Played three times against my wife and friends and won with various lists that had Defenders in it from traditional 100 point game to 150 point games. Each game the Defender was a workhorse with the white K-turns and added survivability helping to win every game.

So while I realize this was a small sample it did make me question why so many X-wing players are so down on the Defender. I play at my local store and most of the players there had a very low opinion of it so I know this is not just some random message board agenda. In my experience it is a great ship and while I admit a personal bias to it being my favorite ship to play in any version of the X-wing/TIE Fighter PC games from my younger years it seems to be a good ship in this game.

I realize you fly casual and play the ships you like but I'm really confused as to why the Defender has the rep it has.

The dial is a little rough and overdone in terms of limitations, imo. Either the red turns or the only greens being straight could have remained and the ship would have been perfectly balanced, but as is we got both.

Otherwise, apart from the morbidly overpriced Rexlar, I don't get the bad rep either. The Defender has a poor jousting value, but the white 4k makes it the best jouster since it's the only ship short of wingman EPTs that can pull of constant jousts. It can even pack an ion or flechette cannon to deny enemies jousts in the first place.

I will say they are a "whole > sum of their parts ship" and expensive points-wise, so it is understandable that one can't see their true value until they hit the table a few times and that no one would want to put them on the table in the first place.

4 Reasons:

1.) How expensive it is. White K turn is nice but it's still overpriced.

2.) All of that red. I'm paying 30 points for a TIE Fighter with red 1 and 2 hard turns. Neat.

3.) Dumpster tier pilot abilities. Vessery's ability is okay but I always want to run him with things that can't TL so then I have to shoehorn something with TL capability in and then I've blown half my points just to get a clunkier version of FCS going on my overpriced Trash Defender. Vessery might get a lot of love with the upcoming Advanced Targeting Computer for the Advanced, though. Rexler's ability is garbage.

4.) By the time I put some decent upgrades on one or get a named Defender, I could just have a Super Buzzsaw Whisper or Echo.

It is difficult to precisely value the TIE Defender's white K-turn, but the required efficiency provides some insight into the ship's total value. With a jousting efficiency of 76.6%, the Delta Squadron Pilot needs to do 61% more damage than its statline provides. The white K-turn does contribute to the game's highest dial coefficient of 1.23, but this is not nearly sufficient enough to do the required damage, and to overcome a jousting efficiency that is on par with the named YT-1300 pilots. The generic pilots are overcosted by at least 2 points, and possibly as much as 3 as these numbers indicate.

Not included in this analysis is weighting the value of the white K-turn inversely proportional to pilot skill. The PS1 Delta Squadron Pilot sees the biggest gain from the white K-turn, since the other pilots can be blocked.

It should be noted that Vessery can do reasonably well if you build a squad around him so his ability triggers on every shot.

However, as Goomba says, the imminent release of the Raider might give Vessery a new lease at life by providing him with spotters who actually want to get Target Locks and then not spend them.

Played three times against my wife and friends and won with various lists that had Defenders in it from traditional 100 point game to 150 point games. Each game the Defender was a workhorse with the white K-turns and added survivability helping to win every game.

So while I realize this was a small sample it did make me question why so many X-wing players are so down on the Defender. I play at my local store and most of the players there had a very low opinion of it so I know this is not just some random message board agenda. In my experience it is a great ship and while I admit a personal bias to it being my favorite ship to play in any version of the X-wing/TIE Fighter PC games from my younger years it seems to be a good ship in this game.

I realize you fly casual and play the ships you like but I'm really confused as to why the Defender has the rep it has.

There are a lot of professional x-wing-tournament gamers here. The glorious TIE Defender cost to much and has to many limitations to fit into their math for a 100 point list to be viable, as they like to say.

I love the ship. I immediately understood that you can not fly it like a TIE Fighter or Interceptor, you have to fly it like a TIE Defender.

Vessery + Adrenaline Rush + Cluster Missiles

2x Tempest Squadron, each with the X1 Title and Advanced Targeting Computers.

16 points leftover, so backstabber, dark curse, etc. Seems like a very fun list to fly and also one that seems moderately competitive.

I guess it also gets a bad rep because the name "Tie Defender" makes no sense because it's not defensive at all, and because it isn't called "Tie Kicker of ass"

Rexler's ability is situationally bonkers, when you watch him flip up 4 crits on a low Agility ship....

TIE/D's are just OK, just overpriced. I'd rather have a Bounty Hunter any day over the generics, and Whisper, Echo, Soontir, etc. over the Elites. It has no role where I don't have a more preferred option. Is that "bad" or just mediocre, or is there a difference when I still only have 100 points to spend?

I think part of the problem (in addition to everything else that has been said) is:

1. Those who played and loved the old TIE fighter computer games remembered the defender and really looked forward to it being the lethal death machine that it is in the computer games. On the table, it's a bit more average and balanced (arguably) as far as its points go. Ergo there was a bit of a let down after the hype.

2. The phantom came out at the same time. And the phantom DID deserve all its hype and DID turn out to be the. Lethal death machine that the Defender was supposed to be. So a lot of people who would have normally given the defender a chance just played phantoms instead.

Me personally, I like it okay, but haven't found anything I would consider competitive with it yet. I do like flying a generic with ion cannon and Prockets in casual games though. Ion your target to set up the shot, then white K-turn behind them with a focus to let loose the Prockets.

I wonder if it'd be overpriced if there was no red on the dial whatsoever.

Played three times against my wife and friends and won with various lists that had Defenders in it from traditional 100 point game to 150 point games. Each game the Defender was a workhorse with the white K-turns and added survivability helping to win every game.

So while I realize this was a small sample it did make me question why so many X-wing players are so down on the Defender. I play at my local store and most of the players there had a very low opinion of it so I know this is not just some random message board agenda. In my experience it is a great ship and while I admit a personal bias to it being my favorite ship to play in any version of the X-wing/TIE Fighter PC games from my younger years it seems to be a good ship in this game.

I realize you fly casual and play the ships you like but I'm really confused as to why the Defender has the rep it has.

There are a lot of professional x-wing-tournament gamers here. The glorious TIE Defender cost to much and has to many limitations to fit into their math for a 100 point list to be viable, as they like to say.

I love the ship. I immediately understood that you can not fly it like a TIE Fighter or Interceptor, you have to fly it like a TIE Defender.

That is true. It has its own unique flying pattern: lots of 3hard, 1slight, and 4white k. Its bulky and does well.

Its only real problem is the cost: its just so damnably expensive, you're going to have a hard time fitting anything else into the 100 pt list, THEN its also 3 points over costed for its value, so you're likely better off taking something else anyhow.

Its a good ship, just not efficient. Great if you aren't doing 100 pt games. ex 125 or 150 you're going to see a little more love for the ship. (But then again, for 120 points you can get 10 tie fighters. very little beats that for cost).

I've been flying the Defender a lot. You really don't need to hard 1 or 2 it if you fly it at arms length of your enemy, which, in my opinion and experience, is how you're supposed to be flying it. Slapping an HLC makes its damage output insane and utilizing its banking maneuvers and hard 3 to find lanes for you to 4k will make it extremely hard to hit. Adding a barrel roll to its action bar gives it even more arc-dodgy goodness, and loading up the cannon slot with an HLC lets you saturate the field with 4 dice every shot they take.

Although, I feel like the only pilots worth playing are the named ones, Vessery is great with Soontir + Targeting Computer and a Doom Shuttle, and Rexler is fantastic with Predator and Lone Wolf. They can pretty much make range 3 shots the entire game until you get to a point where you can just 4k until you win. When I fly Double-D's (dual Defenders, mind you) I like putting Stealth Devices or Hull Upgrades on them to make them even harder to kill, I even tried an Engine Upgrade tonight, but the boost action isn't too great without PtL, and PtL isn't that great on Defenders because they have no green maneuvers that aren't straight.

My favorite thing about the Defender is it green 5 forward. Situation's getting hairy? 5 up the hell outta there! That much distance on a ship armed with an HLC and a white 4k is insanely fun and good, in my books.

You pay through the nose for a nice stat-line and the white K-Turn.

Its biggest problem imho, is that it costs 1/3 of your points in normal play, and it has ONE action.

It usually needs that one action (Focus) for both defending and attacking.

And putting PtL on Defenders is, well..

It came out in the same wave as the Phantom which everyone thinks of as the greatest thing for the Empire since the Firespray

Think about it, would it have been in Wave 3 with the Lambda and the Bomber, things would have been just fine and it wouldn't have been kicked as much as it has been - probably gotten the same treatment as the Advanced with "then cool, now not so much" ... but released together with the Phantom and the attending effects the Phantom had on the way this game is played, the realities were ensured to happen as they have.

I believe FFG was honestly thinking the white 4K would be a bigger deal on the table. Turns out that once people got used to it it has become quite predictable. Of course you can always play mindgames with the 4k or 2forward, but that's really all the defender can do well in terms of his dial and it's pretty one dimensional.

And then it's missing the evade action. I cant tell you how frustrating that is if you've got 40+ invested in that ship. Everybody remembers the games where you just roll blanks and your super expensive defender goes down in a heartbeat. That's not fun.

Rexlar's ability is cool when it works in 1 out of 10 games, but in 9/10 games it's garbage. Vessery's is better IF you build your squad around it. Given the lack of ships with the TL action on the imp side (slightly better with the decimator now) i wonder if this ability shouldn't really have been on an e-wing. But even with Vessery you're building your whole squad around a bonus that a Phantom can get for 2 points with a FCS.

And he's PS6 which is currently in no-mans land.

Too bad the defender doesnt benefit from autothrusters, that would be something.

Its a good ship, just not efficient. Great if you aren't doing 100 pt games. ex 125 or 150 you're going to see a little more love for the ship. (But then again, for 120 points you can get 10 tie fighters. very little beats that for cost).

Definitely one of those ships that really shine in the larger format games where you have a few more points to play with ( a bit like the humble X-Wing)

I was very nearly taken to the cleaners almost single-handely by Rexler in an Epic game last Saturday .

When your primary objective is in front of you, and a Defender is behind you, be sure to wear your brown trousers.

In the standard 100 point format they are OK , but for a ship with a white K-turn, there's surprisingly few ways to improve its action economy.

For most ships - even ones which don't carry a lot of green - PTL or EI are your go-tos for that.

But with Defenders it can be so painfully difficult to shed stress once you've got it so those 2 upgrades are kind of a one-shot deal.

Predator was (quite literally) made for the Defender though

As much I appreciate MJ's number crunching on math wing I don't use it as the sole judgement value for how good or bad a ship is because anyone will tell you a good game has intangible variables. Even Maj Juggler will admit that he isn't too sure about the value of the white K-turn in the jousting calculation. Besides when it comes to math, statistics in my opinion have always been and always will be a dirty dirty liar.

CURSE YOU 1.5 AVERAGE DICE RESULTS FOR ONLY GIVING ME 3 HITS OUT OF THREE ROLLS Oh look 3 hits FOR THE OTHER PLAYER you may call it even but I call BS!

However you do have to look at the defender point cost an notice it is high. It is the most expensive small base ship costing more than a quarter of the large base ships which have more health. And yes it is a Tie bomber with 50% shields and all 3 stats is nothing to sneeze at but is each stat line worth 10 points?

And Yes I have seen some nice tricks with the white K essentially doing a Uturn with the barrel roll to get straight behind someone but I also have seen the red 1 and 2 turns work against it as I was able to ion and stack 2 stress on a defender as it heads for the edge of the table. When it finally shook off the ion blasts from a Y-wing behind it it needed to do a 2 turn to avoid hitting the edge and with 2 stress tokens it left the game.

Honestly I believe it's because the TIE Defender is pretty poorly represented in this game. The Defender is supposed to be the best fighter in every way within its time period, though prohibitively expensive to build. It was also only flown by the most elite of the elite Imperial pilots. Now let's look at the Defender in this game.

> High cost - YES

> Great stats - Debatable. 3/3/3/3 is good but given the ships other limitations I would have wanted one of these values to be a 4

> High pilot skills - NO. Delta Squadron pilot has a skill of 1, whereas the lowest skilled X-wing pilot has a skill of 2. No EPTs on the generics? What's going on here? Also the abilities of the named pilots don't exactly set fire to my underwear

> Great actions - NO. Where is the evade and the boost!?

> Fantastic manoeuvre dial - NO, in my opinion. OK the speed of the Defender is well represented in a straight line, but it also has great agility:

"In addition to the main thrusters located in the aft section, the Defender's triple wing design allowed for three arrays of manoeuvring jets - which gave it a manoeuvring rating of 110 DOF - and it featured an advanced F-sx flight avionics system to process the pilot's instructions. When combined, these systems made the ship not only faster, but more agile than any other starfighter in Imperial service and capable of matching the fastest starfighters in the Alliance Fleet" (From Wookiepedia)

The Defender was the Empire's answer to the threat of Rebel starfighters, it was specifically designed to be superior in every way. It was massively expensive so only seasoned Interceptor elite pilots received one. A single Defender should be a major threat in X-wing, and a pair of them should be a nightmare. I just don't believe the implementation of the Defender was well executed at all.

Its not the ship that is the problem. Its just the cost of it. I think the TIE D is an awsome ship.

Red turns and no evade action.

Played three times against my wife and friends and won with various lists that had Defenders in it from traditional 100 point game to 150 point games. Each game the Defender was a workhorse with the white K-turns and added survivability helping to win every game.

So while I realize this was a small sample it did make me question why so many X-wing players are so down on the Defender. I play at my local store and most of the players there had a very low opinion of it so I know this is not just some random message board agenda. In my experience it is a great ship and while I admit a personal bias to it being my favorite ship to play in any version of the X-wing/TIE Fighter PC games from my younger years it seems to be a good ship in this game.

I realize you fly casual and play the ships you like but I'm really confused as to why the Defender has the rep it has.

There are a lot of professional x-wing-tournament gamers here. The glorious TIE Defender cost to much and has to many limitations to fit into their math for a 100 point list to be viable, as they like to say.

I love the ship. I immediately understood that you can not fly it like a TIE Fighter or Interceptor, you have to fly it like a TIE Defender.

I'm not taking the piss, but what exactly is a professional x-wing tournament player?

I haven't tried Defenders, as far as I recall (maybe one game when they were new?), but I just had a quick look at coming up with a list:

http://xwing-builder.co.uk/view/218700/squid

Couldn't this work quite well?

So while I realize this was a small sample it did make me question why so many X-wing players are so down on the Defender. I play at my local store and most of the players there had a very low opinion of it so I know this is not just some random message board agenda.

Confirmation bias. The internet said it was bad so people find reasons for it to be bad.

I'm not taking the piss, but what exactly is a professional x-wing tournament player?

Same thing a robot death hamster fairy.

Non-existent.

Of course you can always play mindgames with the 4k or 2forward, but that's really all the defender can do well in terms of his dial and it's pretty one dimensional.

One dimensional? It's a constant consideration when fighting a TIE defender.

Not that it'll do a white K-turn, but that it can.

Red turns and no evade action.

Red 1 and 2, its 3 turn is white as is its koiogran. Evade isn't really that much better than focus on a 3 die ship. Is the red koiogran turn on all other ships crippling? No. It's more that they have to go straight to shed that stress. The red 1 turn is in a way an advantage in disguise: nobody ever expects you to do it.

The Defender's problem is that it excels at long range but has a fast dial that pushes it into situations. The trick to it is learning how to keep it fighting at range. The 1 bank is your friend, as is the cannon slot. If you can't afford the HLC the Mangler's pretty **** nasty too. The crit is a highly underestimated effect because it gets mathematically quantified in terms of Direct Hit and Minor Explosion and not on the rest of the damage deck.

It's a hard ship to play well, and as a result isn't popular. People tend to (myself included) assume a ship is bad if they lose with it, as if skill level is a constant and it's all list building.

One thing I find very useful for them is a Command Shuttle (Fleet Officer, Advanced Sensors, Omicron Group Pilot). You've also got a spare crew slot for Weapons Engineer if you want to combo with Vessery, and it frees them up to use their barrel roll without losing offensive potency. I also think the TIE defender is the single best ship for Hull Upgrade in the game: Hull Upgrade is much better behind 3 agility, and unlike the TIE interceptor the TIE defender gets shot a lot more.

Too many drawbacks for its only advantage.

Very high cost... no green banks (even the TIE bomber has green Banks, come on)... and most useful turns are red (which also combine with the previous in horrid stress management in a more and more frequent stress meta)... Poor action bar (it really should have had boost native or evade), and to be really nitpicky, mutually exclusive upgrades (you probably are not going to equip a missile if you equip a cannon)...

At some point FFG has to understand that if they stack too much limitations in exchange of an advantage, ( see Saboteur, Kanos, Lorrir...) that ability ceases to be an advantage and becomes a hindrance.