Hah! I'd love to see someone bring only carriers. Blow up the carriers (which can't give the repair order since they're too busy spamming the squadron order) and suddenly more and more of his fighters are hamstrung to only move or shoot in a turn, after I do my thing. And remember the first victory condition of the game: Once all of your capital ships are gone, you lose.

No, it seems that balance is the key here. A VSD rolls quite a lot of dice and can take a lot of damage before going down. And that's before we take ship upgrades into account, which fighters so far do not seem to have. It'd be insane to just discard a ship like that.

Meanwhile on the fighter front, we have jewels like Luke who seems to be tailor made to engage capitals. Taking a few fighters to screen him and getting him in a good position to do damage sounds like it's going to be a common tactic.

First, you dismiss carriers, then you rave about Luke. Which is it to be? Moving last is an advantage, as you know from X-Wing so fighters will evade a capital ship till they hang on its tail..

It is easy for the Yamato to blow up a carrier, but it will not get past the fighter screen.

First, you dismiss carriers, then you rave about Luke. Which is it to be? Moving last is an advantage, as you know from X-Wing so fighters will evade a capital ship till they hang on its tail..

It is easy for the Yamato to blow up a carrier, but it will not get past the fighter screen.

My point is balance. Fighters as far as we've seen them are not a binary "OP or not" situation. They're good, they're agile, they can get to places where the big ships can't ludicrously fast and the named pilots seem to have very good abilities, but you have to use them well or you'll get screened or blown away.

In X-wing it isn't just moving last that's the advantage, it's the moving last and shooting first. In Armada, unless you're on a squadron order, you move or shoot. And you're going to be doing both last.

The reason I dismiss carriers as a "take carriers and you win" option is that a high squadron order count is going to mean the ship is going to sacrifice other stats. Weapons? Sields? Hull? I don't know which, but there's no way a carrier is going to be able to get a high squadron count and fight off a VSD one on one.

I think for Star Wars as in WWII, fighters definitely have the potential to be king and frankly, that's appropriate. In all the movies and TV shows, fighter battles are given much more time and drama than ship-to-ship combat.

So the question is: Why capital ships?

What's poorly reflected in games in general, especially ship-to-ship games like Armada, is that capital ships provide logistics. It's like a carrier group..you can't operate far away in deep space with just fighters. They have to land somewhere, the pilots need to rest, refit, etc.

You also can't stage a land invasion with fighters. Big ships provide transport and support for land armies. In general what's missing in a lot of fleet-to-fleet combat games is that the point of big ships is NOT to well..shoot at each other, the point is to provide mobile bases from which to stage massive military operations.

If we're going WWII analogies, I feel that the Rebel philosophy is the (American) fighter heavy tactic, while Imperials favor (Japanese) battleship-style tactics. While fighters had the advantage in WWII, certainly that can be altered by making battleships stronger/cheaper/more powerful, or limiting fighters in such a way to reflect logistics.

Agree with Your post, but You completly missed with WWII comparison.

Japaneese pioneered "Fighter aka Aircraft tactic". In 1941 Japaneese had 10 carriers and US had 4. Pearl Harbour, Kuantan was Japaneese Aircraft vs Allied Battleships battles. Only after that, US have started to build lot of Carriers.

And unfortunately, logistic/transport function of big ships is hard to put to tactical combat game. It would be more valid in some "galaxy conquest" or "sector conquest" game. I hope that Fighter Command order will be useful enough..

The Squadron Command lets you both move and fire in the same turn, before the big ships themselves fire and move. I'd say that's plenty useful.

but it will not get past the fighter screen.

Given the fact that Cap ships simply plow though fighters, and the fighters have to be moved next to the closest friendly ship... Yeah it will be pretty easy to get past the fighter screen.

but it will not get past the fighter screen.

Given the fact that Cap ships simply plow though fighters, and the fighters have to be moved next to the closest friendly ship... Yeah it will be pretty easy to get past the fighter screen.

"next to the closest friendly ship"? Where did get that information from? From the video I got the understanding "moved out of the way". The interesting question is, how many fighter groups can the capital ship survive. If it displaces fighter groups, those groups can probably attack in the fighter phase. I doubt that there are capital ships agile enough to actually hunt fighter even if they had the anti-fighter armament to make that viable. I do hope they make fighters not strong enough to attack capital ships with impunity. If I want to play a fighter game, I play X-Wing.

You're rolling one dice per squadron, each squadron costs about 9 to 14 points, can only move or shoot without a squadron command and once a squadron is within range 1 of an enemy squadron they're engaged and can't shoot the capital ships.

Sure, if you leave enemy squadrons unchecked and don't mount any kind of anti-fighter defence they can wreck your face. But that's only natural, otherwise nobody would ever take them. But there are ways to defend against them. We already know you can tie them up with your own squadrons, and who knows what options the upgrade cards bring.

"next to the closest friendly ship"? Where did get that information from?

From the video. Starting at around 19:15 when the CR-90 overlaps a X-Wing, the Imperial player gets to pick where that ship it's placed.

I do hope they make fighters not strong enough to attack capital ships with impunity. If I want to play a fighter game, I play X-Wing.

Each cap ship gets between 2 and 3 blue dice for anti-fighter. Cap ships can attack every squadron in that arc at range 2. With blue dice you have a 50% chance of a <hit>, and a 25% of a <acc> So killing a 3 point Tie Squadron won't be too difficult.

On the other hand Fighters will do some damage to cap ships but from the looks of it, not a ton. Luke having the best anti-cap attack of 1 black die which ignores shields, but also costing half a CR-90... Ties on the other hand have at best a 50% chance of even landing a hit, which the ship may just ignore if they use their defense powers.

I do hope you don't have to bring fighters to defend against fighters, because that would make fighters the only viable option - they can fight against fighters and capital ships.

I doubt that there are capital ships agile enough to actually hunt fighter even if they had the anti-fighter armament to make that viable. I do hope they make fighters not strong enough to attack capital ships with impunity. If I want to play a fighter game, I play X-Wing.

During the 2-turn demo game I played, using a little bit of luring, in one round I managed to wipe out 3 TIE Fighter squadrons with Concentrated Fire out of one arc each (I didn't even get to use the possible two arcs) from a CR90 (2 blue AS) and a Nebulon B (the Support Refit, 2 blue AS) and two X-Wing squadrons. I ended up only taking 1-2 damage on a ship and 1-2 damage to one X-Wing squadron. The dice rolls were just slightly above average. I took away from the demo that fighters are hardly overpowered.

I do hope you don't have to bring fighters to defend against fighters, because that would make fighters the only viable option - they can fight against fighters and capital ships.

It all depends on your setup I suppose. If you have strong anti-squadron ships, then they can fill the anti-squadron role. The Nebulon B Escort seems like it might work pretty well in that role, having 3 blue Anti-Squadron attack to every other ship's 2.

I do hope you don't have to bring fighters to defend against fighters, because that would make fighters the only viable option

You will most likely need fighters to help screen other fighters... Which is how Star Wars combat works. That does not however mean they're the only viable option, that means there will need to be a balance between points spent on Ships, Fighters and Upgrades.

A single VSD with 200 points of fighters will likely get destroyed pretty quickly. Engage the Imp fighters, rush forward and pound the crap out of the VSD. When it's dead 2 turns latter, game over.

Trying to fly without any fighters however is unlikely to be a good plan either, because you'll be limited in how you can deal with the enemy fighters. So you have achieved a very Star Wars style fleet game.

I think large fighter swarms will be severely hampered by effective flak ships, especially if we get Lancers and other similar anti-starfighter ships in the future. Due to the fact that capital ships firing on starfighters hit all of them within arc, a large swarm dies just as quickly as a single fighter when it takes incoming fire.

Having 200 points of fighters go *poof* all at once will most likely dissuade people from bringing that many in the future.

especially if we get Lancers and other similar anti-starfighter ships in the future.

Or even anti-starfighter upgrades and commanders. Imagine an upgrade/commander that lets you convert <crits> into <hits>, now you have a 75% chance of landing a hit.

Being at range 2 front arc of a VSD or even Frigate can cover a whole lot of space, you could fit a pretty big number of squadrons in that arc.

especially if we get Lancers and other similar anti-starfighter ships in the future.

Or even anti-starfighter upgrades and commanders. Imagine an upgrade/commander that lets you convert <crits> into <hits>, now you have a 75% chance of landing a hit.

Being at range 2 front arc of a VSD or even Frigate can cover a whole lot of space, you could fit a pretty big number of squadrons in that arc.

And ships get to fire from two arcs a turn. The only time a squadron isn't going to get shot is if the opposing player would rather take shots at your capitals.

The rule regarding how to displace squadrons with a capital ship is that the opponent gets ti pick where the ships go, regardless of if the ships are friendly or enemy. It has nothing to do with nearest friendly ship.

The rule regarding how to displace squadrons with a capital ship is that the opponent gets ti pick where the ships go...

Well the point is that Fighters don't block cap ships like ships do in X-Wing.

I understand that I was just correcting that rules misconception. You are free to plow through squadrons at your hearts content, but doing so will allow you opponent to place those squadrons where ever he like in base to base with the displacing ship. Which could allow them to get an attack they may have not have been in range for, disengage from a scrum, or just mess up your fighter's placement

but doing so will allow you opponent to place those squadrons where ever he like in base to base with the displacing ship.

Thanks for clarifying the rule Based on the one case I saw, I wasn't sure if it was nearest friendly or not. Since it was a X-Wing squad being replaced by a CR-90.

Yep, quite true. Battleships, aircarft carriers and all sorts of ships were sunk in World War II by aircraft. There's a few instances of ships being sunk in 1945 by a single Kamikaze aircraft. So anything is possible. Are we likely to see dedicated strike craft like Y-Wings and TIE Bombers?

What we are seeing is a lot of wild speculation without a shred of evidence as to how it all is going to work. I guess that just shows how impatient we all are.

FYI but the most tonnage sunk in WW2 was by USN Fleet class submarines. After all no ship that small has a cloaking device.

; )

Yes I was fully aware that submarines sunk many more ships than Kamikaze attacks. The biggest battleships in the world, the Yamato and Musashi were both lost to aircraft attack. My point was that the one little pesky mosquito buzzing around a Star Destroyer can still have the potential to damage it. Nothing is immune to damage.

Don't forget that the Bismark and Tirpitz were both sunk by bombers.

And the Hood was sank by the Bismarck

And HMS Prince of Wales, which was involved in the gun battle with the Bismarck, was sunk by Japanese aircraft. I think we've established that if you are going to name your Star Destroyers, there's a couple of names that might bring some bad luck with them.