It's interesting that you can still shoot when sitting on the debris cloud. Knowing that, I hope they don't introduce the debris clouds to tournaments as it makes maneuvering easier. Some people are already upset about more 360 firing arcs entering in the game. They want to claim that it dumbs down the game. Taking the mistake of landing on an obstacle out of the game I find a little disappointing.

For bad players, it may take the mistake out of landing on an obstacle. Good players may use the flexibility to pull some neat tricks and/or create builds that handle the stress, giving them more options than their opponent. Or they might use the different shapes to further craft the battle space.

...which isn't something that should be encouraged. Taking the mistake out of landing on an obstacle removes some of the skill involved in this game (which already relies quite a bit on the luck of the dice).

I disagree. It cuts both ways. The bad player gets some forgiveness, the good player gets another element to take advantage of. Both may improve but the gap remains and the skill is still there. Much like bumping, some squads will take advantage of what is meant to be a penalty by benefitting from its use more than their opponent does. I'm visualizing a squad that can pass through and shed the stress while putting their opponent to decide if taking the stress is worth following. Or during setup a crafty player choosing debris because they are facing a phantom and they'd prefer to have larger obstacles that do just as good a job limiting ACD trigger.

Probably not worth worrying about though. It is likely to be just a mission object and not for tournament play as others have suggested.

The Stay on Target card was designed by 2013 World Champ Paul Heaver, and the Dash Rendar crew card was done by 2012 World Champ, Doug Kinney.

Out of curiosity, how do you know this?

Doug Kinney (Hothie) stated over at Team Covenant that the Dash crew was his design.

I think that the coolest thing so far revealed from Wave 5 is the stress inducing debris obstacles! That is a cool idea and will shake up the 6 asteroid death match that we all know and love. Could be a very interesting new way to play.

Tycho Celchu will be in heaven. He don't give a f**k 'bout no debris fields yo.

Except, I'm fairly certain you still lose your action and roll to take damage. It's merely the no attack if you land on it that is different.

It's interesting that you can still shoot when sitting on the debris cloud. Knowing that, I hope they don't introduce the debris clouds to tournaments as it makes maneuvering easier. Some people are already upset about more 360 firing arcs entering in the game. They want to claim that it dumbs down the game. Taking the mistake of landing on an obstacle out of the game I find a little disappointing.

For bad players, it may take the mistake out of landing on an obstacle. Good players may use the flexibility to pull some neat tricks and/or create builds that handle the stress, giving them more options than their opponent. Or they might use the different shapes to further craft the battle space.

...which isn't something that should be encouraged. Taking the mistake out of landing on an obstacle removes some of the skill involved in this game (which already relies quite a bit on the luck of the dice).

I disagree. It cuts both ways. The bad player gets some forgiveness, the good player gets another element to take advantage of. Both may improve but the gap remains and the skill is still there. Much like bumping, some squads will take advantage of what is meant to be a penalty by benefitting from its use more than their opponent does. I'm visualizing a squad that can pass through and shed the stress while putting their opponent to decide if taking the stress is worth following. Or during setup a crafty player choosing debris because they are facing a phantom and they'd prefer to have larger obstacles that do just as good a job limiting ACD trigger.

Probably not worth worrying about though. It is likely to be just a mission object and not for tournament play as others have suggested.

The good player doesn't want to give the bad player any breaks. So the bad player getting some "forgiveness" is not helpful to the good player.

Furthermore, I think losing your attack is worse than taking a stress. A good player will want his opponent to lose his attack more than he'll want him merely to get stressed (and still make an attack). This game is won by doing more damage, not by racking up stress tokens on the opponent. Stressing an opponent helps you win, but not as much as attacking does.

That said, a good player will want to play with asteroids every time. Sure, you could build a squad that focuses on stressing opponents and punishing them for being stressed. But is that a more efficient strategy than building a squad that doesn't rely on dishing stress to win? Probably not.

The Stay on Target card was designed by 2013 World Champ Paul Heaver, and the Dash Rendar crew card was done by 2012 World Champ, Doug Kinney.

Out of curiosity, how do you know this?

Doug Kinney (Hothie) stated over at Team Covenant that the Dash crew was his design.

OK, thanks.

Having a new alternative obstacle type is nice, and I hope it becomes competitively legal.

Still, if all it does is give you a stress, I'm disappointed. There are couple of ships able to take advantage of receiving/having a stress token.

Ibtisam, for instance, could use Adv. Sensors to nab a focus, fly into the middle of a debris field, and then take advantage of triggering her ability on defense, with every shot that can be fired at her being obstructed. So she'd get double her usual agility + one die reroll + one focus token. Is that game-breaking? Of course not. But it doesn't sit right with me that it's possible to leverage the intended negative consequences of hitting an obstacle into a situation that's actually better than anything currently possible.

Instead, I'd like to see it having the effect of immediately giving a stress if your maneuver template or base overlap it and, if possible, removing all tokens besides stress/ion tokens (but including red and blue TL tokens) from your ship if your ship base is overlapping it at the end of the Activation phase. (This only affects one aspect of the Ibtisam example, but some of the other pilots who can ignore/take advantage of stress are nerfed harder by it)

Fluff reasons being that your attention is trained on the debris and therefore you can't focus on anything else, it's a contradiction to perform evasive maneuvers on top of avoiding the debris, and the debris all over the place interferes with both friendly and enemy targeting systems, and that you have to deactivate your stygium device to more safely move through the debris (I'm shaky on that last point, but game-wise it would be interesting to see something be able to strip cloak tokens).

Game-wise, I mainly want to see a mechanic available to remove enemy target locks, with a drawback. The current ways to get rid of them apart from the locker's discretion to spend it are Expert Handling and Wes Janson, the latter of which is only for the ship you're attacking, and the former is only available to EPT ships, mostly used for being able to barrel roll anyways, and even then also gives you a stress.

Being able to remove TLs, red and blue, at the cost of a stress token + your action that turn + any tokens you get from the stress/other ships' abilities before the Activation phase ends seems like a tradeoff that might be worthwhile, and if you think about it that way, is not all that different from EH.

Sigh.

All we know is that if you LAND on the debris, you get a stress instead of losing your attack. I think the other effects, ie rolling for damage and losing your action, are still in effect.

Yes, it isn't as bad as losing your attack. But considering it looks like a full on debris field will take up more room than an asteroid field, I think it balances things out. If Ibby and Keyan want to keep on potentially taking a hit for their stress, I'm liable to let them.

Having a new alternative obstacle type is nice, and I hope it becomes competitively legal.

Still, if all it does is give you a stress, I'm disappointed. There are couple of ships able to take advantage of receiving/having a stress token... it doesn't sit right with me that it's possible to leverage the intended negative consequences of hitting an obstacle into a situation that's actually better than anything currently possible.

I'm actually completely okay with the idea of a pilot deliberately flying through a debris field in order to disrupt an opponent's attacks and gain an advantage by attacking from an unexpected direction. It seems fluffy to me--isn't that basically what Han does in the Hoth asteroid belt?--and mechanically it's a really clever way to let strategic considerations (i.e., what pilot should I bring?) interact directly with tactical considerations (i.e., maneuvering on the tabletop) in a way that's pretty novel for the game.

All we know is that if you LAND on the debris, you get a stress instead of losing your attack.

And of course it's also good to remember that GTM articles =/= rules text, and it's entirely possible there's other stuff going on with debris fields that we can't talk about yet. Additionally, even if debris fields are legal outside mission play (which is one of those things not discussed in GTM), they may or may not be tournament-legal: we already have the precedent of Epic ships as obstacles, which is legal for casual play but not (yet?) for sanctioned events.

It has been my observation that instead of forcing us to buy the same product or expansion multiple times, FFG has been purposely releasing products which either make use of formelly useless abilities or add a lot of cards that were really popular (2x push the limit in Imperial Aces and the refit in Rebel Aces comes to mind). So while it does not allow a player to create every build, buying 1 of each expansion gives a lot of flexibility.

Now here is what I noticed:

- Epic format requires 12 asteroids, but only 6 come with the core set

- Wave 5 comes with a total of 6 debris fields

I'm willing to bet that debris fields will be meant as an alternative to asteroids for epic games (and maybe even standard games). That's just my 2 cents though

- Epic format requires 12 asteroids, but only 6 come with the core set

I think the (safe) assumption is that if you have enough of a collection to field 300 points on each side, both players probably own the core set

Be interesting to see how the debris is in regards to placing them, how it effects tourney play and force composition if they are being used and you know they are , if they are obligatory if you have one of the new ships out which would be interesting.

I like the ramming mechanic for the Decimator but I wonder how practical it will be, be more of a situational thing as I don't expect the dial will be very manoeuvrable, maybe a bit more than the Shuttle so another ship for the Engine Upgrade maybe

Except you can't ram with a boost, and you can't use it before you move.

You can ram with Daredevil, though, and it looks like Captain Oicunn has an EPT:

Oh my god… you mean… you mean Daredevil could actually… be worth taking?

Are you kidding, I plan on putting Daredevil on Tycho all the time after Rebel Aces.

Be interesting to see how the debris is in regards to placing them, how it effects tourney play and force composition if they are being used and you know they are , if they are obligatory if you have one of the new ships out which would be interesting.

I like the ramming mechanic for the Decimator but I wonder how practical it will be, be more of a situational thing as I don't expect the dial will be very manoeuvrable, maybe a bit more than the Shuttle so another ship for the Engine Upgrade maybe

Except you can't ram with a boost, and you can't use it before you move.

You can ram with Daredevil, though, and it looks like Captain Oicunn has an EPT:

Oh my god… you mean… you mean Daredevil could actually… be worth taking?

Are you kidding, I plan on putting Daredevil on Tycho all the time after Rebel Aces.

I've heard this a lot, actually. Darth Vader/Engine Upgrade/Daredevil or Titled Tycho with Daredevil and PtL can move in crazy ways, because Boost and Daredevil are not the same action. Therefore, you can snake around and move quite far to one side, OR you can turn 225 degrees, though there isn't a whole lot of reason to do so when you could just turn the other way and boost. It lands you in a different location but facing the same direction.

Well, I don't play Rebel. As for Vader, that's not the way I usually use him. And if boost and barrel roll aren't enough movement options for me then i'm doing something wrong. I used to give him marksmanship, but I wanna try him with Outmaneuver.

I've heard this a lot, actually. Darth Vader/Engine Upgrade/Daredevil or Titled Tycho with Daredevil and PtL can move in crazy ways, because Boost and Daredevil are not the same action. Therefore, you can snake around and move quite far to one side, OR you can turn 225 degrees, though there isn't a whole lot of reason to do so when you could just turn the other way and boost. It lands you in a different location but facing the same direction.

As that different location will often be one that puts you out of arc, I think there's going to be quite a lot of reason to do so.

Darn! I know there was a rebel pilot who used to use his X-wing to bump Interceptors using his shields. I read about it a while ago.

Does anyone have his name? I just cannot remember it.

Thanks,

Am I the only one wondering what the actual title of Oicunn is? As far as I can see there is a Lieutenent card and a Commander card, but no Captain. I personally bank on him being Commander Oicunn at PS 6. Do you think I am right about this?

Am I the only one wondering what the actual title of Oicunn is? As far as I can see there is a Lieutenent card and a Commander card, but no Captain. I personally bank on him being Commander Oicunn at PS 6. Do you think I am right about this?

He's the ps4. The titles are Captain, Commander, and Rear Admiral in that order. Captain is clearly visible on his card.

Am I the only one wondering what the actual title of Oicunn is? As far as I can see there is a Lieutenent card and a Commander card, but no Captain. I personally bank on him being Commander Oicunn at PS 6. Do you think I am right about this?

He's the ps4. The titles are Captain, Commander, and Rear Admiral in that order. Captain is clearly visible on his card.

Ok I would like to add to my last post. The copy of the pic I have it says Lt. The one on the previous page says captain.

Am I the only one wondering what the actual title of Oicunn is? As far as I can see there is a Lieutenent card and a Commander card, but no Captain. I personally bank on him being Commander Oicunn at PS 6. Do you think I am right about this?

He's the ps4. The titles are Captain, Commander, and Rear Admiral in that order. Captain is clearly visible on his card.

Actually it clearly says Lieutenant, commander , rear admiral.

Ok I would like to add to my last post. The copy of the pic I have it says Lt. The one on the previous page says captain.

Weird. They've changed images before, so I guess not so weird, but I just looked at the spread in the original announcement and it says captain. Where does it say lieutenant?

http://www.hellfiregamingindustries.co.uk/images/x-wing-miniatures-game-vt-49-decimator-expansion-pack-pre-order-p3214-4564_image.jpg

Not sure if that works but that says Lt.

Edit: as you say they have done it before.

How interesting. I too have the image that says Lieutenant. I didn't spot the renamed card. But I guess he is PS4 then.

From hence forth you are granted the rank of "cough, cough".

Thank you sir but could I get that in writing?