so, the only aspect of this game that has never been addressed to my knowledge is the damage deck.

what I think would be interesting would be, not to replace the deck, but add a few more cards, example:

glancing hit = roll 1 defense die, on an evade result discard this card with no effect. you may use focus tokens for this roll.

or

careen = immediately barrel roll in the direction chosen by attacker. this must be a legal barrel roll, then flip this card face down.

or

engine failure = roll an attack die at the start of each activation phase, on a hit or critical result flip this card face down and continue as normal. on any other result, when your dial is revealed, treat it as a red stop maneuver.

glancing hit = roll 1 defense die, on an evade result discard this card with no effect. you may use focus tokens for this roll.

I don't think we need more effects from damage cards, but maybe things that affect other upgrade cards the way munitions failure does. Something that could cause you to loose a crew or system upgrade card.

It's too difficult to add cards to the standard damage deck since it would require all players to have to have it. It makes sense requiring people to buy the core set, but forcing all players to get additional damage cards? Not likely. Unless they made it a "casual play" only thing.

Well, I like the idea of new damage cards. The obvious issue is the core set. The best way to do it is to add damage cards to each expansion and make them mandatory additions when bringing elements of that expansion, or make damage deck building a part of the game, allowing for players to have non unique damage decks that follow particular restrictions. For instance, players must bring exactly 33 cards and the deck must include at least one of each of the core set damage cards and at least two direct hits. Then they can bring whatever they want from other expansions. The new cards would be balanced to be more impactful, so you weigh shaving off undesirable old crits against the still-potent new ones.

There are crits people would want to keep as they have little effect.

That's one thought anyway. It's certainly a balance challenge to consider introducing new damage cards at all. I do support the idea, the current deck is quite outdated and some cards have little impact on most lists.

A second option would be to release new cards in expansions then supply the full new set to TOs in TO kits to distribute to make them all mandatory. What a nightmare. I like the deck building idea better.

The option they missed was adding a faction locked damage deck to Most Wanted, where scum had to use the new damage deck instead. It's something to keep in mind.

One thing to be mindful of, FFG can also create an Xwing MK 2 and release an MK2 boxed set that includes new whatever they want!

Some players might not like buying new stuff to stay current, but Warhammer does this routinely and Warmachine has done it as well. Most similar games eventually overhaul the game at some cost to players to provide a better game.

Crew and system slot damage cards are too specific. Munitions failure ends up doing nothing often enough- We don't need a card that only applies to a handful of ships.

Damage deck building would lead to a lot of min-maxing and doesn't seem like it would improve the game.

The careen damage card looks interesting, though. Engine failure could be interesting, but it would make more sense if the ship kept it's maneuver from the previous turn (Although that could be a bit of a hassle if someone was just fiddling around with it absent minded and changed it)- There's no friction worth speaking of in space, so if you lost maneuvering control you'd keep going the way you were going.

well, they added debris clouds in wave 5 and now they are tournament legal.

and I am not suggesting damage deck building. what I am suggesting is additional cards that you can use in friendly games, then after a wave or 2 see them legal for tournaments.

also, I see the point of the glancing hit not being negative. but think about it like this, you have that 1 card in the damage deck, where you are down to your last hit and you have to draw a critical. but WOW!! what luck, you draw a lucky glancing hit. you roll your defense die and negate the damage. now that being said, what if the effect was an option. you may choose to roll the die. if you do and succeed you avoid the damage, but if you fail you take a 2 damage direct hit. if you don't roll, you just flip the card face down and treat as normal damage.

well, they added debris clouds in wave 5 and now they are tournament legal.

and I am not suggesting damage deck building. what I am suggesting is additional cards that you can use in friendly games, then after a wave or 2 see them legal for tournaments.

also, I see the point of the glancing hit not being negative. but think about it like this, you have that 1 card in the damage deck, where you are down to your last hit and you have to draw a critical. but WOW!! what luck, you draw a lucky glancing hit. you roll your defense die and negate the damage. now that being said, what if the effect was an option. you may choose to roll the die. if you do and succeed you avoid the damage, but if you fail you take a 2 damage direct hit. if you don't roll, you just flip the card face down and treat as normal damage.

There are lists that pay extra points just to get more crit results, on the basis that a crit should never be beneficial to a regular hit. Making crit cards that are good for a ship to get kinda makes crit upgrades pointless.

Not again. No new damage decks. The core set is required, and that has the required damage deck that has critical damage cards affecting nearly every possible ship on the table. A new deck would require another mandatory purchase--a terrible business move that will never happen. It makes no sense to include rare critical effects for a few special ships or circumstances, where the odds of it actually affecting the game is 3,720 to 1.

This conversation has been rehashed dozens of times.

IF changes are to be made to the damage deck, and that is a big IF, my thought is they just need to expand the scope of a few of the critical cards they have. Munition's Failure is an obvious choice as it just misses much of the time yet if it could hit other upgrades it would be feared a lot more.

The same thing I thought last month when this was brought up, and the month before, and the month before.....

ok idea, no really good way to implement it.

see you next month

I think they've done too much balancing around the current deck to go mucking about.

I am fascinated by the absolute reticent nature of many of the posters on this site when it comes to things like new base components.

I understand that FFG has made a point, at lease until Wave 5, that all that is really required is the core game, as it pertains to base components. But that doesn't mean that it has to stay that way. Nor would it mean the sky is falling if they changed that position.

In fact, as has already been pointed out, Debris Fields were not part of the core game, and yet they are now tournament legal. The way some of you approach change, there should be a massive outcry over this fact alone ... I mean, g-d forbid, you have to purchase something other than the core set to get a new base component.

I, for one, would love to see a new damage deck. For that matter, I would love to see more than one. If would be fairly simple to indicate on the cards themselves as to which deck they belong, and FFG could change the rules so that all you would need is one complete deck to participate in a tournament.

It wouldn't mean the sky is falling, you would be under no obligation to purchase whatever expansion would come with the new deck, etc.

Change is good ... options are better.

I'd like to see some asymmetrical critical hits. A damaged right engine that increases the difficulty of right turns, and also one for the left engine. It's not entirely thematic since X-wing battles are fought in a 3D plane, but I like the gameplay it would offer.

Whether an individual change is good or bad is contextual, and whether more options in an area depends on the effect the presence of those objects has. This thread is getting the reactions it is because this topic has been discussed to death almost every month on these boards. Ultimately, for official play, it just isn't practical for the tournament scene, and would be questionable as to the effect on the play experience, at best.

Now, if you want to homebrew a new damage deck, that'd be an interesting project, but that's better suited to the subforum for that.

Whether an individual change is good or bad is contextual, and whether more options in an area depends on the effect the presence of those objects has. This thread is getting the reactions it is because this topic has been discussed to death almost every month on these boards. Ultimately, for official play, it just isn't practical for the tournament scene, and would be questionable as to the effect on the play experience, at best.

Now, if you want to homebrew a new damage deck, that'd be an interesting project, but that's better suited to the subforum for that.

So, basically, if an idea of some new base component originates with a poster on this site, then it is a non-starter, stupid idea, can't be done, can't be balanced, the sky is falling, etc.

But if an idea comes from FFG (i.e. Debris Fields), then all is right and good in the world, and it achieves complete satisfaction and balance.

Give me a break.

Much like there were a plethora of posters on this site that said that a 3rd Faction would never ever happen, that it was a completely stupid idea, with no possibility of occurring ...

And then, FFG said let there be a 3rd Faction, and now all is right in the world. S&V is the greatest thing since sliced bread.

I swear I would be willing to provide FFG substantial funds to simply have them create a new damage deck so I can see all of you fall all over yourselves as to what a good idea it was, what incredible diversity it added, etc. And even if somehow you didn't feel that way, you would have to live with it. And compete against it.

Oh the effing horror !!!

Ultimately, for official play, it just isn't practical for the tournament scene, and would be questionable as to the effect on the play experience, at best.

How is it impractical for tournament?

Tournament play is the most practical sphere of play to implement new or modified damage cards. Not only are tournament players more likely to stay current with purchasing new material, but they are required to be current on any FAQ or erratta changes. Imaging how much differently the game would play if a munitions failure was erratta'ed to remove a secondary weapon, crew member, systems upgrade, or modification? People might protest that losing their 3 point C-3PO to a crit, but shedding a 7 point HLC doesn't destroy the game balance.

Ultimately, for official play, it just isn't practical for the tournament scene, and would be questionable as to the effect on the play experience, at best.

How is it impractical for tournament?

Tournament play is the most practical sphere of play to implement new or modified damage cards. Not only are tournament players more likely to stay current with purchasing new material, but they are required to be current on any FAQ or erratta changes. Imaging how much differently the game would play if a munitions failure was erratta'ed to remove a secondary weapon, crew member, systems upgrade, or modification? People might protest that losing their 3 point C-3PO to a crit, but shedding a 7 point HLC doesn't destroy the game balance.

Errata'ing the damage deck is a whole 'nother cup of tea, but that would require a functionality change to a game card, which is more than FFG has been willing to do so far (The cloak change is a rules change, not a change to a product). Unless you count making Daredevil function as intended, anyway.

The barrier to entry would be minor. As stated, most tournament players are more likely to buy anything that is released. If they need something to play, and the price is reasonable with regard to the value, then they will certainly buy it.

The difference is that debris are an optional substitution. For the same level of change to apply, any update to the damage deck would have to be optional.

This is not impossible, but it adds a whole new dimension to the game. Do you build your own damage deck? Pick any 33 cards you want? Sure I'll replace all the direct hit with munitions failure.

Another option would be to add an extra ten cards, so you can run a 33 card deck or a 43 card deck. But why would you add cards that you know could hurt you? There would have to be something to offset that, some bonus. Is having a slightly lower chance of drawing double damage worth the risk of losing a crew?

I think it's likely we'll get an updated core set with updated rules and updated damage deck if/when the new Star Wars movie stuff joins the game. It's a good jumping on point for new players so they don't have to go back and collect all the old ships, but it's compatible with the old stuff too, and it could include all the extra rules added with reference cards so we don't have to carry those around anymore. And it could include the now 15 16 pages (holy crap!) of FAQ nonsense that many of us more casual players don't even know about.

with 33 cards i think we are fine with the damage deck. we dont need more crippling effects

I don't think that anyone is looking for crippling effect, just a little more spice when the flip a card. The fact that munitions failure is a good thing to turn over 90% of the time is getting old.

I think at some point we'll see some new damage cards. The X-wing formula seems to be about new ships and upgrade cards, but there are many other variables that make up the game that can be modified to keep things interesting the damage deck is one of them.

Well, I like the idea of new damage cards. The obvious issue is the core set. The best way to do it is to add damage cards to each expansion and make them mandatory additions when bringing elements of that expansion, or make damage deck building a part of the game, allowing for players to have non unique damage decks that follow particular restrictions. For instance, players must bring exactly 33 cards and the deck must include at least one of each of the core set damage cards and at least two direct hits. Then they can bring whatever they want from other expansions. The new cards would be balanced to be more impactful, so you weigh shaving off undesirable old crits against the still-potent new ones.

There are crits people would want to keep as they have little effect.

That's one thought anyway. It's certainly a balance challenge to consider introducing new damage cards at all. I do support the idea, the current deck is quite outdated and some cards have little impact on most lists.

A second option would be to release new cards in expansions then supply the full new set to TOs in TO kits to distribute to make them all mandatory. What a nightmare. I like the deck building idea better.

The option they missed was adding a faction locked damage deck to Most Wanted, where scum had to use the new damage deck instead. It's something to keep in mind.

One thing to be mindful of, FFG can also create an Xwing MK 2 and release an MK2 boxed set that includes new whatever they want!

Some players might not like buying new stuff to stay current, but Warhammer does this routinely and Warmachine has done it as well. Most similar games eventually overhaul the game at some cost to players to provide a better game.

9 got the bulls-eye. It is the core set as such everything you need to play. You can make changes to rules fairly easy with an FAQ. However adding components, changing stat values or point cost on cards, adding or subtracting dice, that is where it becomes a complicated problem. When coming up with ideas you need to think of what restrictions are you working with. For X-wing the answer is simply the core set. You can't just add or take away elements of the core set and expect it to be fair for all players, especially with the competitive scene that X-wing has.

Now sure there can be a 2nd edition of the core set with new rules and components. But you got to remember allot of players already have a core set and don't need to buy new models. If FFG makes a 2nd edition with new components such as new damage cards they will also need to make an update pack which has all the new components that can just be added to the 1st edition core set.

Still the question goes do we really need a 2nd edition. Well that is a good question. After all since the core we have added (to standard) large ships, Ion tokens, 7 different upgrade types, 2 new actions, a new maneuver, and the 3rd faction. I will admit these are a lot of changes that sure I can see the rule-book being rewritten but I just don't think the game is ready yet for a 2nd edition.

The difference is that debris are an optional substitution. For the same level of change to apply, any update to the damage deck would have to be optional.

This is not impossible, but it adds a whole new dimension to the game. Do you build your own damage deck? Pick any 33 cards you want? Sure I'll replace all the direct hit with munitions failure.

Another option would be to add an extra ten cards, so you can run a 33 card deck or a 43 card deck. But why would you add cards that you know could hurt you? There would have to be something to offset that, some bonus. Is having a slightly lower chance of drawing double damage worth the risk of losing a crew?

In my view, if there were multiple damage decks, there would be no "deck building".

You would simply have to come to the tournament with either Deck A (original core set) or Deck B (new deck) in total. In other words, the complete deck from A or B.

I think if done correctly, FFG could create a new deck which fairly balances with the original deck, and where the deck you bring could be one of a strategic choice.

In fact, I for one would love to see it be just another part of your list that you have to supply in advance, and cannot change for the duration of the tournament ... nor should anyone else be privy to the deck you are bringing before they have submitted their own list.