First Place Winner of Tour Stop #4
Congratulations to Chris Williams, the winner of RivCo #4, The Alderaan Graveyard! We sat down with him last week and talked about his successful tournament.
Mason: Hello Chris thanks for joining us after this exciting tournament today, so first, what were you running today.
Chris: I was running Dengar with Fenn Rau.
Mason: Alright, I like to see that. So you were running the Protectorate Fighter, before I get into the Protectorate Fighter and the new wave, what were your thoughts on building the list today and what made you decide on the list.
Chris: I generally run a loaded Dengar with Zuckuss and just the addition of Fenn Rau I realized that he has a much higher survival rate than Zuckuss and still punches just as hard.
Mason: Very cool.
Trevor: What was your modification on Fenn Rau? Was it Autothrusters or Stealth Device?
Chris: Autothrusters
Mason: Going off that, the Protectorate Starfighter is very interesting and there’s a couple different ways you can run it. So of course it can take Autothrusters because you have the boost. I have seen a lot of different upgrades in the modification slot, I’ve seen Stealth Device and one thing I haven’t seen on it is Autothrusters personally.
Chris: I have seen people run the Shield Upgrade, just so you don’t take that first critical hit accidentally.
Mason: Right.
Trevor: Now you do have Stealth Device on Dengar, right?
Chris: I do have Stealth Device on Dengar to make him three dice on defense.
Trevor: How do you like that? Does Stealth Device break often?
Chris: It usually keeps damage from coming through for several rounds.
Mason: Really?
Chris: Yeah being three dice for defense and then at range three it is four dice, so generally it keeps him from taking damage for several rounds and allows him to power up Gonk.
Trevor: Were you able to Gonk your shields back?
Chris: Oh yes. All day.
Mason: That’s actually really interesting that Stealth Device doesn’t break. What do you have defensively otherwise that keeps that Stealth Device from breaking? Usually whenever I go up against Stealth Device the defense dice sour and usually it breaks within the first or second attack.
Chris: It’s being able to stay out at range in the beginning or barrel rolling to arc dodge.
Mason: I forgot that the Jumpmasters have barrel roll. Yeah maneuverability is awesome and then having that extra defensive bonus is great. So moving on, you fought four different lists today and of them which was the toughest and why?
Chris: I would probably say the three defender list [Debra Solley's List]. Mostly because it is really hard to hit them with Dengar and I literally won that round because R5-P8. He got seven hits.
Mason: Wow!
Chris: And Feedback Array which I did five times.
Mason: Holy cow!
Trevor: That is crazy.
Mason: I’m a little speechless, that’s crazy. Yeah, definitely the droid R5-P8 is excellent and that’s definitely proof of it. Did you have any doubts on R5-P8, did you consider taking any other?
Chris: I’ve been using him since Day 1. I took him to the first tournament when Dengar and Zuckuss were available and I won with it.
Trevor: Yeah it’s stapled to Dengar.
Chris: Yeah he’s done three hits to Soontir Fel and killed him, I’ve killed Vader with him, and all with just getting shot at and then him hitting back.
Mason: Yeah, that’s impressive. Excellent. So as far as the Feedback Array, I mean considering that you have the Stealth Device, did you have any consideration to Glitterstim as a defensive boost?
Chris: I thought about it, but it really isn’t worth it on Dengar because of the fact when you’re fighting the dodging Imperial Fighters half the time you aren’t going to hit anyway. Most of the damage is coming from Feedback Array and R5-P8.
Mason: That makes a lot sense. Especially in the two ship lists and securing that damage is really big.
Chris: And with the Gonk you’ll take the damage and then heal back up.
Mason: That’s definitely and awesome thing. My last question I got for you, you flew a two ship list and I haven’t really seen a whole lot of two ship lists and personally I haven’t seen Dengaroo in a tournament, but I know that has been successful. So flying a two ship list that isn’t Dengaroo is something I haven’t seen in a long time, did you have any fears of being completely overwhelmed?
Chris: No, with the large amount of obstacles that has been going on with the tournaments I really wasn’t worried about somebody bringing a swarm. I just figured they’d do more harm to themselves than trying to fly through mass amount of obstacles than cause a problem for me.
Trevor: Were there any particular builds that you thought you would see and had to prepare for?
Chris: Actually, the biggest one was the three defenders. I thought for sure there would be two sets of them here and there were.
Mason: Trevor…
Trevor: Hey, I didn’t fly Triple Defenders last tournament.
Mason: But you do fly them a lot. Anyways, that’s it, thanks for joining us for the interview, have a great night and congratulations!
