First off: this is a bunch of long-winded opinion (which I didn't proofread . . . sorry . . .). If you want a TL;DR version, just read the last paragraph. If you have a different opinion, please share. I love a good debate. Now then:

The Meta

With the release of Wave 5, we've seen a bit of a change in the overall meta. Though Fat Hans are still out there, many are being replaced by SuperDashes and Decimators with Expose, and Phantoms (specifically Echo) are seeing a bit more play.

This means that new lists have to plan to run into high mobility, high Pilot Skill, high attack, and turrets. However, the way that these elements function in the meta has changed due almost entirely to those last two points: high attack values, and turrets.

Right now, there are multiple options for four-attack ships in both factions. The Rebels can field B-Wings with Heavy Laser Cannons, and, more commonly, Outriders with HLCs. The Imperials have Phantoms, Firesprays with HLCs, and now the Decimator + Expose + Experimental Interface combo. All this means that almost every competitive list is capable of dishing out four-dice attacks on a regular basis; the few that don't are generally swarms.

Because of this, the average defensive ability of most lists has to go up, too. Up to this point in the game, there have been two ways of pumping defense: either you pump up hull and shields, or you pump up agility dice and actions. More recently, we've seen builds based more on nigh-foolproof modifying of only a few defense dice, combined with higher hull and shields -- these include Fat Han and Ibtisam builds.

Now, though, that's changing. Up until the last wave or two, the general expectation has been to run into a few three-dice attacks, or several two-dice attacks. Glass cannons were not always very good due to their unforgiving play style, but they could manage because they would generally pit three base defense dice against three base attack dice. The green dice were a bit weaker, but this could be combated by staying at Range 3 or equipping upgrades; glass cannons could stand up to several two-dice attacks or a few three-dice attacks. As of Wave V, though, the standard has changed; now, they have to stand up to four-dice attacks. What's more, arc-dodging is no longer as reliable with more turrets hitting the field. Because of this, three-defense ships have become less common. Phantoms, with their four green dice, have managed to hold on; as has Soontir, with his ability to modify just about every roll he makes.

Thus, the other two defensive builds -- high hit points and dice modification -- have become more and more common, which explains a lot of the "underpowered" ships in the game.

The X-Wing, the E-Wing, and the Defender

The X-Wing, for example, is not underpowered; previous waves have proven that. So what changed? It's simple: previously, two agility dice was enough to limit damage taken from any given attack to one or two hits. It would take a good round of concentrated fire to bring down an X-Wing. But two defense dice is not enough against four attack dice. Now, a single attack can result in two or three hits, which is half of the X-Wing's hull; after that, the rest of the attacks are just mopping up. By condensing the attack dice -- that is, having a similar amount, but rolling more with each attack -- ships that rely on agility for defense have been marginalized, unless they can up their agility correspondingly. The X-Wing simply can't do that, even with a Stealth Device or something similar. Thus, the move toward B-Wings; they have enough hit points to stand up to that sort of punishment.

And that brings us to the E-Wing, and, on a related note, the TIE Defender: two of the most under-appreciated ships in the game right now, for one reason: upgrades. The E-Wing is a good ship, but it needs upgrades -- and with those upgrades, I maintain that it is the perfect counter to a lot of what's in the current meta. It can become a high-agility ship that doesn't rely on arc-dodging or generally not taking damage. With a better hull/shield setup than the X-Wing, it isn't a flimsy little glass cannon; but with the right setup, it can have the same or better agility rolls than a flimsy little glass cannon. Take, for example, the following list:

The future meta, from here, looks like it will keep a few of these aspects. With the Heavy Scyk coming out, it's possible to have four ships each with four-dice attacks on the table, and that's ignoring the other Scum ships with cannon upgrade slots. Sure, the meta will change, but it will change through escalation (and no, I don't mean that in the squad-building sense ). Autothrusters will help Interceptors and A-Wings, but they'll only do that by encouraging extremes; ships like the X-Wing, which essentially exist as basic, well-rounded options, will die off. And that, of course, will lead to people asking for an X-Wing fix, which will lead to even more escalation.

Right now, the meta is a Clash of Titans. You need high defense to defend against the high offense, which means that you need high offense because everyone else has high defense. You need high mobility to defend against equally high mobility, and high Pilot Skill to beat out high Pilot Skill. That means looking at a game of trade-offs, and in turn, a game of extremes. Perhaps you can have a bunch of attack dice and a bunch of hull points, but that will mean sacrificing Pilot Skill and mobility. Perhaps you can have high PS and defense, but you may lack in the other two areas. Or, you could be SuperDash, a Phantom, or a Decimator and have four-dice shots, high hit points or agility, superb mobility, and fairly high PS all in one big, expensive package. So: what builds are out there to beat these ships? What have you been flying? Have you encountered these elements in the meta, or not?

Fat falcons aren't going anywhere in this game.

Your E-wing list is a 3 ship small base rebel build. Those lists historically haven't done that well and ships like the falcon, outrider, and decimator will see to it that it stays that way.

The meta of the game right now is large base anchor + filler. Small base anchor + filler. Swarms. Those are the top 3 archetypes for competitive lists. I believe that control lists do have a place somewhere and we are seeing them do some interesting things.

Fat falcons aren't going anywhere in this game.

Your E-wing list is a 3 ship small base rebel build. Those lists historically haven't done that well and ships like the falcon, outrider, and decimator will see to it that it stays that way.

The meta of the game right now is large base anchor + filler. Small base anchor + filler. Swarms. Those are the top 3 archetypes for competitive lists. I believe that control lists do have a place somewhere and we are seeing them do some interesting things.

I agree that fat Falcons won't disappear, I'm just observing that there seem to be fewer of them with Wave 5, at least in my local meta.

I am aware of the history behind three ship small base Rebel builds. That's why I posted up this list: it doesn't quite follow history. It has beaten Falcons, Outriders, and Decimators because it has enough defense to withstand them and enough offense to destroy them. I appreciate your feedback, though.

I completely agree with that last point -- what I'm talking about its what those anchors are: four-attack ships. Sure, the anchor + support is the template for the meta, but that isn't all the meta is, or why it is what it is.

) don't mean this to sound rude.

I agree with what you said. But the conclussion list has left me quite baffled, because it is, in my opinion, pretty bad. High agility against high attack with double dice modification only matters if you can get double modification aswell (evade + focus, double focus, etc) and arc dodge. High agility unmodified is good against many poor quality shots, like against swarms, not against 4 dice with double modification attacks.

Not only that, but since you will require to use your actions defensively to be able to modify that high agility pool, you are left with 3 ships with one who can't modify it's dice (R2F2), and a second that the moments one hit goes through (likely from ships that can reliabily get 4 shots), it turns into a glorified Tie fighter, and the third is R2D2, which means it already has 3 agility and can die to focused firepower one turn, and at best, he can get one shield back.

That lacks the punch needed to get through the kind of lists with high agility ships and double token spammage that we are speaking of. Not to speak that E-wings are not much better than Xwings maneuverwise, so they are weak against arc dodgers like the phantom, or Dash.

The answer to 4 attack dice is, kill it or have enough hitpoints to surive several turns while being able to return fire every single turn. Hence why large base turrets are considered reliable against Phantoms. It's the kind of list that i would love to play against with:

Fat falcons aren't going anywhere in this game.

Your E-wing list is a 3 ship small base rebel build. Those lists historically haven't done that well and ships like the falcon, outrider, and decimator will see to it that it stays that way.

The meta of the game right now is large base anchor + filler. Small base anchor + filler. Swarms. Those are the top 3 archetypes for competitive lists. I believe that control lists do have a place somewhere and we are seeing them do some interesting things.

I'm on large base anchor + filler control. It's a think of beauty.

I'd drop the Stealth Device for R5-P9. For the same cost you gain regeneration. Which is far stronger than +1 agility at the same cost.

While performing Evasive Maneuvers for a few turns would allow you to possibly be back at full shields before re-engaging. Basically Hit-and-Run tactics.

) don't mean this to sound rude.

I agree with what you said. But the conclussion list has left me quite baffled, because it is, in my opinion, pretty bad. High agility against high attack with double dice modification only matters if you can get double modification aswell (evade + focus, double focus, etc) and arc dodge. High agility unmodified is good against many poor quality shots, like against swarms, not against 4 dice with double modification attacks.

Not only that, but since you will require to use your actions defensively to be able to modify that high agility pool, you are left with 3 ships with one who can't modify it's dice (R2F2), and a second that the moments one hit goes through (likely from ships that can reliabily get 4 shots), it turns into a glorified Tie fighter, and the third is R2D2, which means it already has 3 agility and can die to focused firepower one turn, and at best, he can get one shield back.

That lacks the punch needed to get through the kind of lists with high agility ships and double token spammage that we are speaking of. Not to speak that E-wings are not much better than Xwings maneuverwise, so they are weak against arc dodgers like the phantom, or Dash.

(I don't mean to sound rude either -- thanks for your comments!)

You're right that dice modification is important -- hence the Experimental Interface to go with R2-F2. You can still focus or evade (but not, sadly, both). The one with the Stealth Device is, I agree, weaker than the others, but you can still save a few hits with it. And, even once a hit gets through, it still has three attack and three agility . . . . The last one, though, is probably the strongest, I've found. Yes, a round of Range 1 shots can bring it down; but that's generally something you can avoid by flying smart and barrel rolling. Once it starts to get focused down, just send it flying off, out of the battle, to regen shields. It generally saves about three to five hits per game: definitely worth it.

I suppose you could be right on those last points. I can't say much to argue, except that I've had success thus far. Against Dash, at least, blocking usually works pretty well, and these ships have enough agility to stand up against a few attacks.

I agree completely with that last bit. That's a lot of what I was saying in my first post . . . I just wanted to give an example, with E-Wings, of how we might try to break that mold.

I'd drop the Stealth Device for R5-P9. For the same cost you gain regeneration. Which is far stronger than +1 agility at the same cost.

While performing Evasive Maneuvers for a few turns would allow you to possibly be back at full shields before re-engaging. Basically Hit-and-Run tactics.

That's a good idea. At first, I'd shied away from R5-P9 because I hadn't generally found him useful . . . but with the hit-and-run tactics, that makes a lot of sense. I'll try it out.

Thanks, all, for the comments! I wonder, though, if anyone has more to say on the "meta" part of the article . . . while I appreciate the feedback on that list, I mostly brought it up as an example for a possible high-agility list.

I've thought a bit about this in terms of the Defender. The best I could get is a Defender+Stealth Device+ Lone Wolf, which with that many green dice is almost as good as another one. If you round up a little and call it 5 green dice, you're averaging ~2 evades with a flat roll, and 3 with a Focus. The downside is that HLCs too frequently turn out 4 hits, dropping your Stealth device, and bringing you down to your regular level. If more than one HLC is out there, the second one is even more likely to drop your Stealth Device. The upside of this is that it requires high firepower to take it out, as it's almost invulnerable to lower attacks, especially at long range. It ends up relying too much on dice. A little luck could see a couple HLC shots bouncing off of you first turn. A little bad luck could see you lose 3 shields right off the bat. The regeneration route is better, but it's pretty much a Rebel only strategy. Another Rebel option with E-wings is the combination of spitting out Stress and Sensor Jammers. If you can reliably deny actions (via blocking and Flechette Torps and R3A2), you can limit HLCs to flat rolls. A flat HLC with one hit converted to an eye is not a very dangerous attack. A couple of Prototype pilots blocking would make a couple of E-wings with Sensor Jammers pretty durable. Doesn't leave much points for anything else, though.

I havn't really seen the rise of any E-wings or defenders in my meta.

To counter the hyper-mobility of the phantom, I've just been bringing variant sources of hyper mobility (Jake and Sensor Keyan playing the PS 9 game, Soontir Fell ditto, V.I Boba being a surprising counter...)

To counter the idiot-proof fat based turrets without resorting to them, I've just been throwing as much dice as possible at them since dice quantity is quite literally the only thing they lack.

To that end, it's been nothing but Named Character & Posse (mini-swarm) though for some reason I've found TIE fighters to be far more effective than Zs, so the rebels get flown with a mob of B-wings instead.

E-wings in particular are far too expensive to operate as pouches of dice and not maneuverable enough (or high PS enough) to go after phantoms. They have made for rather nice center-pieces to squads when given R2-D2 and push the limit, the combination of which makes them hilariously durable. Otherwise, though, they're not at all exceptional.

The meta right now is a game of skews because of how easy Whisper and Turrets are to fly, and if the well rounded X-wing is suffering than the well-rounded & overpriced E-wing will only be worse off (characters excluded, of course, because the combination of EPT, sensor, and astromech makes them a skew in their own right)

The Defender's in the same boat (nothing more well rounded than 3/3/3/3) with the drawback of having characters of dubious quality (well Vessery's a boss, but he's a hard man to build around)

Imo, Wave 6 is going to bury phantoms (MOAR turrets ala Kavil and Mux, who seems to have been made for the sole purpose of giving Whisper the middle finger) and auto-thrusters don't do nearly enough to move the corpulent, bloated mass of fat turrets off of our tables

The meta, as far as I can see (which may not be far, only been playing and reading the forums a week) is that we have a nice Rock/Paper/Scissors going on, or at least we did in the very recent past and it might change with what Scum brings. It seems that:

Phantoms counter Swarms

Swarms counter Turrets

Turrets counter Phantoms

At least, broadly speaking. And to my mind, that's actually a nice place for the game to be in, as there is nothing as well balanced as the quintessential Rock/Paper/Scissors rotation. Not only that, but two of the choices (Turrets and Phantoms) have a pretty good range of options of what to include to support them, with Swarms being the only thing that eat 100pts by themselves with no other options available.

In terms of where the "meta" is going, it's pretty hard to say without some table time with the new cards and ships that Scum is going to bring out. The presence of a third faction is going to significantly impact the game in and of itself, because previously we had Rebel abilities, and Imperial abilities, and they pretty much countered each other out. Now we get to see whether they both play nicely with Scum, or if by accessing new upgrades one faction benefits significantly more, and therefore rises to the apex of power. For example the next unseen Scum wave might hard counter swarms, leaving Imperials scratching their heads as their top-tier list is rendered unplayable. Hopefully this won't be the case, but we can't tell at this stage.

At the moment, I like the game very much in terms of it's balance. Each ship can be used, competitively, with certain combinations of items, pilots and supporting squad composition. Sure, maybe hypothetically Corran is the only way to competitively run an E-Wing, but at least it means you see E-Wings on the table! Coming from 40k where a good 50%+ of each army is competitively worthless, that makes me very happy.

I havn't really seen the rise of any E-wings or defenders in my meta.

To counter the hyper-mobility of the phantom, I've just been bringing variant sources of hyper mobility (Jake and Sensor Keyan playing the PS 9 game, Soontir Fell ditto, V.I Boba being a surprising counter...)

E-wings in particular are far too expensive to operate as pouches of dice and not maneuverable enough (or high PS enough) to go after phantoms. They have made for rather nice center-pieces to squads when given R2-D2 and push the limit, the combination of which makes them hilariously durable. Otherwise, though, they're not at all exceptional.

The meta right now is a game of skews because of how easy Whisper and Turrets are to fly, and if the well rounded X-wing is suffering than the well-rounded & overpriced E-wing will only be worse off (characters excluded, of course, because the combination of EPT, sensor, and astromech makes them a skew in their own right)

The Defender's in the same boat (nothing more well rounded than 3/3/3/3) with the drawback of having characters of dubious quality (well Vessery's a boss, but he's a hard man to build around)

Imo, Wave 6 is going to bury phantoms (MOAR turrets ala Kavil and Mux, who seems to have been made for the sole purpose of giving Whisper the middle finger) and auto-thrusters don't do nearly enough to move the corpulent, bloated mass of fat turrets off of our tables

Boba is a surprising counter. Have you just been using him as a PS 10 Firespray, or has his ability actually come into play?

As for the E-Wing . . . the reason I say that it can make a comeback is because there are a few routes of improving its agility/defense to extreme values. The reason that I say the X-Wing is too well-rounded is because its only "extreme" value is attack, and three dice isn't all that extreme right now. As for the Defender . . . I feel like it would have more potential if it had the right upgrades. Again, nothing on it is really quite enough. An HLC gives it great offense, but the defense is too lacking to justify such an expensive package. It has almost-potential; it's waiting for the right combo to be found.

I think your prediction about Wave VI is probably fairly close to the mark, but I think that generic Phantoms may survive. A simple Sigma with Stygium Particle Accelerator is relatively cheap, has good action economy, good maneuverability, and four-dice attacks. We won't see as many Phantoms, but we will see some. Those big attacks are needed to chew through those uber-defense builds.

Ps 9+ counters phantoms.

Phantoms counter PS <8

Swarms counter single green dice ships

4 red dice/rerolls counters swarms

Ewings and defenders aren't being played much because their pilots arent very good.

Right now, there are multiple options for four-attack ships in both factions. The Rebels can field B-Wings with Heavy Laser Cannons, and, more commonly, Outriders with HLCs. The Imperials have Phantoms, Firesprays with HLCs, and now the Decimator + Expose + Experimental Interface combo. All this means that almost every competitive list is capable of dishing out four-dice attacks on a regular basis; the few that don't are generally swarms.

Because of this, the average defensive ability of most lists has to go up, too.

If what you say is true about 4 ATK ships, then shouldn't the lowly R4-D6 astromech droid start seeing some table time? If an X-wing's problem is that it can't cancel all the hits from HLC, then this little droid can drop that damage down to 2. That give is 3 hull to survive the onslaught from the rest of the squad, but it may still die from focused fire. Might be worth a try. It's only 1 point, so if he comes up against swarms it's not a bunch of wasted points.

I have to say that I haven't seen 4-dice attacks take off in our meta. A couple people tried Super Dash, but couldn't get him to work, and nobody is running the Exposed Decimator. It's really interesting how different local metas can be.

I just won a 12 person event with a six ship swarm and 5 missiles. (3 ion pulse and 2 P-rockets)

A majority of players brought two big base ships. That can't handle a control swarm.

I was the only swarm.

No Phantoms in my meta so I don't know if I could pull it off...

I just won a 12 person event with a six ship swarm and 5 missiles. (3 ion pulse and 2 P-rockets)

A majority of players brought two big base ships. That can't handle a control swarm.

I was the only swarm.

No Phantoms in my meta so I don't know if I could pull it off...

What six ships were you running? I'm just curious.

I just won a 12 person event with a six ship swarm and 5 missiles. (3 ion pulse and 2 P-rockets)

A majority of players brought two big base ships. That can't handle a control swarm.

I was the only swarm.

No Phantoms in my meta so I don't know if I could pull it off...

This is the next phase that I see. At the moment, everyone is running big, turret ships in my area. What I see is any list that can dish out the damage before a Fat Han w/ Luke as Gunner can destroy will do well. It can be a Tie Swarm or a Scyk Mangler Cannon list. Maybe it's a Tie Advanced w/ AutoCorrector list. You can go with numerous cheap ships or you can go with several high damage ships that can take a little punishment. Overall, though, I see people going after lists that can cream a big ship. Maybe they don't do well against other lists, but if they hit a big ship, it can be pasted most of the time.

Fat Han is great for tournaments for a few reasons.

1) It has a lot of hull points to chew through in 70 minutes

2) It can reliably dish out hits each round vs. one target

3) It can reliably dodge one good attack a round.

One good ship is a terrible match up vs a Fat Han. He will focus fire at you until you die and be able to evade most of your damage. What you need is numerous things that can dish out damage that can do it before most of your ships are dead.

Personally, I'm going with a 4 Tie Bomber list until S&V comes out. Or the Imp Raider and Tie Advances gets into my greedy little hands.

My dear OP:

"The X-Wing, for example, is not underpowered; previous waves have proven that. So what changed? It's simple: previously, two agility dice was enough to limit damage taken from any given attack to one or two hits."

"ships like the X-Wing, which essentially exist as basic, well-rounded options, will die off"

So X-Wings are NOT underpowered, but basically 3 attack dice is not enough and 2 defense dice is not enough, and also they will die off. Well that sounds godawful to me. And you didn't even speak about the non-existent mobility options for the ship...

"And that, of course, will lead to people asking for an X-Wing fix, which will lead to even more escalation."

Well to me it sounds like those people (include me if you want) are **** right to ask a rebalancing of the X-Wing if i follow your analysis. And how will that lead to escalation? I think that the rebalancing of the Advanced was well **** made and it does not lead to anything but the ship being finally playable! Which is great!

The rest of your analysis is not exactly wrong. But the conclusions are mostly...

By the way:

I just won a 12 person event with a six ship swarm and 5 missiles. (3 ion pulse and 2 P-rockets)

A majority of players brought two big base ships. That can't handle a control swarm.

I was the only swarm.

No Phantoms in my meta so I don't know if I could pull it off...

What six ships were you running? I'm just curious.

Three Prototype As (one refitted) and three Bandit Zs.

My dear OP:

"The X-Wing, for example, is not underpowered; previous waves have proven that. So what changed? It's simple: previously, two agility dice was enough to limit damage taken from any given attack to one or two hits."

"ships like the X-Wing, which essentially exist as basic, well-rounded options, will die off"

So X-Wings are NOT underpowered, but basically 3 attack dice is not enough and 2 defense dice is not enough, and also they will die off. Well that sounds godawful to me. And you didn't even speak about the non-existent mobility options for the ship...

"And that, of course, will lead to people asking for an X-Wing fix, which will lead to even more escalation."

Well to me it sounds like those people (include me if you want) are **** right to ask a rebalancing of the X-Wing if i follow your analysis. And how will that lead to escalation? I think that the rebalancing of the Advanced was well **** made and it does not lead to anything but the ship being finally playable! Which is great!

The rest of your analysis is not exactly wrong. But the conclusions are mostly...

I can put literally anything on the table that will beat this. Fat Han, Dash/Corran (the only real E-Wing), any Autothruster Interceptor squadron with more than 4 PS, Decimator/Whisper, a new Advanced Squadron, a Scum Turret list... Swarms are perhaps the only thing this can beat, and only if you are lucky enough to get trid of Howlrunner fats enough or even that damage might focus you one E-Wing down per turn...

The E-Wing is just too cost inefficient. You see, either you go really big on a pilot like Corran, then he might pay you back (and thats still pretty risky), or you leave it be with E-wings. You can't even seriously equip 3 basic ones as you prove with your own list.

At the moment i don't see the Meta shift back to lower pilot skills, not at all! And this will not happen as long as Phantoms are that powerful.

On your points about the X-Wing: please don't twist my words. The X-Wing has been in Worlds squadrons, nationals squadrons, etc, etc. I'm just saying that it's currently lacking the defensive options to put up with condensed attack dice, which are very common right now. If those attacks become less common, the X-Wing will become more common. I will admit that it doesn't have much mobility, but it's not as if it has a bad dial. Yes, I am saying that it can't put up with the offense and mobility we see now, but a shift to a more rounded meta could change that. If we continue to get high attack and high defense and high mobility ships, then maybe the X will be left behind, but that has a lot more to do with power creep than basic faults with the ship.

As for escalation: what I'm saying is that a poorly-executed or unnecessary fix will make something overpowered. Let's pretend, for example, that the Lambda had been given some sort of fix when it came out, before anyone had really learned to appreciate. Fast forward a few months, people have figured the ship out -- suddenly, it would be quite overpowered. Likewise, an X-Wing fix now could result in a very overpowered ship if the meta shifts. One overpowered ship leads to others being dominated, leading to those needing a fix, etc, etc. And since the meta is a rather unpredictable mistress (as much as we all may like to try to predict it ), it doesn't make a lot of sense to fix a ship that, at its heart, doesn't need fixing. Unless FFG can guarantee that the meta will continue to hurt the X-Wing, we shouldn't add power to a powerful ship. If the rock-paper-scissors meta faded into a more rounded meta, we would probably see more X-Wings, since it's a fairly-priced ship in such a meta.

And I don't think I said that the TIE Advanced fix was a bad thing . . . I don't particularly like it as a piece of game design, and I feel that such a powerful fix is a rather dangerous precedent to set. But you're right, it does make the ship competitive.

Oh, and "by the way:" congratulations. You're evidently a much better player of the game than most of the people with whom I've played, and have much more experience with that list with me in actual games.

Let me say it again: I don't mean to be rude or belligerent, but I posted that list as a bloody example. And I did that because it was surprising. You wouldn't expect such a list to do terribly well. That's why I thought that people might be interested to hear that it had done well. Is it the most competitive list possible? Probably not. But is it a competitive list? Yes. I've had success against most of the types of lists you named with this E-Wing list, and the people I played were no slouches. There's a difference between theory and practice. (And the English nerd in me bleeds . . . if you could beat it with literally anything, can we fly that list against a small paperweight? Perhaps a guitar? A microphone? ).

****

Right now, there are multiple options for four-attack ships in both factions. The Rebels can field B-Wings with Heavy Laser Cannons, and, more commonly, Outriders with HLCs. The Imperials have Phantoms, Firesprays with HLCs, and now the Decimator + Expose + Experimental Interface combo. All this means that almost every competitive list is capable of dishing out four-dice attacks on a regular basis; the few that don't are generally swarms.

Because of this, the average defensive ability of most lists has to go up, too.

If what you say is true about 4 ATK ships, then shouldn't the lowly R4-D6 astromech droid start seeing some table time? If an X-wing's problem is that it can't cancel all the hits from HLC, then this little droid can drop that damage down to 2. That give is 3 hull to survive the onslaught from the rest of the squad, but it may still die from focused fire. Might be worth a try. It's only 1 point, so if he comes up against swarms it's not a bunch of wasted points.

I have to say that I haven't seen 4-dice attacks take off in our meta. A couple people tried Super Dash, but couldn't get him to work, and nobody is running the Exposed Decimator. It's really interesting how different local metas can be.

That's interesting. I might have to try out R4-D6, or at least look at some math for him vs. four attack dice.

****

And, finally, since several folks have been agreeing with my analysis and not my conclusions: what conclusions, exactly, should I have drawn about the meta, the X-Wing, the E-Wing, and the future of the meta? I know a lot of you have said this already, but I'd be interested to see some more evidence and arguments for alternate conclusions.

Again, thanks all for the comments, thanks all for the debates, and thanks all for keeping it civil.

I've not flown an E-Wing, but I did find your example list interesting. Look forward to further discussion.

I have not twisted your words, i have just taken a few citations. And i have not even pulled them out if context. In your response you go on with making little sense:

You say again that the X-Wing lacks offense, defense and has no great mobility. Your statement, and i agree. I add to this that it's not even good value for its points now that we have the Z-95.

Then you say that this is all compared to the meta we see now only. But do you really think 4-5 attacks per roll will disappear? Or hypermobility builds, or 4 defense dice. Or all in one ship of that. Well i don't see that disappearing. Why would it. There is no foreseeable upgrade announced that invalidates such a meta. So the X-Wing is bad right now, and it will stay inthis spot for all we can see.

What i plain don't understand then is that out of your own analysis advocate against any change or balancing to the X-Wing. Because of hypothetical future meta where the X-Wing could be overpowered if the changes would not be well-made.

I just can't get behind that kind of logic. So we have absolutely powerful ships right now that dominate the meta, but we can't have a better X-Wing because you fear it could become too good. Weird stuff...

And coming back to the Blackmoons, yes play them if you like. I have tried Knaves, not Blackmoons and picked up some System upgrades for the difference and slightly different astromechs, but they just sucked (excuse the language but it has to be said the way it is)! Any list with mobility and higher PS will pick this apart (and picking PS 3-4 will not help you in any way except for predator). It's a Rebel 3 small ship build. An archetype that never was competitive in any meta...

You can of course play it and have fun with it, but if you just get close to any meta lists the fun will end pretty fast, at least the fun associated with winning!

I just won a 12 person event with a six ship swarm and 5 missiles. (3 ion pulse and 2 P-rockets)

A majority of players brought two big base ships. That can't handle a control swarm.

I was the only swarm.

No Phantoms in my meta so I don't know if I could pull it off...

What six ships were you running? I'm just curious.

Three Prototype As (one refitted) and three Bandit Zs.

That's an interesting mix. Did you use A-wings for quick attacks and the Z's to overpower each ship, or have the Z's do something else. I have not run Z's yet, so I am looking at those who do to learn their pros/cons. Thanks for replying btw.

I have not twisted your words, i have just taken a few citations. And i have not even pulled them out if context. In your response you go on with making little sense:

You say again that the X-Wing lacks offense, defense and has no great mobility. Your statement, and i agree. I add to this that it's not even good value for its points now that we have the Z-95.

Then you say that this is all compared to the meta we see now only. But do you really think 4-5 attacks per roll will disappear? Or hypermobility builds, or 4 defense dice. Or all in one ship of that. Well i don't see that disappearing. Why would it. There is no foreseeable upgrade announced that invalidates such a meta. So the X-Wing is bad right now, and it will stay inthis spot for all we can see.

What i plain don't understand then is that out of your own analysis advocate against any change or balancing to the X-Wing. Because of hypothetical future meta where the X-Wing could be overpowered if the changes would not be well-made.

I just can't get behind that kind of logic. So we have absolutely powerful ships right now that dominate the meta, but we can't have a better X-Wing because you fear it could become too good. Weird stuff...

Okay . . . I seem to not be really saying what I'm thinking, so let me try again:

The X-Wing has good offense, good defense, and halfway decent mobility. I won't argue much on that last point because I agree that the lack of movement-modifying actions is a detriment to it.

As for the first two points, though, the ship is essentially sound. Against two- and three-dice shots, it will statistically survive about as long as a B-Wing. Likewise, it will deal as much damage as an unmodified B-Wing.

For defense, the problem is a weird density of dice. Four to five attack dice on a single shot is too much for an X-Wing to handle. Because attacks with that many dice are quite common, the X-Wing now has a vital weakness, something that it didn't really have in earlier waves.

The fact that it has such a weakness does not make it a bad ship. The reason that it is currently not flown very often is, in my opinion, due mostly to how common that weakness is. Those high-dice attacks are everywhere. Flying it right now would be like flying an interceptor in a meta full of turrets (so . . . right now ); you know that your Achille's Heel will show up at some point.

In the future, however, it is possible that we'll get new and exciting ships with new and exciting abilities that create new and exciting lists that are played instead of those high-attack lists. If there is a move away from a rock-paper-scissors meta and toward an "anything goes" meta, then X-Wings will see more play.

If, on the other hand, FFG continues to pump out ships with more and more offensive ability (ships that make the phrase power creep cross through my mind), then the X-Wing will need a fix. But this is not because it is a bad ship. This is because the power level of the game will have increased beyond its original level (where the X-Wing was good) to a point where good ships are no longer good.

The X-Wing has good attack and good defense, but it has lost its niche in the game.