LGS had a small 10 man tournament. 180pts (essentially half a starter). No a scenarios.

The choice was to avoid confusion seeing as my 3 games was the most anyone had played of the game prior.

I picked Rebels and immediately regretted it. Without scenario, The VSD parked on the back edge and moved 1 the whole game to avoid giving me a rear shot. After 6 turns, I cleared most of the fighter squads (all 3 games had Hoiwlrunner and 5 other squads) but lacked the firepower to punch through the VSD to do any meaningful damage.

After the game, all 3 Imperial players were 1st, 2nd, and 3rd. We decided next event will use objectives.

So how has objectives changed the game for you? Do you find it balances the game? Share your thoughts please.

Currently rebels are, essentially, undefeated in scenario play @ the LGS. The only loss was because the corvette just clipped the back edge of a victory 1 and ended up leaving it right in front of the victory, which one shotted the corvette. Had the corvette not been one shotted, or had the maneuver been 1/4" further, the game would have gone to the rebels. 1 ship is just too little in scenario play, and a VSD has a horrible time getting a shot off out of the front arc if its not hugging a board edge.

Play 300 point games. Play with objectives. So much better that way.

Play 300 point games. Play with objectives. So much better that way.

Signed

Currently rebels are, essentially, undefeated in scenario play @ the LGS. The only loss was because the corvette just clipped the back edge of a victory 1 and ended up leaving it right in front of the victory, which one shotted the corvette. Had the corvette not been one shotted, or had the maneuver been 1/4" further, the game would have gone to the rebels. 1 ship is just too little in scenario play, and a VSD has a horrible time getting a shot off out of the front arc if its not hugging a board edge.

I'm confused about how clipping the back edge of a Star Destroyer put you in front of it...ships don't follow the same overlapping placement rules as squadrons. Can you elaborate on what happened?

Overall, I agree, Objectives significantly change the game for the better, giving fleets both more flexibility and more focus.

Always play with the objective cards.

However, if you do play without objective cards make sure you use the rules from "Unlimited Rounds" which has initiative transferring back and forth between players. So a rebel player can move safe in the knowledge that he gets first activation next turn.

I actually don't like the strict 6 turn limit of the objective cards, or the weirdly gamey aspects to a number of the objectives. I see a lot of battle reports being more single passes than slugfest fleet smashing fight.

So I think I will play an equal number of games with my own scenarios that have a more flexible time limit, but also uses the Unlimited Round rules to keep initiative fair. I suspect that FFG will have more missions later on as the game progresses.

Funny note, I've only gotten in two while games so far, played as Rebels both times. Game one was the starter game, I wiped out his fighters, had four or five hits on the Vic, had both my ships with little or no damage, and Luke was parked on him when round six ended.

Game two was an Objective game, I lost my fighters, my Corvette was a single hit from destruction, my Neb was busy rebuilding all shields, and the Vic was basically untouched.

Guess I'm the odd man out as a Rebel commander, as the Objective was harder on me than "faster pussycat, kill! Kill!"

Currently rebels are, essentially, undefeated in scenario play @ the LGS. The only loss was because the corvette just clipped the back edge of a victory 1 and ended up leaving it right in front of the victory, which one shotted the corvette. Had the corvette not been one shotted, or had the maneuver been 1/4" further, the game would have gone to the rebels. 1 ship is just too little in scenario play, and a VSD has a horrible time getting a shot off out of the front arc if its not hugging a board edge.

I'm confused about how clipping the back edge of a Star Destroyer put you in front of it...ships don't follow the same overlapping placement rules as squadrons. Can you elaborate on what happened?

Overall, I agree, Objectives significantly change the game for the better, giving fleets both more flexibility and more focus.

He started his activation near the edge of short range of the front left corner of the victory. He tried to go "though" the victory just past the back right corner of the victory, but didn't quite make it, so we reduced the speed by 1 and checked to see if he could land. He couldn't, so we reduced the speed again by one, which left him sitting right next to the corner of the victory, and we assigned both ships a damage card.

Its possible we're playing that wrong - there is still some bleed over from x-wing in some of the games.

Looks like you played it right to me.

In a 180 pt game on a 3x3 mat, that tactic of the VSD deploying in the corner and crawling at Speed 1 is very difficult to beat, esp if they max their Squadron commands. One word for this. BORING. The only defense is to do pretty much the same thing IMO. VERY BORING. Lets face it, at that point it ceases to be a game so what's the point in playing? If I come up against another player who does that I'll just concede and go and watch some paint dry.

Fortunately, in a 300 pt game with a bigger play area, smaller deployment zone and objectives, it doesn't work. 300 pts is where its at. Swap/lend your core ships and have a proper game, it is SO much better that in many ways it is a different game.

In a 180 pt game on a 3x3 mat, that tactic of the VSD deploying in the corner and crawling at Speed 1 is very difficult to beat, esp if they max their Squadron commands. One word for this. BORING. The only defense is to do pretty much the same thing IMO. VERY BORING. Lets face it, at that point it ceases to be a game so what's the point in playing? If I come up against another player who does that I'll just concede and go and watch some paint dry.

Yeah, I mean that's pretty much exactly what happened. I was the only Rebel player in the top 4 and every game was exactly the same. The VSD parked in the corner, spd 1 and adjusted to keep the nose pointed at one ship. I pretty much went max speed to slip past the front arc but if they take a few command tokens, they can just set up engineering on turns 3 to 6 to recover shields and I wasn't making significant damage. I put through 3 to 5 hits, but there isn't partial points so I had to play very carefully. One ship loss was essentially an auto lose.

Fortunately, this sounds like this will be the last tournament without objectives. I made my case that Rebels really only had 1 real way of winning in the set up: moving Speed 1 and clearing out their Tie Swarm, then running until turn 6 is over while not losing all your X-Wings.

Once Wave 1 hits and people are able to buy some more stuff, I'm sure we'll be moving on to 300pt games. Right now, it's tough trying to convince these guys to buy 2 box sets a piece.

In a 180 pt game on a 3x3 mat, that tactic of the VSD deploying in the corner and crawling at Speed 1 is very difficult to beat, esp if they max their Squadron commands. One word for this. BORING. The only defense is to do pretty much the same thing IMO. VERY BORING. Lets face it, at that point it ceases to be a game so what's the point in playing? If I come up against another player who does that I'll just concede and go and watch some paint dry.

Fortunately, in a 300 pt game with a bigger play area, smaller deployment zone and objectives, it doesn't work. 300 pts is where its at. Swap/lend your core ships and have a proper game, it is SO much better that in many ways it is a different game.

My sentiments exactly, what fun is there in playing like this let alone playing against it. Whenever I play Imperial I just go for it and have a great game and I still haven't lost a SD!

Though in tournaments where prizes are on the line, most people are going to do what they think is going to get them the win, regardless of how fun it is. I don't know who said it, but a game designer was quoted as saying something about how players will do whatever will help them win, even if it doesn't seem intuitive or makes the game not fun.

That is why I bought 6 sets........I have lots of ships and fighters, I also have ship cards for Imperial Nebulon B and CR-90. I have shopped at Shapeways and bought a set of 12 TIE defenders and TIE Avengers. I have finished the fighter card for the TIE Defenders, now I am working on the card for the TIE Avengers. Also you know you can have tourneys that are not regulated, there is no such this as "game police". I am tired of the "On the boat" , thing for wave one. I know you have to plan but try to get the next set of ships quickly so that in this instance there is some kind of variety.

If I am going to play I want a lot of stuff to use. So if you opponent wants to play slow mo, then swamp him with ships. Alsomake your own if you need to.

Remember, I'm talking tournament play here. You make a single 180pt fleet and play 3 or 4 rounds.

Outside of that, I will definitely be playing some Imps for a bit to see how 'greener' that grass is over there.

Honestly playing 180pt tournaments right now is just silly. There isn't enough going on in the Core Set to allow for interesting optimal gameplay. If you play smart on both sides the game at that point level turns into one where just Squadrons die.

The Victory has no way to hedge in the faster Rebel ships and the Rebel ships don't have enough to kill the Victory, without taking undue risks.

Even with objectives it doesn't help the fact that there isn't enough on the board to make tactically sound play interesting.

Not that there needs to be in a Core Set but this 180pt stop gap point level really isn't a good showcase for the game.

Once Wave 1 hits and people are able to buy some more stuff, I'm sure we'll be moving on to 300pt games. Right now, it's tough trying to convince these guys to buy 2 box sets a piece.

No need to buy 2 box sets. Buy one and go splitsies on another. I'm still not sure how into the game I plan on getting, but I just split a core set 60/40 with a guy who already owned one. I got the rebel ships I wanted, dice, and a plastic snake; while he got another VSD and some more ties. It made the startup way more palatable.

So glad some people here agree with me Thankfully, most people I play with do too.

I swapped my Imp stuff for a friend's rebel stuff. We've been playing 300 points since then and haven't looked back. Wins/losses have been fairly balanced and we've had some fantastic games - even if you just swap ships for the duration of a game, I cannot recommend it enough. The objectives can really add a lot too.

The VSD parked on the back edge and moved 1 the whole game to avoid giving me a rear shot.

So since I play Imp's I have to automatically give you free shots at my rear arc?

On a serious note, until wave 1 is out and people start running at 300, we really can't tell how much difference scenarios are going to really going to make. And honestly, until wave 2 hits and it goes to 400, that's when we'll really see how it balances out.

For Rebel players who don't want to slug it out with a Star Destroyer at 180 points, the scenario is essential. Some of the navigation scenarios especially allow a player to rack up 75 to 80 points without ever having to engage the enemy at all, so the Rebel ships could just run for the objectives, rack up the points, avoid the Star Destroyer altogether, and win in six turns.

The scenario can also force the Imperial player to not hang back, come out to chase the Rebel ships, and make a fatal error, such as allowing the Rebel ships into his rear arc.

So yeah, scenario changes everything, especially at 180 points!