So with Wave 1 now finally out full games of customizable 300 point fleets can be played complete with at least 4 different squadron types and 2 capital ships per faction. So now that there is variety within the next couple of months a meta will develop as we wait for wave 2 but looking at the prices was something of well not a shock as we already know the prices but more of a concern.

So lets take a look at the cheapest starting point enough for two 300 point fleets, one rebel and one Imperial. Lets take another look at prices

• Core set ~$100 ($99.99 but sometimes you can find them for $20 cheaper)
• Large Capital Ship ~$30-40 each.
• Small Escort Ships ~$20 each (as of now only Rebel faction has these ships)
• Fighter pack ~$20.

So lets just say that 1 large capital ship should be enough to take ~180 points to the standard ~300 points needed for a full armada game. So lets get go for the VSD expansion ($40) and the Mk2 expansion ($40) pack and call it even. That would be $180 to start and that is amusing fighters don't make that much a difference in Armada thus not needing the packs (another $40).

Compare that with X-wing (yeah I know different game but still a good comparison when talking about cost of hobby) To get at least two 100 point standard squadrons you need to get the core set (~$40) and 4 small expansion packs, 2 imperial and 2 rebel (~$15 each) and that should easily give you enough to make one 100 point rebel squadron and one 100 point imperial squadron. So we are looking at $40+ 4 x $15 ($60) for a total ~$100.

So comparing $100 for the cost to enter X-wing with the $180 for Armada does look like the higher priced game. Now these are just for the initial entry to say standard format for competitive play. It is not the actual cost to make a competitive Armada list.

So here is the place for speculation, does the $180 of Armada give more variety than X-wing? Will it be cheaper to keep up with the meta or will it get to be more expensive? It is possible for Armada that you need fewer expansion packs to make a competitive list but then again it is also possible that the higher price per pack means it will always cost more than X-wing. Any opinions or comments on this?

Depends. Based on what I have spent and the time I have played I think I am getting good value out of the game.

I can't really say that you would or would not get value from buying the game. It may sit there on a shelf and gather dust or you may play so much of it the print wears off the speed dials. You should answer that question for yourself.

As for variety, your preamble to the question has you buying a rather limited selection of models for each game. So, just how much variety can you get from 2 VDS's, a commander and some Tie Fighters? If you want variety you have to exceed the minimal buy in you have made and actually purchase enough models to provide variety. Mind you you have created the same issue with the X-Wing buy in of 4 Imperials and 3 Rebels, just how much variety is Armada competing with there?

In some regards the Star Destroyer is significantly larger than an X-Wing ship. So I am not too sure why there would be any expectation for them to be similar in price.

Let me start by saying I have never played X-Wing. I had to choose between getting into that, or Armada. I chose this game, in part, because I wanted to be part of a game like this from the very beginning, before power creep and the like start to kick in. As for which is more expensive, it's impossible to say in the long run. X-wing has way more stuff out for it, naturally, so from a collector's perspective, Armada is going to be way less painful to get at least one of everything.

However, once you start talking about playing competitively, it all depends on how the game unfolds. Eventually most games get consumed by power creep to the point that old units become worthless. I just depends on how well FFG handles the evolution of the game.

Regarding individual price tags, compared to other games out there, Armada is very reasonably priced for what you get in a pack. And the numbers you quoted are MSRPs . . . if you buy online you can shave 30% off most that stuff.

And for the record, you mention 300 pt games . . . that number will be 400 pts once wave 2 comes out, which should be taken into consideration.

If you are on a tight budget, do what I did. Find a friend also on a budget who wants to play the opposite faction to you, and then just swap all your core set stuff as applicable. Using printouts of spoiled cards you can have some good 300 point games right there (that's what we've been doing since release).

You can then buy expansions as you can afford them. I'm getting the rebel fighters and AF2 which gives me a lot of options when building my fleet.

The flawed basis of the argument is that the cost of the core set in X-Wing for value is equal to the cost of the core set in Armada for value.

There was a whole thread about this months ago - Armada contains so much more that of course the core set had to be more expensive. The fairer way to look at it is, how much more beyond a core set do you need to spend for each game?

Actually I think this argument is moot.

Look at X-Wing, you need all these fancy upgrade cards that only come in a certain pack. Then you need more of those upgrade for each ship.

Armada however is a bit smarter. It is so far putting many of those upgrades in several packs so that there are more options to get them. Could you buy 3 of the same ship, yes but you could also buy this other ship as well.

Try that with upgrades like C3P0

the comparison is indeed moot every which way. the only thing tying the two games together is "Star Wars."

even ignoring upgrade cards (proxy in casual games), they're completely different games on completely different scales

variety is something we'll need to determine on the table

in a core vs core set experience, though, Armada kicks the living **** out of X-wing

I a agree. Armada is so engrossing while I tried an X-Wing demo and while fun, it is just not my style.

I took the imperial half of the starter for armada as well as all the core components (dice, damage deck, ect) for $40. For wave 1 I am getting an extra Victory class, 2 gladiators, 2 fighter squadron boxes (16 models in those two boxes + the 3 star destroyers) and an extra pack of dice for $101. Wave two will cost me around $70-$80.

6 small X-Wing ships cost $90 (though you could probably get them as cheap as $60), even if they are lowly TIE fighters. I spent $200 on wave 6 of X-Wing and that was only for 15 ships, 2 of which were large (2 most wanted, 4 scyk, 3 viper, 2 Aggressor).

There is also a difference in game scale. In X-Wing, the largest list you can make in a normal game is 8 ships. My first full Armada list is three Star Destroyer (1 Vic + 2 Glads) and 11 fighter squadrons (mix of bombers, interceptors, advanced). And fighters very much do make a difference in Armada.

Also having mission objectives makes individual games of Armada different even if the lists remain the same.

I am picking up my wave 1 stuff today. With the discount from FLGS, I have 1 core set, 1 Vic, 2 Glads, and 2 Imperial Fighter packs totaling a little over $200. With that $200 I have a lot of options build wise. The three primary builds I am looking at right now are: 1 Vic, 2 Glads, and fighters/ 2 Vics and a lot of fighters/ or 2 Vics and 2 Glads w/o fighters. Those are three VERY different builds that will play very differently. There is also nearly an infinite number of tweaks available to those lists through changing the upgrades and squadrons in those lists. Running a Vic1 with expanded hangers and flight controllers with a swarm of interceptors and ties is going to play a lot different that a Vic2 with Corrupter and Chiraneau with Major Rhymer and a bomber wing.

I'm with WillisMaximus, I haven't played x-wing. It was one or the other for me. I had played around with squad builders online, and I realized how much it was going to take to get into x-wing at a level that would be fun to play. To get the same variety of play from x-wing, you are going to be spending a lot more money.

Armada will be much more expensive.

Armada:

Core = $100

Wave 1 = $190

Wave 2 = $160

Total of 12 capital ships (only 3 duplicates). 34 fighter groups. Price = $450

X-Wing:

Core = $40

Wave 1 = $120 (doubles of everything)

Wave 2 = $120 (doubles of the smalls, 1 each of the mediums)

Total of 2 medium ships, and 15 small ships. Price = $280

Difference in price at this point is $170. You could pick up Wave 3 for that adding another 7 ships to your total. Toss the most wanted pack for another 3 ships and you have $10 to spare! So for 10 bucks less you can have 3 medium ships and 24 small ships.

The other issue is the variety of what you can fly. By purchasing 2 of each small for X-wing you get a pretty good collection, and a lot of interesting combinations of ships that you can fly. Few builds demand multiples of the medium ships. You also get a pretty good collection of the additional cards. Armada leaves you a little more limited. You have 1 of every ship, except for the duplicates from the core set. As for fighter squadrons, you only have a decent supply of X-wings and TIEs. Everything else is pretty limited with only having 1 or 2 units to work with. If you want 4 Y-wings, or 2 ISDs, or 2 raiders, you're going to have to pay even more. It's likely that the competitive builds will include some of these sorts of duplicates.

Is X-wing cheaper to play? Yes.

Is X-wing cheaper to maintain a large diverse collection? Yes.

Is X-wing cheaper to provide yourself with access to the majority of the competitive builds? Yes.

Is X-wing cheaper to buy into fully right now? No, but after another wave or two of Armada it will be.

Is either game worth it's cost? That is up to you personally.

To be fair, FFG seems to be trying to up the per wave cost of X-wing right now. Wave 7 is a $150 wave. Wave 6 is $140. Although wave 5 was only $70. If this upward trend continues the per wave cost could be identical soon, but keep in mind that you still end up with more variety per full wave with X-wing.

I got my core for 65$ actually

X wing is actually a very low priced miniature game.

Armada is actually on par for a miniature wargame.

Price of entry for warhamner is hundreds of dollars, and a competitive army could easily cost thousands.

Point is i dont think comparing the price of armada to x wing is gonna get you anywhere. X wing is cheaper, flat out. If keeping up with the meta is your thing, x wing is older so its gonna cost more to get every ship. But give armada a few waves and its gonna cost more.

Rather than compare pricing of entry level/competitive lists of x wing to armada, compare prices of armada to warhammer, warmahordes and other mini wargames.

X wing is actually a very low priced miniature game.

Armada is actually on par for a miniature wargame.

Price of entry for warhamner is hundreds of dollars, and a competitive army could easily cost thousands.

Point is i dont think comparing the price of armada to x wing is gonna get you anywhere. X wing is cheaper, flat out. If keeping up with the meta is your thing, x wing is older so its gonna cost more to get every ship. But give armada a few waves and its gonna cost more.

Rather than compare pricing of entry level/competitive lists of x wing to armada, compare prices of armada to warhammer, warmahordes and other mini wargames.

Good point, with other games it is not just the cost of the models but also the model count in a bog standard average game. Now a start er set for warhammer does cost ~$100 (the usual $99.99 + tax) and in order to get around 500 points (start of an escalation league) for an army you often have to buy a couple of squads which is ~$40 a box and maybe a commander blister which is ~$15. So that right there will likely cost ~$205 for a single 40K army (and that doesn't include the $60 codex). Now they do sell starter sets for an army at $250 which for now is way to pricey for me to consider.

Warmachines/Hords has been known to be slightly cheaper because the typically model count is on average less than a game of 40K. Not all the time there are 12 model 40K armies as well.

Model count for Armada could be 14-20 models (counting squadrons as 1 model) so while the big ship count might be 4 the model count will exceed that of X-wing,

I think of armada like x-wing only with the large base ships such as the falcon and firespray, so the core sets, instead of the 3 small ships of x-wing Is like buying 3 large ships so yes it costs more but you still get the same bang for your buck. And the expansions are priced similarly to the x-wing large ships as well at around 30$. That's how I like to think of it anyway...

I think of armada like x-wing only with the large base ships such as the falcon and firespray, so the core sets, instead of the 3 small ships of x-wing Is like buying 3 large ships so yes it costs more but you still get the same bang for your buck. And the expansions are priced similarly to the x-wing large ships as well at around 30$. That's how I like to think of it anyway...

Yeah, thats what I meant in my earlier post - its not just cost, its cost per value.

Armada is a far superior game in my opinion, plus the ships you get are much larger, so should rightly cost more and to expect it not to is just unrealistic. Asking if its going to be more expensive is therefore a silly question - the real question should be "Is it too much more expensive for what it is?" Which then becomes far more subjective to each persons budget.

I dunno,

Long run Armada may be more casual'ish, even if the games themselves could be more engaging ...

I plan on buying 1 of each exp pack and that's it

In X-Wing I tend to want to min-max more, i.e. buy multiple copies of the same ship just so that I can huh, run 7 generic Z-95s for example.

I think part of the issue is that Armada primarily focuses on large ships. FFG's prices for larger ships in X-wing have always been unjustifiably high. Both a decimator and VSD are $40 msrp ships for example. They're fairly similar in size. On a model for model basis the prices aren't that far off. Well, the ships like the cr90 and neb B should cheaper, but there are a few more moving parts. There is zero chance a VSD costs twice what a cr90 does to make for instance. Armada is just soaking you on every ship with the "premium large model" pricing.

Fwiw the core set is demonstrably a worse deal.

MSRP on the models for armada is $80. Core is $100. You pay $20 extra for the other stuff in the box. Dice, movement tool, rulebook.

MSRP for xwing is $45. Core is $40 You get a $5 discount instead and still get dice, movement tools, etc.

The core armada set should be $70-$75 MSRP to be on par.

Armada is more flexible with less ships. With Just the core, 1 Gladiator and 1 Aces pack you could make 10+ viable builds by tweaking each ship a little.

Where Armada does not shine is when you want multiples of cards, especially fighers. If you wanted 10 Y-Wings you'd have to buy 5 Rebel Aces packs, and if you wanted three Flight Controllers you'd need two VSDs, etc.

We'll almost certainly see Flight Controllers on an additional ship or two in Wave 2, I would think.

I think part of the issue is that Armada primarily focuses on large ships. FFG's prices for larger ships in X-wing have always been unjustifiably high. Both a decimator and VSD are $40 msrp ships for example. They're fairly similar in size. On a model for model basis the prices aren't that far off. Well, the ships like the cr90 and neb B should cheaper, but there are a few more moving parts. There is zero chance a VSD costs twice what a cr90 does to make for instance. Armada is just soaking you on every ship with the "premium large model" pricing.

Fwiw the core set is demonstrably a worse deal.

MSRP on the models for armada is $80. Core is $100. You pay $20 extra for the other stuff in the box. Dice, movement tool, rulebook.

MSRP for xwing is $45. Core is $40 You get a $5 discount instead and still get dice, movement tools, etc.

The core armada set should be $70-$75 MSRP to be on par.

Actually MSRP on the box for just the ships is $105.

VSD: 40

Corvette: 20

Frigate: 20

10 Fighters (1 and 1/4 boxes): 25.

There are also more to the models (on the capital ship side at least) than X-Wing. Much better and more durable stands and pegs with much more plastic put into them for example.

Armada is more flexible with less ships. With Just the core, 1 Gladiator and 1 Aces pack you could make 10+ viable builds by tweaking each ship a little.

Where Armada does not shine is when you want multiples of cards, especially fighers. If you wanted 10 Y-Wings you'd have to buy 5 Rebel Aces packs, and if you wanted three Flight Controllers you'd need two VSDs, etc.

I would say the model count for Star Wars Armada is deceptively larger as most people don't count squadrons and just count the big ships. The core set comes with over a dozen models. Adding expansions (and with the Wave 2 400 points) could easily have over 20 models a game.

As someone who plays X-wing I can tell you the following would be true for competitive play,

1) you’re going to buy at least 3 of each small ship,(with exception of the E-wing and Tie Defender) Ships like the Z95, B-wing, Tie Fighter will require more ships then the standard 3. Right now in my Area 4 B-wings and 1 Z95 is a hot list to fly. Also certain upgrade cards only come with some ships, if you want more than 1 of them your locked into buy more.

2) you’re going to buy at least 2 of each large ship. Slave is a 3 purchase and the shuttle could be 4.

3) you’re going to buy 1 of each epic. (C-3PO is in the Tantive IV and is a must have card for Falcon Lists) Also if there is a local tournament that is doing epic battles you want to have the ships) also with epic you are allowed to have 12 of each small and 6 of each large.

4) you’re going to buy 2 core sets. (the extra tie figthers and x-wing fill out lists nicely and its good to have extra dice and 1 extra ruler to cut into a range 1, and range 2)

(prices for all ships from http://www.miniaturemarket.com/table-top-miniatures/x-wing.html?dir=asc&order=name&p=1 )

The following is in my opinion the breakdown for each side for having many different comp lists. (also with things like aces or the raider fixing an older ship that is not played keep in mind a tweak from FFG can make any ship back into the meta)

2 Core Set 53.98

Rebels

1 of Each

Tantive (61.49) Trans (41.37)

2 of Each

YT-1300 (19.99) YT-2400 (19.99) Rebel Aces (19.99) E-Wing (9.99) X-wing (9.99) B-wings (9.99) A-wings (9.99) *K-wing (13.77) If the cost of a loaded out K-wing is less then 25 3 would be bought

3 of Each

Hwk (9.99) Y-wing (9.99)

4 of Each

Z-95 (9.99)

Total 496.30

Imperial

Raider (68.97)

2 of Each

VT-49 (27.57) Tie Defender (9.99) Phanton (9.99) Advance (9.99) Imp Aces (19.99) Fighter (9.99)

3 of Each

Shuttle (19.99) Slave 1 (19.99) Bomber (9.99) Intercepters (9.99) Punisher (13.57)

Total 395.63

Scum

2 of Each

IG-2000 (19.99) Hound (27.57) StarViper (13.77)

3 of Each

Most Wanted (27.57)

4 of Each

M3-A (9.99) Kihraxz (9.99)

Total 285.29

Grand Total 1231.20

Heres the breakdown for Armada Ships from Min Market ( http://www.miniaturemarket.com/table-top-miniatures/star-wars-armada.html#/?_=1&page=1&filter.stock_facet_ext=In%20Stock&sort.name=asc )

Core Set 68.97

Maneuver Tool 5.49
Dice 6.87

Total 81.33

Rebel

2 of Each

Rebel Fighter Squadrons (13.77) CR90 Corellian Corvette (13.77) Nebulon-B Frigate (13.77)

3 of Each

MC30c Frigate (19.99) Assault Frigate Mark II (27.57) Home One (27.57)

Total 225.30

Imperial

1 of Each

Rogues and Villains Expansion (13.77)

2 of Each

Imperial Fighter Squadrons (13.77) Imperial-class Star Destroyer (34.47)

3 of Each

Imperial Raider (13.77) Gladiator-Class Star Destroyer (19.99) Victory-Class Star Destroyer (27.57)

Total 294.24

Grand Total 600.87

Buying a Gladiator for myself kind of put things in perspective (it came out around $30?) The ship itself is smaller than the similarly-priced Falcon from X-Wing. Considering this is also one of the Empire's lighter ships, could it mean you need $60 for a decent screening force for your imperial craft?

Then I remembered saying an X-Wing large ship is worth the two ships' worth of price you put into it, and I realized that fleet sizes are going to be about half that in X-wing. So will two Gladiators to add to your lone victory make for as satisfying of a force as most X-Wing lists would at similar cost?

I don't feel the bite to go out and get expansions for the sake of cards. I know that's something said about this game in some places (it's really a card collecting game packaged as a minis game), but I find the lists I make are lighter on upgrades and more about ship selection. In the end I think two of every ship at medium and under is going to give you the widest options without being excessive.