This article is a slight continuation from my last article on the Colossus Aces, so I’d suggest reading that one as well as this one!
I had a lot of fun making the Colossus Aces and adding in a new mode into X-Wing with the Platform Classic allowing you to race X-Wing ships. However, one of my favourite ship designs we saw from the Resistance show was the Droid Racer used in season 2 episode 9, The Voxx Vortex 5000, where the Colossus Aces go up against the Hype Fazon’s old boss Vranki the Blue and his cheating Racing Droids.
As someone who loves Vulture Droids both as a design and in X-Wing, the Racing Droids design has always jumped out at me as a cool idea for X-Wing, with a ship that can grapple onto enemy ships, using them for either a speed boost or cover.
So like last time; ready, set, let’s get started:
The Overall Design:
As we saw in the Resistance show, these ships seem to be fast, tricky little pests that can easily keep up with other racers while also having tricks up their robotic sleeves to win races at any cost.
So because of this, the design will take some aspects of the Vulture Droids they seem to come from, but expand upon it much more, creating a solid racer as well as an annoying addition to the scum faction!
The Stats:
This ship looks to be very similar to the Vulture only larger and with rear-facing blasters, however, we’ll put them to one side for now. Because of this, I gave it a stat line similar to the Vulture Droid’s stat line, only increasing its hull value by one.
This gives the Droid Racer the stat line of:
Front Arc: 2
Agility: 2
Hull: 4
The Actions:
These are pretty basic, with the Racing droid getting its standard white calculate, a roll with a linked red calculate like the Vulture Droid and a SLAM with a linked red calculate.
However, this last one raises some questions about SLAMing and linked actions. Can a ship that SLAMed perform its linked action if it didn’t fully execute the manoeuvre?
This isn’t currently a problem in X-Wing as we don’t have a SLAM into a linked action in the game, but with Advanced SLAM’s dependence on fully executing the manoeuvre, I’d say it would be the same with linked actions.
The Ship Ability:
As the Fireball and most of the Aces title’s I made included a way to perform attacks even while disarmed, I decided to add a way for the Racing Droids to also remove their disarm tokens.
So as long as these Racing Droids are close to their owner, Vranki the Blue, they can stress themselves to remove their disarm tokens. This does mean they can’t perform their linked calculate actions without becoming double stressed however being able to perform an un-modded shot is still better than not being able to perform an attack at all.
The Dial:
For the dial I've taken the basic Vulture Droid's dial and slowed it down a little to compensate for the SLAM action. Therefore, the Racing Droid is still rather fast, being able to keep up with most ships with SLAM actions, however its lack of one banks will be sorely missed.
The Upgrades:
These are really basic with these droids getting:
Configuration
Illicit
Modification
So like the Vultures, these are quite cheap ships that are meant to be lightly equipped.
The Configuration:
When I started to design this ship I was determined to give it a way to grapple onto your opponents like in Resistance. So naturally, the configuration was the easiest way to do this, similar to the Vulture/Hyena's configurations. The Cheater's Grapplers allow you to dock with opponents ships on a successful roll letting you ride them and take advantage of their speed. However as it’s hard to catch a moving ship, you do need to be calculated to show that you are concentrating, so this config does depend on the potential new bumping rules we could get (I know controversial,
please just let it slide for this article). As well that, it is harder to grapple ships that are more agile so they roll more dice to increase their chance of escaping.
I was also afraid of it being too easy for the ship to just stay docked onto an opponent and hide from other shots. Therefore even while docked, you can be shot and hurt, however it does slightly damage your carrier. You also will get thrown off during the end phase if your green token is spent or is removed during the last end phase, but as you can choose to remove green tokens first before checking to see if you are thrown off, you can lose your calculate then get a straight boost.
The Pilots:
V-V-5000 Alpha:
First up we have Alpha, the droid I see as being under Vranki’s direct control. Because of this, as long as it is not stressed or jammed, it and its nearby Racing Droid allies can still use their ship abilities as Vranki is personally giving it orders from long range. This means you don’t need a carrier to support them. This is really useful if you don’t want to bring a double crew carrier for my Vranki crew that’s later in this article. It’s especially useful for the Platform Classic game mode I designed in my last article, as you only get one racer, so you can’t have one of these droids and the actually Vranki crew, so this gets around that. Also thanks to its high initiative, I decided to give it a talent slot, unlike most droids.
V-V-5000 Beta:
This next droid is able to compensate for overshooting its target if you either muck up your dial or your opponent moves before you and you don’t exactly get their position right.
This is especially useful if you would land at range one of a deadly opponent that you really don’t want to be shot by as you can attempt to grapple on and dock with them instead.
This makes Beta hard to avoid and the best option for aggressive grappling, especially as the Droid Racers lack of low-speed bank manoeuvres could make it hard to grapple some ships right in front of you.
Again like Alpha, Beta has a talent slot to improve its chances in both combat and races.
V-V-5000 Gamma:
Gamma takes full advantage of its configuration, allowing it to harass your enemies more effectively as well as being an amazing racer. Gamma can latch onto a higher initiative pilot, avoid their fire, then shove them backwards after letting go. This increases the range between you and your opponent before they move. This could even push them onto an obstacle and give them a very bad round.
It also gives you a slight advantage against racers in my racing game mode, letting you not only get off a free boost during the end phase but also pushing your opponent’s ship back and further away from your next sky ring. This is also the final pilot in this pack that gets a talent slot.
Voxx Vortex Protector:
These double limited droids are possibly the most useful pilot in this pack for the standard game as they can still perform attacks while docked, using your opponent’s ship’s front arc.
This means not only are you safe from one of your opponent's ships, but you can also still harass them while riding that ship, which is especially effective as your opponents normally don’t have to think about keeping their ships out of their own front arcs which gives an even better chance of getting off a shot!
I did consider making this a core part of the ship however it probably would have been far too powerful, and its already a little odd and bends some of the game's rules.
The Generics:
As normal here are a pair of generics for the ship.
Like with Vultures, both have no talent slot and the only difference is the higher initiative.
Also like the Vultures, I'd say they'd probably be both the same amount of points as both have an advantages and disadvantages.
The Upgrades:
“Hot Shot” Blaster:
Until I started to write this article the Racing Droid had a two dice rear arc as we see them use it against the aces. However, I felt this would make them a little too expensive and realised that it was a dirty trick they pulled so it would fit an illicit upgrade. Then I remembered that there was a 1.0 upgrade exactly like that! Although my “Hot Shot” Blaster is nowhere as good as the 1.0 version, that’s very much on purpose, alongside the lack of ability to rotate the mobile arc outside of an Agile Gunner, so pick your direction wisely when you deploy!
Less Than Reputable Course:
As we see in Resistance, Vranki uses a version of the Sky Rings equipped with laser cannons to force pilots to evade incoming fire and spend more of their effort evading instead of racing. This upgrade lets you bring one of these Sky Rings into the battlefield instead of one of the standard Sky Rings given to you by
the Sky Ring Racer upgrade I put in my Colossus Aces pack.
It could also be used to change out a Sky Ring in the course set up in my Platform Classic game mode, letting you use that sky ring to harass one of your opponents once per round, either when that ship or another passes through it.
Although its hard to trigger the shots from this remote, that is sort of the point so you can't easily have another three agility four hull shooter on the board which would make this remote far too powerful and expensive!
That being said, shooting ships during the system phase means that the defender is less likely to have defensive tokens making them easier to hit!
A Deadly Profession:
Although not useable by most of the droids in this pack, this talent is great for the higher initiative unique pilots who can take advantage of their opponent’s downfall and boost past them. This either allows them to avoid shots in standard games or gives them the edge in a Platform Classic game, both of which are useful, even if it’s only twice per game.
Vranki the Blue:
Although he says he's not like the other Hutts, Vranki is still a lying, cheating gambler who just wants to make as much money as he can!
To show this I gave him two abilities, firstly he allows his allies to betray and attack each other. This is mainly because if your racing droids can land on an ace, it would be easier to shoot your racing droid and damage them, letting the bleed through damage do the work. His second ability shows his gambling side, letting your droids risk becoming jammed and losing a calculate for the potential of doubling their calculates.
The Example list:
Dead Droids Tell No Tales:
Illegal Racing Droid (22)
Cheater’s Grapplers (0)
Deadman’s Switch (2)
Ship Total: 24
X6
Freighter Captain (41)
Vranki the Blue (1)
Deadman’s Switch (2)
Ship Total:44
Autopilot Drone (12)
Ship Total: 12
This list is probably not the best use of these droids, however, one of my friends has a love for Deadman’s Switch, so a cheap fast-moving swarm that can he could get into range 1 quickly and then shoot with his own ships to trigger the Deadman’s Switch is a happy day for him and a terror for me… especially as he’ll want to use these next time we paly… (oh god I’ve made a mistake).
The Conclusion:
I’m really enjoying designing these racers for X-Wing as I feel the ships from Resistance have been looked over a little, with there only being three ships from the show made and two of them are First Order ships that were needed for the faction to function as a faction.
As I said earlier I’m a fan of Vulture Droids, so the Droid Racer has always been one of the ships I’ve wanted in the game and I feel it fits well into the Scum faction and their ethos of high risk, high reward.
As normal, feel free to use my cards in friendly games to continue to show the rest of the X-Wing community your need for speed!
Thank you all for reading,
Watcher Leader out.