Okay so, the following thought occured to me:

The Vette is 44pts. Dodonna is 25pts, so the most you can field as a rebel player is about 6 with some points left over for upgrades.

Now, with the current ramming rules, what exactly is to stop this "Vette Swarm" from using it's high speed and agility from having all 6 ships ram a single target each, inflicting 6 damage cards on it with only 1 damage per ship for return?

Positioning themselves in front of a VSD for instance they would easily be able to set it up so that he cannot help but ram into them on it's next activation, and even if he drops his speed to 0, next turn those Vettes can ram him again and destroy him.

This isn't even all that hard! A Corvette is the fastest and most agile ship we've seen in this game, adding Engine Techs on top of that almost DOUBLES the damage output of this tactic!

If this was how it worked in the films then the opening of A New Hope would have started with the Tantive IV moving in the other direction, barelling in on the ISD in the classic and feared "ramming maneouvers" that made them the bane of Imperial shipping, as Corvettes roamed the spaceways in packs, picking off vulnerable Star Destroyers with their low risk ramming speed tactics.

Seriously FFG you've done this dance before with X-Wing, you know someone is going to bring this to a tournement and that will be all you ever see being brought for four years until you bandaid the problem sufficiently post-release. Don't let that happen again, fix those ramming rules now, before it becomes a problem.

Personally, I can see two fixes:

1) You can't ram unless you have NO other movement options.

Or

2) Ramming damage inflicts a number of damage cards equal to the difference between the ship and what is ramming/it has rammed, to a minimum of 1. So a Vette ramming a VSD would take 4 cards and be instantly destroyed, whilst the VSD only takes one. The VSD is slow and expensive, so you can't really use it for ramming tactics, and whilst the Kamikaze option still exists, it will only work against and already badly damaged ship.

Or both. Whatever.

Look, I am not a clever man. I always miss stuff like this, so if I've spotted it, you know somebody else has.

Thank you.

Well....it wont be that easy at least. First, they have to all survive the full Imperial fleets fire (say 3 VSD's), though given their speed this isnt hard. More to the point, they have all to survive their fire after their first ram attack puts them in short range of the Imperial fleet, which removes their evades and opens them up to massive firepower with little to no real defence.

At best I can see them getting 1 full stregth suicide attack, then losing 2-3 ships, then limping back into the damaged VSD to try to finish it off.

Leaving 2 Star Destroyers laughing their asses off.

I dont see it as that bad tbh. it looks scary compared to a lone Destroyer, but then 6 corvettes would kill that with just their guns anyway.

Yeah, but that's in a 3 VSD list, if you're just going VSD - Gladiator + Fighters then it might be more troubling.

It still feels like a very valid tactic as is. Heck, just take 4 and a pair of Nebs or something, the Vettes ram and the Nebs clean up? Or just 5 vettes and some fighters.

Well, a Gladiator has MORE short range power than a VSD, so i'm not sure the Corvettes are going to benefit there!

I guess i just dont see it as quite as powerful, given the horrific damage they will receive from even just a VSD and Gladiator in a round of point blank range shooting.

In addition, there are obstacles. Those things really cause a lot of damage compared to X-Wing....a smart imperial player shouldnt find it too hard to force at least some of the corvettes to have to fly through 1 on the way in.

We'll have to see how it pans out, but genuinely i dont see it working all that well in practice. I have been wrong before though....

Just realised it'd actually be quite hard to get all6 hitting one VSD too, without ramming your own corvettes by accident after the first few!

Im not sure. We know nothing of the officisl rules of the game that what was explained in the demos on you tube. There can be rulling in the official rule book of tjis game that just says no to this tactic....after all this is not supposed to be an X-Wing clone

Im not sure. We know nothing of the officisl rules of the game that what was explained in the demos on you tube. There can be rulling in the official rule book of tjis game that just says no to this tactic....after all this is not supposed to be an X-Wing clone

Well, to be fair the ramming was explained by FFG in one of their early previews on this site, so at one time at least it did work that way. it may have changed by now of course.

Im not sure. We know nothing of the officisl rules of the game that what was explained in the demos on you tube. There can be rulling in the official rule book of tjis game that just says no to this tactic....after all this is not supposed to be an X-Wing clone

Well, to be fair the ramming was explained by FFG in one of their early previews on this site, so at one time at least it did work that way. it may have changed by now of course.

Was it explained for Star Wars Armada is what i meant.. I know x-wing has rules for ramming and such because it is something i needed to know because I am one of the many who owns a Decimator.. with that said do we have an oficial rule pdf for star wars armada? And if not, why not??? I seem to remember there was a rule pdf for x-wing before the game was actually available....dont quote me on that because it has been awhile before pre release of X-wing...and there has been many drunken shenanigans from that time till now for me to remember that far back

Damage by size would make sense. During a collision you take damage equal to the size of the other ship.

Small = 1

Medium = 2

Large = 3

3 small ships ramming 1 large ship = Each small ship takes 3 dmg (9 total) and the large ship takes 3 dmg.

I wonder if this would tip the scales in the other way though. Suddenly the VSDs are hoping for rams against lighter rebel ships.

Yeah the ramming rules didn't make sense to me when I read them.

To draw on the idea above:

When you ram a ship you suffer 1 damage and the rammed ship suffers 1 damage. If the shipped ram is a larger hull size, IE small ramming medium, you suffer an +2 damage. If it is two hull sizes bigger, suffer +4 damage. So essentially ramming a larger ship would most likely kill or cripple your vessel.

However, to not turn the game into capital ship bowling, a larger ship ramming a smaller one would still equal 1 damage per side. I don't want Armada to turn into epic X-wing, where the only viable tactic for the Huge ship is to ram all the smaller ones.

I think ramming should be a tactic in this game, but only as a desperation move when your ship will likely die anyway.

Im not sure. We know nothing of the officisl rules of the game that what was explained in the demos on you tube. There can be rulling in the official rule book of tjis game that just says no to this tactic....after all this is not supposed to be an X-Wing clone

Well, to be fair the ramming was explained by FFG in one of their early previews on this site, so at one time at least it did work that way. it may have changed by now of course.

Was it explained for Star Wars Armada is what i meant.. I know x-wing has rules for ramming and such because it is something i needed to know because I am one of the many who owns a Decimator.. with that said do we have an oficial rule pdf for star wars armada? And if not, why not??? I seem to remember there was a rule pdf for x-wing before the game was actually available....dont quote me on that because it has been awhile before pre release of X-wing...and there has been many drunken shenanigans from that time till now for me to remember that far back

Yes, it was in one of the earlier Armada previews. look for "Set Your Course".

Yeah the ramming rules didn't make sense to me when I read them.

To draw on the idea above:

When you ram a ship you suffer 1 damage and the rammed ship suffers 1 damage. If the shipped ram is a larger hull size, IE small ramming medium, you suffer an +2 damage. If it is two hull sizes bigger, suffer +4 damage. So essentially ramming a larger ship would most likely kill or cripple your vessel.

However, to not turn the game into capital ship bowling, a larger ship ramming a smaller one would still equal 1 damage per side. I don't want Armada to turn into epic X-wing, where the only viable tactic for the Huge ship is to ram all the smaller ones.

I think ramming should be a tactic in this game, but only as a desperation move when your ship will likely die anyway.

I always thought ramming ones ship was always an act in a last ditch effort to take the other guy out if you knew that you were screwed and you have all ready ran out of every possible option..

I think it should be treated as it would be treated if you hit an astroid... ... I just dont see things ending well for a CR-90 trying to plow itself into a Star destroyer lol. I mean seriously would you throw yourself in the mouth of a Great White shark?

I dont want to see raming in this game as a silly tactic to deal damage. It should be treated as a penalty for hitting another capital ship.

Im not sure. We know nothing of the officisl rules of the game that what was explained in the demos on you tube. There can be rulling in the official rule book of tjis game that just says no to this tactic....after all this is not supposed to be an X-Wing clone

Well, to be fair the ramming was explained by FFG in one of their early previews on this site, so at one time at least it did work that way. it may have changed by now of course.

Was it explained for Star Wars Armada is what i meant.. I know x-wing has rules for ramming and such because it is something i needed to know because I am one of the many who owns a Decimator.. with that said do we have an oficial rule pdf for star wars armada? And if not, why not??? I seem to remember there was a rule pdf for x-wing before the game was actually available....dont quote me on that because it has been awhile before pre release of X-wing...and there has been many drunken shenanigans from that time till now for me to remember that far back

Yes, it was in one of the earlier Armada previews. look for "Set Your Course".

Cool ill look this up. This one snuck past me

I always thought ramming ones ship was always an act in a last ditch effort to take the other guy out if you knew that you were screwed and you have all ready ran out of every possible option..

Agreed. Ideally, there would be some sort of morale/leadership test to see if you could pull it off - officers and crew would be unlikely to sacrifice themselves if they had batteries of fully working weapons.

Ok I checked out the ruling on collisions I.E. capital ship vs capital ship colisions. It states in a preview that if a capital ship were to deliberately hit another capital ship that both ships involved receive one face down damage card.

I think it is generally more of a punishment, and while i dont think it's going to be effective to build a force around, i do agree it's too easy to do 1 point to finish something off.

i dont really see any way around that though, short of removing any damage for collisions, which feels even more wrong.

Damage by size would make sense. During a collision you take damage equal to the size of the other ship.

Small = 1

Medium = 2

Large = 3

3 small ships ramming 1 large ship = Each small ship takes 3 dmg (9 total) and the large ship takes 3 dmg.

I wonder if this would tip the scales in the other way though. Suddenly the VSDs are hoping for rams against lighter rebel ships.

Thing is, VSD's are really slow and ponderous, whereas smaller stuff is correspondingly more agile and (presumably) would know to get out of the VSD's way, the thing can basically only go straight unless it reveals a navigation order after all. Given that even without ramming, it's in an opponents best interest to try and get behind those big ships anyway, I think this would be fine.

Collisions

While you follow one set of rules whenever your ship overlaps an obstacle, you follow another set of rules whenever your ship would collide with another ship or one or more starfighter squadrons.

First of all, it’s worth remembering that you always have the opportunity to measure your movement before you move. Thus, if your initial course would force your ship to overlap another ship or squadron, you can adjust your course. However, in some circumstances, you may still find it impossible to avoid a collision, or you may find it advantageous to ram into your opponent’s ship.

When the Rebel player sees that the course he wanted to set for his CR90 corvette would cause it to overlap the Imperial player’s Star Destroyer, he can either adjust the maneuver tool at its first two joints or suffer the consequences of the collision.

Whenever your ship’s final position would overlap another ship, it cannot finish its movement normally. Instead, you temporarily reduce its speed by one increment and attempt to execute your ship’s movement at the reduced speed. If reducing your ship’s speed by one still wouldn’t permit a legal movement, you continue to decrease your speed by one increment and attempt to move until your ship can legally finish its movement or until its speed is temporarily reduced to “0,” in which case it does not move.

After resolving this movement, your ship and the closest ship that it overlapped both receive one facedown damage card.

The Rebel player decides to have his CR90 corvette collide with the Imperial player’s Star Destroyer. He reduces the corvette’s speed by one so that both ships have clear shots at each other from their front hull zones, and then both ships suffer one facedown damage.

On the other hand, if your ship’s final position would cause it to overlap one or more squadrons, you complete your ship’s movement normally and move any overlapped squadrons out of the way. Then, your opponent places all of the overlapped squadrons next to your ship so that their bases are touching its base.

I think it is generally more of a punishment, and while i dont think it's going to be effective to build a force around, i do agree it's too easy to do 1 point to finish something off.

i dont really see any way around that though, short of removing any damage for collisions, which feels even more wrong.

"Dirty deeds, done dirt cheep"

I think something better would be a single attack die, correlating to the size of the ship. Like small is red, medium is black, large is red and black. That way there's a chance that you can crit or double hit, however you could completely miss. The ramming ship would still receive a damage no matter what

I'm not sure how this was handled in the movies, but wouldn't starship shield s have some effect?

While space is mostly empty, there is the occasional dust cloud, floating rock, etc...

Maybe the fix here is to have shields mitigate the damage -- at least partially.

Let's never forget this tactic does work! Skip to 7.02.....I can't get the time set properly.

This is a viable tactic, however I think the biggest challenge as mentioned before is the collision will look like a 7 car pile-up, in that your corvettes will end up crashing into each other.

This is a viable tactic, however I think the biggest challenge as mentioned before is the collision will look like a 7 car pile-up, in that your corvettes will end up crashing into each other.

Because the ramming ship draws back to just before the contact - unless they are destroyed by that single damage card then the rammer will now block a significant area infront of the target ship - so for this tactic to work you would not only have to have a bunch of corvettes, but have them all coming from completely different angles also. Sounds like its more effort than its worth to be honest, and it is always going to disadvantage the smaller ship - because for a corvette it means loosing 1/4 of its hull, as opposed to a Victory losing 1/6th of its hull.

This is a viable tactic, however I think the biggest challenge as mentioned before is the collision will look like a 7 car pile-up, in that your corvettes will end up crashing into each other.

Because the ramming ship draws back to just before the contact - unless they are destroyed by that single damage card then the rammer will now block a significant area infront of the target ship - so for this tactic to work you would not only have to have a bunch of corvettes, but have them all coming from completely different angles also. Sounds like its more effort than its worth to be honest, and it is always going to disadvantage the smaller ship - because for a corvette it means loosing 1/4 of its hull, as opposed to a Victory losing 1/6th of its hull.

Now I want to see someone try this on a ship with Expanded Launchers equiped You may get a single VSD with this tactic, but not the whole list. Don't forget the Rebel player would get to shoot as well, but you'd still only get about one ram per ship before being utterly dead. One thing that may get people to try this more though is that I believe you get to measure before commiting to a move now unlike X-Wing? If not this idea needs to be dropped now before someone starts ramming their own ships trying to pile onto a VSD.