I know that in this game that when you are just looking at ships you could claim one ship to be the best and then with upgrades something else is the best and then depending on the wingman a third ship could be called the best. So my question is (including S&V ) is there a list out there of the number one ranked ship down to the worst ranked? Like I said I realize that there will be some disagreement between one or more ranks on any list but something that could be considered close enough for must people to generally agree on

AFAIK, there isn't. "Best" isn't really quantifiable. There are far too many variables in this game,such as which pilot you're taking, what upgrades, if any, and what's being flown alongside it.

For example. I'd much rather take Dark Curse over Fel's Wrath, because...let's face it, the latter sucks. That being said, I'd much rather take a Saber pilot with Push instead of just about any other generic Imp ship, but without push, I'd probably take a Delta instead.

Phantoms are the extreme example. WIthout ACD, the top-tier pilots are far less attractive. The generics are almost never flown because Pilot skill makes so much of a difference with Phantoms.

See the problem?

Let's see... I don't know about a best to worst list, but I could classify ships into three categories

The First category would be metagame defining ships. These are ships that you must have a plan for when going into a tournament, or they will walk all over you.

Millenium Falcon, TIE Phantom

The second catgory would be "strong" ships. These ships are very competitive, but they don't warp the metagame in quite the same way.

Y-wing, Tie Fighter Tie Advanced with Fix, Slave I, Tie Interceptor, A-wing, Lambda Shuttle, B-wing, Z-95, YT-2400, Decimator, M-3A Scyk, Aggressor (This one might end up becoming metagame defining, but Scum is still too new for us to know.

The third category would be "fringe" ships. These ships aren't necessarily bad, and certainly can find a home in competitive lists, but they generally only have a few really strong builds.

X-wing, HWK-290, Tie Bomber, Tie Defender, E-wing, Starviper, Tie Advanced without X/1 Title, Generic Yt-1300

I think it might be fair to put the TIE Advanced without the fix into a fourth category of "Bad, unless you fly Vader and then it's Fringe".

You'd have to sort it by pilot.

MajorJuggler's mathwing thread is what you want. He offers an exhaustive breakdown and ranking of each ship and pilot taking base stats, dial, upgrades, actions, powers etc... I don't always agree 100% with his model, especially on the TIE D and some named pilots, but it is the place to start for a list like this.

MajorJuggler's mathwing thread is what you want. He offers an exhaustive breakdown and ranking of each ship and pilot taking base stats, dial, upgrades, actions, powers etc... I don't always agree 100% with his model, especially on the TIE D and some named pilots, but it is the place to start for a list like this.

MajorJuggler's mathwing thread is what you want. He offers an exhaustive breakdown and ranking of each ship and pilot taking base stats, dial, upgrades, actions, powers etc... I don't always agree 100% with his model, especially on the TIE D and some named pilots, but it is the place to start for a list like this.

OK that would be great where can I go to find that?

Right here

I think it's a lot easier to classify ship types by tier, much like fighting games.... I think x wing is small enough to have three tiers, though the small and large ships may need to be separated... The trouble is talking about individual pilots, and upgrades... If we say no upgrades, and look at each ship class holistically (generics, but access to good pilots/dial/upgrades/cost) we can come up with something..,.

My gut feeling based on experience For th imperial ships, as the game stands now (wave 6 release)

Tier 1 (top) (very competitive)

Tie fighter / Tie phantom (w acd)

Tier 2 (middle)

Decimator / Tie interceptor / Tie bomber / Firespray / phantom / shuttle.

Tier 3 (bottom)

Tie advanced/ Tie defender

There are times when you could consider the bomber and defender in the lower tier, but they're quite good at something. Now, there are many ways to build the shuttle, and pilot abilities that put it into the second tier, it's really not very far off from the bottom tier, if naked, or not flown with technique. The bomber Is also closer to tier 3 - and can end up there with the wrong builds (say assault missile + proton torp x2 and a proton bomb - way too many points for what you get) ere are also a few builds with the defender that put it up not tier two... So don't look at this as a set clear list, but a bit fuzzier. Put all the factions together and there's room for lower middle and upper middle.

When you start doing this for pilots it starts to clear up a bit soontir is tier 1, fel's wrath tier 3. But I thnk the game is fairly balanced from a holistic perspective, phantom w acd and high pilot skill though is probably at the top for now.

Worst ship = Phantom.

The ship that wrecked the Meta, is unusable against new players (if you want them to play again) and stirred up a bucket of hate for Han Solo! (as the Falcon got kitted out as a counter to the OP Phantom).

Best Ship = Anything from the original Trilogy.

Phantom is fine against new players if you don't grab acd and vi.

best to worst ship list, does it exist?

Absolutely not, and such a mentality will harm your skill in the long run. Power is absolutely not linear.

There are a few ships that are seen to be kinda weak at their intended role but every single ship in the game has its own role to play and those roles are not the same. TIE phantom's useless if you want an ion weapon, no good taking a VT-49 if you want to dodge arcs, Falcon's terrible at blocking.

MajorJuggler's jousting values are a measure of that, jousting. They're how a ship does if it parks opposite an opposing ship, doesn't move ever and they sink dice into each other. They're not a measure of the quality of a ship, they're a measure of how much a ship needs to get back in its other abilities and strengths.

As near as I can tell, the best ship seems to be the one my opponent is playing. I seem to naturally choose the worst ship.

Oh, wait. That's just the way I fly...

Any such list would be incredibly subjective to the authors personal bias, let's go right to tie defenders they are a marmite ship you either love or hate them there's little middle ground, I have a lot of success with them as do others but most dismiss them due to cost or not having enough greens, no real right or wrong.

So your really going to struggle for a universal consensus.

Jousting values are great and MJ puts a lot of work into his calculations, but how often do you fly head on really? There are just so many things maths can't account for such as skill of the players and how hot their dice are in any given game.

Apart from the advanced pre raider release there's no ship that's outright terrible.

There's no such thing nor will there ever be at this point

"Best" and "worst" are completely subjective and incredibly vague definitions. You're better off just flying what you like. Granted, some combinations of ships/pilots/upgrades are in-efficient or just silly, but that's taken far more specifically than the "ship" level. Even the poor beleaguered tie advance is getting a face-lift soon.

Also, while the work Majorjuggler has done is commendable and his findings very interesting, Mathinwing is far too limited a perspective to offer any accurate information on the actual, overall effectiveness of certain ships. It just tells you how good they are at exchanging dice.

While readings on ships such as the X-wing, which can do little apart from maneuver and throw dice, do show that the base capabilities of the ship has issues, ships like fat han have an awful jousting value because of their cost/stat ratio. And yet, being a poor jouster does not stop it from being one of the most effective options in the game

Rather than an unattainable metric of "best" and "worst," you should be looking at these two critieria

1.) "What do I enjoy flying?"

2.) "How do I make what I enjoy flying work in the current metagame"

in the case of #2, until Wave 6 settles and probably beyond, whisper and turrets are still the ships to beat, but there are no other ships in the game that do not slot well against at least one of these extremes.

My very sloppy attempt at ranking the most common builds for each ship and how likely I am to use them in a tournament;

Rebels:

Fat Han

Super Dash

Corran Horn

Generic B

Generic Z

Warthog Y

Decked Out Jake/Generic A

Roark HWK

Luke

Imperial:

Whisper

Chiraneu

Soontir

Post fix advanced vader

Generic TIE/Howlrunner

Doom Shuttle

Vessery

Generic Firespray

Jonus

Guys, OP knows that no list is perfect. He or she recognizes that we all have preferences and that different situations favor different ships. We don't need to keep challenging the basic question.

As a new player, lists like MJs are incredibly helpful. They allow a player to look at what is considered effective and then develop personal opinions in conversation. We don't need an impulse from a vernal wood; sages are actually quite useful when trying to learn.

Further, MJ is very forthright about the potential shortcomings of his methods. He recognizes and addresses the critiques mentioned in this thread. Again, I don't think these numbers are the be all/end all of the debate. but dismissing them with straw man arguments does nothing to further our understanding of the game.

Worst ship = Phantom.

The ship that wrecked the Meta, is unusable against new players (if you want them to play again) and stirred up a bucket of hate for Han Solo! (as the Falcon got kitted out as a counter to the OP Phantom).

Best Ship = Anything from the original Trilogy.

Totally agree

Best ship = Assault Gunboat or K-wing

Worst Ship = Any Alternate Universe ships that show up

Also dont forget each player has their own unique play style and that alone changes which ships are amazingballs and which are weaksauce

I have a good buddy who loves the Defender and he makes it do great things while most would say its a "meh" ship at best

See what I'm saying?

TIE phantom's useless if you want an ion weapon, no good taking a VT-49 if you want to dodge arcs, Falcon's terrible at blocking.

While you are right about Phatoms and Ions, I think you are missing the mark with those other two. A VY-49 with PTL, Ysane Isard, and Engine Upgrade makes an awesome arc dodger and an ORS is a great blocker.

which only further mucks up any idea about a best/worst list

many ships have multiple uses, some of them being "better" than others at a particular role in a given circumstance and not so much in another, plus the distinctions between factions and how said ship complements said faction and that other options said faction offers and how they complement said ship and...

The "Best to worst" list is probably the most muddied right now than it's been since Wave 4 hit. Just about every ship has matches that they're strong against and matches they're weak against, which is wonderful.

Decimator + Whisper/Fel is probably still the list to beat, but there are a lot of roads that will get you to that win.

Sure there is, but the thing with a "best to worst" list is that every player has their own.

So play a bunch, and make yours.

The Phantom is blatantly the best ship. Turretwing is based entirely around not having to deal with one, so anyone that thinks turrets are annoying has the phantom to blame. It can be countered, but if you don't bring counters it's an autoloss. Not many other ships are like that in the game.

The whole meta revolves around dealing with the phantom's obnoxious shenanigans, of course it's the best ship.

Worst ship is the pre-raider advanced. Once the raider lands, eh. Probably the bomber or defender. 5 HWKs and 5 flight instructors is the worst possible list, but named hwks with upgrades are usable in a utility role in some lists, scum hwks especially.