so basically its a "Space cow" that can turn slightly better?? does look cool though.

Made by the same company, the gunboat shared many superficial similarities. Folding wings, the cockpit, ECT. In the games it had two ion canons, two lasers, and a warhead launcher. For Xwing it'd be kinda like a mix between the bomber and the shuttle. 18-25 points, 2/2/3/3 stats, upgrades in a canon, bomb, torpedo, and torpedo.

It was the Imperial's first hyperspace-capable starfighter, and the first that used shields - essentially the first that could perform deep space escort, assault or patrol missions without the support of a captial ship or carrier. Almost all the Rebel starfighters were hyperspace capable up to that point, so the issue of the Assault Gunboat allowed the Imperials greater options when it came to combating Rebel hit-and-run tactics.

It was similarly sized to an X-Wing - and similar in role - single pilot, 10 metres long, 15 metres wide, with two laser cannons, two ion cannons and concussion missile launchers.

It first appeared in the original X-Wing PC game I believe, and all it's sequels.

You can see the bad boy in this little video at the 3:10 mark (along with a hell of a lot of other Star Wars EU ships):

Well, not exactly the first Imprial starfighter with hyperdrive and shields. Maybe the first to be deigned under the Empire but there were a few starfighters flown by the Empir as legacy ships from the clone wars including:

Y-wing BTL-B (hyperdrive and shields)

Z-95 head hunters (clone variant) (shields, possible hyperdrive or ring)

ARC-170 (both)

Don't know about the V-wing having shields but it did have hyperdrive rings and some models had their own hypedrives (they escorted the Emperor's shuttle)

Delta-7 and eta-2 had no shields but did have access to hyperdrive rings.

The V-19 had shields and also relied on rings, but was on its way to being replaced alread by the end of the CW.

I guess the XG-1 is supposed to predate the TIE Advanced, but as we see in rebels the V1 and X1 models were around 5 and 4 yeas before Yavin, respectively. That makes a very early date for the Gunboat compared to what we see in the games.

why do we have to make a thread everyday about, "OMG Gunboat pwease FFG!!"

We should be rallying for the Clawcraft, not the Lambda's disfigured cousin.

Actually this thread has been around for a while. It just gets necro'd a lot.

And I think I'd rather see the IG-1000 before the Clawcraft. It even looks more like a legitimate TIE design than just making A curvy-winged Interceptor rip-off.

why do we have to make a thread everyday about, "OMG Gunboat pwease FFG!!"

We should be rallying for the Clawcraft, not the Lambda's disfigured cousin.

I would say the Clawcaft is the Interceptor's disfigured cousin.

The Gunboat is ace. My old trusty attack vessel. It was the first shielded craft to fly in Tie Fighter .

And were did the Clawcraft appear?

We should be rallying for the Clawcraft, not the Lambda's disfigured cousin.

No, we really shouldn't. But nothing's stopping you making a thread to that effect instead of posting naught but negativity on this one.

Well, not exactly the first Imprial starfighter with hyperdrive and shields. Maybe the first to be deigned under the Empire but there were a few starfighters flown by the Empir as legacy ships from the clone wars including (list of Rebel ships snipped):

I guess the XG-1 is supposed to predate the TIE Advanced, but as we see in rebels the V1 and X1 models were around 5 and 4 yeas before Yavin, respectively. That makes a very early date for the Gunboat compared to what we see in the games.

From the Wookiee :

The Cygnus Spaceworks Alpha-class Xg-1 Star Wing, also known as the Xg-1 Starwing and commonly referred to as the Assault Gunboat, was one of the Galactic Empire's first general-deployment starfighters to be equipped with deflector shields and a hyperdrive.

Bearing in mind the fluff for the XG-1 on the Wookie was around before the godawful prequels were even a dollar-shaped twinkle in George Lucas' eye. Also, the TIE Advanced wasn't a general-deployment starfighter, even if you consider Rebels (a cartoon which also stomps roughshod all over the fluff background of the A-Wing and B-Wing as well, if memory serves). In the games, the XG-1 pre-dates the Battle of Yavin by a considerable margin (it was knocking around in the first campaign of the original X-Wing game).

Edit: And while we're at it, revised the homebrew rules from page 1 for debate:

XG-1 "Star Wing" Assault Gunboat

Attack: 2

Agility: 2

Hull: 4

Shields: 3

Faction: Imperial

Actions: Target Lock, Focus, Barrel Roll

Upgrade Slots: Cannon, Systems, Missile, Missile

Notes: Dial has the Segnor's Loop manuever.

Comes with a new Systems Upgrade card:

Linked Weapons Array: "If this ship is equipped with an Ion Cannon, you may perform a secondary weapon attack after a SUCCESSFUL primary weapon attack."

And were did the Clawcraft appear?

The Hand of Thrawn books. So like 20 years after Yavin. And it's not even really an Imperial ship.

We should be rallying for the Clawcraft, not the Lambda's disfigured cousin.

No, we really shouldn't. But nothing's stopping you making a thread to that effect instead of posting naught but negativity on this one.

Well, not exactly the first Imprial starfighter with hyperdrive and shields. Maybe the first to be deigned under the Empire but there were a few starfighters flown by the Empir as legacy ships from the clone wars including (list of Rebel ships snipped):

I guess the XG-1 is supposed to predate the TIE Advanced, but as we see in rebels the V1 and X1 models were around 5 and 4 yeas before Yavin, respectively. That makes a very early date for the Gunboat compared to what we see in the games.

From the Wookiee :

The Cygnus Spaceworks Alpha-class Xg-1 Star Wing, also known as the Xg-1 Starwing and commonly referred to as the Assault Gunboat, was one of the Galactic Empire's first general-deployment starfighters to be equipped with deflector shields and a hyperdrive.

Bearing in mind the fluff for the XG-1 on the Wookie was around before the godawful prequels were even a dollar-shaped twinkle in George Lucas' eye. Also, the TIE Advanced wasn't a general-deployment starfighter, even if you consider Rebels (a cartoon which also stomps roughshod all over the fluff background of the A-Wing and B-Wing as well, if memory serves). In the games, the XG-1 pre-dates the Battle of Yavin by a considerable margin (it was knocking around in the first campaign of the original X-Wing game).

Edit: And while we're at it, revised the homebrew rules from page 1 for debate:

XG-1 "Star Wing" Assault Gunboat

Attack: 2

Agility: 2

Hull: 4

Shields: 3

Faction: Imperial

Actions: Target Lock, Focus, Barrel Roll

Upgrade Slots: Cannon, Systems, Missile, Missile

Notes: Dial has the Segnor's Loop manuever.

Comes with a new Systems Upgrade card:

Linked Weapons Array: "If this ship is equipped with an Ion Cannon, you may perform a secondary weapon attack after a SUCCESSFUL primary weapon attack."

I think 2 agility is just a little much for the gunboat. It flew like a Y-wing, so probably should be Agility 1, but 4 hull 4 shield, same HP as Y but different spread. I do like the S turns, maybe include those on the dial but no K turn. Definately BR. Dial should be similar to Y or bomber.

Dunno if I like that system upgrade, but it would make the gunboat more viable.

And were did the Clawcraft appear?

The Hand of Thrawn books. So like 20 years after Yavin. And it's not even really an Imperial ship.

Also, the TIE interceptor was a bit much in my eyes in 1983. All they did was put a bunch of guns on the TIE fighter and give it pointy wings. Not nearly as cool as the Advance or the Bomber, and those didn't need fancy guns on the wings. The Clawcraft just continues the silliness that the Interceptor started. Hopefully the Special Forces TIE from Ep. 7 shows a practical variant in normal TIE instead of 'it's got a much faster engine cause we said so, even if they only thing we changed was the wings'

I stopped reading the novels long before that ship appeared, because by that time the EU was an unmanageable mess full of every two-bit 'author's' ideas of how SW should be.

I read pretty much every SW novel up until they started putting out novels for the prequel movies. At which point, I stopped reading them altogether, because if I wasn't going to read all of them, I wasn't going to bother reading any.

That said, I kinda wish I'd stopped sooner. Like right after the Hand of Thrawn books(which I liked). Cause I really could have done without reading all of those New Jedi Order Yuuzhan Vong books.

The Gunboat is ace. My old trusty attack vessel. It was the first shielded craft to fly in Tie Fighter .

Not to mention that it is probably one of the few craft in the whole Star Wars that was created because it made sense and had a role to fulfill, not only for the "looks cool" reason like most others.

The Empire has its doctrine about shield-less, hyperdrive-less, but agile and inexpensive, swarms of TIEs popping out of a capital ship. The capital ship is there to bring fear of the imperial power. The cheap fighters en masse are there prove that there is a reason to be afraid, as basically nothing can rival a swarm of dozens of TIEs.

However the imperial star destroyers cannot be everywhere, they aren't fast enough to be used for patrolling duties or quick response to distress signals, they are warships, not wardens.

Pirates and rebels used this to their advantage, assaulting trade vessels and defenseless facilities knowing that by the time a star destroyer arrived, they would be long gone and their damage dealt.

So the Empire needed a fast deploy, fast response patrol fighter. With hyperdrive to be able to move without the umbilical cord to a star destroyer, and with shields, to be able to survive on their own until bigger help arrived.

Also, it had to be reasonably priced, even if not as agile as the TIEs, as their main purpose would be to be scouts, disable craft, interrupt raids and give the voice of alarm to bring in reinforcements. If problems were too big to handle, they could always hyper out.

And so, the Assault Gunboat fills all these blanks.

- It's shielded and hypercapable, and has ion cannons to disable and allow capture of prisoners. But it cannot be expensive if it's to perform its main role of guarding the dangerous sectors. We know the results of Sienar Fleet Systems when they attempted to develop a fighter with those parameters: the TIE Defender wanted to be so much, and ended costing a fortune.

- Cygnus Spaceworks had already a history of shielded, hypercapable small craft and worked for the Empire. It made sense that it was this company the one producing the Gunboat. And that is why it looks distinctively non-TIE, and quite lambdaish.

In-game, the Gunboat provides a role to the Empire that no other craft of its class can fulfill:

- The one imperial small base "tanky" ship. Without turning the Empire into a Rebel clone, this craft can serve as spearhead to soften enemy formations before the TIE main force arrives.

- Control, with ion cannons, or flechette cannons. Of course, a cannon upgrade would allow for heavy laser cannon or mangler cannon, allowing for a heavy assault fighter a la B-Wing, and so they would be the cheapest imperial small base ship to be able to carry those.

- Systems. The cheapest ship this side of the TIE Phantom able to carry these from factory settings (the TIE Advanced needs the X1 title). There is no system upgrade that currently makes no sense on the Gunboat.

The gunboat stats need to give it a chance without making it OP.

- An attack of 2 would require equipping a damaging cannon if this ship is to deal any damage. So we need to take that into account when pricing it. The Y-Wing has the benefit of the turret, and the B-Wing its primary 3 attack weapon. The TIE Fighter has 2 attack, but has its price and its agility to balance it out. Missiles, as usual, won't be used for 100 point dogfights. The Gunboat could equip the Accuracy Corrector system, giving it a good enough average damage that would kind of balance out it's 2 attack.

- The Gunboat definitely doesn't have 3 agility in the lore. But 1 without a turret or a strong primary feels too little to me. Unless we come up with something to give it extra mobility, like white s-loops, we need to give it a little more agility, a little more firepower, or that combo of "after a primary attack, perform a ion attack", so that when they manage to get someone in arc, they make it count. Advanced sensors and barrel rolls should help with this, though.

We have a ship that when it equips some upgrades it can be quite good, but naked, it is clearly underwhelming.

Att: 2, Agi: 1, Hu: 4, Sh: 4, Focus, Target Lock, Barrel Roll. Systems, Cannon, Missile, Missile

Those are roughly the stats of the Y-Wing, with the upgrade bar of the B-Wing. If the dial is like the B-Wing's but with 2-segnor loops instead of 2-koiogran, it should be priced just below the B-Wing as it lacks primary attack and shields are more valuable than hull. A Gunboat needs a cannon and/or the accuracy corrector, or fire control system, or advanced sensors, to be any useful. Otherwise it is a bulkier Z-95.

It should cost around 18-19 points.

What do you think?

Nice post about the gunboat being a ship the empire totally needed in the lore and still needs in this game.

However I just can't see the Gunboat being agile enough to have 2 green dice. It would compare to the B-wing but be cheaper due to only 2 green dice and probably much better dial. S loops should be included, making them white might be a bit much though. Cost of 19 for lowest PS pilot sounds about right with 2 red 1 green and 4/4 hull/shield. It does have BR, which is always useful. If you think the ship still needs help the. We could include a title:

Xg-1 (title, gunboat only)

Cannon upgrade costs 2 less to a minimum of 0.

A 24 point 4 red dice ship that's between a B and X it's dial sounds about right. Of course that's only 3 dice at range one, not 5 like that (expletive deleted) Phantom. More expensive than HLC Scyk too, so it's probably around he right price.

Nice post about the gunboat being a ship the empire totally needed in the lore and still needs in this game.

However I just can't see the Gunboat being agile enough to have 2 green dice. It would compare to the B-wing but be cheaper due to only 2 green dice and probably much better dial. S loops should be included, making them white might be a bit much though. Cost of 19 for lowest PS pilot sounds about right with 2 red 1 green and 4/4 hull/shield. It does have BR, which is always useful. If you think the ship still needs help the. We could include a title:

Xg-1 (title, gunboat only)

Cannon upgrade costs 2 less to a minimum of 0.

A 24 point 4 red dice ship that's between a B and X it's dial sounds about right. Of course that's only 3 dice at range one, not 5 like that (expletive deleted) Phantom. More expensive than HLC Scyk too, so it's probably around he right price.

And what blank role would it fill in X-Wing? A cheap cannon carrier?

There is no reason why it should be capable of doing s-loops btw.

I still think its time to introduce beam weapons - or at least the tractor beam.

Small base with a shuttle dial, but with the boost and barrel roll actions. sh*tty maneuverability on the dial, plenty of arcdodging on the tailend (or the beginning with Advanced Sensors) Also lets the thing take autothrusters while being decidedly NOT a dogfighter. Good stats for it's price, because it's going o have to burn it's action every round to not drive like a shuttle.

It would fill the same roll it did 20 years ago, a durable ship that can dish out damage and control ships while being much cheaper than a Defender and more maneuverable than a Shuttle. Yeah it's a cheap but rugged cannon carrier. An Assault Gunboat, just as it is named. And it's not gonna be a shelf warmer like the Scyk which failed to be a cheap cannon carrier and sucks as an 'interceptor'... No boost or 5 straight! And the gunboat is much better looking than any Scum ships anyway.

There's no reason any ships should be K-turning or S looping, but that's what we have I this game. And it can have S loops cause they are cool!

Tractor beam can be introduced with the Missile Boat. And we don't need any tractor tokens or weird mechanics, just a System upgrade that gives an action to double stress a ship within arc at range 1-2.

And a title for the Defender that gives a system slot.

Missile Boat

Attack 1

Agility 3

Hull 3

Shields 3

Focus, target lock, BR, SLAM (maybe evade instead of BR)

System, missile x 4, maybe a torp and bomb slot for EM shenanigans.

And a dial very similar to the Defender. No idea of the cost, probably around 27 for lowest PS like an e-wing.

Nice post about the gunboat being a ship the empire totally needed in the lore and still needs in this game.

However I just can't see the Gunboat being agile enough to have 2 green dice. It would compare to the B-wing but be cheaper due to only 2 green dice and probably much better dial. S loops should be included, making them white might be a bit much though. Cost of 19 for lowest PS pilot sounds about right with 2 red 1 green and 4/4 hull/shield. It does have BR, which is always useful. If you think the ship still needs help the. We could include a title:

Xg-1 (title, gunboat only)

Cannon upgrade costs 2 less to a minimum of 0.

A 24 point 4 red dice ship that's between a B and X it's dial sounds about right. Of course that's only 3 dice at range one, not 5 like that (expletive deleted) Phantom. More expensive than HLC Scyk too, so it's probably around he right price.

And what blank role would it fill in X-Wing? A cheap cannon carrier?

There is no reason why it should be capable of doing s-loops btw.

I still think its time to introduce beam weapons - or at least the tractor beam.

If the Gunboat came with the first beam weapon, there would be its unique role. Many have proposed mechanisms for the different beams (tractor, jamming, decoy).

I totally believe the beam weapons should be Systems, but have an Attack: header in them. This firmly represents the special device nature of the beams, but also that they had to be aimed and "shot" at targets. Also, this would balance out some of the most overpowered effect of beams if they use up the ship's attack for this round.

Some examples:

Tractor 1: If hit, defender gets 1 ion and 1 stress. No damage.

Tractor 2: If hit, defender gets 1 tractor token. Next activation phase, they can only perform green maneuvers, then discard tractor token.

Jamming: If hit, defender cannot perform attacks with its secondary weapons, and out of their firing arc.

Decoy: Action: Skip your attack phase. Select a friendly ship in your firing arc (even yourself). Until the end of the round, the chosen ship immediately discards all red target lock tokens it has or gets.

About the S-Loops, I don't know why, but the gunboats somehow loved to do that in the sims. I have been recently replaying the X-Wing sims and unlike TIEs, that usually moved in a straight line and suddenly turned around to perform another attack run, the gunboats almost never did this. They usually flee the dogfight in a curve path, then, when they are far enough, they turn around and prepare for another attack run. I guess in the sims it was to make for their low speed, low turn rate and huge hitbox, as it is harder to hit a strafing target than a fixed one if you are on their tails. The TIEs didn't have so much problem with this, because their profile from behind is harder to hit.

Anyway, it seems to me that if a Gunboat existed in XWTMG, it would do curved loops instead of straight loops.

Even though it was created much later, the TIE Hunter pretty much does everything the Gunboat does. Shields, hyperdrive, 2 lasers, 2 ions, warhead launchers. It even has S-Foils.

Only real difference is that the Hunter carries torpedoes, instead of a ton of missiles.

You know that's not really an S-Loop right? That's flying away, making several turns to turn around, then flying back.

Only real difference is that the Hunter carries torpedoes, instead of a ton of missiles .

The Gunboat and the Missile Boat aren't the same ship.

The Gunboat and the Missile Boat aren't the same ship.

I know. The Gunboat still carries 40 concussion missiles. And while that's only half as many as a Missile Boat carries, it's still 5 times what a TIE Bomber carries.

That's a ton of missiles.

The Gunboat and the Missile Boat aren't the same ship.

I know. The Gunboat still carries 40 concussion missiles. And while that's only half as many as a Missile Boat carries, it's still 5 times what a TIE Bomber carries.

That's a ton of missiles.

I'm pretty sure you are making a mistake here. I don't think it carried more than 8 missiles per launcher. That is 16 total. The bwing carried about the same amount of torpedoes. If that translated into two torpedo icons here, it should be similar with the gunboat.

The AI Tie bombers had both missiles and torpedoes, clearly surpassing the gunboat payload.

Bombing was the TIE bomber work, while ionizing and alpha striking was more of the gunboat work.

The missile boat had 4 launchers, though. The first two with 20 missiles each. The other two were configurable, but could carry also 20 missiles each. If that ship ever comes to this game, it will be either greatly nerfed, or with a special rules card saying "if a torpedo or missile attack tells you to discard it, don't"

Edit: Visual evidence: It had 12 missiles total

It actually makes sense if you look at the front of the ship, where you can see the individual missile tubes:

While the Missile Boat had 40 per launcher! That is a maximum total of 120 misiles!:

If the Missile Boat is released and doesn't come with a title card called "The King Hell God Emperor Starfighter Of Death!", I'll be very disappointed.

I'm pretty sure you are making a mistake here.

Apparently. It's Wookiepedia page lists two different amounts. The Rebellion Era Campaign Guide says it carries 40, while it carried 16 in TIE Fighter.

That said, all of your "visual evidence" ended up being misleading. As both that 3D model and that screenshot show it having 12, neither of which is correct(unless they are showing it with torpedoes instead of missiles, which it did carry 12 of).

And all sources say the Missile Boat carries 20 missile in each of it's 4 launchers. So that's only 80 total.

While the Missile Boat had 40 per launcher! That is a maximum total of 120 misiles!

4 x 40 is 160.

And there you witnessed the power of my fully armed and operational math skills!

Gunboat carried 16 missiles, or 12 torpedoes. For some reason the side pods always showed 6 'ports' each per pod, so I guess all depictions of the ship showed its torpedo carrying configuration.

It could also carry heavy rockets (probably what Proton Rockets are supposed to be) space bombs (maybe proton bombs), may pulse warheads (no equivalent yet) and both advanced concussion missiles and torpedoes, all with variable numbers. There was even an option in the editors to double the warhead limit on any ship, so yeah it was crazy in that game. Buy the way the quoted number of 16 missiles for a Bomber is actually the double load in TIE fighter. The bomber was somewhat nerfed in that game compared to the RPG wear it could carry missiles and some other ordinance at the same time.

It could also carry heavy rockets (probably what Proton Rockets are supposed to be) space bombs (maybe proton bombs)

The basic 4 warheads types in TIE Fighter were all pretty much the same. Each one was just slower, but dealt more damage than the previous one. Missiles>Torpedoes>Rockets>Bombs.

So the Space Bombs were just like REALLY slow, REALLY powerful Missiles.

Whereas, this game's Proton Rockets seem like a dumb fire weapon. Since they don't require a lockon, and do more damage the more maneuverable your ship is.

Yeah, heavy rockets benefited greatly from a high speed carrier like the missile boat or defended because they carried some of that speed over when launched but slowed (in space, somehow) after launching. I blew up lots of big ships with heavy rockets and even the big slow space bombs by unloading them at their door step at full throttle. Fun times. I miss being able to edit that game and make totally new missions, I haven't figured out if that's possible in the GOG version yet.