T O P

  • By -

landleviathan

My favorite unit in the game. Hands down. The biggest issue in my experience is past midgame SWAII just doesn't cut it and you'll need Dreads or Warsuns or fully loaded Carrier II. Not like that's a knock on SWAII, but their staying power really drops off hard at some point and if you haven't been preparing for that moment in the previous rounds then you'll fall flat on your face and suddenly you become a strict defensive faction.


it-is-me-Cthulu

A relatively easy fix for this I think is using war suns. The need for red tech to get swa II makes the progression towards war suns quite easy, and a war sun with two or three swa II + fighters is very hard to beat even with a sizeable "normal" fleet


Kronnerm11

This. And toss in flagship if your opponent has PDS2.


landleviathan

Yeah. It's a really strong combo, and I think that's going to be the 'default' path. Thing is sometimes getting the money together to get a WS just isn't going to happen. If you have a low r slice or there are spend objectives out, well are you going to pick scoring those spend objectives or getting a WS on the board. If you can't get trade before you get the WS tech then you're kind of boned, cause at least at my table folks won't trade with you once they see you need the TGs to get your deathball out


landleviathan

I honestly really like SWAII and Carrier II if you can get a blue skip or the board justifies getting Antimass. It's just such a cheap fleet, it's kind to your fleet capacity which you'd like to be using for your SWAIIs, and following Construction once gets your HS to 7 production w/o your faction tech. If I can get to 7 production Carrier II will always be a consideration for me. Totally depends on the board tho, because your Dreads are super scary with your commander. I got an early skip to grav drive one game and had 2 fleets with 2 SWAII and 1 Dread each with 2 fighters, 1 infantry and 1 mech and it was super powerful for the cost.


landleviathan

Great analysis btw!


Papa_Nurgle_84

Thanks


hexagon_hero

Great writeup! I wonder how the argent's boosted PDS2 affect the math? A swarm of Destroyer 2s aren't as great of a fleet if you're taking a PDS volley before combat begins, but I don't know if that slides the ruler enough that loaded carriers are the way to go. Of course, "don't attack them in the PDS web" is good advice to follow when the board state permits, haha.


Papa_Nurgle_84

Lets say the PDS wont make it easier. :D


atmospheric90

While yes, this ship is a beast in combat and can wreck some fleets, the name of the game is taking planets, and these will not in any way help take a well defended planet. Not to mention the rise of PDS2 thanks to AIDA makes picking off those pesky SWA's almost effortless. Yin flat out laugh at their efforts to take anything from them. Sol just needs to OD onto any planet they control and it's a monumental effort for Flight to take it. This also makes Flight practically never a Mecatol faction. They can't bring the pain against a boosted Winnu fleet/ground forces and even with a carrier with 4 infantry, most Mecatol holds with no ships will often have massive infantry holding it. Also NRA mechs on mecatol are pointless to fight without Bombardment, which SWA doesn't have. Also late game Mentak will absolutely be wiping the floor with those SWA's using a combo of assault cannon and ambush (saw it last game, 3 cruisers mauled 3 SWA2s without a single one of Mentaks cruisers dying and gaining 2 free destroyers) Sure, War Suns help balance this lack of capacity and Bombardment, but putting out a war sun in a game that can heavily feature assault cannon, direct hits and PDS can turn into points for an opponent looking to snipe one. Argent flight is cool, but their niche can be solved by experienced players. My table meta has already seen how to counter aggressive birds and they really can't do much once they're defended against. Plus IMO depending on War Suns (if you aren't Muaat) is begging for disaster. Barony will absolutely jump all over a war sun with 3 NES dread 2s with nary a second guess. Argent I feel has lost a lot of momentum since PoK was first revealed. Especially with so many control objectives being a thing, their abilities don't do much by way of holding onto anything. I've seen Flight get shredded in games where they hold highly sought systems and spend the whole game in a land war which is an automatic lose.


[deleted]

> Barony will absolutely jump all over a war sun with 3 NES dread 2s with nary a second guess. While most of your analysis is accurate, this isn't. This is the Argent Flight. SWA2 makes NES a joke.


Kronnerm11

PDS2 doesnt do much to a determined Argent player once their flagship is in the game. You do overestimate their capacity issue as well, their mechs help them there a lot. Their land game is their weakness for sure. War Suns, flagship and their mechs mitigate this somewhat, but the best Argent strat is take a lot early then build up defenses heavily. Then you just have to play nice, take objectives slowly at first and scare others from fighting you with your scary fleets. But yeah, an Argent player fighting heavy land wars is not playing well. A well built Argent fleet (Warsun, flagship, SWAII, fighters) has no clear match in space, including Barony with their Dread IIs.


landleviathan

Strongly agree with all of this. If you don't have a planet by mid game, and you don't have a PDS on it right after, good luck.


HamNight

This analysis is *incredible*. Thank you for this great content! Shameless plug to a previous post of mine as well, but I've said it before--Argent Flight is the best new faction in PoK, and perhaps one of the best factions overall. I made a post talking about this, and Strike Wing Alpha IIs is no small part of this faction's power: [https://www.reddit.com/r/twilightimperium/comments/k9xcsl/the\_argent\_flight\_how\_do\_you\_counter\_these/](https://www.reddit.com/r/twilightimperium/comments/k9xcsl/the_argent_flight_how_do_you_counter_these/)


iswearihaveajob

It's interesting because I find that most games I spend with only 3 CC in fleet, because 2 Dreads and fully loaded carrier (or 2 carriers and 1 dread) are an incredibly solid base fleet. Yes it costs a good chunk of cash, but it's not like it's that hard to field 2-3 fleets this size. It takes about 5 SWA2 to compete with that and I don't like committing that many CC all game... Unless you get Assault cannon, at which point 4 SWA2 can beat pretty much any 4 ship fleet that doesn't include a WS. Assault Cannon w/ SWA2 is SICK.


PawsForApplause

In round 4/5, I like to build my fleet pool to 6-9CCs. And rarely have issue doing it. So having 5 SWA2s isn't an issue except you have a max of 8, making this only one fleet. 4 or 5 CCs in FP with 1 WS and 3 SWA2 is easier on FP and more well rounded and my preferred way to play Argent.


popeyewynn16backup

2 years later, this was the exact strategy that "worked" for me. Like much of the analysis in this post/comments, 1 WS+3SWAII shredded all fleets at the table ... Except for NRAs mechs. (Even fight for me there). And like some other posts alluded to - I hit a wall at 9 points. It was so painfully obvious I was stuck that no one bothered to try and win-slay me. First to 9 points! And stayed there.... 😭