One thing I could not help but notice in the Armada demo is that both X-Wing cards out, Luke Skywalker and the regular X-Wing Squadron, have an ability called Escort . The actual text is:

" Escort. (Squadrons you are engaged with cannot attack squadrons without ^_ESCORT .)"

This is a fantastic addition to the game, in a genre where it is important to design every element in your fleet with a specific purpose in mind. In a game of Epic X-Wing, you can field a wing of Bombers with torpedos and simply fly over to your opponent's capital ship as quickly as turn 2 without them being able to stop you short of diverting their whole squad's attention to it.

In Armada, it seems like the rules are directly facilitating purpose-built anti-capital ship bomber wings. Assuming there will be Y-Wings or B-Wings, which roll more dice against capital ships, then you'll be able to protect them with Escort ships. Attacking ships will have to chew through your Escort fighters before being able to destroy your bombers. So it prevents your specialist ships from being sniped immediately. However, due to the engaged rules, it's still beneficial to harry your opponents' bombers, because they can't fly off and attack your capital ships while engaged.

It also allows for some named characters, like Vader perhaps (Leading Black Squadron?), to be protected by other squadrons with Escort. Very Thematic and appropriate.

All in all, I think it's a very elegant way to handle this system in a game where you're job is to micromanage capital ships - you just give your commands to the fighters, and they automatically do their thing of engaging and locking down enemies. Meaning, they're important, but the focus is still on the big ships.

What interests me is that the base games doesn't appear to have any Rebel squadrons without Escort. The preview said the box only comes with TIEs and X-Wings, so this mechanic may not come into play with the starter at all. We may be able to infer from this that the Armada special announcement (X-Wing has it's own) on Friday will be for Armada Wave 1, with new squadron types like Y-Wings and TIE Bombers. Otherwise, unless the starter has more cards than it seems, they'd be releasing a game with a mechanic that doesn't get used.

I'd bet we'll see Interceptor on Squints and A-wings. Perhaps allowing them to ignore the Escort rule?

Or get extra dice vs Escorting squadrons?

Or have entirely different abilities altogether? X-Wings may be ideal escorts but certainly not Y-Wings, or B-Wings.

Right, I think this opens up a lot of design space. For instance, somewhere down the line they may release TIE Phantom squadrons which cannot be engaged and do not engage other squadrons until they fire on something. Expensive, but hard to pin down squadrons which can attack priority targets.

I'd think y-wings and tie bombers are a sure thing, and b-wings would come later with Mon cal ships.

All in all it sounds interesting.

This is a great thread because it points out the strength of the game design and shows some possible upgrade paths for the game that make tactical sense.

It's like WWII combat in space - the same thing George Lucas was trying to do with the movie space battles.

I'd bet we'll see Interceptor on Squints and A-wings. Perhaps allowing them to ignore the Escort rule?

The Interceptirs are noted for their mobility, so they'll probably get rules that allow them limited movement when Engaged.

FYI...

The Imperial Fighters pack will have Tie Fighters, Tie Bombers, Tie Interceptors and Tie Advanced.

The Rebel Fighters pack will have A-Wings, B-Wings, Y-Wings and X-Wings.

I'm guessing 2 of each, there's 8 ships per pack, and each pack costs $20

The way the fighters work reminds me of a mix of War at Sea and Victory at Sea. In War at Sea, some fighters had the escort ability that worked that the opponent could not target your bombers if they were escorted, so you had to destroy the escort before being able to attack the bombers. In Victory at Sea, when you launched fighters from your carrier, you could move them in any direction, no facing, up to your speed distance; once engage in a dogfight, you could not get out until it was resolved.

I really loved Victory at Sea as a game and I see a lot of ressemblance with it so, the more I learn about Armada, the more enthusiast I am!