It's a combined weakness of itself and Armada arriving on the scene, I'd say. The people who love capital ships were interested in Epic because it is the only Star Wars game that gives us the option of putting down big ships. With Armada on the scene, the capital ship lovers now have a choice.

And amusingly enough, despite the $100 starter set Armada is the cheaper choice for large scale fleet battles (plus, X-wing's never going to let you put down Star Destroyers anyway).

I most certainly won't stop playing X-wing, and I'll wait and see before I declare I'll never play X-wing Epic (no reason to jump to conclusions when both Armada and the Imperial epics are still half a year away after all). But where the Epic ships were a 100% certain buy for me before, now I'm no longer as sure.

I'm all in, and I LERVES that they are going with a Victory-class for the starter. Granted the ISD will come later, but I love the Victory as a ship in EU fluff, even managed to mode a decent Micro Machine ISD into a Victory years ago.

Stoked for Armada!

I'm all in, and I LERVES that they are going with a Victory-class for the starter. Granted the ISD will come later, but I love the Victory as a ship in EU fluff, even managed to mode a decent Micro Machine ISD into a Victory years ago.

I agree that the Vic is a good choice for the starter set. I had just hoped on a less regressive sliding scale. (I'll let the mathwingers let me know if I used the proper term here.)

What makes you like the VSD so much? What's your history with it?

Back to the topic at hand:

Keroko is probably right that we're still roughly 6 months away from getting our grubby hands on the hypothetical Imperial huge ships. I think that's somewhat frustrating, since it will be nearly a year since the Rebel huge ships came out. It doesn't suggest to me that FFG is working a methodical development and production plan, but somewhat adapting to changes as they seem to happen. I'm not saying flexibility is a bad business strategy (to the degree that it is a strategy), but it does leave us in uncertainty as to what game pieces to invest in.

While I am certainly in love with the idea of playing Armada, I might not get into it if it seems like nobody else in my community is planning to do so. I don't know what itch my fellows are looking to scratch, and that will matter for me.

Keroko is probably right that we're still roughly 6 months away from getting our grubby hands on the hypothetical Imperial huge ships. I think that's somewhat frustrating, since it will be nearly a year since the Rebel huge ships came out. It doesn't suggest to me that FFG is working a methodical development and production plan, but somewhat adapting to changes as they seem to happen. I'm not saying flexibility is a bad business strategy (to the degree that it is a strategy), but it does leave us in uncertainty as to what game pieces to invest in.

"Armada was designed in response to the reaction to Epic" is an easy conclusion to come to, but given that the Transport was released just last June, and the steps from conceptual game design to working prototype tends to take a tad longer than 4 months, I do think FFG has had Armada planned for a whole lot longer.

I'd hazard a guess that they started conceptualizing Armada when X-wing's sales shot through the roof.

Yeah, just looking at the components, this has been in the works a LOT longer then even than when pre-orders went out for the huge ships.

"Armada was designed in response to the reaction to Epic" is an easy conclusion to come to, but given that the Transport was released just last June, and the steps from conceptual game design to working prototype tends to take a tad longer than 4 months, I do think FFG has had Armada planned for a whole lot longer.

I'd hazard a guess that they started conceptualizing Armada when X-wing's sales shot through the roof.

Well, the Transport was released at the end of April.

(Back around then, when I put in the mail-order for my first X-Wing core set I told my wife: "Honestly, I wish there were a capital ships game instead.")

But your point is well taken, and you're probably right about that timeline of conception. The notion of "Armada was designed in response to the reaction to Epic" is not what I was intending to suggest, but I can see how you might have read that into my words.

However, the one can still have been affected by the other, even during the development stages of both. They might have already committed to X-Wing epic and come to the realization that while these might see some niche use, they wouldn't fulfill people's desire for truly epic capital-scale combat, nor would they be the same commercial success as smaller ships in X-Wing were/are. So, that realization might have triggered the development of Armada.

Or, I might be wrong and they're both a part of some long-laid plan. It just all feels haphazard to me. The main hint to that is the fact that we haven't had Imperial huge ships. Why would they produce rebel huges without Imperial huges at the same time, so that there could be balance to the forces? That, and the bizarre Wave V.

Yes, I agree. Design is never a solid thing, so the progress of X-wing's growth would have inevitably affected it. I think part of the problem with Imperial huges was that, unlike for the rebels, the Imperials don't have any movie iconic huge ships that can be adjusted for X-wing's scale with minor losses. Figuring that out took a lot of time.

Question though is why release Huge ships for X-Wing if FFG already knows that they will be releasing a separate game for capital ships?

Question though is why release Huge ships for X-Wing if FFG already knows that they will be releasing a separate game for capital ships?

$$$

Question though is why release Huge ships for X-Wing if FFG already knows that they will be releasing a separate game for capital ships?

No idea, but I'm sure they had a reason.

(Although seriously it has introduced another element of play into Xwing, and they are stunning models)

Scratching a different itch? You mean Capital Ship combat? That is what I thought Star Trek Attack Wing was for. To have capital ship combat.

Will have to wait and see how good it is. I mean right now, I have my itched scratched with Attack Wing.

It's funny, I read the description of the game, and it seems to read almost as FFG took all the complaints about X-wing, Attack Wing players had, and then add said we'll do capital ship game better.

I can totally see people playing both in the same campaign. Doing large Armada games and then 'zooming in' to play X-Wing and see the smaller battles within the large fleet engagments.

THIS... I had exactly the same thought.

Question though is why release Huge ships for X-Wing if FFG already knows that they will be releasing a separate game for capital ships?

Who knows when the decision on the development of Armada was made. Epic might have already have been in the works by then.

I was a huge games workshop devotee playing fantasy and 40k for close to 20 years. I loved fantasy battle but it was lacking in that grand scale epic battle feel. 12 years ago when they released Warmaster, I was all in. Probably one of the best games systems they created and it is actually the only GW game I still play currently. Warmaster died long ago due to the fact GW gave it no love as it did with all it's "specialist" games, even though these games were better systems than their flagship games of fantasy and 40k.

Looking at armada, it definitely fills the grand scale niche, and I will definitely buy in. I know FFG is not GW (thank god), but they need to not follow same mistakes and equally support x-wing and armada. Armada will likely have a slow start in sales compared to x-wing but if not supported will most likely not get any more expansions and fade away like a dead Jedi.

It's funny, I read the description of the game, and it seems to read almost as FFG took all the complaints about X-wing, Attack Wing players had, and then add said we'll do capital ship game better.

Heh, when I saw the announcement with the pictures of individual parts and rules overview I was sitting there imagining that WizKids execs were also reading it, thinking "****, if we had just waited a year or so, we'd have a system to copy that actually does capital ships well...."

Question though is why release Huge ships for X-Wing if FFG already knows that they will be releasing a separate game for capital ships?

Because X-wing already is an existing and stable market. Armada on the other hand still has a risk of flopping entirely.

Scratching a different itch? You mean Capital Ship combat? That is what I thought Star Trek Attack Wing was for. To have capital ship combat.

Will have to wait and see how good it is. I mean right now, I have my itched scratched with Attack Wing.

Star Trek isn't Star Wars though. There are plenty of potential customers who passed on Attack Wing due to not being Star Trek fans.

It's also made by WizKids rather than FFG.