Were all Arc-170s always crewed and flown with a tail gunner? If not, a title or modification (or crew?!) may be the best way to show that mechanic. APL only works on Large Ships and a rear arc isn't right, but what about:

Tale Gunner, 3 points

"You may make a 2 attack at enemy ships within range 1-2 of your rear arc."

Were all Arc-170s always crewed and flown with a tail gunner? If not, a title or modification (or crew?!) may be the best way to show that mechanic. APL only works on Large Ships and a rear arc isn't right, but what about:

Tale Gunner, 3 points

"You may make a 2 attack at enemy ships within range 1-2 of your rear arc."

Yeah, pretty much all of them were. It'd be akin to flying an F-14 without two in the cockpit.

I like that idea a lot Baron. As long as it's a crew for the arc-170 only.

Would it be an alternate attack like the firespray, or an additional attack like some suggested?

Do we know that only the Alliance would get all the old Republic ships? The Republic became the New Order in one go and kept using them at least until the TIE/LN came out, to my knowledge. The ETA-2 has the same front window and even inspired the design philosophy of the Empire's line fighters, and the V-wing makes exactly the same noise as the TIEs. I've even seen Imperial V-Wing designs, I think Lego made one. They lacked the Astromech slot. And while the Republic ships may only have been used in the early days and years of the New Order, the Restored Empire faction was using them again some 30-odd years after the Clone Wars.

I know the Alliance picked up all the old Y-Wings, but it's easy to see how that happened. Who else was desperate and poor enough to buy them up?

...

I'm not sure why you're comparing it to the b-wing as a choice. The republic is proto-empire and would be on their side.

Not to throw a wrench into this debate, but the Arc170 should be an Empire ship. The Republic turned into the Empire and the early Empire would have used them to fight remnants of the Separatist systems or Rebel groups. The other thing that I think would be good to add to any Prequel era ship to represent their age/lower tech level would be to allow no system upgrades and make it so the Prequel ships cannot role crits. There cannons were not as strong and I think this would represent that fact nicely.

"During the Galactic Civil War, ARC-170s could be found in both Imperial and Rebel fleets, where they were considered elite craft."

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which in the end would make it difficult to assign them to a specific faction.

also, while the ships might be still in used or even produced in certain cases, you can't really use the prequel pilots, if any specific stand out anyway.

my personal suggestion when dealing with prequel ships would be to release them as accessible to both factions and supply them with pilots from both sides. It would have the benefits of bringing something new to table in terms multiple faction ships and reduce the needed total amount of ships of that era for a balanced representation.

Do we know that only the Alliance would get all the old Republic ships? The Republic became the New Order in one go and kept using them at least until the TIE/LN came out, to my knowledge. The ETA-2 has the same front window and even inspired the design philosophy of the Empire's line fighters, and the V-wing makes exactly the same noise as the TIEs. I've even seen Imperial V-Wing designs, I think Lego made one. They lacked the Astromech slot. And while the Republic ships may only have been used in the early days and years of the New Order, the Restored Empire faction was using them again some 30-odd years after the Clone Wars.

I know the Alliance picked up all the old Y-Wings, but it's easy to see how that happened. Who else was desperate and poor enough to buy them up?

The Empire only used them for so long, and retired, forgotten, or even damaged ones were picked up by Rebels.

There's a reason I've said that these starships need to be able to be used in both factions, for some time. But if I were to pick, I'd give the ARC-170 to the Rebels. It fits them more.

Well, I don't know quite how to calculate cost. But I'd say also in the middle ground. Entirely because its dial would not be too great, and likewise, it has so many options that the cost of filling them all will more than make up for that. Of course, you COULD fly a few naked '170s.

As for stats?

3 2 4 3

A baseline for calculating cost is to figure out what the stat line in and of itself is worth. From my Lanchester's thread, a very good formula is:

12* ( A_coeff * D_coeff * (1.14*Shields + Hull) / 3 )^0.52

A_coeff =

1.000 for 2 attack dice

1.759 for 3 attack dice

D_coeff =

1.387 for 4 defense dice

1.000 for 3 defense dice

0.731 for 2 defense dice

0.549 for 1 defense dice

0.427 for 0 defense dice

So for a stats of 3/2/4/3, you have:

12* ( 1.759 * 0.731 * (1.14*3 + 4) / 3 )^0.52 = 21.9

By the way, this term dictates its durability normalized to a TIE Fighter:

0.731 * (1.14*3 + 4) / 3 = 1.81

That is very good. Compare against:

X-wing: 0.731 * (1.14*2 + 3) / 3 = 1.29

B-wing: 0.549 * (1.14*5 + 3) / 3 = 1.59

E-wing: 1.000 * (1.14*3 + 2) / 3 = 1.81

So basically it's got the same raw attack and durability as an E-wing.

Based on just its stat line, the 3/2/4/3 or 3/3/2/3 is "worth" 22 points at Pilot Skill 1, relative to a PS1 Academy TIE costing 12 points.

Now you need to add in all the other factors, like dial, actions, and specialty stuff like rear arcs, etc. A fair value for adding a rear arc that seems to work well mathematically on the Firespray, is to multiply everything inside the ()^0.52 by 1.25. In other words your overall attack and defense effectiveness is increased by 25%. That would put it at 24.6 points at PS1.

Once you consider the dial, droid slot, and keeping its raw stat line value (i.e. jousting value) a hair below the TIE Fighter, you are probably looking at around 27 points at PS2, assuming no system upgrade slot. The E-wing is a tempting comparison since it is 27 points at PS1, but the E-wing is overcosted by about 2 points and is hardly seeing any use in wave 4 Regionals lists as a result.

whoa, that's a lot of math. You should know, I scored 18% on the GED test in Math. (And somehow passed? What a low bar.) So I'm really, really ridiculously bad at math. (Excellent with english and practically applied science though, so there's that.)

That said I'll trust your judgement and formula. Seems solid enough to really get something down.

I'm not a huge Clone Wars fan, but that doesn't mean the ships in it are useless. The ARC-170 is a great looking fighter that would offer something unique to the game, and lore wise the Rebels would have fielded it. More importantly, after they release the R-41 Starchaser, I'm hard pressed to think of a good looking Rebel fighter. Some would like to see the T-Wing and K-Wing but those are really "meh" to me. Or at least, I've never seen a picture of those that looked good as of yet. And I can't even think of any other fighters off the top of my head.

So I'm all for allowing the Rebels to use some of the late-Republic ships. I think they need the boost.

I am not for allowing them to use droid fighters. That just seems like they wouldn't be able to maintain that kind of technology decades after combat droids have been outlawed. It's also a bad PR move, as it would openly connect the Rebellion with the Separatists in people's minds and would lose them public support. And it would just "feel" wrong honestly.

I am definitely not in support of a separate Clone Wars game. It would only take up production slots from X-Wing, and split the player base. If they want to create a spin off game then either a capital scale or ground game make a lot more sense. Especially with Disney moving away from the Clone Wars era as quickly as they can.

But I also don't think FFG putting Clone Wars stuff into this game is a forgone conclusion either. Is there anything from the Clone Wars in the RPG or LCG? If not, then why would you think they'd add it to this game? It may very well be possible that FFG itself is made up of "neckbeards" in which case your cause is already lost.

Even if they are not, FFG has clearly decided their target audience are fans of the OT and the EU of the 90's. They've never done anything to market their games to Prequel fans, and as that time in Star Wars fandom begins to fade, there's less and less reason for them to bother. The next generation of "kids" will be fans of the Rebels series and the Sequel trilogy. Most of the current hardcore fans are older OT fans. Sure there's people interested, but is it enough to bother? Is it enough to take production away from their most profitable game in their history?

I just really doubt we'll ever see a Clone Wars based game. But a ship here and there added to this game, that I can see. After all a few people will dislike it, but there were those who disliked seeing the EU ships too.

As for the ARC-170 I think allowing it to shoot in it's rear arc is what makes it special, a free APL just isn't good enough. But a 3 attack to it's rear seems too powerful. Also it feels like a Y-Wing with the firepower of an X-Wing. I'd rather see it with a 2 attack, but have an upgrade that allows you to upgrade the front arc to 3 if you wish to spend the points. That gives you more to think about when making your squad and makes the ship feel rather unique.

I can't really disagree with any of that, and hadn't considered an upgrade to allow a boost in a particular firing arc.

Really, I disagree with none of that.

If they make Republic era vessels, I'm going to have to insist on Jar Jar as a crew card.

If they make Republic era vessels, I'm going to have to insist on Jar Jar as a crew card.

Jar Jar Binks - Crew

Republic Only.

Treat all your red maneuvers as green maneuvers and all green maneuvers as red maneuvers.

4pts

I like how in some threads we pretend to be FFG designers and executives sitting around the board room, discussing the future of the game as if we had control (to suit our personal gaming desires instead of the company bottom line).

whoa, that's a lot of math. You should know, I scored 18% on the GED test in Math. (And somehow passed? What a low bar.) So I'm really, really ridiculously bad at math. (Excellent with english and practically applied science though, so there's that.)

That said I'll trust your judgement and formula. Seems solid enough to really get something down.

Playtesting is obviously the final word on balance, especially if the ship has unique capabilities. The less "unique" the ship is, the more accurate the formulas will be. It points out why the TE Advanced, naked Y-wing, A-wing, ORS, and a few others (E-wing) hardly ever see play. For more esoteric ships like the TIE Phantom you have a harder time putting value on unique things like the cloak action, but the stat line math is still a necessary baseline and one component of proper game design.

I like how in some threads we pretend to be FFG designers and executives sitting around the board room, discussing the future of the game as if we had control (to suit our personal gaming desires instead of the company bottom line).

At some point FFG will stop supporting the game, then I'm sure there will be a few rabid fans that will continue to make new ships, 3D printed, with reasonable stats.

If they make Republic era vessels, I'm going to have to insist on Jar Jar as a crew card.

Jar Jar Binks - Crew

Republic Only.

Treat all your red maneuvers as green maneuvers and all green maneuvers as red maneuvers.

4pts

I would use that card.

And I don't think we ever heard his final fate. He could actually be in the Sequel Trilogy. You know... if JJ wants to alienate everyone and risk everything Disney is trying to do.

"Mesa baaaaaaack!"