This may have been covered in other topics (I am to lazy to search for them if they have) but I am curious...

Is it better to take a stealth device on your a-wing/interceptor or a shield upgrade?

In my mind the shield is guaranteed stopped damage and results in one of the above ships not being shot off the board (unless its range one with 4 attack dice and you roll three blanks on an interceptor).

So I ask thee veterans of x-wing, which is better the stealth device or the shield upgrade for your three agility ships?

This may have been covered in other topics (I am to lazy to search for them if they have) but I am curious...

Is it better to take a stealth device on your a-wing/interceptor or a shield upgrade?

In my mind the shield is guaranteed stopped damage and results in one of the above ships not being shot off the board (unless its range one with 4 attack dice and you roll three blanks on an interceptor).

So I ask thee veterans of x-wing, which is better the stealth device or the shield upgrade for your three agility ships?

Mathematically, Hull Upgrade is better than stealth. On a 3 agi ship, stealth will avoid ~.65 damage on average compared to the 1 damage hull upgrade avoids. Shield avoids <1.25 damage (it avoids 1.25 if it is always blocking a crit, 1 if it is always blocking a hit)... So, again, mathematically speaking, hull upgrade is the best added survivor tool, well, besides Chewy .

That being said, as others have pointed out, there is a psychological effect that stealth device adds, especially when coupled with an evade token. However, as more math wingers point out the short comings of the stealth device, fewer high quality players will fall for the psychological effects. Which means that it only works on beginners and intermediate players, whom most bothering to wonder which is better won't have issues routinely beating.

Stealth Device is wasted points. Go for the Shield Upgrade, or even the Hull Upgrade.

I disagree on the idea people will ignore it more. It's still going to be the least likely to hit ship making it a gamble. Throw it on a lower threat target like an A-wing or constantly focus/evade with the ship and nobody will attack it because even with SD's flaws it isn't likely to get hit. Hull device is more efficient sort of, but even holding off one attack makes the SD better, and any competent player will take the most accurate shot they can on the highest threat they can. This allows you to keep your A-wing alive until nothing can get it in arc.

If you want to use Stealth Device, you need to have a modifier in order to make that extra dice count, be it a Focus or Evade token. EDIT: ok in hindsight, not so much the evade token, but the focus token yes, you really need at least a focus token to make stealth device work

Just by itself, Stealth Device isnt very useful, and you would likely be better off with Hull Upgrade. Basically, if you have PTL or somehow have that extra focus / evade token that you will not be using for attacking, Stealth is better. If you do not have such freebies, Hull is a safer choice. So you would see like say Soontir PTL Stealth, and Cowall AdrenalineRush Hull

I used to do this interesting experiment, where I took an evade dice and painted it a different colour, and have it represent the Stealth Device Dice. After rolling the dice a few times, I can quickly see how lousy Stealth Device really is

It depends on how you use it, IMO. Hull/Shield are absolutely reliable, but they also have a very specific limit. You gain one health, which is extremely valuable on certain ships (e.g., Interceptor). If you're good at defensive positioning, getting behind rocks, at Range 3, and turtling w/ Focus/Evade, the bonus from the Stealth Device can make you extremely durable for a prolonged period of time. If you think SD makes you invulnerable and charge in, it will evaporate and be a waste of points.

For the typical pilot and the guaranteed return on investment, Hull/Shield are certainly safer.

Stealth device a waste? Are you high? When I'm rolling 4/5 defense dice on every attack and you can't seem to get a hit in then tell me it's a waste. Shield/hull upgrade can only prevent 1 damage, stealth can stop several. Yeah you may get unlucky and lose it quick (or Blount ruins your day) but it's far from a waste. I've won several games with 2 ints undamaged because of stealth.

oh ya, goes without saying, but Stealth Device is more useful on ships that already have a naturally high agility. Although you may see funny combos like Ibtisam + Sensor Jammer + Elusiveness + Stealth Device from time to time.

4 blanks... psh, I see your 4 blanks, and raise you a 5th blank with no evade token!

Soontir with SD and Range 3 got 1 shotted by a Rookie, yup that's happened to me.

Mathematically Stealth does suck. It can't be denied, as even with a focus it only has a 5/8ths cchance to add an evade.

Against a 3 attack ship with focus odds are you'll lose it the first time they roll 3 hits. About 50% of the time They're 3 hits chance is better than your chance of 3 evades. It helps most against tie swarms.

The psychological advantage is phenomenal though.

I think on low priority ships Stealth device probably blocks ~1.6 damage because it will likely stop them from choosing that ship first. The stealth device isn't actually do this, the ship it's on is. On a basic interceptor or awing it might avoid you a shot and therefore a damage.

I like stealth on basic awings because they already have a little less variance than an interceptor and it's not the worst thing if it does nothing, where as on an interceptor if you roll 4 blanks you're probably dead while the awing can limp away.

GSP with Stealth and PtL is one of my go-to ships, and soon they'll only be 23 points on the board. I'd be lying if I thought they were the best thing ever to deploy, but they're fun and I do have a lot of success with them.

Stealth on Awings is actually rather unnecessary. Assuming you are only running 1 Awing in your rebel list, chances are your opponent would already be shooting at something else that is a lot more dangerous, like say Xwings or Bwings. Even if you include HWKs, Ywings, etcetc, the Awing would easily be one of the lowest priority targets, and when given the chance, your opponent would not want to attack your Awing anyway.

Stealth on Awings is actually rather unnecessary. Assuming you are only running 1 Awing in your rebel list, chances are your opponent would already be shooting at something else that is a lot more dangerous, like say Xwings or Bwings. Even if you include HWKs, Ywings, etcetc, the Awing would easily be one of the lowest priority targets, and when given the chance, your opponent would not want to attack your Awing anyway.

But it is better on them than Hull Upgrade. And late game it may be very useful whrn it's the last ship. Of course with the whole upcoming mutiple APS thing A-wings are going to want to cut points somewhere.

Stealth on Awings is actually rather unnecessary. Assuming you are only running 1 Awing in your rebel list, chances are your opponent would already be shooting at something else that is a lot more dangerous, like say Xwings or Bwings. Even if you include HWKs, Ywings, etcetc, the Awing would easily be one of the lowest priority targets, and when given the chance, your opponent would not want to attack your Awing anyway.

But it is better on them than Hull Upgrade. And late game it may be very useful whrn it's the last ship. Of course with the whole upcoming mutiple APS thing A-wings are going to want to cut points somewhere.

Im trying to say that actually hey, Awings don't need any such upgrades at all, and you are a lot better off spending that 3 points on other things, than to spend it on something that you probably wouldnt even get to use once

Shield device is terrible. Go ahead and count up the number of times a ship without either upgrade gets killed by an attack that does more than the perfect number of damage needed to kill it.

From what I've seen, it's within the margin of error for stealth device being useful. + 1 cost.

Shield device is terrible. Go ahead and count up the number of times a ship without either upgrade gets killed by an attack that does more than the perfect number of damage needed to kill it.

From what I've seen, it's within the margin of error for stealth device being useful. + 1 cost.

Shield device is terrible. Go ahead and count up the number of times a ship without either upgrade gets killed by an attack that does more than the perfect number of damage needed to kill it.

From what I've seen, it's within the margin of error for stealth device being useful. + 1 cost.

Goes well on Luke with DTF and R2 though.

also good on ships that already have quite a lot of shields, since it increases the "buffer zone" and really makes the ship less likely to be hit by a crit

Stealth Device is the ultimate risk/reward upgrade. It could save your butt 5 times or it could fail the first time you throw the dice. I think the shield upgrade is almost entirely off the table now with the cheaper hull upgrade. For three points you can KNOW you've got an extra hit point or you can risk those three points and hope the dice are kind.

4 blanks... psh, I see your 4 blanks, and raise you a 5th blank with no evade token!

Soontir with SD and Range 3 got 1 shotted by a Rookie, yup that's happened to me.

Under the newest "Fly Casual" rules that player owes you a beer... and a pretty good one too as it scales by difficulty.

4 blanks... psh, I see your 4 blanks, and raise you a 5th blank with no evade token!

Soontir with SD and Range 3 got 1 shotted by a Rookie, yup that's happened to me.

That's adorable. I got one shotted, at range three, with a stealth device, while using Tycho, against a Rookie X-wing pilot. He rolled 2 hits and a crit. I all blanked the 5 dice. The crit was the 2 hit crit. I just blinked, cocked my head, then shook his hand while muttering "Well ****...."

4 blanks... psh, I see your 4 blanks, and raise you a 5th blank with no evade token!

Soontir with SD and Range 3 got 1 shotted by a Rookie, yup that's happened to me.

That's adorable. I got one shotted, at range three, with a stealth device, while using Tycho, against a Rookie X-wing pilot. He rolled 2 hits and a crit. I all blanked the 5 dice. The crit was the 2 hit crit. I just blinked, cocked my head, then shook his hand while muttering "Well ****...."

And now you know the power of the Hull upgrade!

4 blanks... psh, I see your 4 blanks, and raise you a 5th blank with no evade token!

Soontir with SD and Range 3 got 1 shotted by a Rookie, yup that's happened to me.

That's adorable. I got one shotted, at range three, with a stealth device, while using Tycho, against a Rookie X-wing pilot. He rolled 2 hits and a crit. I all blanked the 5 dice. The crit was the 2 hit crit. I just blinked, cocked my head, then shook his hand while muttering "Well ****...."

And now you know the power of the Hull upgrade!

Total odds look like a .0006 chance of that set of circumstances.

GSP with Stealth and PtL is one of my go-to ships, and soon they'll only be 23 points on the board. I'd be lying if I thought they were the best thing ever to deploy, but they're fun and I do have a lot of success with them.

Will it be possible? I think the Chadraam Refit or whatever lowers the cost by two is a modification, so you can't take stealth/hull/shield and the refit.