll if you want to keep them.