Thanks. I think the biggest thing about the Firespray is that at the 100pt level it’s just dead weight in a list. It really relies on synergy with other units. You either need a lot more fast and disposable units to herd your opponent (TIE Fighters), or some fast moving elite units to outflank your opponent (TIE Interceptors) or support units to help give you more capabilities (Darth’s TIE Advanced with Swarm Tactics or Squad Leader). At the 100pt level it’s hard to squeeze all of that in your list along with the 40–50pt Firespray.

Whereas the Falcon is basically the source of list synergy. It’s the unit that provides your list with benefits rather than requires you to add support to keep it useful. So it’s a lot more useful in a 100pt list, and can actually make a 100pt list better if you choose the right pilots and crew.

The other problem with the Firespray is the stupid mines. They’re a late game weapon, totally useless in the first 2–3 turns, but your opponent will be hammering on the Firespray so hard that it’s not likely to survive long enough to make good use of them. It needs to be in a list with more ships (to keep the enemy from focusing all of their effort on the Firespray) to really make itself useful.

In larger games on larger tables it has a lot more tactical usefulness, but at the standard tournament level of 100pts it’s easier to make a strong list with the various TIE ships than it is with a Firespray. I like using the ship in really big games, and it performs much better then. The Falcon performs well pretty much all the time. The 360 firing arc with three attack dice is the real strength of the ship. Combine that with the pilot and crew members that have damage mitigation abilities, and it becomes really frustrating to kill in spite of it’s single defense die. If someone throws a YT-1300 down without those mitigation abilities, it will die much more easily, but I’ve never seen anyone do that. There’s little reason to.

Combine the Falcon, piloted by Chewbacca and equipped with a shield upgrade, with Wedge Antilles and Swarm Tactics, and you have a ship that can absorb hits, takes no critical hits ever, and almost always fires first, usually at ships that can be destroyed by three attack dice in a single lucky round. It’s brutal. The Falcon is basically Darrel-grade cheese when set up properly. The Firespray is just a fairly good ship.