Power creep is bound to happen at some point. If the new releases are weaker (less power at higher cost) than what's already released, then why would you buy them? (Well besides fans of a particular new ship design maybe, but that can't be a large crowd.)

or the alternative:

new ship is competitive alongside the old options

why must it be overall more or less powerful than something else? Unless the game is stiflingly simplistic, new options can excel in new areas while failing in others to present an overall package that can either succeed or fail with equal reliability against options new and old. The differentiating factor should always be the player.

better question: why the hell are we even asking this question?

yes

unless FFG turns into a scum-bag company like GW, your older options should always be relevent

We have a term for what happens to games that leave their older options behind. It's called "Power Creep." It's not a good thing.

The X-wing's already obsolete, though. It got its ass kicked by the head-hunter (which, ironically, is obsolete in the fluff because it was replaced by...the X-wing). Only a few of the named pilots keep it kicking.

And then the K-wing happened.

yes indeed.

the K-wing happened, and at the base level it sucks compared to the B-wing. Balanced chugs on as normal.

The X-wing was in a bit of an odd spot since it was released next to the more efficient tie fighter

Seeing as this is a quarter past the rebellion, the X Wing should be the rebellion's main fighter and in no way should be obsolete. It should be one of the most cost effective (and straight up effective) options for a rebel list. Instead its not. Hence a lot of the discussion about the X.

A battletech style era system could work bby,aby,abe and then whatever we call the new era.

But even 3039 mechs still work in 3090 they are less advanced but also alot cheaper.

The massive problem we had with battletech was the 'tonnage' points system.

Clan mechs when they came out massively outperformed inner sphere mechs of the same tonnage.

We fixed it in true narrative style.

We'd set a 'tonnage value' of inner sphere mechs and then both of us would 'bid' to see what the least amount of clan we coudl counter it would be (as both of us had clan and IS mechs). Whoever bid loweset got the battle as clan.

Id did mean you could find yourself figghting 250 tons of IS mechs with a madcat on its own though

Your not using battle value 2.0?

Cause that mad cats 2737 BV it's an amazing mech and 75 tons of IS mechs will not win.

If you go to sarna.net it lists the BV for every mech build your forces using that value you'll have much fairer matches, generally IS mechs will have a 2-1 advantage in numbers, if you get the manuals they also have the costs for the mechs.

Balance is something everyone strives for in nature (Yin and Yang). Without balance you have Chaos, which means the game is going to be no fun to play and soon dead.

Balance allows for all creatures and game pieces to each have their own use along with others. If you don't strive for balance in everything you do, then chaos will reign supreme.

eagletsi

Not played since about 2000, we used to use tonnage.

I sort of loved and hated BT in equal measures. Great concept, much better if played as miniatures rather then hex maps though.

But i hated the fact that armour was apparently made out of plaster.

Because a machine gun did one point of damage. It might take you 200 turns but you could essentially chip away at a hih tech 100 ton battle robot with a .50 cal and destroy it.

And if you were lucky enogh to get a critical on its ammo storage bin for say a SINGLE machine gun then it took 200 poiints of damage to that area that cascaded out. Given that a short range anti tank missile did what, six poiints of damage.

I struggled with my sense of disbelief with that

CASE helped a lot but again, clan mech.

Back to xwing, Phiocon is right in the 'time frame' of the gamethe Xwing should be good. And if you play all OT ships its still not bad IMO but the problem is their is no timeframe.

The 'ewing' is so late as to be virtually irrelevant, most of the EU stuff comes out *after* endor and is created with all that trhawn/clone emperor/lasong sushong rubbish and is years down the line from the original trilogy battles.

But you have to keep making new models to sell the game to stay in business so you have to get increasingly obscure and lets be honest their are only like what TEN small ships that are space battle worthy in the films.

The game would have been dead in the water a year ago if they had not included 'late' and 'obscure' eu stuff.

And then as others have said, you bring out a new ship. It needs a USP, it needs a 'feature' so it gets a new trick (ION, boost, cloak, SLAM... you choose, all post core game card upgrades) so it seems very shiny and does make the original stuff (thats still IMO sound) look a little flat.

Balance is something everyone strives for in nature (Yin and Yang). Without balance you have Chaos, which means the game is going to be no fun to play and soon dead.

Balance allows for all creatures and game pieces to each have their own use along with others. If you don't strive for balance in everything you do, then chaos will reign supreme.

eagletsi

Actually without 'balance' you have chaos or law if you like your Moorcock

His multiverse is all about chaos and law fighting for control of the earth and the neccesity of a 'balance'

Chaos is beauty and art but also destruction, law is stability and peace but also stagnation.

more simply,

game balance is stability and peace

dice are chaos

or perhaps....fickle?

Only the green ones.

The red ones are faithful, well my doctored ones with no blank faces are anyway

(that was a joke btw, i dont use doctored dice)

Only the green ones.

The red ones are faithful, well my doctored ones with no blank faces are anyway

(that was a joke btw, i dont use doctored dice)

Thats true the person doing the operation did not have his licence.

Aaaawww! I wanna play unbound/alternate history WWII games!

Oponent: "Okay I got my 1943 russian army with me and- Dafuq did you bring?"

Me: "My "Patton's Alliance" army: Joint american/german infantry devision mounted in M3 halftracks suported by 3 Königstigers."

Opponent: *facepalm*

Me: "We can also play "Operation Downfall"! I got home made nuclear blast radius markers!"

Opponent: *Double facepalm*

You say this but we used to play 'rapid fire' at GW HQ (til we were told off my the directors because all the figure cabinets in the head office were full of 20mm WWII and not GW!) and people had very 'tenous' historical armies.

I think one guy using the '1 tank = 5' scale of rapid fire had more jagdtigers in his army than were actually ever produced , certainly more than would ever have been in the same place at the same time.

But I did once want to do a 'end of the war goes wrong' game with Soviets vs Americans on the demarcation line in the middle of germany.

I also wanted to do a 'warfilm' 20mm geman army where every thing was actually a chafee or a sheridan but just painted grey and had a huge swastika drawn on the side.... like in all the old post war movies!

Does a 52 Chevy need to be rebalanced in GMs terms in comparison to a 2014 Chevy Vette?

At some point an older ship is just that, obsolete.

Just my opinion.

Well, your opinion is wrong. Sorry to be so terribly blunt.

Its not that wrong

The point is valid that at some point things become obsolete.

In an ideal world obsolete craft would be 'cheaper' in points as they were no longer 'top dogs'

Im much the same way i could buy (were I a country) an f4 phantom for pennies compared to say a eurofighter. They would probably *give* me the phantom just so i had to take out regular maintainance from that countries technicians

So in a timeline star war universe there will be a point where the TIE fighter is obsolete. Probably why they have new ones in the new movie. Some backwater stations will still be flying the old model but when the new rebel fighter comes along it will cut it to pieces.

It doesnt make *much* sense narratively for a TIE fighter to be able to compete with say an xwing unless you do what they have done and make them 'cheap' so you can have lots of them for the cost of an xwing

in essence obsolescence is built into the points system.

The problem we have is that FFG seem to have a policy of not 'repointing' to address balance but instead to give 'free upgrades' to give balance.

The problem we have is that FFG seem to have a policy of not 'repointing' to address balance but instead to give 'free upgrades' to give balance.

Yeah I have wondered why they make it more difficult by not keeping this avenue of balancing open. I can completely understand the difficulties of reissuing cards etc- but errata for card text could also include points I guess.

I know they reserve errata for stuff that isnt working properly, but there are a few instances where repointing would be absolutely appropriate.

It doesnt make *much* sense narratively for a TIE fighter to be able to compete with say an xwing unless you do what they have done and make them 'cheap' so you can have lots of them for the cost of an xwing

Edit: I guess 'compete' is determined by your tactics and industry, it doesnt necessarily have to mean one-to-one. If you have an abundance of manpower it possibly makes sense to design cheap, disposable craft piloted in larger numbers. In this way a single flight element of TIEs could actually comprise of a dozen TIE fighters, whilst a single element of X Wings might contain only 4 ships. Balanced by the fact that an X Wing might be able to maintain a kill ratio of approximately 3:1. Any less than that and the Empire eventually wins.

The Rebellion was certainly militarily smaller. Whilst the Empire could afford ISDs and squillions of TIEs. The Rebels needed a harder hitting, survivable fighter which could operate in small groups and still take the fight to the TIE fighter. The X Wing fitted with their concept of operations.

Problem is not everyone reads faqs so while tournament players will know it's been altered casual players may not.

Thats why i think a magazine sized quarterly 'xwng journal' with some tactics articles, latest FAQ, possible repoints/errata would be a pretty good seller.

I do not think the post was off the mark. The Tie-Advanced was wholly reworked with new unique pilots because the ship was a failure, and hence obsolete. In fact nobody played any of the Tie-Advance ships except Darth Vader. Which is probably true to the EU lore (I cannot really tell as I did not read the EU stuff). Now that the Tie Advance is rebalanced with new pilots and added systems, some people will play it, well, those that can afford the package deal.

Bombers are suffering or did suffer a similar fate, likely caused by the ordinance rules. I play bombers all the time and I read a lot of posts asking for a fix as bombers were starting to fade away, becoming obsolete. Now a new heavy bomber comes out with new cards to rebalance the bomber.

Rebel Aces was necessary to rebalance the A-Wing.

Scum and Villainy added auto-thrusters, seems to have added something to Interceptors, but I did not get into S&V as its too EU for me.

Well, enjoy the game and thanks for the posts....

In thinking about this on a timeline some errors of logic have been made. The first is assuming that the rate of technological progress in SW is a known quantifiable thing. The second is that superiority is the reason one ship proceeded the one before it. Ships can be replaced due to ease of manufacture, cost, a different desired function or even a simple desire for a change in style. It is entirely possible that the 50+(guesstimating) years from Episode I to Espisode VII didn't see a huge leap in technology just a slow or even minimal natural progression. A '57 Chevy is still faster than a Prius, just not as efficient. It's very possible that few to none of the ships (even going back to Episode I) were obsolete.

Thats why i think a magazine sized quarterly 'xwng journal' with some tactics articles, latest FAQ, possible repoints/errata would be a pretty good seller.

I think the FAQ is good enough. Any TO worth their tournament should have a printed out copy of the latest FAQ so that other players can read.

I remember the White Dwarf magazine (and when they changed it into a weekly thing ) but as of now print magazines are expensive and not to mention that niche magazines have to rely on ad revenue from either the industry that supports the niche hobby or subscriptions. Besides those that have a vested interest in the hobby would go to the home page and websites and will be able to find the needed information such as FAQs and other stuff.

Didnt i just say a few posts up that a lot of people dont use the interent, especially older gamers.

Having all your fixs online is great until you get someone 'not online'.

The cost of FFG doing a quarterly printed FFG, putting in all the articles from the website etc etc would pay for itself easily if it were say a tenner.

GW made a mint doing this with 'warhammer annuals' and 'chapter approved' suppplements that basically updated rules between editions, contained errata, scenarios and tactics articles.

Those had no advertising, they sold well.

A strong working precedent exists.

As a 43 year old gamer, I know of no gamer who wouldn't go to a game's official web site to look for a FAQ if they had questions about how something in a game worked.

if gamers don't check for online resources, encourage them to

it's the 21st century guys, like it or not we're already well past the point where civilization would collapse without the internet

How about when FFG takes it out of their tournament rules that all players are forced to buy an X-wing and 2 Tie Fighters to compete, then you talk to us about when it becomes okay to allow those ships to become obsolete.

Because forcing customers to buy products that are obsolete is the definition of scummy business practices.

in essence obsolescence is built into the points system.

The problem we have is that FFG seem to have a policy of not 'repointing' to address balance but instead to give 'free upgrades' to give balance.

I've had this complaint for years.