I will be holding a fundraising tournament for my “Let ‘em Fly” campaign on September 13 ^th at Mayhem Comics in Clive Iowa.

Let ‘em Fly campaign thread is here, for those who don’t know about it:
http://community.fantasyflightgames.com/index.php?/topic/110555-let-em-fly-campaign-support-our-troops/

Mayhem’s website is here:
http://mayhemcomics.com/

Doors open at 10. I would like to start getting squads built at 11, so that the tournament can start at noon.

-FREE Entry-This is a fundraiser tournament, but I am leaving open the possibility of a person being able to play without paying anything. So entry will be free, and the “Quartering” part is optional.

Pirate rules:
1. No unique pilot or upgrade cards
2. No faction restrictions
3. No more than one of each ship type.

“Drawn”: there will be a stack of Rebel non-uniques and a stack of Imperial non-uniques face-down. Players will draw from either stack (and it’s pirate rules, so you don’t necessarily have to draw from the top. until they have 150 points worth of ships. If a player draws 2 of the same ship type (like Rookie and Red, for example) he sets one of them aside and continues drawing. Players will decide which ships they want to use to make a 100 point squad. Once players have their squad picked out, they replace the cards. The Rebel and Imperial decks will be comprised of 3 of each non-unique, so the next person may draw while the previous person is deciding about their squad.

Squad-building: players will build 100 point squads using the cards they drew. Players are expected to use their own materials, but if a player does not have his own ships or cards, he can use mine for this tournament. Only legal upgrade cards may be used for the ships that were chosen. Players may pay an extra $1 per point to go over 100, to a max of 105 points.

“Quartering”: before the tournament starts, players will have a chance to buy color-coded snack bags with quarters in them. The max will be $5 (20 quarters) per bag, but players may pay less to have less quarters if they choose. The bags will contain quarters which can be used throughout the tournament to allow players to buy certain in-game perks. All perks will be “once per round”, but a player may use a perk from each bag if he chooses to in any given round. Once a bag is bought, that is the amount that the player may use for the duration of the tournament.

Before the match starts, each player will have the one-time option of paying $2 to swap squads. (shenanigans). All payments before and during the match will be made into a jar assigned to each map. At the end of the match, the match winner will bring the jar to me and report the result. Matches will be 60 or 75 minutes, depending on the number of entrants.

The bags and their “once per round” perks will be coded as follows: (paq=pay a quarter from your bag)

(green)1. Alter maneuver dial speed OR direction by 1 -when you reveal your maneuver dial, you may paq to alter your maneuver dial by one increment. The new maneuver must be on the dial, and you cannot rotate your dial to a red maneuver if stressed. For example, if you reveal a 2 left bank maneuver, you may rotate to either: 1 left bank, 3 left bank, 2 left turn, or 2 straight maneuvers.

(yellow)2. Action -you may perform one “Action Bar” action during your “Perform Action” step with a ship that does not have that action in its action bar. This will allow you to barrel roll your Rookie Pilot, Target Lock with your Academy Pilot, or Cloak your Prototype Pilot, among many other possibilities.

(silver)3. Target Selection- you may paq to force your opponent to choose a different, legal target
(pink)4. Dice rerolling -you may paq to reroll one of your dice, either offense or defense, or you may paq to force your opponent to reroll one of his dice, either offense or defense. This is separate from Target Locks or Flight Instructor abilities.
(purple)5. Token removal during end phase -you may paq to remove one token from one ship during the end phase. This includes removing a target lock, stress, ion, or cloak token from either your own ship or your opponent’s ship.


Prizes: Yes, there will be prizes, most likely to be gift cards for the store among other things. That will be sorted out at a later date.

Questions? Comments? Post them here so we can work out any bugs beforehand. Hope to see you there!

For the green paq, you might want to clarify that the player must use the ability when revealing his/her dial. Someone might get the impression that they can swap maneuvers after laying down their template. I realize it's a trivial distinction, but timing matters.

Done, thanks. I'm sure there will be more clarifications like this that will need to be made.

After looking through all of the upgrades for "Enhanced Abilities", I may do something different with that. About half have no effect, and some people won't use any upgrades at all. Suggestions?

After looking through all of the upgrades for "Enhanced Abilities", I may do something different with that. About half have no effect, and some people won't use any upgrades at all. Suggestions?

Scrap it. It'll save you a ton of work going through and adapting all of the abilities, adjudicating them, and it spares your players having to learn them inside and out. The term "burden of knowledge" comes to mind.

And replace it with...? I'm open for other ideas for people to use in game perks on. How does Target Selection sound?

Replace it with this:

Double-Down: Choose a ship. Until end of turn, the next time that ship would receive a focus token, evade token, or target lock, you may give that ship an additional focus token, evade token, or target lock of the same type. Target locks acquired in this way may exceed that ships normal allowance (to include Weapons Engineer, for a total of 3), but you may still have only 1 lock per enemy ship.

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Now, it's up to you whether your cap of "once per round" means that you can only perform one of any given perk per round, or if you can only perform one perk total per round. There might be some interesting combos in there, but there might also be some broken ones. Tread lightly, and make your rules crystal clear.

Also: Target Selection sounds really cool, but may require clarification for secondary weapons (like Biggs).

Also again: Clarify the pink paq for me. Does it break the normal "one re-roll per die" rule? Because that would also be cool if it did.

Once per round means you can use a perk from that bag once per game round. So if you used a perk from each bag, the most you could spend is $1.25 per round. most of these are for a single ship or event anyway, so one ship, one perk, for one round. I tried to keep it from getting too broken, but still be fun to play. Also with a max of 20 for the entire tournament, people will have to choose carefully what they want to do, as some games take upwards of 10 rounds or more to play. And if you're looking at 4-5 games throughout the day...

As for target selection, as long as it is a legal target, it's fair game. You want to ion turret this one? No, I'm going to make you use your primary against this one at range 3. But if you chose another ship at range 2, the attacker could still use his turret if he chose to. Again, it's only for one ship, once per round, so it shouldn't be too game-breaking. Just a little wrench in the game.

Hmm, as for pink, sure, we're pirates, let's break rules!!! Sure, it can break the only rerolling a die once rule, because again, it's only a single die, once per round, and target locks or Flight Instructor are really the only way you are going to be rerolling dice anyway (no uniques). Just remember, defender modifies first when it comes to attacking, so if you want to make the attacker reroll, it has to be first. I guess the same side of that coin would mean the attacker modifies the defender's dice first, too...

I'll think about Double down and see if there isn't a cleaner way to say it.

If you have issues with the way I worded Double-Down, feel free to ask questions. I worded it as precisely as possible to try and avoid confusion, but the gist is that once per turn, you can get double tokens (or, more specifically, an extra one, in the case of Recon Spec / Weapons Engineer) of the same type. I felt that was sort of the spirit behind enhanced abilities, but this way you avoid most of the fuss with upgrade cards.

Sounds like a lot of fun.

Note going out to local group now to gauge interest in a road trip.

Could be a lot of fun, but it also sounds like a lot of random stuff to remember.

(pink)1. Dice rerolling -you may paq to reroll one of your dice, either offense or defense, or you may paq to force your opponent to reroll one of his dice, either offense or defense. This is separate from Target Locks or Flight Instructor abilities.

Me thinks it may be a good idea to establish the timing of this "pay a quarter" feature. In other words, in the case of (pink), who decides first as to whether or not they are going to pay to either re-roll one of their own dice, or force an opponent to re-roll one of theirs. Offense, Defense? At the same time? Quarters hidden in the hand (or not), and both show at once?

How you do this could impact planning, strategy, etc.

(pink)1. Dice rerolling -you may paq to reroll one of your dice, either offense or defense, or you may paq to force your opponent to reroll one of his dice, either offense or defense. This is separate from Target Locks or Flight Instructor abilities.

Me thinks it may be a good idea to establish the timing of this "pay a quarter" feature. In other words, in the case of (pink), who decides first as to whether or not they are going to pay to either re-roll one of their own dice, or force an opponent to re-roll one of theirs. Offense, Defense? At the same time? Quarters hidden in the hand (or not), and both show at once?

How you do this could impact planning, strategy, etc.

The game rules already establish when you get to force your opponent to re-roll. See page 10 and 11 of the core rulebook, second paragraphs under "Modify Attack Dice" and "Modify Defense Dice."

Could be a lot of fun, but it also sounds like a lot of random stuff to remember.

I think I will print out sheets that list which colors do which and give them to each participant. I think after the first game it will be easier, because they mainly take place at different times in the game.

Green is when maneuvering,

Yellow is when taking actions

Pink and silver are combat phase

purple is end phase

Here, I'll rearrange them to make it easier.

(pink)1. Dice rerolling -you may paq to reroll one of your dice, either offense or defense, or you may paq to force your opponent to reroll one of his dice, either offense or defense. This is separate from Target Locks or Flight Instructor abilities.

Me thinks it may be a good idea to establish the timing of this "pay a quarter" feature. In other words, in the case of (pink), who decides first as to whether or not they are going to pay to either re-roll one of their own dice, or force an opponent to re-roll one of theirs. Offense, Defense? At the same time? Quarters hidden in the hand (or not), and both show at once?

How you do this could impact planning, strategy, etc.

it's an "immediately after rolling" thing. And technically, players could both choose to have the attacker reroll a die on the same roll. For example, attacker rolls a (blank) and a (crit). Attacker pays to reroll the blank, defender pays to reroll have the attacker reroll the crit. That's completely feasible. Of course, keep in mind, it is a once per round thing, and players max out at 20 for the entire tournament.

For consistency, you should stick with the established rules requiring the defender to modify rolls before the attacker. I would also recommend not allowing the quarters to break the one reroll per die rule. What happens if one player pays a quarter to reroll a die and the other player can reroll that die with another effect? Is the single reroll rule "one way" so the second player could not use a regular game effect, but would be forced to pay a quarter if he wanted that reroll?

For consistency, you should stick with the established rules requiring the defender to modify rolls before the attacker. I would also recommend not allowing the quarters to break the one reroll per die rule. What happens if one player pays a quarter to reroll a die and the other player can reroll that die with another effect? Is the single reroll rule "one way" so the second player could not use a regular game effect, but would be forced to pay a quarter if he wanted that reroll?

For a non-unique tournament, you've got Elusiveness, Flight Instructor, and Target Locks.

I honestly doubt we will see Elusiveness, given the already low number of elite pilot slots in this format being used on better ept's, Flight Instructor is a distinct possibility due to the general low ps, but it's still one die with a 37.5% chance of success. Target Locks are where you are going to see the most rerolls, which is on offense.

But I think I see your point. What would be the point of a defender paying to have the attacker reroll one of his dice if he already has a target lock? So I could see not breaking the one reroll per die rule.

The way it's looking, this will largely go towards packages 3 and 4, as 1 and 2 will likely already be in the mail and arrived when this tourney takes place. Workiing on getting a second address now, and should have it soon.

New idea: players may place bounties on another players head. The first person to beat that player gets half, other half goes to the charity. If the player goes undefeated, they keep the bounty.

Ooo, I like the bounty idea.

Do not forget Predator and Sensor Jammer. The former was what I had in mind for my previous post, but it can apply to either. I just think it would be best to avoid a the situation where a player could not reroll with a normal game effect but can if they spend a quarter.

Just bumping to remind people the tourney is this Saturday. Hope to see you there!

Where in the hell is Iowa?

Looks like fun. I wish good luck with it.

I won't be able to attend, but is there a way I can send along a donation?

I won't be able to attend, but is there a way I can send along a donation?

Sure, just check the link for my Let em Fly campaign thread in the first post.

The tournament rundown:

We had 6 people show up, including myself, to participate in the tourney. Jim came down from Minneapolis with a bag of ships from that group to send out to the troops as well.

Check the first post in this thread for the tourney rules. People could pay $1/point to go up to 105, which is why the squads will be over 100 points.

Jim drew first, and he ended up drawing the one Patrol Leader (Decimator) that I had thrown into the Imperial stack, since I got one at Gencon.

Jim's squad:
Patrol Leader with Intelligence Agent, Weapons Engineer, Gunner, Proton Bomb
Blackmoon with R2 Astromech and Advanced Sensors
Academy Pilot with targeting Computer

Kailen drew next, and he managed to pull the one Shadow Squadron Pilot I put in the Imp deck (3 of each other non-unique).

Kailen's squad:

Bounty Hunter with Tactician
Onyx Squadron Pilot with Heavy Laser Cannon (HLC)

Shadow Squadron Pilot with ACD

Sean then drew exclusively from the Imperial Deck, looking for a Royal Guard Pilot, which was the next to last ship that he drew.

Sean's Squad:
Omicron Group Pilot with HLC and Fire Control System (FCS)

Sigma Squadron Pilot with Recon Specialist and FCS
Royal Guard Pilot with Push the Limit (PTL)

Black Squadron Pilot with Veteran Instincts

Dan then drew from both piles until he had a good mixture.

Dan's Squad:

Rookie Pilot
Tempest Pilot

Avenger Squadron Pilot

Bounty Hunter with Hull upgrade and HLC

Caleb then drew the one Wild Space Fringer (YT-2400) I put into the Rebel deck.

Caleb's squad:

Wild Space Fringer with tactician
Gray Squadron Pilot with Ion Cannon Turret (ICT)
Saber Squadron Pilot with PTL
Dagger Squadron PIlot

Then, since we only had 5, I decided to play, and I also drew out the one Shadow that had been replaced into the Imperial deck.

My squad:
Scimitar Squadron Pilot with Seismic Charge
Shadow Squadron Pilot with ACD, Intelligence Agent, and Enhanced Scopes
Dagger with Advanced Sensors

Gray with ICT and R2 Astromech

People all paid to buy bags of quarters and go up to 105. A $20 bounty was placed on Sean's head, which went to the first person to beat him.

First round Jim played Sean, and Jim wasn't able to claim the bounty. Caleb played Kailen, with Caleb coming away with the win. I played Dan in what would be the closest game of round 1. I played my Phantom poorly, not used to the set up of Enhanced Scoped and Intelligence Agent (credit to KineticOperator). I forgot to use Intel Agent the entire game, and the Enhanced scopes threw me off, not allowing me to go where I wanted to go, since my shadow would normally have moved last. He and I both burned through half of our Pink (die rerolling) bags. In the end, though, his Tempest was the last ship on the board. I also forgot to use my Silver bag (target selection) the entire game as well.

Round 2 was Caleb's turn to try and claim the bounty, and he was unsuccessful as well. That was a close game which went to time, but Sean pulled it out on points. Dan played Jim, and the Decimator still didn't show how it could decimate, so Dan won that one as well. I played Kailen in what would be one of the quicker games of the tourney. Unfortunately for Kailen, it didn't go his way. I focused down his Shadow, then his Onyx, then the BH. The Silver bag was huge in that one, keeping my ships on the board lots longer than they should have.

Round 3 was Dan's turn to try his hand at capturing the bounty on Sean's head. By this time Sean was feeling like Han Solo, having so many bounty hunters come after him unsuccessfully. This time, though, Dan claimed the bounty, and first place in the tourney by beating Sean. I played Caleb to a good game as well, but I came out on top, so I was 2-1 with a really high MoV score. Jim, having lost twice with the Decimator, called shenanigans and swapped squads with Kailen. Kailen wanted to try his hand at flying the Decimator, so he obliged. Let's just say the Decimator squad had as many wins as it does natural agility dice. Jim came out on top in that one.

So Dan won the tournament and chose the Outrider that I had put up for prize support. I was second based on MoV points, and I knew Sean wanted the Rebel Aces that I had put up, so I chose the Tantive that Mayhem had donated to the prize pool. I will be sending the Tantive over with package #4 as soon as I can get another address to send ships to. Sean chose the Rebel Aces, and the other 3 players each got Mayhem gift cards for playing.

All in all, everyone had fun and would do it again. The tourney raised $145 for my Let 'em Fly campaign, which will cover shipping and other expenses. It was a good time and a great tourney, so I was happy. Everyone liked the bags of in-game perks, and used many of the quarters that they had bought. Everyone there donated their extra quarters that they didn't use to the campaign, which was fantastic. Also, Dan donated the Bounty he collected to the campaign as well, so that was phenomenal.

Thanks to everyone who came out and played, and to Mayhem for hosting and for donating to the prize pool. We had fun for a good cause, so it was a good day.

Sounds like you had fun and served a good cause. Let us know when you do it again.