Greetings all. This is my very first post & I have to say I really enjoy reading about the ideas & thoughts of everyone on here.

I have almost a year's worth of Xwing experience under my belt & I love & enjoy this game just as much now, as I did when I first saw it. I've won tournaments, & I've lost a few too. :-)

But getting to the topic, this is something that's always bothered me & I was hoping you all could help shed some light on it for me.

I'm a very competitive type of person. If we're playing for fun, then I'm a fun guy to be around. But if its a real tournament, you best bring everything you've got.

The thing that bothers me is this, I enjoy using Soontir fel with PTL, Targeting computer, & stealth device. (I even took the time to upgrade a plain interceptor to a true royale guard interceptor. Ill have to post pics one day)

To this day he has proven to be a near unstoppable beast. Lol! I also enjoy using a shuttle with vader or even a firespray with vader.

I've ran other lists & I enjoy trying new things, but those two work for me & have brought me more wins than anything else. Mostly because how many times I've run it.

So if its good, I like it, & it works, why do I feel bad for running a winning list all the time?

If you know what I'm running, you can build a counter to it right? So if you don't, then that's not my problem, right?

Thanks in advance everyone. :-)

Oh god, I read the thread title and thought this was going to be another one of those questionable sportsmanship related threads.

You're fine, though I'm forced to wonder whether a name change will be in order when you do eventually lose.

There is nothing wrong with running the same list all the time. On the contrary, your opponent should feel embarrassed to loose to the same list over and over again. lol

My reply would be, don't worry about it. If you enjoy running the list, and have success with it, then by all means stick with it. If you want to shake things up and try something different, do that. Either way, it's entirely up to you.

It is fair, especially tournament wise.

Is it fair? Certainly.

Is it fun?

In any case, fair or not, fun or not... welcome aboard

To this day he has proven to be a near unstoppable beast. Lol! I also enjoy using a shuttle with vader or even a firespray with vader.

I can't help but appreciate the irony of declaring Fel unstoppable in the same breath you mention a hard counter to Fel.

Obviously you've never seen him be one shot. Once you do, I think all question of Fel being unfair is gone.

If you run that list all the time and you opponents haven't figured out how to stop it, then that really is somewhat on them. It is far from unbeatable, in fact it's down right fragile. In our meta, Fel is most certainly not the key to instant victory. :-)

I took a very similar Soonter to my last tournament. And true to form Soonter was just awesome, right up until the moment where he was killed in a single turn of shooting. When he did die, I lost a whole lot of my points.

Soonter, is like a super Interceptor, he has all their strengths and weaknesses amplified. He is very susceptible a bad turn of rolling, and with with a third of your points only protected by three hull points, I don't think anyone can say that Soonter is unfair.

As for fun, I don't play Soonter because he is supper tuff, but because he is super fun. I think he is hard to fly, but flying him well in very rewarding. In short Soonter Fel rewards skilled play, I find that terribly fun.

You know what is an amazing counter to a souped up Fel? Lt Blount with an Ion Pulse Missle and Deadeye. 21 points of sheer TIE Interceptor killing goodness. Focus to fire the missile so you dont need to fight for a target lock. Blount always hits so he strips away the Stealth Device and the IPM gives 2 ion tokens even if it does no damage. Next turn Fell has to move 1 forward, has no actions and gets massacred.

Lieutenant Blount +Deadeye +Ion Pulse Missiles

Han Solo +Marksmanship +Gunner

Tarn Mison +R7 Astromech

Thats almost a guaranteed second turn kill of Fel and then being up 35 points. Don't get me wrong I love Fel, I just find when you start adding stuff to him he just becomes way too big a target.

You know what is an amazing counter to a souped up Fel? Lt Blount with an Ion Pulse Missle and Deadeye. 21 points of sheer TIE Interceptor killing goodness. Focus to fire the missile so you dont need to fight for a target lock. Blount always hits so he strips away the Stealth Device and the IPM gives 2 ion tokens even if it does no damage. Next turn Fell has to move 1 forward, has no actions and gets massacred.

Pretty sure that you still get actions as usual unless something was FAQ'ed when I wasn't looking?

As for your list and it being fair, it's pretty fair. I personally don't like Vader but that is just me

The ordnance that really messes with Fel and Int's in general is Flechette Torp. Stressing an Int severely damages it's abilities and usually leads to it's death in a single round.

Fel is especially vulnerable to this as his main method of being "Super Fel" is to PtL. Hitting him with a Flechette torp after he PtL's opens him up to a whole round with just 3 def dice keeping him alive.

Pretty sure that you still get actions as usual unless something was FAQ'ed when I wasn't looking?

You are right, Ions dont remove his actions, but Fel will have PTL, and the temptation to use it is really high. Chances are you will catch him with the IPM while he has the stress token from PTL. Then its 1 straight, no stress removal, no action. Flechette torps are also good, but as you arent limiting his movement, Fel can still go a bunch of places.

You know what is an amazing counter to a souped up Fel? Lt Blount with an Ion Pulse Missle and Deadeye. 21 points of sheer TIE Interceptor killing goodness. Focus to fire the missile so you dont need to fight for a target lock. Blount always hits so he strips away the Stealth Device and the IPM gives 2 ion tokens even if it does no damage. Next turn Fell has to move 1 forward, has no actions and gets massacred.

Actually, if Blunt fires an Ion Pulse at a ship it WILL take damage. That is part of what ion weapons do if they hit and it doesn't care what the dice actually say.

The Flechette Torp can add more stress to Fel but that gives him another Focus token along with the added Stress. Perhaps the benefit there is that the added Stress can't let him clear it making it impossible to perform action again the next turn.

Some people like saying that Gunner is overkill on Han but it is a natural counter to Fel. Throw in Marksmanship and things really start looking bad for the Interceptor.

So if its good, I like it, & it works, why do I feel bad for running a winning list all the time?

If you know what I'm running, you can build a counter to it right? So if you don't, then that's not my problem, right?

Thanks in advance everyone. :-)

Hey UA,

Your list is fair, and you shouldn't feel bad for playing it but the real question is, "are my opponents having fun?"

In one of my groups of friends, I have outspent them all when it comes to X-Wing, and will probably continue to do so. I know one of my friends is ill equipped to deal with a TIE swarm, so I don't run one. When I play them I try out all my bad ideas. I still play hard, but I don't exploit the limits of their collections. Why? Well, if I do eventually I won't have any opponents in that group not because I would be winning but because I would be taking the fun out of the game. Saying they just need to buy X, Y or Z (or I guess X, Y or B) may be correct, but is it fun?

And that is all you really need to ask yourself. Not "is it fair?" but "is it fun?". Is the player across the table having fun with the challenge or are are they just getting frustrated? If it is the second one, it may be time for adjustments. The short answer is, play what you want, but be aware of what is going on across the table. As a guy on the Warmachine boards used to love to say, the goal is to win, the point is to have fun.

One way I have had fun with lists people thought were unbeatable was to brainstorm ways to beat it with them. This helps make them better players, and makes you a better player as well as you will find holes in your lists you didn't know existed.

That's why I love this site & forum. I posted this last night b4 going to sleep, & now I check back to see it full of replys.

Thanks for all of the responses.

Lol! Trust me, I know all too well that Soontir isn't invincible. I've had bad defense rolls b4 & I can't even begin to tell you the soul crushing feeling of having your maxed out named pilot one shotted by a low PS vanilla fighter. Its BAD. LOL

I always see to it that I'm having fun & I do my best to make sure my opponent does also. Even in tournament settings, if I'm winning, I make sure to just play professionally & avoid all of the ooo's & aaaa's of rolling 3 crits or perfect maneuvers. Its not fun hearing that when you're losing.

As for my Profile name, I'm by no means "undefeated" lol. First starting off I actually lost quite a lot. Until one day I seriously asked myself, why am I losing? From then on I devoted myself to doing everything I could to become better & it paid off. :-)

Soontir isn't unstoppable, but in the hands of someone who's flown him many many times, he's a pilot to be feared.

Fear not the man who has practiced a thousand punches,

But the man who has practiced one punch, a thousand times.

~Bruce Lee

And that is all you really need to ask yourself. Not "is it fair?" but "is it fun?". Is the player across the table having fun with the challenge or are are they just getting frustrated? If it is the second one, it may be time for adjustments. The short answer is, play what you want, but be aware of what is going on across the table. As a guy on the Warmachine boards used to love to say, the goal is to win, the point is to have fun.

You do have to be a bit careful with that though, as there are some people who will lose, not think too hard about it, not change up their tactics significantly, possibly make up some excuse (at least to themselves), and just keep losing. It's one thing to play down to a less skilled player (or one with a limited collection) to make a better match or teach a specific lesson, but sometimes you just have to ask yourself if it's worth coddling and putting up with someone just to have an opponent.

With luck you will rarely, if ever, have to deal with these kinds of people, and a larger community will tend to wash them out naturally over time or force them out of their negative mindset, but if you have a really small player base it's something you might have to watch out for. Cultivating a friendly and educational atmosphere is good but eventually players need to think for themselves and accept responsibility for cultivating their own skills.

I once one-shotted a stealthed Fel by blocking him with a Rookie pilot and then using Chewie to blast him. Admittedly, I was very luck - I mean skilled. He's pretty good and a lot of fun to run, but not unstoppable. Your opponent needs to guess where Fel is going and block him. A Fel without actions is a dead Fel.

I do feel kinda bad when I continually beat a certain player over and over, whether it's with the same squad or not.

On the flip side there's a few people on vassal and in real life I don't think I've ever beaten, and it can be a bit intimidating and cause me to be off on my game as I'm so worried about playing flawlessly to have a chance to win that I might make a even dumber mistake then playing a "normal" game.

Winning by outspending your opponents may not be "fair" but at least with X-Wing it really isn't as easy to do. I say that because you should know what you're buying and everything is available so there shouldn't be runaway prices on anything. While it may take some investment to get a "viable" squadron (more depending on the squadron) once you have it all you need fear are some bad matchups. When your collection is much larger you have a lot more freedom in what to play making you less predictable so it is harder to meta game against you but easier for you to do it against another.

An odd thing here is that it sounds like your "go to" squadron is actually relatively cheap to metagame against. Variants of HSF are commonly recommended as easy, and perhaps more importantly inexpensive, starter squadrons yet they can be murder to Interceptors.

To the OP:

My opinion is similar to that previously posted regarding the Fun and Fair portions. I would believe that anything that has been released is "fair" to play (i.e. if you work for FFG and get product some period of time in advance, that isn't fair).

The fun issue is far different to me. If I were across from you running the same squad every week, I'd ask my self a couple of questions. First, am I learning/improving by losing to the same squad? Second, how are you acting while playing?

If the games in question are "for fun", I would wonder why you keep playing the same squad over and over (yes, I did see your Bruce Lee quote). I would think playing multiple squads would increase how well prepared for tournaments you are.

With regards into how much you spend on your squads versus other people, it definitely has an advantage to do so. I wouldn't begrudge anyone for being able to do it, but it would be nice to have you "dumb" down your list to options available to your opponents (even if it comes down to only 1 of a certain ship) on occasion . Conversely, you shouldn't be punished by not being able to play the new Phantom w/ Advanced Stealth day 1 just because no one else has it yet.

All in all, in casual play I'd recommend mixing it up as it will likely make for a more fun event for all parties involved (even if Fel appears more often than most squads).

With regards to tournament play, I'd say play what you want when you want. When I go to my first tourney (not likely this weekend, but hopefully still this summer) I expect to be hammered by everyone's best squads even if they aren't the meta top squads.

Lastly let me say that you were thoughtful to ask the question. That really speaks well of you. Keep up the good sportsmanship and teach others the same (I wish I had learned that much earlier in life).

I took a very similar Soonter to my last tournament. And true to form Soonter was just awesome, right up until the moment where he was killed in a single turn of shooting. When he did die, I lost a whole lot of my points.

Again, sorry about that buddy! I actually felt bad when I one shot him because I think the Interceptor is one of the most fun ships to fly and it hurts a little to deprive somebody of that fun.

An odd thing here is that it sounds like your "go to" squadron is actually relatively cheap to metagame against. Variants of HSF are commonly recommended as easy, and perhaps more importantly inexpensive, starter squadrons yet they can be murder to Interceptors.