Recently the discussion of the sorry state of the TIE advanced x1, one of the most popular recurring discussions of the forum, was brought to an abrupt end to to and end by the announcement of the Raider and the fairly powerful TIE advanced fixes that came with it. With advanced back in the game so to speak, attention quickly turned to another ship and to a discussion that had been quietly bubbling away in the corner for a few months now.

I refer to the X-wing, the eponymous icon that gives its name to the game, a ship that has been as sure a staple of lists since Wave I and which now finds its quality called into question, first by the mathematics of respected members of the community and now by ever more players. This has provoked something of a backlash from people who feel that the X-wing's fine, that the A-wing and TIE advanced were the two ships that needed fixing and now the forum will be filled with accusations of ineffectiveness for every ship in the game that hasn't instead got a thread complaining about it being overpowered. It's an understandable reaction, I felt the same way when the forum filled up with fourth faction threads after S&V was announced, and no amount of explaining why S&V exists and this isn't the beginning of a flood of new factions could shake them from their belief that they were right and that their ideas were amazing and that FFG will "certainly" do something I view as both completely illogical and inconsistent with FFG's apparent modus operandi. I may have been right in my posts, they may announce a fourth faction or a cards only pack tomorrow and I'll look like an idiot.

My aim with this post is to throughly examine the cause of this discussion and the state of the X-wing in the hopes that everyone who reads this post gains a deeper understanding (whether they agree with my views on it or not) of both the X-wing and both sides of the discussion. I won't be going into it mathematically, however. For that, I recommend reading MajorJuggler's MathWing and House Rules threads.

So, in a vacuum (no pun intended) is a X-wing a bad ship? If you ask me, definitely not. It's the only ship in the game to have been released three times, it has eight named pilots and they're excellent. Wedge is almost as effective as Biggs as protection for other ships because he draws so much fire, Wes Janson singlehandedly makes Opportunist viable, Tarn Mison with R7 Astromech is amazing for his point cost and Luke Skywalker effectively has a focus token for every time he gets shot.

The pilot abilities on the named X-wing pilots are great: they power up the X-wing's attacks, make it a nightmare to kill, boost its action economy or set up lethal synergy combo attacks with other ships. They're the Rebel faction identity in a nutshell and I think when someone leaps into action to defend the X-wing against its critics its these guys they're thinking about. Tarn, Hobbie, Wes, Wedge, Biggs and Luke. (Garven and Jek are all right too.)

This post is not about the named pilots. Some will disagree with my assertion that the named pilots are pretty **** competitive as they are and that's fair enough. This thread is about the X-wing in general.

You may well now be asking yourself how I can make a post about the X-wing's power level when I just said I'm going all but ignore eight out of its ten pilots. I'm going to go a step further and ignore nine.

Red Squadron Pilot's problem is that it pays 2 points for 2PS, and nowadays that's simply not worth it. One point for a two PS jump over the pilot below it would be so cheap we'd have the opposite problem (why take a Saber when for one point more you can get a Royal Guard?), but the fact remains that, with a few notable exceptions, +2pt +2PS elite generics are rarely considered when those two points could go on much more useful upgrades. FFG carried on printing them, and they continue to be widely ignored. How many ships are you going to beat on PS by going from Blue Squadron Pilot to Dagger Squdron Pilot? How much have you seen Avenger, Grey, Onyx, Blackmoon, Gamma or Red fielded? The elites that get used are Green, Black, and Royal Guard.

Fortunately I think FFG has realised this and is trying to give the elite generics more pull. Predator was meant to encourage Elite Generics and the Scyk elite for example gets a +3PS buff and it may also have an EPT. Regardless, it's a widespread elite generic problem and not specific to the X-wing. Red may not be good (at least in my view) but that's not the X-wing's fault.

I'm going to mainly consider one pilot here, which is Rookie Pilot. Why? Because the discussion about the X-wing is really about this guy, and how he's been pushed out of his spot in the Rebel military doctrine.

Why was the TIE advanced fix met with such elation? It's not just because it was a broken ship people really wanted fixed. It wasn't just because Vader regained his rightful place as one of the galaxy's best pilots. It was because of the new options, and I don't mean the massive diversification in role the x1 title provides. In its previous state the TIE advanced was so cost inefficient it wasn't worth considering. When a ship is in that state, it effectively doesn't exist. Bringing the TIE advanced back into the game was effectively readding it to the game, and that opened up new options for the Empire by giving the Imperials a solid fighter in the 20pt bracket.

The designers spoke about this in the GenCon interview. There are three levels (I avoid the word "tier" because that's used in a very different context quite often on this forum and I don't want to be ambigious), and the Imperials were lacking in the 20pt zone.

Prior to this, the Imperials had three ships sitting here. The TIE interceptor was a fragile arc dodger which did better when pushed into named territory: the 30pt Soontir Fel being one of the most desirable. PTL interceptors really start at Royal Guard Pilot at 25 points. The idea with the interceptor is not to get shot.

The other two options were the Lambda Shuttle and TIE bomber, both of which are something of utility ships and oddballs. The TIE advanced fix gave the Empire a the 20pt range ship it was meant to be in the first place: it fits in an area of design space the Empire needed. Three ship elite Imperial can now be four ship elite Imperial.

The Rebel Alliance has never had this worry. Rookie Pilot defined this bracket and has been there since the start. It's probably one of the most recognisable pilot cards in the game and it's a pilot that's more than earned its stripes. The worries with the X-wing are, I feel, truly worries about Rookie Pilot.

The named pilots are good, but the ones that get used usually have upgrades that push them into the 30pt bracket where the likes of Soontir Fel and Delta Squadron Pilot live. The two named pilots living in the low twenties are Tarn Mison and Biggs Darklighter. Biggs is a special case as his appeal is overwhelmingly his ability rather than his Red 3 X-wing. Tarn, however, is relevant and will come up later.

Back when generics ruled the game and you wanted at least four ships in a squad Rookie was beloved. He (or she) was low in point cost, fairly durable and could punch hard. He was also the only thing really in his bracket. The A-wing was dwelling in the Rebel's version of the TIE advanced's prototyping hanger of overcosted misery and the Gold Squadron Y-wing had yet to come into its own (control wasn't nearly as important or useful as it is now) and more importantly was a very different, less maneuverable beast with a lower damage output.

However, soon there was a new kid on the block.

The B-wing was not designed to replace the X-wing. Its dial was meant to be a weakness, its ordnance slots were meant to be used. It looks like what its designers had in mind was more of a turretless Y-wing archetype than a new X-wing, something you'd load up with a secondary or two and shred your enemies with. It's also got a dial that was almost certainly meant to be a weakness: a ship that can pull off some impressive slow maneuvers but pays dearly for them in stress tokens. A new player looking at the B-wing isn't likely to coclude it's meant to be a dogfighter like the X-wing.

Unfortunately for the X-wing, a certain world champion saw a way to turn it into an amazing dogfighter. By purchasing a couple of Lambda shuttles (at the time mostly ignored by Imperials) stripping out their sensor packages and fitting them to Dagger Squadron B-wings (here being our foremost notable exception to the 2pt 2PS thing from above) he was able to turn that Achilles Dial into a huge strength. With the Lambda's Advanced Sensors the B-wing no longer lost action economy. It was the first ship to K-turn and keep its action, it could pretty much turn on the spot, it couldn't be blocked and all those red maneuvers didn't hurt its action economy at all so long as it flew red green red green red green. This B-wing flew strangely but it flew great. Paired with Biggs and a Rookie two of these Daggers took Worlds off guard, defeated the dominating Howlrunner TIE swarm and made Paul Heaver the Wave 3 World Champion and spawned the Biggs Walks The Dogs list archetype (aka XXBB and XBBB).

The B-wing matches the X-wing for firepower. It's tougher, and its reliance on health instead of green dice makes it both more reliable (highly valued in tournaments) and improves its action economy (health doesn't need focus tokens to get the most out of it, green dice do). It's more maneuverable in a close quarters furball, can reposition with barrel roll, can turn and K-turn more sharply and beats the X-wing on upgrade options. The X-wing's got its astromech slot but the B-wing's got both system and cannon slots. The newer B-wing/E2 can take crew which give it the ability to match most of the tricks the X-wing has up its sleeve. Stressbot? B-wing's got Tactician. Multiple B-wings with Tactician. And to add insult to injury, the mathematicians of the X-wing community have run the numbers and in a straight up joust the B-wing's better too.

But if the B-wing's so great, why did Paul Heaver run a Rookie Pilot?

I'm not Paul Heaver and thus can't answer that question, but it's not actually possible to fit another Advanced Sensors B-wing in without dropping to Blues, and if Paul didn't go with the cheaper Blues in the first place I'd wager there was a reason he wanted the Daggers. What the X-wing's got going for it is that it's cheaper. While a version that used three Adv Sensor Blues with Biggs soon appeared, if you wanted anything more expensive than Adv Sensor Blues you couldn't take a third Adv Sensor B-wing. You've got to take a cheaper ship, and the best one was Rookie Pilot. The only things below a Rookie Pilot are naked Y-wings (not worth taking) or the A-wing (still sitting in the cripplingly overcosted hanger of sadness) and neither could match the X-wing for firepower.

Or rather, what it had going for it.

Ironically, as filler, the X-wing was replaced by its predecessor, a craft so much cheaper than the Rookie X-wing that using it as filler instead freed up seven points to power up your list elsewhere (that's some serious upgrading. Seven points can take you from Blue to Keyan). The Z-95 sacrifices one hull and one attack die, but for 3 points more than a Rookie you get two of them. Two shots at two dice mitigates the loss of the single 3 dice shot, there's more hit points for the opponent to chew through and it can block two ships at once. Three Z-95s is six points cheaper than two X-wings, technically matches it for attack dice and beats it on health. meaning for the oncoming Fat Falcons the Z-95s were the backup of choice, letting the Fat Falcons be fatter and giving the Z-95s some room to improve themselves over Bandit Pilots. The dominance of the Fat Falcon that was to follow further cemented the Z-95 as the filler of choice and lessened use of the X-wing outside of its high tier named pilots.

That being said, one X-wing did come into the light: Tarn R7. Tarn R7 costs 25 points, the same as an Adv Sensor Blue Squadron Pilot and a steal. He has one more pilot skill, meaning he outflies low skill generics, has an X-wing/B-wing's bite, improved action economy and tanks like nothing else. He discourages shots at him by locking onto ships that target him for free (powering up his attacks against them in a joust) and against ships that arcdodge him/when he rolls badly on defence he can spend that lock to reroll the opponent's attack dice and survive more hits. Remember that an X-wing doesn't take five hits to kill. It takes five hits plus every hit its evade results cancel throughout the entire game. By being so much better at cancelling hits, Tarn gets that much tougher. By being more powerful, Tarn competes with the B-wings for a similar role. This is the approach taken with the A-wing fix in Rebel Aces and the TIE advanced fix in Imperial Raider, you outright buff it, make it mathematically stronger, and it sees more use.

For example, a lot of people have recommended a title for the X-wing that makes it take more hits before dying by giving it another hull point.



The problem with a title like this (in that it's something people don't like) is that it's almost autoinclude. Usually I see it suggested as a 0 cost title (an outright patch). The two ships that received this sort of autoinclude or near autoinclude fix (Chaardan Refit and TIE/x1) desperately needed it. The X-wing isn't in such desperate need, and many would rather FFG didn't enter a cycle of successively nudging the "worst" ship up in power over and over like some sort of starfighter power level game of leapfrog until you need four expansions to get all the fixes for half the ships to be competitive. While the titles and refits for the A-wing and TIE advanced were greeting with joy it appears based on forum responses that people don't want an autoinclude "fix" where it isn't needed.

The other danger with this approach is if you surpass its competitor (the B-wing) you simply create the same problem in the other direction (suddenly we need a B-wing "fix"!)

However, even if an upgrade that pushed the X-wing into clear superiority over the B-wing as a basic jouster was released, I'm not worried about that. The B-wing has a huge range of options thanks to its upgrade bar and Rebel Aces and can fill a lot of roles the X-wing can't. The same isn't true in reverse. This leads me on to the other way to "fix", for need of a better word, the X-wing.



The Rookie Pilot's turf also has a new player muscling in on it, the BTL-A4 Y-wing. By definition, the BTL-A4 is also muscling on the B-wing's turf. Except you see no worries about BTL-A4 killing off Advanced Sensor Blues.

Why? Because the hypermobile Adv Sensor B-wing is a very, very different beast to the doubleattack BTL-A4 Y-wing, be that Y-wing armed with Ion Cannon Turret or Autoblaster Turret. Which is better? You can't really say because they're different. You fly them differently, they do different things and your opponent has to shift tactics depending on which one you're using.

I'll restate that I don't think the X-wing is weak. I think it's slightly outclassed by the B-wing in its role as a twenties jouster and dogfighter. If we want to see it become more common we need to give it tricks the B-wing doesn't have.

What I think the generic X-wing could do with (I shy away from saying it needs it outright) is options. It doesn't need an A-wing or TIE advanced style "aces treatment," it needs a B-wing/TIE interceptor style one. What did the B-wing get from Rebel Aces? B-wing/E2. It got options, not a boost. The X-wing got a bunch of new named pilots in Rebel Transport and with the most named pilots in the game I don't think it's in need of that. So what sort of upgrades could help the X-wing get out from under the B-wing's shadow? I'm no designer but here are a few examples.



The first is the so called "RecSpecMech" I've suggested before. The X-wing's greatest asset is its astromech slot: it can stress other ships, partially shrug off Ship crits, vastly increase the amount of green on its dial or even regenerate health. All for a price, however. This makes astromech slot both very useful to give the X-wing a new toy for and also dangerous. Astromechs have so many solid options that they aren't autoinclude, but if you do make an astromech upgrade that's autoinclude you kill off variety, which is a very bad thing (unless you wanted to do that.) What mods does the elite TIE phantom take other than Advanced Cloaking Device? How many A-wings take ordnance (unless it's Proton Rockets)?
The RecSpecMech (thus named because it has the exact same effect as the existing Recon Specialist) can both power up the X-wing (but it pays for it so it isn't a buff) by making its dice more efficient and also has beneficial effects elsewhere. The Rebel Y-wing, for example, can now use the much maligned Blaster Turret and are more action efficient with BTL-A4. Garven Dreis, one of the less used X-wing named pilots, becomes pretty good and an excellent synergy with any X-wing using the focus token health regeneration astromech. Even on Biggs, a ship you don't want to improve the durability of, it isn't autoinclude because if you take it you're not taking either of the health regeneration Astromechs.

The other suggestion is one that's oft been suggested in the last year or so, and that's a new X-wing generic.


(I make no claim to this being a perfectly balanced card. I've priced it according to how Royal Guard Pilot did it relative to Saber. Personally I feel it should probably be either 25pt or PS5.)

Royal Guard Pilot is hailed by many to be the single best pilot in Imperial Aces. The only reason we don't see much of it is because Soontir is the only one that can stand up to the pancakes pre-Autothrusters. The one notable thing the B-wing lacks, that people ask for, is an EPT generic: an aggressively priced EPT X-wing generic opens up the EPT/Astromech combination that makes the top three X-wing named pilots so threatening (stress EPTs and R2 Astromech come to mind). Not to mention the EPT slot in of itself is incredible. If Red Squadron Pilot had an EPT it'd be a serious consideration.

The X-wing's not a bad ship. It's no rebel TIE advanced and I don't think it needs an explicit, universal buff. The meta is partly to blame for the reduction in use of its generic pilots and it could well shift again in the future. That being said, the B-wing does cast a shadow over the X-wing and I believe it'd benefit from some good options the B-wing doesn't have.

Unfortunately for the X-wing, a certain world champion saw a way to turn it into an amazing dogfighter. By purchasing a couple of Lambda shuttles (at the time mostly ignored by Imperials) stripping out their sensor packages and fitting them to Dagger Squadron B-wings (here being our foremost notable exception to the 2pt 2PS thing from above) he was able to turn that Achilles Dial into a huge strength.

I'm actually the first one to post about this on the forum.

I saw how folks were saying that EU + AS was "Necessary" for the shuttle, and noticed it was so much better on the B-Wing, and coined the term "Hypermobile". I think I spelled it hyphenated at the start....

Excellent thread. Well written and some very interesting points.

I'd also like to see something of the likes of "options" rather than buffs for the X-Wing as well. Personally, I believe the best fix is adding a new generic pilot with an EPT. A Rogue Squadron Pilot card would make sense mechanically at PS6 to compete with Royal Guard TIEs and the new Mandalorian Firespray and it fits the bill flavorfully as the well-knowm elite generic in the most iconic ship in the universe and the game of X-Wing. I agree that a points cost of 25 for a PS6 X-Wing is more reasonable.

I also think if we were to have a RecSpecMech, it would have to be cost identically to a RecSpec. 2 points for 2 Focus tokens is extremely powerful, and while it does fit the "options" aspect of fixing the X-Wing, it is a powerful card with consequences that spans 3 ships. I guess it can be seen as hitting 3 birds with 1 stone, but an "RSM" Astro on Corran Horn would be extremely lethal, it would also make the E-Wing generics way better. And, while granting options rather than buffs still, we need to be careful when pricing the points on these cards because it either creates a card storage fodder or a rippling effect across the meta.

I'm not saying the proposed mech is a bad idea, its a fantastic idea. I would even pay 4 points to stick it on any ship with an Astromech slot. I just fear that 2 points would be too cheap and 3 points would be too stifling to try.

Edit: I also believe Paul Heaver took Daggers over Blues as a PS bid over other Rookies and Blues.

I reckon it'd work at 3.

Great post. lots of food for thought here. Bravo. Thanks for getting the discussion rolling. will check back in with some more thoughts of my own soon. I think the fixes for the tie advanced will shake up things quite a bit. The real test will be if the ship makes it into competitive 100pt squads and stays there.

This combo is auto-include, but also makes the Blaster Turret viable.

(I make no claim to this being a perfectly balanced card. I've priced it according to how Royal Guard Pilot did it relative to Saber. Personally I feel it should probably be either 25pt or PS5.)

Did you mean "Avenger vs Saber"?

Also, you're stomping on R2-D6's toes here. Not that R2-D6 is good, mind...

That being said, there is one advantage that the X-Wing has over the other two ships in its bracket: It doesn't have 1 agility.

If we empower other ships in ways that punish 1 agility ships, then the X-Wings will automatically rise back to the forefront. Accuracy Corrector and 3-attack secondary weapons spring to mind...

****, I literally just started a slightly related thread focusing on how ships classes don't seem to matter. The X-wing is the Alliance multi-purpose fighter and should therefore be ubiquitous. I think the X-wing is suffering because, despite FFG makign each ship unique to reflect its character, their ship class doesn't seem to matter. Instead decisions seem to be made based on number of red dice and hull points foremost. The X-wing seems to have fallen into this trap where those facets neuter the X-wing even when its role as a multi-purpose fighter should make it fairly common.

One way to do this would be to create title or 'class' cards that are cheap that reward their style of play. Interceptors like, well, TIE/Interceptors and A-wings could get a bonus against bomber. Bombers/assault fighters could get a free target lock against capital and large base ships. Not sure what you'd do for X-wings to give them a general buff. Though, see the rest of this thread for that I guess!

Did you mean "Avenger vs Saber"?

Also, you're stomping on R2-D6's toes here. Not that R2-D6 is good, mind...

I do mean Saber and Royal Guard, although my brain switched off for a second and forgot Saber had an EPT. Fairly confident in my stance on PS5 or 25pt now.

R2-D6 (assuming that's EPTbot) is unique, eats your astromech slot and charges you a point. Charging a point I'm cool with, being unique I'm cool with, but eating the astromech slot limits it a lot. Probably intentionally, mind you, but it only gets used on Hobbie so far as I see to give him stress EPTs like PTL and Opportunist (he's an awesome Opportunist at PS5). I think I used him to give Garven Decoy once too so he could give high PS X-wings offensive focus. D6'll still have a place. To put it another way, how much is he used on Red?

****, I literally just started a slightly related thread focusing on how ships classes don't seem to matter. The X-wing is the Alliance multi-purpose fighter and should therefore be ubiquitous. I think the X-wing is suffering because, despite FFG makign each ship unique to reflect its character, their ship class doesn't seem to matter. Instead decisions seem to be made based on number of red dice and hull points foremost. The X-wing seems to have fallen into this trap where those facets neuter the X-wing even when its role as a multi-purpose fighter should make it fairly common.

Dials and upgrade options do help significantly differentiate ships. If the B-wing didn't have a System slot I very much doubt it'd be supplanting the X-wing because its Achilles dial would cripple it. FCS and Adv Sensors are how it gets around the action deficiency a mostly red dial gives it. Keyan would be the only real dogfighter.

Great essay -- lots to digest there.

I'm new to the game and it makes me sad that the iconic ships are apparently overshadowed -- from a certain point of view.

If a Rogue Squadron title was created, wouldn't it be better if it had a requirement of pilot skill 6 or higher? Keeps it to the actual Rogue Squadron pilots. (Or list the characters that can take it)

Perhaps a title that does something then is discarded? One time use. Keeps it from being an automatic inclusion.

Another option is a title that provides a benefit only if it is included on more than one pilot. A three point title that allows you to ignore stress if rogue squadron pilots are in range 1, or something like that.

Final option here:

Rogue Squadron title:

X-wing only?

5 points

When attacking an enemy, reroll 1 die (or add a die?) for each additional rogue squadron that has the targeted ship in their fire arc.

Very well written! Excellent thread!

Agreed the X-wing doesn't need a fix, but more options would be a good thing.

The Flechette Torpedo is one

your recspecmech idea is good, maybe for 3 points like it's human counterpart?

The Rogue Squadron Pilot at PS6 with an EPT I would prefer to be priced 25 as well.

You can still take four without upgrades then, which is quite heavy in a 100 point squad.

With 24 points many will stack an R2 Astromech or worse, 4 times Veteran Instincts, on it.

Imagine 4 PS8 X-wings taking the field......

If a Rogue Squadron title was created, wouldn't it be better if it had a requirement of pilot skill 6 or higher? Keeps it to the actual Rogue Squadron pilots. (Or list the characters that can take it)

The thing there is that PS6+ pilots don't really need any help.

Outstanding article man!

I believe you greatly under value that Y-Wing boost in the BTL-A4 title and that this will prove to be an amazing upgrade to this ship. It leaves the X-Wing in a very weird spot. It is the titular ship from the game and yet is out classed by almost every other ship in its point range.

I believe MJ (MajorJuggler) has this ships value as 19 points for a Rookie pilot, meaning that it is about 2 points over costed. I think in the early days of the game and play testing for it, the idea of 5 X-Wing on the board was something they were trying to avoid, similar to how the TIE Advanced received such a gross over costing. So it was pointed at 21 point simply to avoid being able to field 5 as opposed to being worth 21 points.

I see nothing wrong with the 0 point upgrade that adds something to this ship, either 1 hull, which is what I would do, or the Barrel Roll action, making it a bit more maneuverable.

I could see this being packaged with a HWK-290 fix in a 'Revel Aces II' like release that updated the X-Wing and added 1 attack die to the HWK for a point via a title card. As Alex Davey himself pointed to these two ships as needing some love, I'll wager they are on the block for an update.

If a Rogue Squadron title was created, wouldn't it be better if it had a requirement of pilot skill 6 or higher? Keeps it to the actual Rogue Squadron pilots. (Or list the characters that can take it)

The thing there is that PS6+ pilots don't really need any help.

Perhaps something to do with S-Foils? A 0 cost modification with "Action: Perform a free Boost action. You may not attack this turn".

One option would be a StealthX title card that allows the ship to cloak/decloak. Another idea is something that enables the X-Wing to do a Segnor's Loop.

I have a different idea for the Rogue Squadron Generic:

PS 5, 24 points, no EPT. But wait, you say, the X-wing generics need an EPT to be competitive! Ah, but there is one thing they could get that could differentiate them from any other ship in the Rebel arsenal: an Illicit Upgrade. That would make it completely unique and open up some interesting options.

A new EPT equiped Xwing would be welcome, but I kind of like having the EPT be on named pilots. Actually having Rogue Squadron is more interesting then flying generic Rogue squadron pilots one through four.

The fix definitely needs to be something generic like a title or astromech. A new EPT generic wouldn't help the other generics.

I worry that giving them extra hull makes them reach into the heavy fighter roles of the B and Y wings. I hope that any fix would emphasize that it is a multi role snub fighter. Rogue squadron liked them because they could do anything they asked them to, not because they were tanks.

Great post op! I think you are on the right track!

Something to take into consideration. Think of every single small base ship. Now there are really 3 types of ships. Cheap filler, maneuverable with boost or barrel roll. Then turret carriers. Every small base ship fits into 1 of those 3 types except the x-wing. It isn't cheap, can't reposition, or carry a turret. This is a huge reason for the decline of the x-wing especially the generic. If there were to be a rogue squadron title I would suggest allowing you to choose to add the boost or barrel roll action to your action bar. Now the ship doesn't need engine upgrade or expert handling to reposition. This helps it fit into one of the 3 types.

Also about the generics consider the 21 point rookie and the 22 point blue squadron. That 1 point is easily the best value in the game. You gain way more survivability and a better knife fighting dial! The generics have a very hard time competing against the generic b-wings.

I definitely like your idea for the rogue squadron elite pilot. I feel like it shouldn't be 25 points. 24 points would allow you to take some cheap upgrades like how royals are 22 so you can take 4 with ptl.

Some great thoughts here, and I think a good outline of the problem. Riot (League of Legends) has had a similar issue, where they realized many of their characters fill similar roles in similar ways with similar strengths, and so needing/buffing in those cases doesn't really help. So instead they have been trying to make characters that fill similar roles play differently from one another.

(All of which is outlined in your article above. )

In wave 6, Scum will have 2 low cost "filler" ships that will be doing the role in different ways: the Sykc will be a glass canon with high agility- or will opt not to have the "canon", and will instead be a highly mobile swarming blocker. Alternatively: Scum players can use the Z-95 and play them similarly to how Rebels now do.

If we look at the B-Wing and X-Wing as filling the same Medium Fighter role, how do we make them different? The B-Wing has the hypermobility going for it. What can we do for the X-Wing?

I think adding yet another pilot doesn't actually help the problem- it doesn't address the question "Why choose a Rookie over a Blue, or 2 Bandits?" RecSpecMec seems fantastic (I want it!), but doesn't really get at the core problem of role differentiation.

Let me suggest that titles are where the solution can be found. I'd like to see a couple titles that would be different from one another. I have ideas, but let me throw put some parameters first:

Any X-Wing title should synergies well with the rest of the squad. An X-Wing isn't a support ship per se, but it's strength has always been in allowing its teammates to be even better. Any title should address the X-Wing's lack of mobility without adding to the mobility meta.

So, my ideas:

A title that let's an X-Wing attack any target in range 1-3 that has a red target lock on it, spending the target locks if the opponent is out of arc. (Note that it doesn't have to be it's own target lock that is being spent.)

A title that allows a reroll against any opponent that is equipped with a secondary weapon.

A title that allows an X-Wing to fire on any ship that boosts, barrelrolls, or uncloaks from or to a position inside the X-Wing's firing arc. (Call this the End Passent rule).

I'm not going to price these, as I would rather talk about their merits as a whole than their price specifically.

So... What do people think?

Great job eloquently putting into words what most of us have been feeling about the x-wing Tie Pilot. I was thinking something very similar to AtomicFryingPan’s suggestion. A title that gives boost and barrel roll but you can only use one of those two a turn. So even with PTL you could not boost and barrel roll, but you would have the opportunity to reposition somewhat.

Still want to see an astro that gives a free boost or roll after a green manuver.

Don't know about balance but they'll keep up with tie fighters and titled ys would love it

having the generics cost 1 less point would be good enough.

So, my ideas:

A title that let's an X-Wing attack any target in range 1-3 that has a red target lock on it, spending the target locks if the opponent is out of arc. (Note that it doesn't have to be it's own target lock that is being spent.)

A title that allows a reroll against any opponent that is equipped with a secondary weapon.

A title that allows an X-Wing to fire on any ship that boosts, barrelrolls, or uncloaks from or to a position inside the X-Wing's firing arc. (Call this the End Passent rule).

The first turns X-wings into turrets, which I don't think is thematically appropriate. Likewise, I can't see the thematic logic of the second. The X-wing needs to stay being an X-wing really. The final one sounds interesting but I think it's more of a pilot ability than a title ability.