I've seen talk in numerous threads about the desire to have a tractor beam as a systems upgrade.

What would your take on the tractor beam be?

I think mine would look something like this:

Tractor Beam - Type Systems Upgrade - Cost 3 points

Action: Spend your target lock to reduce a ship that is in your firing arc's agility by 1 (to a minimum of 0) for the entire turn. The defender may not perform red or white maneuvers during this turn.

So, the way I look at it is this. I need to spend a TL in order to beam your ship. That means I'm not using that TL to re-roll any damage. 3 points seems like a justifiable cost - not too expensive, and in-line with other systems upgrades. The one-point reduction in agility is in-line with other cards that do the same sort of thing (Wedge's ability, Outmaneuver etc). The added advantage is that this applies for the entire turn, so any other ships attacking after you have been beamed get the advantage of the -1 to your agility as well. Stacking Tractor Beams would grant a cumulative -1 agility, but again, it would only last for the one turn anyway, and a fresh TL would have to be gained and spent on the following turn anyways if you wished to keep doing this. Opponents that are able to use Expert Handling (or something similar) to remove a TL would of course be able to prevent a Tractor beam from grabbing them, provided they did so before the effect took place.

What do you think? Any ideas to make this better?

Any ideas of your own?

Tractor Beam:

3 Pts;

Cannon:

When using primary weapons attack and with-in Range 1-2. When attacking a small based ship, and at least 1 critical is rolled . The target ship m ay not use Evade or Focus Tokens to defend the attack.

This way it replaces the cannon and it's not 100 percent perfect. Small ships dodge lots of Tractor Beams, but once they are caught in it they suffer.

(huge ship only)

"The small tractor beam projector developed for the TIE Avenger could be easily fitted to the Defender." http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/TIE/D_Defender

Since they didn't add a tractor beam mechanic with the Defender I doubt we'll see one.

But then again we all doubted a 3rd faction so anything is possible.

Way too cheap, I think. You're nerfing their Agility not only for your ship, but for all other ships that might want to shoot at them as well. Plus the maneuver restriction. Even with the TL requirement, I'd bump it to 7 points, easy.

I like eagle's Cannon version.

"The small tractor beam projector developed for the TIE Avenger could be easily fitted to the Defender." http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/TIE/D_Defender

Since they didn't add a tractor beam mechanic with the Defender I doubt we'll see one.

But then again we all doubted a 3rd faction so anything is possible.

Yeah, that was one of my biggest disappointments with the Defender. I wanted to see it in all it's glory as presented in TIE Fighter. I wanted Ion Cannons and tractor Beams and missiles spraying everywhere from that three winged beast!!

Alas it was not meant to be.

if it was a huge ship tractor beam would have to be a template weapon which would drop the agility of the closest ship in its template to 0 and make do white straight 0 manuevers. Requires spending a target lock on the inital intended target.

Way too cheap, I think. You're nerfing their Agility not only for your ship, but for all other ships that might want to shoot at them as well. Plus the maneuver restriction. Even with the TL requirement, I'd bump it to 7 points, easy.

I like eagle's Cannon version.

But there is a precedent for nerfing the agility for the attacker and all other attackers. Etahn's ability affects all other attacks as well. "When an enemy ship inside your firing arc at range 1 - 3 is defending, the attacker may change 1 of its Hit results to a Crit result." So, a very similar type of example. If you were running Etahn with a swarm of Z's, that means potentially 5 other ships taking advantage of his ability..

Points wise, I can see it increasing, though I don't know if it needs much of a bump in cost - maybe 5 points?

EDIT: And one of the reasons for making this a systems slot rather than a cannon - the Outrider.. A turretted Tractor Beam would kill this. ANY Turretted Tractor Beam - be it the one I came up with or someone else's idea would be horrible.

I think it would be cool if it actually moved a ship, like:

"Hard point upgrade (2 energy), 2 Attack dice, range 1-3, huge ship only"

Attack (Energy): Spend 2 energy from this card perform this attack. If this attack hits, cancel all dice results and move the defender either 1 straight forward or you may execute a barrel roll with the defender's ship."

With 2 attack dice, its not much good against small one man fighters, but very useful against slower gunboats and larger freighters.

I would have it diminish the speed of the next movement by 2.

I would have it diminish the speed of the next movement by 2.

Bad idea for small ships.

I think this idea might come with the Imperial Huge ship. It only makes sense, because I don't see the Rebels using one in the films, and definitely not on the fighters.

Jacob

hold on to your butts, here's how I would have it work:

tractor beam has an attack = 3

attack: Roll to hit as normal. if target is hit reduce all damage to zero and place a tractor beam counter next to the ship.

in the ships next activation phase the controlling player must roll 1 attack die per speed shown on his maneuver dial and the player that inflicted the tractor hit rolls the tractor attack dice and if the controlling player scores more hits and crits than the attacker the ship is free to perform the move on its dial. if not it remains in place or the attacker can move it 1 range bracket closer until it touches another ship. the tractored ship then gains a stress token.

almost forgot, ships with tractor counters have their evade reduced by 2 to a minimum of 0.

(huge ship only)

Depending on the source you read, the Falcon had one. I think it would be fine for huge and large base ships. Not sure on small based ships though.

I think it would be cool if it actually moved a ship, like:

"Hard point upgrade (2 energy), 2 Attack dice, range 1-3, huge ship only"

Attack (Energy): Spend 2 energy from this card perform this attack. If this attack hits, cancel all dice results and move the defender either 1 straight forward or you may execute a barrel roll with the defender's ship."

With 2 attack dice, its not much good against small one man fighters, but very useful against slower gunboats and larger freighters.

Going this route you exclude large based ships... I do like the idea of it drawing a ship closer to the ship with the tractor beam..

I think it should be a system upgrade as well.. makes perfect sense.

Maybe something like...

Action: Spend target lock to draw 1 ship closer to your position, use a 1 straight maneuver template to pull them closer..

Or something less wordy lol.. or even a 2 straight.. be good for dragging a ship into range for you tonshoot, or, say its on a support ship.. shuttle or YT, and you bring it closer for the escorts to shoot up...

I think this is an upgrade they should have done with the Falcon when it released.. or the Lambda..

In the EU though, there were a couple of examples of ships that had the Tractor Beam - small based ships like the Defender, and the Avenger both had it. The missile boat also had it, though if FFG ever decides to create the Missile Boat, I would hope it would be a large based ship like the Shuttle.

Small ships had tractor beams. In X-wing Alliance, all the main Alliance fighters could mount a tractor beam. It basically slowed down a starfighter so that you could easily lock onto it. It seemed to me that it was more effective on high-speed targets.

Personally, I'd have it operate thus:

Tractor Beam

Modification

Effect: When a ship at range 1-2 is in your firing arc, reduce its agility by 1, to a minimum of 2 for one turn.

Cost: 4

Small ships had tractor beams. In X-wing Alliance, all the main Alliance fighters could mount a tractor beam. It basically slowed down a starfighter so that you could easily lock onto it. It seemed to me that it was more effective on high-speed targets.

Personally, I'd have it operate thus:

Tractor Beam

Modification

Effect: When a ship at range 1-2 is in your firing arc, reduce its agility by 1, to a minimum of 2 for one turn.

Cost: 4

So if you have 2 agility or lower this has no effect? What a waste of 4 points, especially for Imperials.

I would do a range 1 firepower 3 with the wedge effect cannon upgrade, but it will be about 6 points.

However on second thought we already have autoblasters which sort of do the same thing as far as negating agility. Maybe if you drop the agility modification add more like a funky ion cannon rule such as if if hit cancel all results and you may chose (a non red maneuver) the dial maneuver of that ship. So you could push it straight 5 off the board or turn it into an asteroid or you can keep it locked at 1 so you can shoot it next round, but you don't do any damage with tractor beam hits.

Still if there is a tractor beam I think the first one would be on a Star Destroyer that allows it to capture huge rebel ships.

Action: defender may not make hard turns, banks straights and k turns only.

Five points.

Cannon, 5 points, range 1-2. 3 dice: Attack: if this attack hits, cancel all damage and assign one tractor beam token to the defender. When assigning dials. You may not assign a dial to a ship with a tractor beam token. A ship with a tractor beam token may spend one action during its preform actions phase to remove the tractor beam token.

Edit: treat the ships manouver as a green straight 0. (Otherwise ships with a stress get stuck forever)

Edit: treat the ships manouver as a green straight 0. (Otherwise ships with a stress get stuck forever)

Well first there is no straight 0 it is a stop 0.

And yes ships can already be stuck with stress forever. The Stress Ion combo, for example the white 1 straight makes it so that it can't remove the stress tokens. Back on that one game a defender walked off the table I had it double stressed for 3 turns, on the 4th i finally missed but the double stress made it go off table.

However that is the point of cards like these. The ability to provide control makes for allot of unique strategies. So with the tractor beam or the ion cannon there are options. My card draft range 1 firepower 3 where you cancel all hits and choose a non red maneuver on the dial for the next activation phase. The two cannons do about the same thing, however there is the trade off between the two to make them different. Ion is range 3 but tractor beam is range 1, the Ion white 1 straight stops stress removal but selecting a green 1 straight after a tractor beam hit will remove stress from the defender. The ion changes the dial to only one thing but does 1 damage, the tractor beam does no damage unless you run the defender into an obstacle.

Personally, it's not an attack. It's an action.

[action] if an enemy within your firing arc is at range two, you may reposition their ship using any straight maneuver template until they are at range one. You then receive one stress token.

This would be a finishing move, making its cost a little lower, and not terribly over powered, as it would need some decent action economy/experimental interface to work to full effect

AND since you're only using the straight maneuvers, it's possible you can throw the ship out of arc altogether.

Personally, it's not an attack. It's an action.

[action] if an enemy within your firing arc is at range two, you may reposition their ship using any straight maneuver template until they are at range one. You then receive one stress token.

This would be a finishing move, making its cost a little lower, and not terribly over powered, as it would need some decent action economy/experimental interface to work to full effect

AND since you're only using the straight maneuvers, it's possible you can throw the ship out of arc altogether.

Okay as a new action (sort of when I posted about S-foils for X-wing and B-wing) Okay but still I will suggest looking into changing the movement dial (to a non red) of your opponent instead of pulling your opponent in, and if the dial is already reveal choose a non red maneuver and that dial cannot be changed in the next planning phase.. This is the defender tractor beam not the big ones on the Star Destroyer or Death Star.

I think tractor beams would be tough to simplify/abstract in a fluffy and sensical way. Imagine, your ship is in front, left right or back., does it work against huge, or large? Does limiting speed feel ok in those situations? The idea of limiting maneuvering in a game about maneuvering is awfully powerful and probably close to an NPE, even ion movement restriction can be pretty negative. I'm sure FFG could put something good and balanced together, but if we haven't seen one yet, it's probably for good reason.

Maybe we'll one with the imperial huge ship we all hope for!