After 2 years on ice due to the COVID-19 Pandemic, NOVA Open returns in 2022. NOVA is one of the largest conventions for wargaming in the United States and competition at every event is frequently very fierce. Many of the top Star Wars: Legion players were present for this event and the top 8 was composed of some stellar lists and players both from our very own Fifth Trooper and without. So without further ado lets get on with the show.

The finals day format was actually three round swiss rather than elims; these are just ranked by TTO rank. If you go by order of loss (as you would in straight elims) the final table was Kyle and Evan, with Mike and Keegan rounding out the top four. You can find the TTO results here.

1st Place – Kyle Dornbos

First off, congratulations to our own Kyle Dornbos for winning another major event! Since Boba Fett’s revision, Iden-Bounty lists have been seeing a big surge in the meta. Fett’s increased capacity to work as a work alone operative helps improve his effectiveness with extra aim or dodge tokens. Never underestimate the power of Bounties – that one point can win it for you when the game is down to the wire.

After that there’s an eclectic-but solid-mix of firepower. Shoretroopers, Mortars and Pykes all offer extremely solid firepower while strike teams and Stormtroopers lay some decent fire and leave some extra activations in the mix.

2nd Place – Evan Bulriss

Giving special notice to the list’s excellent name “Mad Raccoon, Fury Road”. This is an excellent off-brand list with the clear star of the show being double bus action. The first one offers solid long range suppressing fire with the heavy cannon, able to punch through armor and infantry alike with Critical 1, and the other doesn’t need a weapon when it is the weapon. With Reckless Driver and Comms Jammer you can run down an enemy unit and add insult to injury by making them unable to receive an order the next turn.

The troops offer solid bodies for objectives and a out-of-bus punch with both heavy weapon troopers able to engage at close range. Finally the speeder bikes round out the list with cheap access to units well suited for Breakthrough and Bombing Run. With the Emergency Transponders they can get dodge tokens at a critical moment when they make a break for the objectives.

3rd Place – Richard Lavery

It’s…Blizzard Force, what more can we say? Veers helps keeps the minimum cost required for Commanders while 4 Snowtroopers rock powerful anti infantry flamers. The Stormtroopers get to bring 2 powerful heavy weapons which can bring some powerful anti infantry and take some chunks off vehicles. Naturally with 4 speeder bikes, opponents will struggle to be able to hit all of them and they make excellent linchpins for Bombing Run and Breakthrough.

4th Place – Mike Barry (Dashz)

Anakin + Padme again with some Z-6 and RPS-6 Phase 1s offering support. The Pyke Capo and Foot Soldiers are an excellent add here – one of Republics biggest weaknesses right now is that everything costs too damn much, and Pykes are cheap ranged troops who put down some really solid firepower. They only need to compromise a little on token sharing, but that’s ok since they generate their own. The ARCs offer some extra activations and some potshots, even if they don’t succeed at the task as well as their Rebel or Imperial counterparts.

5th Place – Koray Satili

Another Blizzard Force list, and interesting twist here. Snowtroopers without Flamethrowers is an unusual choice but but with Compel, Vader can move them up the field faster than they would otherwise. The heavy hitting stormtroopers speak for themselves, able to get long range shots on infantry and vehicles alike. Finally, the practically mandatory four speeder bikes are great for objectives and harassing infantry. Emergency Transponder will let them gain some aim or dodge tokens when out on the periphery of your army, where they can’t receive orders, so they can survive longer.

6th Place – Erik Pichette

Our lone rebel list and what a fascinating one. The two commander-operative duos of the army working together in glorious friendship. When leveraging the synergies of these heroes they are exceedingly effective, with Han and Chewie able to deal a lot of damage up close while Cassian can function at both mid to long range.

The corps offer up solid buffs, being able to heal injured characters and units and remove suppression from allies. The wookiees make up the bulk of the force, able to soak up 9 wounds worth of damage to grab objectives and even wrestle some units to the ground in melee.

7th Place – Keegan Evans

Another props for a clever list name “Anakin BARC-ing up the wrong tree”. This has some of the usual Republic list building we’ve come to expect in the past few months. Anakin and Padme for Exemplar, Phase 1 Clone troopers for some solid firepower, and BARCs for outriding and Bombing Run/Breakthrough.

8th Place – James Hedgepeth

Another Iden list, and it brings a solid mix of heavy firepower. The Inferno Squad, naturally, synergizes extremely well with Iden. The ISF and Death Troopers shore up the heavy firepower that give a lot of punch and can take a good few hits.

The Shoretroopers with mortars lay down long range suppressing fire while the Speeder Bikes can run bombs or grab supplies at a discount price.

Closing Thoughts

The list composition of this event is very interesting. Despite the current anxiety about Shadow Collective for the meta game, there is only one list in the top 8. Now, granted, a lot of those lists are using mercenary units as part of another army such as Republic or Imperials, but it is an interesting sign about where the faction is headed when the only list in the top 8 is a very unusual off-brand pick.

Second, there is no CIS here. CIS have had a pretty steady success rate in recent events, while Republic has been dragging behind. Yet here we have no CIS and 2 Republic. Could this also be a sign that things are shifting? GenCon also saw CIS absent from the top 8.

Congratulations again to all the winners. NOVA is one of the biggest events around and competition is fierce, so these were well fought victories.