So I love x-wing. But I'm also a massive Trek fan. Here's the problem: Some of the new x-wing dabblers at the club are really really interested in AW. We are trying to convince them to invest in x-wing, but they are really trying to get us existing x-wing players to buy into AW.

How much is it going to cost me to get rules + a R. warbird fleet? (X-wing Core + 3 TIE D's cost me £66) Is this a fun/competitive build? Are the two games different enough so that I won't burn out?

I REALLY want to just focus on x-wing. I'm an ex-heroclix player so I know all about Wizkids shocking quality and balance issues, and the lack of scale annoys me.

That said, a small part of me really likes the idea of ST battles in the x-wing format, and I like what I've heard about missions involving non-combat elements.

Can anyone either shore up my resistance to buying in or help convince me to play both?

Just remember when you post that even if I do buy in to attack wing, the chances of me ever being in a competitive situation is almost nil.

Attack wing has it's balance issues, but is fun enough, if you like the theme. It's got just enough differences to feel, and for the most part the lack of scale isn't an issue, aside from the tinyprise. Often higher attack, with lower agi and higher hp, the ships at closer to the falcon/bwing than the a wing. There's also a much bigger focus on loading up crew and upgrades.

In general, it's cheaper for me, as I don't need multiples of ships. This isn't true of the Klingon / romulan factions, where you probably want multiple birds of prey.

Unfortunately, I think the only way to get extra d'deridex birds of pray, is crazy eBay prices for the OP event prize, or multiple core sets. That's not terrible, as you could do well with 2 core sets and a the valdore. (Easily a 100 point fleet, and enough dice, with spare templats/damage deck. I refuse to get a second core, and don't play attack wing nearly as often as x wing, but it's nice to pull out from time to time.

Get away from STAW,

to many ships, to many Crazy expensive OP Prizes, and the game balance.....well, buy the borg buy the op prizes, play and win.

its a nice game at its core, lots of missions, crews and tecnology but wizkids killed it to fast for me to enjoy it.

go for Star Trek Fleet captains a much better game.

Get away from STAW,

to many ships, to many Crazy expensive OP Prizes, and the game balance.....well, buy the borg buy the op prizes, play and win.

its a nice game at its core, lots of missions, crews and tecnology but wizkids killed it to fast for me to enjoy it.

go for Star Trek Fleet captains a much better game.

ST fleet captains isn't an option. Also, as I said neither is competitive play. My question is exclusively about it's casual aspect.

I agree with Ravncat: different enough to warrant both games. The scale issue isn't that bad (and, realistically, it would be cumbersome to really respect scale since there is a wide variety of ship sizes in ST). The balance issue is real, but if you keep everything faction-specific, it is mitigated. In Star Trek: Attack Wing, the emphasis is more on missions and crew. I'm a big fan of Next Generation mostly, and it is fun to recreate some scenarios and pit favorite characters and ships against each other. There is another D'Deridex coming as an expansion later this year. I haven't felt the need to buy more than one of each (core set and expansions) so far. And I don't get all the expansions (there are many!), just those from the factions or series that I prefer. There is also a set of extra dice available for ST: AW

I still prefer Star Wars X-Wing by a huge margin, and I play much more often than ST: AW.

Trolls need not post

How. Rude!

Trolls need not post

How. Rude!

Is there a good website for comparing all the expansions/cards etc for attack wing? Finding things on the Wizkids website gives me eye cancer.

Trolls need not post

How. Rude!

There are already dozens of troll friendly threads on page one, this doesn't need to expand their habitat.

Is there a good website for comparing all the expansions/cards etc for attack wing? Finding things on the Wizkids website gives me eye cancer.

http://www.afewmaneuvers.com/forum/57-star-trek-attack-wing/

http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Star_Trek:_Attack_Wing

http://www.dracossoftware.com/STAWHome.html

http://guessingzero.com/category/games/staw/

I recently got into AW after having acquired everything for XW and still having a craving for more juicy juicy ships. I haven't had the chance to play it as much as XW, but I've had a few games. Currently I own 3 ships apiece for Federation, Klingon, Romulan, and Dominion, and 2 for Borg; easily enough to make 100pt lists for any of those factions.

The quality is a consideration. The chipboard they use is on a par with FFG, and although the designs of the tokens tends to be a bit more simplistic, it suits the elegant, minimalist style of ST. I think they're going for an Enterprise-D control panels look. The cards are a slightly different story. The stock for them is a bit thin, making them feel rather flimsy, and all the 'art' is stills from the show. I guess that's good or bad depending on your preference. Also, an interesting point to note is that all the cards, upgrades included, are the standard larger card size. This leads to the potential for slightly more complex, wordier upgrades.

For the models themselves, it's really rather hit and miss. Since these are large ships, the lack of fine detailing isn'tt too bad as you wouldnt expect to see lots of tiny pipes and conduits and stuff. That said, some of the models do still look kinda naff. The scultps are all basically okay, but the paint job leaves osmething to be desired. It seems to have beebn getting better with time, and some of the more recent ships actually begin to approach XW levels. It's just a shame that the earlier models, which also tend to be all the most iconic ships, have gotten the worst treatment. That said, none of them are unbearable to look at. The scale is also a bit of a shame, but you can see why it would be impractical to have absolute scale given the wide range of ship sizes. It does bug me a bit though; there are some clear cases where they could have tried to be more consistent, but just didn't bother. I actually don't mind the mini-prise, as it is consistent with the size of the galaxy-calss in the core set. Of all the ships I own, the one that's actually most out of scale is the Warbird, which should be about double it's size. It annoyed me to the point where I bought a different model, and converted it for use in the game. It's this one, if you're interested:

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-w2NYQxgx3dE/UhP25F1wGNI/AAAAAAAAUJg/ATgrv_n6CE0/s1600/Eaglemoss+Star+Trek+The+Official+Starships+Collection+%25235+Romulan+Warbird+model+1.jpg

For the gameplay, it actually feels very different to XW surprsingly, which is one of the reasons I feel I can justify collecting both. It's the same basic system, but the dials do a good job of making the ships feel like larger, more cumbersome capital ships than fighters. A few new maneuvers you don't get in XW (like the ability to reverse on some ships) keeps things interesting too. Like I mentioned earlier, the upgrades tend to be a bit more complex and game changing. I think this is great for casual, as it leads to some awesome and thematic moments, but I can see why it might cause problem in the min-max world of competative play, especially when you allow cross faction mixing. The other big difference is that the ship and the captain (essentially the 'pilot' from XW) are seperate. You get named and generic versions of each ship, and named and generic captains. Makes for some cool customizability, and allows you to recreate your favourite moments from the show, or try out interesting 'what if' scenarios.

The 'base' stats are different too. Surprisingly, AW can be a lot more lethal than XW. Ships tend to have higher attacks (3-4 being normal, and some going as high as 6) and lower agility (1 being normal, some going up to 2 or down to 1; this is mitigated a bit by the cloak action, which gives 4 extra dice). They also tend to have higher hull and shield (with about 5 of each being the 'average') but there are still times when a ship can just get one-shotted out of nowhere. There are some interesting things with fire-arcs too, like 180 fire-arcs, or rear arcs than can only be used for secondary weapons etc.

I think that covers basically everything. I haven't done much with the missions, but there are tons of them, and they all seem very different and varied. All in all, I would say that XW has a tighter, more competative ruleset, which allows for very fast-paced, tense games of skill. AW has a bit more variety and room for craziness, as well as a slower pace overall, whcih makes it great for casual play. Plus, it has official rules for more than 2 players.

My advice; collect both

Hmm. It's sounding like it wouldn't break the bank to get a 3 D'deridex fleet, 84pts with 16pts left for upgrades.

Get away from STAW,

to many ships, to many Crazy expensive OP Prizes, and the game balance.....well, buy the borg buy the op prizes, play and win.

its a nice game at its core, lots of missions, crews and tecnology but wizkids killed it to fast for me to enjoy it.

go for Star Trek Fleet captains a much better game.

is this simple enough that my wife who isnt a gamer could enjoy? its like pulling teeth to get her to play x-wing

I played AW and liked it well enough, but that is because I am a huge fan of Star Trek and the Flight Path system.

Now that being said... here are the few things I DO Like about AW.

1) Its Star Trek and Trek is cool. All of the ships are there, from all of the races that you know and the characters that you love

2) The fleets tend to be smaller and hence, fairly affordable to get into. Low cost buy in is a huge plus!

3) It uses the Flight Path and FFG system, so the rules are REALLY easy to pick up. Some changes, but most will seem familiar to you

4) New Products all of the time - I think they are on Wave 14...its crazy

5) Good Organized Play community

Now that I said that, here are the reasons I DO NOT play Attack Wing:

1) The FP System was really designed for Dog Fights and not Capital Ship on Capital Ship combat so I personally feel it doesn't translate very well on that scale. The Enterprise-D pulling a K-Turn? Really?

2) Their Size Scaling is WAAAAYYYY off. The ships all feel to be about the same size and that is wrong

3) The cross faction intermingling, I do not get. How in the heck can Captain Picard be on a Romulan ship with a Klingon crew? Makes no sense to me! Note: Most tournaments no longer allow this, but 'Rules as Written' states that I can.

4) The cross time period shift stuff really takes me out of it. I can not see how the old Enterprise could have LaForge as its Engineer and Worf as crew. They should have followed FFG's lead and picked a single era and stuck with it, using original series stuff mixed with Next Gen and DS9 and Voyager makes no sense. Plus, the 'Enterprise' Series stuff is soon to follow. WHAT????

5) Their Organized Play system is good, but introduces poorly tested ships to the game that break the game. Far too many ships have been added though their OP game nights that are considered to be broken by most of the community.

6) Their Organized Play system encourages a "Pay to Win" system I do not care for. If you do not go to this event and win, you do not get the good ship and do not do well in the tournament scene.

7) And finally, their models suck. The paintjob is horrible. Visually, that takes me out of the game right away. Their ships are the reason pre-painted games had a bad reputation.

Ok, those are my two cents worth!

Get away from STAW,

to many ships, to many Crazy expensive OP Prizes, and the game balance.....well, buy the borg buy the op prizes, play and win.

its a nice game at its core, lots of missions, crews and tecnology but wizkids killed it to fast for me to enjoy it.

go for Star Trek Fleet captains a much better game.

is this simple enough that my wife who isnt a gamer could enjoy? its like pulling teeth to get her to play x-wing

I.have just the oppisit problemy wife osnt a gamer she enjoys playing but i have to build both squads

I'm certainly a bigger SW fan than ST, but I am a ST fan. Attack Wing sounded cool, but it's made by wizkids. If you want to learn about AW, look at any of their other products.

First off, the quality is going to be lower, yet the price will be the same or higher.

Customer service is flakey at best.

Wizkids doesn't believe in balance. They use power creep to drive sales, and they give out prizes at events that are unique and can also throw off the balance even further. There are also unique promos and exclusives that require you to buy other products they are tied into.

They also don't care to playtest their materials too much, or think too long term. The rules can be changed quite significantly to deal with mistakes they've made. The added downside to this is that this will often create more problems making entire waves obsolete.

Their release schedule is kind of insane. 3-4 ships have been released on a monthly basis and this looks to be continuing. There are 39 ships available right now (not counting exclusives) and the game has only been out 14 months.

The fact that they aren't doing blind boosters for AW is the only move they've made in the right direction as far as I'm concerned.

This is all from my previous personal experiences with Wizkids and other products they've produced. When I heard of AW, I was pretty pumped. I have some ST fans that don't care much for SW/X-Wing that likely would have been interested. But when I learned it was a Wizkids product, it was an instant no.

About a week ago, I decided to see if I could validate my opinion on the matter, and it wasn't hard. A few minutes in various online forums I found that I was pretty much spot on with my predictions.

The bonus is that this leaves much more $$$ in my pocket for Armada and Imperial Assault which both look to be great games.

1) The FP System was really designed for Dog Fights and not Capital Ship on Capital Ship combat so I personally feel it doesn't translate very well on that scale. The Enterprise-D pulling a K-Turn? Really?

I gotta wonder how hard they are kicking themselves right now with Armada on the horizon. I have a feeling that a modified Armada design would have worked MUCH better for them than X-wing did.

1) The FP System was really designed for Dog Fights and not Capital Ship on Capital Ship combat so I personally feel it doesn't translate very well on that scale. The Enterprise-D pulling a K-Turn? Really?

I gotta wonder how hard they are kicking themselves right now with Armada on the horizon. I have a feeling that a modified Armada design would have worked MUCH better for them than X-wing did.

Oh I agree! I think WizKids was in a bind, they had those models and a crappy system to go with it. They decided to camp on to what FFG was doing and put a band-aid on their ailing Star Trek game.

Armada would make for a much better system!

And the models are all the same mold of heroclix tactics.

Casual and fun games it is great. But if you get more involved it can try your patience. With all the combos available the b system can easily be broken. You will need a starter and then the fleet you want and then the captains you want or need. I will be a lot like X-wing in there are a few ships you will never play just to get the cards you want for your build. A little cheaper but I would suggest you go faction pure builds to keep the majority of the broken issues at bay.

I can not see how the old Enterprise could have LaForge as its Engineer and Worf as crew.

Dude...

Geordie and Worf take a vacation together to tour the original Enterprise Memorial museum ship and start to realize they have deeper feelings for each other than they first thought, but then suddenly Romulan terrorists attack and take hostages, and only they can save the day - retaking the ship and then facing off against a rogue Warbird?

I'd watch the hell outta that movie...

I can not see how the old Enterprise could have LaForge as its Engineer and Worf as crew.

Dude...

Geordie and Worf take a vacation together to tour the original Enterprise Memorial museum ship and start to realize they have deeper feelings for each other than they first thought, but then suddenly Romulan terrorists attack and take hostages, and only they can save the day - retaking the ship and then facing off against a rogue Warbird?

I'd watch the hell outta that movie...

I almost peed my pants reading that! Thanks for the good belly laugh man!

The things that make trek a great franchise just do not translate well to games.

The things that make trek a great franchise just do not translate well to games.

I don't know - I thought A Final Unity was as perfect a TNG experience as a game could offer. But in general I agree.

Hmm. It's sounding like it wouldn't break the bank to get a 3 D'deridex fleet, 84pts with 16pts left for upgrades.

To be clear - this would not be a useful list, even for "casual" play. The D'deridex in this game has the firepower of the original-series Enterprise. It has a VERY weak attack.

The Valdore-type warbird is what you'd want to get if you are going to play Romulans - somewhat closer to the type of attacks that other factions are putting out (4 attack dice still pales in comparison to the Cardassian's typical 5 or the Borg's 6 - or even the Federation's 4 that commonly comes with a 360-degree-arc, as the Romulans just have the typical 90-degree arcs).

ST was always at its best when there were deeper moral issues on the line, more than just space bullets and flying leg kicks (see Season 3 *shudder*).

However, that doesn't really answer the question - for my purposes, why I haven't taken AW seriously (and all this has pretty much been said previously - just a ditto):

Models: not on par with X-Wing

Mechanic: FFG crafted a game mechanic specifically for the SW universe. AW simply licensed that and stuck different ships on it. That bugs me. Especially because it doesn't translate as well. Now, Armada gameplay in ST universe: I'd be interested in that. Bigger, better models, inertia affecting moves, multiple action pre-planning. Armada is the perfect mechanic for Star Trek universe

Expansions: I have a severe distaste that certain things are only available as giveaways or prizes. That's fine if you are a competitive player or near those events. I am neither. If I want a ship, I should be able to buy a ship. Not travel to some event. For me, that's a fail and demonstrates the general lack of care about cultivating a compelling game for *everyone*.

Finally, and I say the following as, honestly, a bigger Trek fan than Star Wars fan overall:

Another thing to consider is the expected growth rate, investment in the respective franchises. JJ Abrams aside, Trek is in some ways on life support. No new TV on the immediate horizon, no toys worth mentioning (they really blew it signing building toy contract with Kreo and not Lego) and the new movies aren't really designed (or have failed to) capture the imagination of the younger crowd (though they are quite good, well cast, etc...). Contrast that with Star Wars... :\

Whatever you do, don't get into Attack Wing.

The quality of the minis is awful, the balance is outright absent and if you think Fat Falcons are cause for alarm Attack Wing'll throw you into a full panic attack. X-wing's designers are skilled, based on the state of Attack Wing and its lazy costing, Attack Wing's either don't or don't care.

It's not a Star Wars versus Star Trek argument, it's quality versus total lack thereof, a company that cares about its product versus one that only has a profit motive.

They also have business practices such as giving away very powerful exclusive cards at events.