"If none of your ships move for two or more consecutive turns because they bumped each other, all of your ships suffer 1 damage."

That would be the rule I'd try. You can fortress for one turn. After that, your entire squadron starts taking damage. Keep it up and you'll lose in short order.

Lots of reasons. Slow a big ship down. Get a shot at another ship. Prevent you ship from running into a rock

Yeah, Danthrax, that gives some insane power to the Swarm. Ever been in a nasty traffic jam? There have been times when I haven't moved, merely because of the other ships.

Yeah, Danthrax, that gives some insane power to the Swarm. Ever been in a nasty traffic jam? There have been times when I haven't moved, merely because of the other ships.

I don't think so, based on how I worded it. All of your own ships have to not move because they bumped each other — not other ships — and for at least two turns in a row. It would be stunning if a swarm managed to force its opponent to not move any ships because of bumping themselves for two turns in a row.

It's just an inelegant solution to the "problem", Danthrax.

You're dealing with the symptoms, not the root cause.

I'm sorry guys, I know there's a lot of outrage here, but what was the fortressing player's other option? Running a goddamn fat falcon like everyone else, that's what. FFG screwed the pooch with the phantom and ACD. I put this squarely on them, not the player who was within the rules but didn't feel like eating 4 to 5 dice from outside his arc an entire match, all while the Imperial player hissed, "Pure skill!" to himself each time he blasted a hapless X-Wing from the board.

The only way to break this cycle of RPS is to move this to objective based missions, where actions are forced. Honestly, I'm not sure what this guy did was any worse than someone who blows up one enemy ship and then runs for the next hour to win on time constraints.

I dont see the problem with it. Opposing player has the option to slowly roll across the board in formation, and then jump into range.

Squad vs squad but the fortress guy doesn't get any actions.

I like those odds.

The issue with that, is that you technically get rid of setting a ship up behind another one.

Like I said, the issue isn't the bumping rules. It is the lack of outside motivators for engagement.

good point.

i wonder what would promote more engagement? it really starts with your ship choices. u r playing an attacking list or a defensive lists or focusing on some aspect of the game like stress giving or ionizing or playing a list which can do multiple things but isnt geared to any one thing.

as stated here already the Phantom changes the way you play (with it and against it). its hyper-mobility is very difficult to deal with for certain squads. It has also been stated here that the rebel player who used the fortress tactic was justified in his tactics because of the matchup being unfavourable. I am not sure how i feel about this. I know he was totally within the RULES but its just feels like a less than satisfying way to win a game.

Is there any valid reason why, other than deliberately trying this, that your ships would be deliberately bumping right off the bat?

In a large furball I have seen some ships (especially large ships like the falcon) go for a few turns without being able to move 1". however the main concern is with the so called "Fortress" builds in which ships are set up in a corner so that they can continuously do moves that overlap each other such as 1 banks or straights. They come into 2 forms, you got the YT-fortress (formally called the Falcon Fortress until the Outrider was released) which generally has 2 large turreted ships face each other so that the 1 straight will not keep them there. The other is the Corner Castle or just "corner" or "wall" Where the ships are set up in a corner so that facing they will always have arc towards the center and to where they can continue to make moves that not only overlap but keep them in place. The problem with the wall if you are not precise in your deployment or setup the ship can move slightly and then the wall will fall apart.

The biggest concern as many people will agree is that while not tournament winning as other builds (FAT HAN, Echo swarm, ect) it is a manipulation of the overlapping rule to prevent ships from having to move. It is an unintentional strategy (then again so was low pilot skill action blocking) and it absolutely goes against the theme of starfighter combat which has jet like space craft moving all around in attempts to get get behind an opponent and shoot them down. Now there were other rules in overlapping that made it so that bumping into any ship (friend or foe) has a disadvantage such as forfeiting your action step. The other disadvantage to these fortress builds is that the opponent knows where the unmoving ships will be so they can approach the best angle and take 1 ship out. After the loss of a single ship the fortress will have to break.

Now many people are calling this "exploitation" something of being un-sportsmanship. It is rule lawyering at its pinnacle. However I think along the same line that was stated in the Team Covenant Interview with FFG which is that there will always be some sort of rule exploitation for every word printed in a rule book card FAQ or errata. As long as these "cheap" tricks don't dominate the game play then let people experiment with different things. From what I heard fortress builds fail fast and hard. I guess there are a few people who have lost to them, but if they lost to a fortress then the FAT HAN list that they would have inevitability meet would have wiped them off the table.

The issue with that, is that you technically get rid of setting a ship up behind another one.

Like I said, the issue isn't the bumping rules. It is the lack of outside motivators for engagement.

good point.

i wonder what would promote more engagement? it really starts with your ship choices. u r playing an attacking list or a defensive lists or focusing on some aspect of the game like stress giving or ionizing or playing a list which can do multiple things but isnt geared to any one thing.

as stated here already the Phantom changes the way you play (with it and against it). its hyper-mobility is very difficult to deal with for certain squads. It has also been stated here that the rebel player who used the fortress tactic was justified in his tactics because of the matchup being unfavourable. I am not sure how i feel about this. I know he was totally within the RULES but its just feels like a less than satisfying way to win a game.

Probably more satisfying than losing to a Phantom with X-Wings.

It has also been stated here that the rebel player who used the fortress tactic was justified in his tactics because of the matchup being unfavourable.

He had a reason. That doesn't mean it was justified.

I'm not really sure what can formally be done about it, though. Having judges disqualify people for "unsportsmanlike conduct" because of their maneuvering choices opens a whole nasty can of worms. Blocking, intentional collisions, and even intentional self-collisions have always been a viable tactic, and the line between collisions as a tactic and collisions as a strategy is very blurry.

And I'd like to point out that one of the best ways to safely engage a "fortress" deployment of any type is to intentionally block your own ships on the second or third turn of the approach to maintain your concentration of fire.

So by that logic, anyone thats on the bad side of a Rock/Paper/Scissors matchup should forget trying to play the game and look through the rule book for exploits?

Yup. In a tournament... absolutely. In a casual game just ask your opponent to play something that will make the game fun for you both or (in the case of Phantoms) destroy the offending model/s with a hammer.

^THIS (minus the hammer)^ is the best rule with regards to fortress builds or any build in general. If you don't like a certain list ask to play against something else. Now if that is the case you must also take a certain degree of responsibility. You can't list tailor to counter the squadron you asked your opponent to play. Also if you want to play against a non-high meta list then don't bring in your own tournament squadron. (It would be a jerk move if you asked your opponent not to bring their FAT HAN list only for you to show up with Whisper/Echo and Shuttles once you learned your opponent's flechets torpedoes will have little effect).

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It is an unfun tactic, but it is also a bad tactic. If it was a good tactic, we would have seen it a lot more than we have over the 2 years the "Falcon Fortress" has existed.

As Jiimbo'so fiancee and Richard's friend, the unsportsmanlike conduct mainly came from his jumping up and down at Jiimbo'so bad rolls and loudly joking and talking up his strategy throughout the game. It was rude and Jiimbo was having a hard time knowing what to do because of Richard's strategy everything would be a gamble.

The problem objectively comes from abother possibility in single elimination high-lows where MOV has no real substance: number 1 player vs. Number 32 where 32 has initiative. 32 performs the "fortress." An essentially unskilled player (not that Richard is) can gamble and force the number 1 to engage and roll off the map or possibly lose a single small ship in a bad roll.

Complete gambe and potentially disturbing to the flow of a championship. And that's what this was - the world championship. Employing a tactic like that could oust the most skilled player in the matchup. Richard lost his next round to Keith, who Jiimbo had defeated on Thursday. Jiimbo consistently out-pilots richard. Jiimbo had a much better chance of making top 4 than Richard. In the theoretical situation, the world champion player gets cut off from an unskilled player who barely made it in on a 4 & 2 - the reason we have high-low elims is to eliminate slot machine games like that.

It's bad because FFG has to fix a thing that's only half a problem - how do you rule against something so specific without hurting an essential tactic: bumping ships. It's a necessity, a solid strategy but in Richard's case there's something scary happening. Games don't just depend on dice in xwing, and for Richard to risk his arse and Jiimbos gives FFG the opportunity to review this possible abuse of a "loophole."

And if you weren't present to see Richards attitude throughout the 70 minute bump fest and his cheering at his friend's misfortune, I don't think you'd fully appreciate why we were so down.

However friends are friends. Angry sometimes but it's a game. FFG may or may not have a fix for future games. As for now, we fly casual and wait to see what happens. And we are not bitter, we are glad to have Richard as a friend. He will be a better sport in the future.

Wow. It sounds like this game has its first heel, IMO.

Please, the fortress strategy has existed for 2 years now. One appearance in the top tables, and it is now an "issues".

Serious questions:

Q1 - How many games were played over the weekend?

Q2 - What percentage of those games was the fortress tactic used?

Not many? Yeah, I thought so.

Now we can all move along to the next 'storm in a tea-cup' issue... this one has run its course.

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How do you determine whether it was deliberate or not? People bump into their own ships even if they are not using the fortress.

Declare it a form of stalling, and leave it up to the TO. We leave it to them to make a number of other, similar calls, I don't see any reason to think they couldn't handle this one.

Making a rule that defines fortressing would be hard... but as the judge once said, he knows it when he sees it.

That's pretty much the best you can do. Though, would both sides merely going up and down opposing sides of the map also be considered stalling?

How do you determine whether it was deliberate or not? People bump into their own ships even if they are not using the fortress.

Declare it a form of stalling, and leave it up to the TO. We leave it to them to make a number of other, similar calls, I don't see any reason to think they couldn't handle this one.

Making a rule that defines fortressing would be hard... but as the judge one said, he knows it when he sees it.

As much as I don't think this guy did anything wrong by fortressing (acting like a prick during the game is a separate thing, imho) I would be perfectly happy to see this become the rule. Everyone knows fortressing when they see it, but defining it in terms of a specific number of bumps or whatever is a nightmare. Say that you can't fortress and let the TOs call it. It's not hard to spot.

Please, the fortress strategy has existed for 2 years now. One appearance in the top tables, and it is now an "issues".

No, it has always been an issue. People have disliked it from the first time it appeared, and it has spawned countless complaints, threads, and debates over the nature of the tactic.

Should we only ever fix loopholes and bad plays in the rules if there's truly broken? Is douchebag play to be encouraged just as long you think it's beatable enough?

There are things which, win or lose, create a very negative play experience. This is one of those things. That's the point I was trying to get at earlier - if it's a game that you couldn't present to a potential player without a lot of explaining and caveat, it needs to be seriously considered.

And lets' flip it around - is the game BETTER with fortressing in place? Does it enable interesting, unique gameplay? Does anyone ever come out of a game with a fortress going "Wow, that was one of the most awesome games I've ever played!!"

It shouldn't matter if it can be beat, or how good or bad you think the tactic is. Is the game a better place with it in place, or removed? Because that's the thing I never see the defenders address. I see lots of "Anything goes" and "Sportsmanship is for wimps" and "It's not that good, L2Play NOOB HA HA!" silliness. Can anyone suggest any possible way this is better for the game?

That's pretty much the best you can do. Though, would both sides merely going up and down opposing sides of the map also be considered stalling?

Do we have to fix every possible un-fun and poor play experience in order to fix this one?

Yes, there are other avoidance strategies. None of them have the stink of exploit that the fortress does.

It's also not nearly as persistently reliable as the fortress. If you're at least having to zigzag up the board, I can try to time an approach to catch you where you're facing away, or after you K-turn so you're stressed but I'm not. The problem with the fortress is that it can sit in a position that makes it hard to approach and maintains its coverage indefinitely. A back-and-forth can't do that.

So not only is this a straw man, it's honestly not even a very good one.

Please, the fortress strategy has existed for 2 years now. One appearance in the top tables, and it is now an "issues".

No, it has always been an issue. People have disliked it from the first time it appeared, and it has spawned countless complaints, threads, and debates over the nature of the tactic.

Should we only ever fix loopholes and bad plays in the rules if there's truly broken? Is douchebag play to be encouraged just as long you think it's beatable enough?

There are things which, win or lose, create a very negative play experience. This is one of those things. That's the point I was trying to get at earlier - if it's a game that you couldn't present to a potential player without a lot of explaining and caveat, it needs to be seriously considered.

And lets' flip it around - is the game BETTER with fortressing in place? Does it enable interesting, unique gameplay? Does anyone ever come out of a game with a fortress going "Wow, that was one of the most awesome games I've ever played!!"

It shouldn't matter if it can be beat, or how good or bad you think the tactic is. Is the game a better place with it in place, or removed? Because that's the thing I never see the defenders address. I see lots of "Anything goes" and "Sportsmanship is for wimps" and "It's not that good, L2Play NOOB HA HA!" silliness. Can anyone suggest any possible way this is better for the game?

It's really annoying to play against, even if you beat it. Again, I don't think that guy was doing anything wrong by using that tactic, but I'm not going to be unhappy if it's removed (and for the record, I'd never play in a way that's that tedious).

Holy cow crazy reaction. Richard had a gamble that worked. It was incredibly boring but there is a very high chance he loses that game if he doesn't. Jim had an opportunity to win either by not engaging or fine tuning his approach. The fortress wasn't unbeatable. This is a mole hill, not a mountain.