Because, getting a specialization shouldn't just be about the Talents you get. It should be about the skills just as much. In a world where I am learning to be an Infiltrator I should be able to learn Stealth. If I am learning to be a starfighter pilot Hot Shot I should be able to learn Gunnery.

I'm already spending extra XP on buying a spec outside of my career. Spending even more points because a skill that I would think should be part of the training is just wrong. Yeah after all that said it's just 5 xp per level but it shouldn't be that way. I'd much rather spend 5xp per level on Coordination. A skill I would not use at all in starfighter combat.

"HotShot" is about piloting, not about shooting.

Hotshots are risk-taking daredevils – naturally gifted, overly confident, and constantly improvising. Their flashy maneuvers can go horribly wrong, but most of the time their Cool , Coordination , and natural abilities in Piloting (Planetary) and Piloting (Space) serve them well in combat. Because of their unrestrained bravery, they tend to dive headfirst into the thickest part of battle, shoot first, and execute mind-blowingly narrow escapes. They are also a bit cocky, liable to brag endlessly about their most astonishing feats to anyone willing to listen. Putting a Hotshot at the head of your vehicle formation is usually a winning move – as long as the Hotshot’s luck holds out.

Nothing in there says anything about being an accurate gunner, just that they tend to shoot first and ask forgiveness later. Someone coming into the spec out of Career is taking it because they want to be a daredevil pilot. If they want combat capability, go straight Pilot or Gunner.

Death-defying moves, not death-dealing accuracy; that's what a HotShot is in my mind.

...Gunnery should be a part of that spec. ... If a farm boy goes into the Hot Shot spec then they should have access to the top four skills that spec would need. ...

The farm boy "used to bulls-eye womb rats from his T-16" so he did have a couple of points invested in gunnery. Plus every Hotshot needs Coordination to get out of the fights his big mouth gets him into without getting crushed.

Just wait for the talents, maybe if he misses an attack he can get a second one due to his incredible piloting or something.

The Rigger sounds pretty cool: with underworld contacts he could go into the direction EotE's Pilot. Let's wait and see.

If that is your wish might I suggest, you know, just starting off as a Hot Shot?

Sorry if this is a slight hijack, but does anyone have any recommendations on the fastest way to get new books? Is the quickest way through the FFG store?

I have pretty good success with Miniature Market. Because they are a real gaming store that gets their merchandise quickly and then they turn around and send them to you.

I just hope we get an Adversary profile for a Nemesis ace pilot, the Rebel and TIE ace profiles in the book are good for your typical X-Wing vet or TIE Interceptor jockey but I need something nastier to challenge the Ace in my party. I've been working on a profile of my own but it might have been too much; was as nasty as space combat as the Hutt Crime Lord as at social encounters or the Assassin Droid was at personal combat.

Cool Stuff Inc is another good location. Especially in the SE of the US. They're in FL and I'm in VA, and I get stuff quick even on the standard shipping.

Yeah the big thing is that both the E-Wing and T-Wing were designed for the same role IMO. High speed Interceptors armed with Torpedoes so they could also function as fast bombers. They could tweak the E-Wing's stats to balance it, cutting the Hull points and shields, the speed or both maybe set the E-Wing up as a sniper fighter since it has the longer ranged heavy lasers.

Depends on where you come from. I recall t-wings being cheap fighters rapidly poduced during the rebbelion period to cash in on the "wing" crazy, but with performance only marginally better then other similar cheapos of the time.

E-wings to me are overpowered long range escourt and strike craft from the overpowered everything era of dark empire. Seriouly, world devestators were a sweet concept, but it seemed like dark empires solution to everything was to stick turolasers on...

If I remember right the T-Wing was designed to compete with the A-Wing but other then having higher punch ordnance (Proton Torpedoes to an A-Wing's Concussion Missiles) it was either equal or slightly inferior to the A-Wing in most areas so the Alliance sold most of them off to their privateer and merc allies, and I think some other pirate groups got some as well.

That's unfortunately the case. The T-Wing just did not measure up. It was good, but not AS good, and thus a failure of a replacement.

E-Wings are amazing by their fourth iteration, but their cruddy initial rollout gave the XJ series X-Wings an even stronger start than they would have already gotten. They would (and should) actually require two entirely different sets of stats!

The first E-Wings are sorry affairs with compatibility issues and a tendency for what should be medium lasers to sputter out and lose both range and firepower. Maneuverable, fast, but ultimately not too good.

The Series IV E-Wings on the other hand are hideously expensive, elite ships for people who've gone up the duty track a few **** times. Agile, fast, with triple 'heavy' lasers, a cavernous (should count as "multiples" for replacement HP cost) proton bay, notably heavy armor (probably 4 in this system) and strong shields. Right up there with beasts like the Missile Boat.

Please let there be an E-Wing in there somewhere.

I'm kind of torn on how I would feel about an E-Wing appearing. On one hand it is my third favorite EU fighter. On the other hand I personally like the T-Wing more then the E despite the E having better stats, and since the T-Wing and E-Wing are IMO meant for similar roles but with the E-Wing being more advanced and thus more powerful I'm not sure if FFG would include both.

Maybe they did both?

There's room for a lot of starfighters for the AoR product line as well as beasts, so it's not impossible that both ships made the cut and into the book.

As for the E-Wing and its level of power, prior to the AoR core rulebook the TIE Defender was pretty much the poster child for munchkin starfighter designs, being superior to every other starfighter out there in every way that mattered. And yet, FFG created TIE Defender stats that were pretty well balanced against other starfighters; it was fast but not TIE Fighter fast, had a lot of firepower but didn't completely eclipse the B-Wing. So it's quite possible that the E-Wing will be a capable fighter but won't utterly dominate the game.

They did Nerf the TIE Defender didn't they?!! Where's the Tractor Beam?! Where is the Speed?? Where's the OOMMFF!!

That fighter should be the class of starfighters! But alas, I guess they didn't want everyone to go and try to steal a TD and start a mad squadron w/ them. (I know I would've w/ my PC)

Given that they are saying there is going to be another preview, I'm guessing this book isn't going to make the 4th quarter deployment they intended it to.

Except that (and the missile boat, E-Wing Series IV, Incom XJ-5s and so on) is exactly what players should be 'questing' for. There's no need for nerfs if they're treated as the grand prizes that they are!

Does the jedi not adventure for some ultra-rare crystal? Does the commodore not brown-nose and meritocracy his way up from a rickety frigate unto that SSD? Does the droid not consistently demand to be uploaded to said Star Destroyer's computer core for reasons he swears have nothing to do with his idol IG-88?

Take the Missile Boat for example. A 'lore-accurate' missile boat would be monstrous, but also the handful that exist are mothballed in some secret hangar-vault probably behind a hidden wall with Palpatine's finest Holocrons on a pedestal in the room before left there as decoys in hopes people will stop looking once they found one greatest treasure.

These fine examples of starshipness need only their rarity and value pointed out in their descriptions and their rarity.

Even though I'll buy this, I'm not into the AoR setting much. Nothing to do with FFG's product, but I had enough of this with WEG. Judging from the traffic here compared to other boards, I'd say I'm not alone...

I have a theory that everybody posts their threads on the EotE boards, because they feel it would have the best chance of being seen by everybody else. The sooner we have a unified 'Star Wars Roleplaying' board, the better!

I actually prefer AOR to EOE or Privateer campaigns which IMO blur the line between the two but EOE s fun

I think the Hot Shot's spec skills, much like many AoR specs, are poorly designed. Gunnery should be a part of that spec. They need to approach the specialization trees as if the character doesn't have the Career. If a farm boy goes into the Hot Shot spec then they should have access to the top four skills that spec would need. Coordination isn't one of those skills. If they had thought in this manner to begin with we wouldn't need the Basic Training spec tree.

I'm withholding judgment until I see just what the Hotshot talents are. I suspect there will be a certain element of "general recklessness", an talents that may apply to more than just piloting. In that case, Coordination might fit perfectly well, letting the Hotshot be just as nimble and daring on the ground as in the air. Especially since Agility is the most important characteristic for any Ace character.

Besides, the three specs in the Core book all give Gunner, plus Riggers are getting it too. Plus, with Driver and Pilot both completely doubling down on their parent career skills, Aces are kinda starved for breadth. More career skills is a welcome addition in my opinion.

Our Ace is happy to carry a rifle or heavy weapon into ground battles; Coordination fits fine.

I really don't want the new Specs to be carbon-copies of the existing ones anyway. Anyone who wants Gunnery can take one of the three existing Ace specs or start as an Ace.

Ace is a kind of narrow career anyway - I'm glad the new specs will offer something different.

Anyways... anyone think we'll see this before Xmas?

Anyways... anyone think we'll see this before Xmas?

I flipping hope so! Hard to put stuff ona X-mas list that isn't even on the shelves yet, heck it's not even listed on bloody amazon except one third party vendor claiming to have it for the low price of $1,000!

Well, there's a new preview of gear and beasts up, but still no release date!

I think they are stealing the Release date from WoW with "Soon "

Fantasy Flight has always meant two things:

One, quality products.

Two, delays.

I can wait, just nice to see this one before Xmas as we have some big games coming up.

Huh, wonder what those carriers are going to be...

SWEET MERCIFUL CRAP! H-WING!!!!

Man, I never thought I'd see an old Challenge Magazine ship make the leap to Canon(ish). I loved the hell out of this thing in the early WEG days. Well played, FFG, well played.

(By the way, full news report here: http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_news.asp?eidn=5256 )

Cool! Now this is starting to talk about some of the stuff that I did... Not the ships, mind you, that was Jason Marker's area, but the Beast Riding rules and mounts was me.

My copy is tied to a pre-order of the Hutt book. That'll teach me.