So looking back at the X-wing game design ... should pilot cards have been separate from ship cards?

You'd buy a generic ship (e.g. TIE Fighter at 12 points). Each ship *must* have a pilot. Your pilot choices would be cards with the Pilot skill and Pilot ability ... so Academy Pilot for zero points to Howlrunner for 6 points. But then you could put different pilots on different ships (e.g. Soontir Fel is 9 points but could be on a regular TIE or an Advanced). Some pilots might be restricted to ships based on pilot ability (e.g. Echo).

It doesn't work with the cardboard as printed but would have allowed more generic cardboard.

Would the game still balance appropriately on this model?

Would have been cool, but probably too difficult to balance.

I mean, each new pilot would need to be playtested with every craft. Every new craft would need to be tested with every existing pilot...

They *could* reprint ships like the TIE Defender flown by Maarek however.

Looking at Attack Wing, hell no.

Just for the fun of it, test your idea.

Some time ago I made a custom X-Wing pilot as a combination of http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Dorovio_Bold with the pilot ability of Soontir Fel. It was fun and didn't break the game.

I don't think so, both for balance and fluff reasons. The more expensive ships have better pilot abilities generally speaking, and sticking those on cheap ships could get ridiculous pretty quickly. Besides, I can't really see Tycho flying the Falcon or Corran in the Outrider (speaking of which--can you imagine a fat, turreted HLC Corran?).

Seems like balancing it would be a nightmare. Luke in an A-Wing? Vader in a Phantom? "Howlrunner" in a Decimator? Major Rhymer in an Autoblaster equipped Firespray? Wedge in an E-Wing? Biggs in a fat Falcon? Or, hey, Biggs in a title+PTL A-Wing with a Stealth Device?

All of those sound downright broken... because they would be, and would be, again, a nightmare to try and balance. Sure, I guess you could restrict some of that, but it'd leave us more or less back where we started. And fully open, it'd lead to a lot of silliness like probably seeing Han Solo and Boba Fett flying things that aren't the Falcon or Slave-1... which, thematically, makes me cringe. For some pilots it makes sense... but there's just as many where it'd make the situation worse. And, at least for the pilots that didn't have a single typical ship, it still makes sense that they could be flying whatever FFG assigned them.

It would either have created imbalance, or it would have limited design options in order to maintain balance.

Maybe using a system similar to the Action Bar & matching Icon on upgrade cards could have made it work.

In my opinion? Absolutely. Locking pilots to specific ships makes no sense. Especially when FFG keeps putting pilots into ships they didn't fly.

From a gameplay perspective? I have no idea. It's probably broken or something.

I want my Maarek Stele in a Defender...

The prototype was like this. They consciously changed it.

People look at this and think they can put Corran and Tycho in X-wings or Maarek in a TIE defender. What it would actually do is limit design massively (you can't print a pilot that doesn't work on every ship) and you'd get a lot of TIE interceptor PTL glue problems: Vader and the Interceptor for example. Imagine Corran in a Falcon, Vader, Carnor and Soontir in an ACD TIE phantom, RAC on anything that's not a Decimator, Oicunn in a TIE fighter, N'dru in an IG-2000, Mithel in a TIE interceptor. You'd get a small number of antithematic power combos and everything else would suffer.

I think it could could work if you rebuilt the game from the ground up to accommodate it. A lot of stuff would have to be balanced differently. You'd also need to severely limit which pilots can fly which ships in order to cut down on the balance issues and power creep that inherently happen when you have an ever-growing range of possible combinations (this is why Magic: The Gathering rotates old cards out of the tournament-legal set as new cards are released). The problem is how do you keep track of the list of who can fly what as new ships and pilots are released.

By printing them onto the pilot cards of the ships they fly.

The only reason they don't yet have multiple ships with the same pilot is because they felt it unnecessarily limited choice at that stage: the PS8 E-wing was originally Luke Skywalker. They made it Corran because they saw no reason to stop you flying PS8 E-wing with Luke's PS8 X-wing (and people do.)

What if pilots were limited in the ships they could fly, but not normally bound to a single ship?

So Biggs would be "Xwing only", but Marak Steel would be "Any Tie, and Assault Gunboat."

Some pilots would have access to other factions ships- for instance, Wedge flies Xwings and Ewings (and probably gets a bonus to them) but can also fly Tie figters, Intercepters, and Defenders, depending on the book.

What if pilots were limited in the ships they could fly, but not normally bound to a single ship?

So Biggs would be "Xwing only", but Marak Steel would be "Any Tie, and Assault Gunboat."

Some pilots would have access to other factions ships- for instance, Wedge flies Xwings and Ewings (and probably gets a bonus to them) but can also fly Tie figters, Intercepters, and Defenders, depending on the book.

Because future proofing is a real difficulty. Especially when you mention a ship that is years a way in terms of release.

What if pilots were limited in the ships they could fly, but not normally bound to a single ship?

So Biggs would be "Xwing only", but Marak Steel would be "Any Tie, and Assault Gunboat."

Some pilots would have access to other factions ships- for instance, Wedge flies Xwings and Ewings (and probably gets a bonus to them) but can also fly Tie figters, Intercepters, and Defenders, depending on the book.

A cool idea, but it requires FFG to plan out every ship they will ever release over the entire lifespan of the game. For instance, if they hadn't ever expected to actually get to the E-Wing and therefore left it off of pilot cards, would they reprint Wedge with the E-Wing added to his list of ships?

This is one of those ideas that would work very well in a game where you buy the box and you're done. It has too many logistical problems for a game where basically everything is an expansion.

FFG is doing things as right as they can be and when compaired to many games there is very little for any of us to be upset about.

Vader in a Phantom?

...I'll be in my bunk.

I liked this idea when I first played the game, But attack wing really showed why its a bad idea.

Alex has said in an interview to houserule pilots in other ships. I want to say he even gave a simple formula to show how to put mareek in a defender.

It would be real hard to balance.

It would be fun to have Soontir in a TIE Fighter, but that could be more easily done by just packaging another ship tile and a pilot card in with an aces pack or something.

The only reason they don't yet have multiple ships with the same pilot is because they felt it unnecessarily limited choice at that stage: the PS8 E-wing was originally Luke Skywalker. They made it Corran because they saw no reason to stop you flying PS8 E-wing with Luke's PS8 X-wing (and people do.)

Where did you hear this from? That makes a lot of sense, but I had not heard that from anywhere else.

I liked this idea when I first played the game, But attack wing really showed why its a bad idea.

Alex has said in an interview to houserule pilots in other ships. I want to say he even gave a simple formula to show how to put mareek in a defender.

TIE defender Maarek Steele for example is 38 points. You work out how much it pays for its pilot skill, EPT and ability, then transfer that onto a generic of the new ship. Maarek's TIE/x1 pays 6 points for 5 pilot skill, an EPT slot and Maarek's ability. TIE defender costs 31 points at PS2, (PS1 is 30 and PS3 is 33), 31 + 6 = 37.

The only reason they don't yet have multiple ships with the same pilot is because they felt it unnecessarily limited choice at that stage: the PS8 E-wing was originally Luke Skywalker. They made it Corran because they saw no reason to stop you flying PS8 E-wing with Luke's PS8 X-wing (and people do.)

Where did you hear this from? That makes a lot of sense, but I had not heard that from anywhere else.

It was in an interview the Scum and Villainy podcast did with Alex Davy and Frank Brooks around the time of the Scum and Villiany release. Same interview as that Maarek formula.

I also think it was a Gencon interview.

What if pilots were limited in the ships they could fly, but not normally bound to a single ship?

Well, lore seems to suggest that people can either pilot a starship or they can't. There are countless examples of people in SW who just jump on board the nearest ship, and have no difficulty flying it. Even when it's a ship type they've never flown before.

Did Vader ever fly a TIE Interceptor? Probably not. Could he have? Most likely.

Starships in SW are like cars in that respect.

I would say the most "realistic" solution, would be to give pilots one or more "Preferred" ships, that give a bonus to their pilot skill while flying it.

So Vader is a 9 PS in the TIE Advanced, but maybe only a 7 in something else.

Boba Fett in IG-2000. Because rerolls are fun when you're throwing that many dice already.

Wedge in a fat Falcon; Howlrunner in a Decimator (Or heck, in a Phantom!). There are many, many ways to tip the system on its head if you can mix'n'match. While I totally Get It in regards to wanting the canonical mix'n'match, in practice it turns out a lot harder to balance a game where it's allowed.

I wouldn't mind an 'aces' pack to show up that let you have extra editions of Luke, Maarek, Wedge, etc, though. Picking which ship to put Luke in for a given engagement could be a heck of a cool thing to need to do... just let the designers do it.

What if pilots were limited in the ships they could fly, but not normally bound to a single ship?

Well, lore seems to suggest that people can either pilot a starship or they can't. There are countless examples of people in SW who just jump on board the nearest ship, and have no difficulty flying it. Even when it's a ship type they've never flown before.

Did Vader ever fly a TIE Interceptor? Probably not. Could he have? Most likely.

Starships in SW are like cars in that respect.

I would say the most "realistic" solution, would be to give pilots one or more "Preferred" ships, that give a bonus to their pilot skill while flying it.

So Vader is a 9 PS in the TIE Advanced, but maybe only a 7 in something else.

A pilot skill reduction does nothing to address the possibilities of over power combos resulting from combining pilot abilities and the available upgrade options of the ships you add them to. That why this method would either limit design space or create imbalance. As I understand it this has already happened in Star Trek Attack Wing.

You need to look at it as a game and not just a representation of the Star Wars lore.

You need to look at it as a game and not just a representation of the Star Wars lore.

Well, I'm a Star Wars fan, not a tournament player. So I wouldn't say I NEED to do that.