I guess the dial will look like this (maybe the 2 straight will also be green)

I'm guessing this top one will be pretty close.

I think that the 2 sharp turns will be red as well

My thoughts on the Defender Dial:

I think it is basically the advanced dial. With all straights being green and 3 turns red. Everything else the same.

As someone stated it's very good vertical, but not as good at cornering.

An alpha interceptor with 3 shields, no boost, no evade, a worse dial, whose incentive is to joust? Going to need 2+ white kturns and all speed 3 green and all speed 2 green and white to have a shot.

A ship is more than the sum of it's parts but these parts aren't adding up to 30pts. Can't compare to a sup'd up interceptor as the dial is worse, no boost, no evade. Can't compare to the firespray because even the firespray gets evade and has 1 more sheild and 3 more hull; and doesn't have to joust to work (and that doesn't cover crew, missile, bomb, and higher PS!).

I'm just not seeing it.

The Defender gets both Cannon and Missile upgrades, so I think it will have a wide variety of uses. I bet the dial is a lot crazier than we think; theres no way did FFG overcosted it by more than a point or two.

Its very possible there is either

1-an upgrade combination none of us know that makes this thing good

2-it has more to its dial than they have let on.

FFG has done a great job so far of making ships fit their fluff role, lets not dismiss the tie defender as garbage just yet. I remember when everyone was shitting blood about how 3 hlc bwings were going to break the game, we didnt see advanced sensor/fcs as the better build until later.

I see it as a fast cannon carrier. Less Hull and shield than the Firespray, but faster, more maneuvrable and harder to hit. There is an evade token coming with the ship, so there is a way to get an evade with the Defender. Wether it's from an EPT or a pilot ability remains to be known.

I see it as a fast cannon carrier. Less Hull and shield than the Firespray, but faster, more maneuvrable and harder to hit. There is an evade token coming with the ship, so there is a way to get an evade with the Defender. Wether it's from an EPT or a pilot ability remains to be known.

Plus, everyone has a problem with the fact that the cannons usually aren't useable for more than 1–2 turns with the Firespray without it having to stress for a K-turn. Not anymore.

I think these could be the ideal Ion Cannon carriers. Hit them with IC, K-turn behind them, and then lay in the hurt.

The Defender gets both Cannon and Missile upgrades, so I think it will have a wide variety of uses. I bet the dial is a lot crazier than we think; theres no way did FFG overcosted it by more than a point or two.

Except, that so far, FFG has overcosted every single shielded 3 agility ship. (%)'s are the "jousting efficiency" from my Lanchester's thread: doesn't consider dials, upgrades, but does consider attack/defense/hull/shields.

• A-wings (87.2%): just got a -2 point reduction in Rebel Aces (98.8% after buff)
• TIE Advanced (82.3%): overcosted by 2-4 points
• TIE Defender (81.4%): It has a white K-turn, otherwise it is the least tactically interesting ship in the game.
• E-wing (83.2%): Also looks very overcosted, but at least it has lots of upgrade options. (droid + System Upgrade)

Similar but significantly different in that the white K and DD Boost has you pointing out, the Hard turn K would have you facing in. Actually the white K and DD boost would be pretty much the same as doing a hard 2 turn. Not that special.

If Ive got the angles right!

Hard-2-K-Turn? If the White-K is at 3 or 4 speed and you have daredevil you can achieve similar results provided room to maneuver.

The real insanity is going to come with the Elite Pilots. Push the Limit after a K-turn, yeah, that's going to be fun. Here's hoping the PS 3 pilot has an elite talent, like the A-wing.

The Defender gets both Cannon and Missile upgrades, so I think it will have a wide variety of uses. I bet the dial is a lot crazier than we think; theres no way did FFG overcosted it by more than a point or two.

Except, that so far, FFG has overcosted every single shielded 3 agility ship. (%)'s are the "jousting efficiency" from my Lanchester's thread: doesn't consider dials, upgrades, but does consider attack/defense/hull/shields.

• A-wings (87.2%): just got a -2 point reduction in Rebel Aces (98.8% after buff)
• TIE Advanced (82.3%): overcosted by 2-4 points
• TIE Defender (81.4%): It has a white K-turn, otherwise it is the least tactically interesting ship in the game.
• E-wing (83.2%): Also looks very overcosted, but at least it has lots of upgrade options. (droid + System Upgrade)

I feel like if this game was designed by you, we would end up with 1 point tie fighters, 2 point interceptors, and 3 point YTs. Your jousting numbers are only a SMALL part of this game. If you focus that much on just base numbers, then we might as well just average everything no dice, fly straight at each other, loop back and repeat till one of them dies. That sounds fun.

The Defender gets both Cannon and Missile upgrades, so I think it will have a wide variety of uses. I bet the dial is a lot crazier than we think; theres no way did FFG overcosted it by more than a point or two.

Except, that so far, FFG has overcosted every single shielded 3 agility ship. (%)'s are the "jousting efficiency" from my Lanchester's thread: doesn't consider dials, upgrades, but does consider attack/defense/hull/shields.

• A-wings (87.2%): just got a -2 point reduction in Rebel Aces (98.8% after buff)
• TIE Advanced (82.3%): overcosted by 2-4 points
• TIE Defender (81.4%): It has a white K-turn, otherwise it is the least tactically interesting ship in the game.
• E-wing (83.2%): Also looks very overcosted, but at least it has lots of upgrade options. (droid + System Upgrade)

I feel like if this game was designed by you, we would end up with 1 point tie fighters, 2 point interceptors, and 3 point YTs. Your jousting numbers are only a SMALL part of this game. If you focus that much on just base numbers, then we might as well just average everything no dice, fly straight at each other, loop back and repeat till one of them dies. That sounds fun.

Well, then you would be wrong.

But I wouldn't have made a 21 point TIE Advanced or a 17 point A-wing, that's for sure.

None of us knows what formula FFG used to make these ships.. so I usually ignore all the math wing stuff.. just static in the line to me.. plus I feel it isn't helpful at all so.. that's just me..

Well, then you would be wrong.

But I wouldn't have made a 21 point TIE Advanced or a 17 point A-wing, that's for sure.

Yep, cause hind sight is always 20/20 and calling others out for mistakes makes you a better person. The A-wing is still a viable ship, with this expansion it just gives you more options to outfit it. The advance, I do agree with is a bit much, but we can see a upcoming change to it more then likely, or they will keep it how it is, a ship meant only for Darth Vader (iconic standing). If they used your numbers there would be such an imbalance it wouldn't even be funny or fun. I shudder at the thought of a "joust worthy" interceptor. If that happened, it would be the only ship any one would use.

Who says they even have a formula? It could simply be iterative playtesting.

Is it useful? Well, as a player rather than a designer, it really only affects House Rules and trying to predict the meta shifts before the ships are even released. I personally find that useful, but then that's just what I do.

After the A-wing balance changes, its point efficiency is right on par with the TIE Fighter. The math said the A-wing was overcosted by about 2 points. Then later FFG reduced the cost by 2 points.

I was also able to predict, before wave 2 was released, that the TIE Interceptor wasn't going to see much competitive use, and not just because its a glass cannon. It's currently accounting for 4.21% of points spent in the Store Championship lists that we have reported, where average is 8.33%.

So, looking forward, I have a good degree of confidence that:

• Z-95's will be an amazing filler craft at 12 points. Between this and 15 point A-wings, I predict that the standard rebel squad will go from 4 ships to 5 ships, with a splattering across the 4-6 range.
• E-wings look overcosted, but they might find some use in some elite 3 ship builds, especially with wonky upgrade options.
• Phantom is a question mark until we know everything about the Cloaking action.
• TIE Defender would be overcosted by the same percentage as the TIE Advanced, but it does have a white K-turn. Will that make up for it being overcosted by 5 points otherwise? Highly unlikely. Unless the evade token mechanism turns out to be really good, or one of its pilots has a really good ability, it'll almost certainly fall into the bottom tier of competitive ships.

Well, then you would be wrong.

But I wouldn't have made a 21 point TIE Advanced or a 17 point A-wing, that's for sure.

No, but that's because you make a ranking based on stats, disregarding one of the most important factors in the game and then blatantly stating that FFG has been making mistakes by overcosting agile ships. How can you come to that conclusion without taking into account the dial? At least 50% of this game is maneuvring.

Yep, cause hind sight is always 20/20.

I got well out in front of the A-wing balance change. It wasn't hindsight.

Which numbers? My current House Rules for the the TIE Advanced are:

• All TIE Advanced may now equip Fire Control System for 0 points.
• All TIE Advanced ships other than Vader are reduced in cost by 1 point.

Obviously. I would reduce the cost of the Interceptor by 1 point across the board. That would put its jousting efficiency at 94.2%, which is basically halfway between the X-wing and the B-wing, but still lower than the TIE Fighter. It still wouldn't synergize well with Howlrunner compared to regular TIE Fighters. TIE Fighters with 1 reroll work out to 116.9% efficient, for reference, so even with a -1 point change to squints you still wouldn't see people abandoning TIE Swarms for them.

Well, then you would be wrong.

But I wouldn't have made a 21 point TIE Advanced or a 17 point A-wing, that's for sure.

No, but that's because you make a ranking based on stats, disregarding one of the most important factors in the game and then blatantly stating that FFG has been making mistakes by overcosting agile ships. How can you come to that conclusion without taking into account the dial? At least 50% of this game is maneuvring.

No, I don't disregard the dial or upgrades, those are also considered in the Lanchester's thread. It's less scientific than simply running the math on the stats, but still does a pretty good job at sorting out the ships' "fair" costs.

Edit: I didn't say FFG made a mistake by overcosting agile ships. Just the ships that have 3 agility dice and have shields. Slight difference. Those 4 ships are the A-wing, TIE Advanced, TIE Defender, and E-wing.

You play the game how you want bud. I just hate when people do math calculations on these ships, judge them for that and then pass on options that are extremely fun to play and effective once you get a handle on them. Yeah joust numbers are great, but like I said, if you are going to do that, we might as well just toss the dice out and say you take such and such damage each turn. I know you think you have this all figured out but I wouldn't want you any where near the design floor for this game.

P.S. The hind sight thing is about ships in general, not just the A-wing. I've read your suggested ship designs and they all focus on jousting, if that happened I would drop this game instantly if it came to that.

Edit: Grammar

Let's also consider that if we go by the jousting efficency, than the Lambda shuld be the second must common Imperial shp due to it's high efficency.

I do find it odd how you are using the results of WINNING squads to justify whether a ship is overcosted or not. If a ship is bad, then shouldn't it not show up in winning squads at all?

I just hate when people do math calculations on these ships, judge them for that and then pass on options that are extremely fun to play and effective once you get a handle on them.

That's really not a fair accusation to make, considering you don't know how I play the game.

Which designs are those? The only ones that come to mind are a hyper maneuverable TIE Avenger, and a TIE Defender with a Beam Weapon slot.

Let's also consider that if we go by the jousting efficency, than the Lambda shuld be the second must common Imperial shp due to it's high efficency.

This was covered in detail already in the Lanchester's thread.

I do find it odd how you are using the results of WINNING squads to justify whether a ship is overcosted or not. If a ship is bad, then shouldn't it not show up in winning squads at all?

If a ship is bad, then you would expect it to show up less than the good ships, but not necessarily zero. The world is analog, there's a distribution, not an ON/OFF switch.

If a ship is bad, then you would expect it to show up less than the good ships, but not necessarily zero. The world is analog, there's a distribution, not an ON/OFF switch.

That line just made me laugh so hard. Thank you. So much contradiction its hilarious.