well the GSD is more of a wedge and the neb more of a twig

I started to think of a potato wedge for the GSD with a bite taken out of the front and now I want potato wedges for lunch

This is where I cross my fingers that a mod changes your user name to PotatoWedgeAntilles now.

But you had to pay both in points, opportunity cost, and a command to do so, and you still haven't really matched the speed of a Vette.

[...]

I'd say so yes. I expect the MC80 to be fairly nimble for such a large ship, and the MC30 to be like the Vette in terms of speed and turning. The Raider may be quick and nimble, but it's a Vette so it should be, but a single ship does not destroy the factions feel or identity. Slow and cumbersome isn't even the whole of the Empires identity, it's also the forward arc, the swarms of fighters, and more.

Sure-sure, but - again I'd say the variance between the gameplay identity of the Empire and Rebellion is significantly diminished compared to what it was straight out of the core.

But why would letting the Empire have Nebulon-B frigates break the game?

It won't at least not alot, but it would take away from the RA's identity. But IMO the reason it won't happen is less to do with game design and pretty much everything to do with the lore. Despite what the EU says, the Neb B is a Rebel ship, not an Imperial one.

It doesn't look like an Imperial ship, it's the wrong color, it's the wrong shape, it's never seen in an Imperial fleet, it's only ever seen in the Rebel's fleet. For those reasons you'll never see a Imperial Neb B, because it was never intended to be an Imperial ship. It's not that I am against such a thing, I just don't see it happening for the above reasons.

I think you're probably right that it won't happen, but I'm trying to tease out what this identity means to us.

Letting the Empire have Nebulon-Bs brings up the question of how that happened, which is answered with "the Rebellion is a Rebellion, and they had to steal the ships." In my mind, that establishes their identity far more powerfully than supposing that they have their own shipyards somewhere. Besides which, the Nebulon-B is a Kuat Drive Yards product - the manufacturer of the wedge-shaped star destroyers we love so much. (That's also not just something obscure from a now-defunct EU. It's been re-established in new canon.)

That's why the Mon Calamari's revolt (coming later this summer to an HNN near you) was such a significant occurrence, it meant that there was a major sector on the Outer Rim that declared its independence, threw in with the Rebellion with their shipyards.

But the reasons you do state sound very powerful - the visual identity, which would be a very powerful concept for a miniatures game company (as well as a motion-picture et al. company, ie. Disney). But it creates a form of identity than we discussed in our gameplay vs lore debate earlier on in the thread.

So, why did that visual identity not matter to FFG when they decided that Scum could have Y-wings, Firesprays, HWKs and Z-95s?

well the GSD is more of a wedge and the neb more of a twig

I started to think of a potato wedge for the GSD with a bite taken out of the front and now I want potato wedges for lunch

Mikael Hasselstein, Kuat sold ships to everyone. Now the Nebulon-B may have been originally for Imperial use, they likely got sent off to outer rim world patrols and planetary defense forces because they had weaknesses that did not fit with what the Imperials wanted.

If you give the Nebulon-B and the CR90 to the Imperials you have to give them access to the Impstar and the Victory. Then there would be no seperate identity.

Now FFG (in my opinion) while they are using a lot of EU works, they are really using Empire at War (ship wise, not upgrade wise, though they did swap out the broadside for the Gladiator which I approve of). In EaW, Imperials never had CR90's or nebs. I think this was a great design.

Sure-sure, but - again I'd say the variance between the gameplay identity of the Empire and Rebellion is significantly diminished compared to what it was straight out of the core.

Sure, but that's a natural occurrence. The more stuff you put in, the more blurred the lines will become. There's only so many things you can do with a spaceship in a game like this, and sooner or later you're going to start blurring the lines between the factions.

So, why did that visual identity not matter to FFG when they decided that Scum could have Y-wings, Firesprays, HWKs and Z-95s?

Because the Y-Wing and Z-95 are older beat up ships, if I were to pick ones that the fringe has, those are ones I'd pick. The HWK is pretty much pure EU, and the only people who are going to recognize it know what it is. The Firespray never belonged in the Imperial faction in the first place. IMO it was a colossal mistake on FFG's part to give it to them in wave 2. It has never again IMO looked right on the table next to a bunch of Ties.

Honestly that's what it comes down to. FFG wants to have a game that when a casual observer would look at a game being played, they'd have a least a decent chance of knowing who the two sides are. If you saw a GSD flying around with say 2 Neb's, it would lose that visual impact and identity.

Giving the Imperials a Neb B, does little to nothing from a purely mechanical standpoint, it doesn't fill balance issue or something. So there's no compelling reason to add it.

Mikael Hasselstein, Kuat sold ships to everyone. Now the Nebulon-B may have been originally for Imperial use, they likely got sent off to outer rim world patrols and planetary defense forces because they had weaknesses that did not fit with what the Imperials wanted.

If you give the Nebulon-B and the CR90 to the Imperials you have to give them access to the Impstar and the Victory. Then there would be no seperate identity.

Yes, they can sell to anyone, but I think it's safe to say that they're not that different from our defense contractors (e.g. Lockheed Martin) in that they can develop and build high-tech defense equipment for the US Government, but they are restricted in what they're allowed to sell to other governments and private entities. Coming from the defense world, you probably know more about that than I do.

I would imagine that Kuat Drive Yards is riddled through with COMPNOR and ISB agents. Sure, there would be corruption top-to-bottom, but that doesn't mean that they will manufacture directly for the Rebellion.

I think you're probably right that in the Imperial service, they would be sent off to the Outer Rim worlds to protect shipping, because you're much more likely to see piracy out there. But that's where most of the conflict we're simulating takes place in the first place.

If you give the Nebulon-B and the CR90 to the Imperials you have to give them access to the Impstar and the Victory. Then there would be no seperate identity.

It's exactly the concept of identity that I'm trying to tease out here. Let's say we're creating a game that simulates the Soviet-Afghan war. Are we going to say that the Soviets can't use AK-47s because our stereotype of the Mujahideen is tied to the AK-47? No, that would be ludicrous.

I understand that this is not a simulative game in the same way, but it means that we're constructing identity in a very different way. I'm trying to figure out how FFG (and we, FFG's customers) are constructing that identity and what limitations/structure it's giving this game's further development.

Now FFG (in my opinion) while they are using a lot of EU works, they are really using Empire at War (ship wise, not upgrade wise, though they did swap out the broadside for the Gladiator which I approve of). In EaW, Imperials never had CR90's or nebs. I think this was a great design.

Yes, it's very clear to me that FFG is marketing at a generation that grew up with these video games, rather than other types of games (e.g. RPGs) and sources. As someone who grew up on the RPGs, I'm constantly having to suck it in when we get obscure and initially broken stuff from the video games, rather than perfectly good stuff from the RPGs.

[/old man grouching]

So, why did that visual identity not matter to FFG when they decided that Scum could have Y-wings, Firesprays, HWKs and Z-95s?

Because the Y-Wing and Z-95 are older beat up ships, if I were to pick ones that the fringe has, those are ones I'd pick. The HWK is pretty much pure EU, and the only people who are going to recognize it know what it is. The Firespray never belonged in the Imperial faction in the first place. IMO it was a colossal mistake on FFG's part to give it to them in wave 2. It has never again IMO looked right on the table next to a bunch of Ties.

Honestly that's what it comes down to. FFG wants to have a game that when a casual observer would look at a game being played, they'd have a least a decent chance of knowing who the two sides are. If you saw a GSD flying around with say 2 Neb's, it would lose that visual impact and identity.

Giving the Imperials a Neb B, does little to nothing from a purely mechanical standpoint, it doesn't fill balance issue or something. So there's no compelling reason to add it.

I agree with you that the Firespray looked 'off' next to the Imperial ships, and it took someone giving me a Firespray for me to start actually using one, and even then only reluctantly and because I didn't want to offend the guy who gave it to me. I also played a Kath & Krassis list under the guise of them being 'private defense contractors' but then without Imperial backups. You can read about that here.

The thing is, however, FFG didn't seem to have a problem with that, and they nevertheless sold a bunch of Firesprays. It was only sticklers like you and me who had problems with it. So, by what metric was it a 'colossal' mistake? What do you base your assessment of 'what FFG wants' on, given that the actual track record is the opposite? I remember that you used a similar logic when you argued that they would not introduce a third faction.

I think your mechanical argument is more sound and probably more likely to be something that FFG is mulling over. But that isn't a lore-identity argument, nor is it a visual argument.

The thing is, however, FFG didn't seem to have a problem with that, and they nevertheless sold a bunch of Firesprays.

Sure, because it's a popular ship lore/fan wise. If they had produced the Shuttle in wave 2 for example, I have no doubt that we'd have weekly posts on the X-Wing boards asking for the Firespray to be put into the game.

Partly because as I said it is a popular ship, and also partly because there are people who don't care about the lore, and it it looks right or not.

But that isn't a lore-identity argument, nor is it a visual argument.

I called the Firespray a colossal mistake, because I'm a stickler for appearance. But the fact that they didn't doesn't mean FFG isn't concerned about lore identity or visual identity, just not as much so as I or others may be.

I would imagine that FFG uses a process something like this when deciding what ships to make.

Does it fill a need in the game? Does it add something new? Does it provide something that faction is missing?

Does it fit in that faction from a lore stance?

Does it fit in that faction from visual stance?

If a given ship can't say yes to the first questions then the 2nd and 3rd set don't matter much. But even if it does say yes, that doesn't mean that they ignore the 2nd and 3rd questions. I'm sure they give more weight to the gameplay questions.

Look at the Raider for Epic X-Wing. It answers yes to all those questions quite handedly. A 16-18 inch ISD would of answered yes to two of those questions, it also answers the gameplay question quite easily, it clearly fits in the faction from a lore stance. It was also clearly a very popular option.

Yet rather than do the easy and requested thing, they created the Raider, because I believe anyway, they knew that the ISD would not look right on the table. So the visual argument does have an impact, even if it carries less weight.

The thing is, however, FFG didn't seem to have a problem with that, and they nevertheless sold a bunch of Firesprays.

Sure, because it's a popular ship lore/fan wise. If they had produced the Shuttle in wave 2 for example, I have no doubt that we'd have weekly posts on the X-Wing boards asking for the Firespray to be put into the game.

Hehe, pretty much.

So, let's think about your three logics (were they in order of relevance?)

• Does it fill a need in the game?
  • Does it add something new?
  • Does it provide something that faction is missing?
• Does it fit in that faction from a lore stance?
• Does it fit in that faction from visual stance?

In that first set, if they want to keep the factions distinct from one another in terms of gameplay - ie. to withstand the natural convergence that we agreed upon earlier - then the 'does it provide something that the faction is missing?' might be amended to 'does it provide something that the faction is missing, which has not already been reserved for the other faction'

I still think it's interesting that they had to invent the Raider when the Gozanti had already been repurposed for Imperial use in SW Rebels. I was pretty confident that they were going to introduce that as the Imperial huge, and was floored when they didn't. If they are going to continue with Huge ships (and the Raider is a sign of things to come, rather than a rearguard action*), maybe the Gozanti will be the Imperial equivalent of the rebel transport.

But anyway, that's X-Wing and this is Armada. I wonder how long they're going to maintain the 'visual identity' of Imperial ships in Armada by keeping them wedge-shaped.

*By rearguard action, what I mean is this: They found that the bread and butter for X-Wing is in 100pnt6asteroidDeathMatches and not in epic play. They don't intend to pursue epic play unless they see a marked increase in epic play following the Raider's release. Even so, it'll be a while because they have an ~18-month process between conception and release.

So, let's think about your three logics (were they in order of relevance?)

Yes and no. I think gameplay takes precedence over everything else. But the other two aren't in a given order.

might be amended to 'does it provide something that the faction is missing, which has not already been reserved for the other faction'

Good point and it should be amended to include that.

I still think it's interesting that they had to invent the Raider when the Gozanti had already been repurposed for Imperial use in SW Rebels.

It's possible and I'd think likely that they started designing the Raider before they knew much about Rebels, and how the Gozanti would be in there. Or maybe not, maybe they just didn't think the Gozanti looked Imperial enough.

But it's another argument for visual identity having a factor. The Gonzanti as you point out would of worked out as a Imperial Huge, so why invest the resources into making the Raider?

A Gozanti might work in X-Wing but it would be almost useless in Armada. The Gozanti is much smaller then a Raider and like the Lancer and Tartan almost useless against capital ships. They wanted something that could hold its own against a corvette not just fighters and small transports.

A Gozanti might work in X-Wing but it would be almost useless in Armada. The Gozanti is much smaller then a Raider and like the Lancer and Tartan almost useless against capital ships. They wanted something that could hold its own against a corvette not just fighters and small transports.

The actual size of it is disputed. The one we see in Rebels is possibly larger than the one depicted earlier and elsewhere.

Oh gosh, don't start a "gozanti size thread" again... There were like 6 of them back on the X-wing forums.

I think the general consentius was that it was around 65-70m long anyways.

Oh gosh, don't start a "gozanti size thread" again... There were like 6 of them back on the X-wing forums.

I think the general consentius was that it was around 65-70m long anyways.

What, don't you miss those heady days when there was a 100-page thread on the Imperial huge, which nobody got right, and the threads about the third (and fourth) faction, etc.?

Indeed. I'm actually looking forward to trying out the Neb-B if I ever get a chance to play Rebs. It looks like a ship that's hard to use well...something I love.

I feel it was a mistake of FFG not to issue Imperial versions of the ship cards with the base-set for both the Neb-B and Corellian Corvette. The Nebula-B frigate is an Imperial built ship that the Rebel's have acquired through capture or defections and the corvette is used by the Empire, local defence forces, corporations, rebels, and pirates. There is even a reference in the excellent Star Wars Sourcebook (West End Games) to a VSD "GrimDeath" operated by the Rebels. So should be no harm to use the other sides ships by agreement or in custom scenarios for your own fun, though I imagine the Empire at its height would not care or need to use captured Rebel-designed ships (like AF2), unless as a ruse e.g. staged attacks on civilians to discredit the Alliance.

None of the extended background is visible in any way in the movies though, so FFG has every right to ignore it. We did not see these elusive Imperial Nebulon-B's at Hoth or Endor. We did not see a rebel taskforce capturing them from an Imperial shipyard. We just see two very distinct types of fleets, without any identical ships between them, duking it out at Endor.

But still it is silly to ignore such (good) lore. I mean what do we see in the movies at all? Not even the main guns of an ISD operating.

regardless of extended background's relevance in the OT, there's a golden rule that makes FFG far more justified in making nebs rebel only

regardless of extended background's relevance in the OT, there's a golden rule that makes FFG far more justified in making nebs rebel only

gameplay >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> fluff

Gameplay is important, but for me it has to be close to the fluff. Hell even Rock/Paper/Sciccors does this. The art is not to make a good game, there a plenty, but to make a good game that matches its setting. Armada sells so well because its Star Wars. So Fluff is at least as important as gameplay, because without one of it the game would sell like one of this Terran vs. Alien Fleet bricks games that clutter the Internet.

And why should it be bad for gameplay to have fluffly Imperial Neb-Bs and Cr90s?

well ... the neb more of a twig

Because its Imperial Design

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