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You're pretty much wasting your time criticising FFG in any way on these forums, even though you've made some good points and done so in an articulate and polite way. You'll find the crowd here is very one-eyed.

Indeed...

People are also aware that the designers on X-wing have changed, correct? Alex Davy and Frank Brooks started at Wave 4.

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You're pretty much wasting your time criticising FFG in any way on these forums, even though you've made some good points and done so in an articulate and polite way. You'll find the crowd here is very one-eyed.

For the record, there are a lot of things I wish FFG had done differently for X-wing--or rather, things I hope they'll consider for the game's second edition in a few years. But the OP thinks (e.g.) that re-litigating the issue of how upgrade cards are distributed is more interesting. Apparently you do, too--or at least, you're willing to go along in order to feel superior by taking a cheap shot at the rest of the board.

(...apparently I'm more cranky than usual this morning. Done posting for the day, I think.)

When I say separated pilots, I'm not saying a pilot should go with every ship (most would keep piloting just one ship). But some pilot did indeed pilot different ships (like the Stele).

And Steele released in Wave 1. That gives you two ships to choose from. TIE fighter and TIE advanced. And whenever they released a new pilot, they could only put it on past ships, because they don't know what future ships they'll release due to this thing called licensor approval. It's much easier and gives them a lot more design freedom to just release future ship cards for that pilot. They almost did: the elite E-wing was going to be Luke Skywalker. They changed it to Corran so that you could run it and the X-wing Luke together.

The designers are human, like everyone of us. The game is great, but it is perfect? Of course not. We can't rewind the time, but we can learn with the past. X-Wing Miniatures Game is what it is, but lessons could be learned for other future (and different) games.

But that's not what you've said. You've said this is what FFG did wrong, not what they could do better armed with the experience from X-wing.

You're applying hindsight to everything. You're saying what you'd change with all the knowledge we have now, and then saying FFG should have done it differently without that knowledge.

Guys, there are a lot of games out there. You can get knowledge from existing games and apply it to a new game.

I think it would be hard to balance the game around pilot abilities transferring from ship to ship - especially if ship cards were neutral or cross factionable...

Go ahead - Shoot my Serrisu, body guard supported, stealth biggs phantom with recon specialist and sensor jammer, behind a tactical jammer. 8 green dice at range with a reroll and 2 focus tokens. I get to convert a hit to a focus,

1- The pilots should be a separated card of the ship. That would allow some interesting things: a) ships could have their own "ability" (much like what they are trying to do with the TIE/v1); b) pilots could describe which ships they can fly, allowing a pilot to fly 1-3 different ships (more lore friendly); c) combining the ship ability with the pilot ability would allow greater customization and tactical richness; d) hey, it is much cooler to see the pilot picture than some generic image of the ship.

This makes balance a nightmare. Star Trek: Attack Wing players used to brag to the X-Wing players all the time about how they could put any captain on any ship, and they could mix factions together.

They don't do that anymore because:

A. That becomes incredibly difficult to balance over time.

B. No one in our local area plays Attack Wing anymore, because they got tired of dealing with imbalance and wonky rules calls. Guess what they play now? X-Wing.

The game is really great as is. I definitely wouldn't go so far as to say those changes are needed because they did it "wrong" the first time.

but I'll bite:

Allowing the same pilot ability to float between ships that might also have abilities seems like it might create some balancing restrictions. The same pilot ability would be worth drastically different amounts in different ships that they might reasonably fly. Luke in a B-wing would be pretty much worthless, despite the fact that his PS progression means the B should actually cost MORE additional points than the X version. The version of this game where you move around pilots and put them on ship cards is a lot more complex for both the player and the designer. It would not recruit as quickly.

The dial argument doesn't make sense unless we have floater pilot cards. The current situation with dials is fine. Same for bases.

Some 2-attack ships cost too much. Some are also the most efficient generics in the game. I'll agree that some of the early costing was way off, but their fixes for these ships have so far made the game more fun and balanced than it would have been with perfect wave 1 costing.

The point about selling things is a bit ridiculous. Look around at other miniatures games. The pricing is very reasonable and you can always find individual cards for a few dollars if you really want them.

The point about upgrades is just silly. Were you also mad that they made a whole torpedo slot just for torpedoes in the core set?

I think it would be hard to balance the game around pilot abilities transferring from ship to ship - especially if ship cards were neutral or cross factionable...

Go ahead - Shoot my Serrisu, body guard supported, stealth biggs phantom with recon specialist and sensor jammer, behind a tactical jammer. 8 green dice at range with a reroll and 2 focus tokens. I get to convert a hit to a focus,

It is hard? Yes. But you already do this with the crew upgrades, don't you?

And Biggs would only fly the X-Wing, of course.

And what's to say they didn't? Your criticisms of what they "did wrong" are based on seven waves of this game, from knowing how each mechanic and interaction turned out. When you're designing, you don't know that. Armada, for example, avoided many of the pitfalls of X-wing, but we don't know what troubles it'll run into further down the line.

Furthermore, this notion that they'd plan the whole game out from the start is just silly. Firstly, in a commercial environment you have to manage your design time. Designing the game and all its future expansions and mechanics off the bat is limiting. Secondly, expansion based game design is iterative, you design a component as best you can, release it, see how it does and then you use that knowledge to make future components better. If they planned the whole game out in advance and never designed anything new based on feedback then it'd be a much worse games: we'd have seven Wave 1s rather than each Wave improving on the last.

I think it would be hard to balance the game around pilot abilities transferring from ship to ship - especially if ship cards were neutral or cross factionable...

Go ahead - Shoot my Serrisu, body guard supported, stealth biggs phantom with recon specialist and sensor jammer, behind a tactical jammer. 8 green dice at range with a reroll and 2 focus tokens. I get to convert a hit to a focus,

It is hard? Yes. But you already do this with the crew upgrades, don't you?

And Biggs would only fly the X-Wing, of course.

The only point I'll comment on is separating pilot cards from ships. On the table, from a GM/RPG'er perspective it's a great idea, no guys hear me out. It allows the ability to mix and match and have hero characters. If you are playing a co-op or RPG campaign then it would be fantastic. Guess what, if you are doing that, then you are house ruling anyway - use moar house rules and seperate the pilot cards yourself. strange eons ftw.

From a balance perspective, it's the worst idea there. The broken combos you could have would ruin the game. I'd love to say that I am using hyperbole here, I'm not.

The rest of the points I mostly disagree with or think are moot, sorry.

And what's to say they didn't? Your criticisms of what they "did wrong" are based on seven waves of this game, from knowing how each mechanic and interaction turned out. When you're designing, you don't know that. Armada, for example, avoided many of the pitfalls of X-wing, but we don't know what troubles it'll run into further down the line.

Furthermore, this notion that they'd plan the whole game out from the start is just silly. Firstly, in a commercial environment you have to manage your design time. Designing the game and all its future expansions and mechanics off the bat is limiting. Secondly, expansion based game design is iterative, you design a component as best you can, release it, see how it does and then you use that knowledge to make future components better. If they planned the whole game out in advance and never designed anything new based on feedback then it'd be a much worse games: we'd have seven Wave 1s rather than each Wave improving on the last.

You can't design 8 waves forward, but you can have a general plan. It is not that the EU will change much in the meantime (you kind of know which ships will be added).

It looks like the simply words "did wrong" offend a lot of people here.

I think it would be hard to balance the game around pilot abilities transferring from ship to ship - especially if ship cards were neutral or cross factionable...

Go ahead - Shoot my Serrisu, body guard supported, stealth biggs phantom with recon specialist and sensor jammer, behind a tactical jammer. 8 green dice at range with a reroll and 2 focus tokens. I get to convert a hit to a focus,

Sounds like a 40k army...and why I quit THAT game.

X-Wing is just fine. Fun. Flawed? Maybe, but fun, tight, accessible.

I dunno why people feel the need to point out it's faults incessantly. If you think you are better in game design...apply to FFG. Go make your own game or something. Starting threads like this don't make you smarter than the designers.

This sort of thread is tired and played out.

I think it would be hard to balance the game around pilot abilities transferring from ship to ship - especially if ship cards were neutral or cross factionable...

Go ahead - Shoot my Serrisu, body guard supported, stealth biggs phantom with recon specialist and sensor jammer, behind a tactical jammer. 8 green dice at range with a reroll and 2 focus tokens. I get to convert a hit to a focus,

It is hard? Yes. But you already do this with the crew upgrades, don't you?

And Biggs would only fly the X-Wing, of course.

It's true they do this with crew upgrades. It's also true that certain crew upgrades have lead to some serious balancing issues.

The crew upgrades are much more universal than what I proposed for the "pilot cards".

And what's to say they didn't? Your criticisms of what they "did wrong" are based on seven waves of this game, from knowing how each mechanic and interaction turned out. When you're designing, you don't know that. Armada, for example, avoided many of the pitfalls of X-wing, but we don't know what troubles it'll run into further down the line.

Furthermore, this notion that they'd plan the whole game out from the start is just silly. Firstly, in a commercial environment you have to manage your design time. Designing the game and all its future expansions and mechanics off the bat is limiting. Secondly, expansion based game design is iterative, you design a component as best you can, release it, see how it does and then you use that knowledge to make future components better. If they planned the whole game out in advance and never designed anything new based on feedback then it'd be a much worse games: we'd have seven Wave 1s rather than each Wave improving on the last.

You can't design 8 waves forward, but you can have a general plan. It is not that the EU will change much in the meantime (you kind of know which ships will be added).

It looks like the simply words "did wrong" offend a lot of people here.

I think it would be hard to balance the game around pilot abilities transferring from ship to ship - especially if ship cards were neutral or cross factionable...

Go ahead - Shoot my Serrisu, body guard supported, stealth biggs phantom with recon specialist and sensor jammer, behind a tactical jammer. 8 green dice at range with a reroll and 2 focus tokens. I get to convert a hit to a focus,

It is hard? Yes. But you already do this with the crew upgrades, don't you?

And Biggs would only fly the X-Wing, of course.

And there are crew upgrades that are for one faction only for a reason and crew are limited to fewer ships. Allowing pilots to switch ships creates exponentially more possibilities and would make playtesting for balance even harder than it already is -- impossible really.

X-Wing is just fine. Fun. Flawed? Maybe, but fun, tight, accessible.

I dunno why people feel the need to point out it's faults incessantly. If you think you are better in game design...apply to FFG. Go make your own game or something. Starting threads like this don't make you smarter than the designers.

This sort of thread is tired and played out.

Incessantly? Oh, that was my first time. I'm new in the forums, so I didn't know there were many threads like this.

I'm not better in game design, but I'm not a complete ignorant about the subject.

About my own game, I'm trying...

I think it would be hard to balance the game around pilot abilities transferring from ship to ship - especially if ship cards were neutral or cross factionable...

Go ahead - Shoot my Serrisu, body guard supported, stealth biggs phantom with recon specialist and sensor jammer, behind a tactical jammer. 8 green dice at range with a reroll and 2 focus tokens. I get to convert a hit to a focus,

It is hard? Yes. But you already do this with the crew upgrades, don't you?

And Biggs would only fly the X-Wing, of course.

And there are crew upgrades that are for one faction only for a reason and crew are limited to fewer ships. Allowing pilots to switch ships creates exponentially more possibilities and would make playtesting for balance even harder than it already is -- impossible really.

Not impossible, specially because there are only a few pilots that could fit in different ships.

I think it would be hard to balance the game around pilot abilities transferring from ship to ship - especially if ship cards were neutral or cross factionable...

Go ahead - Shoot my Serrisu, body guard supported, stealth biggs phantom with recon specialist and sensor jammer, behind a tactical jammer. 8 green dice at range with a reroll and 2 focus tokens. I get to convert a hit to a focus,

And this, this right here is why I have sunk $2000 into x-wing over the last 2 years, and maybe $120 into 40k (andthat's just cause i liked the minis).

In 40K, you can pull this sort of bull, and because you can, you do. If I was to play fluffy, my opponent probably will not. I've seen some ridiculous combos that left a bad taste in my mouth till even today.

My 5th edition lysander and sternguard in a droppod combo is TAME compared to some of the stuff out there.

You thought phantom combos, fat han and superdash are bad now?

oooOOOOOhhhhhhhhhhboy. If you allowed separate pilot/ships they'd end up being a welcome sight. The only consolation is that green dice are still green dice, and if i were to roll 9 of them I'd still probably only get 1-2 evades.

In the co-op campaign that's going around it's perfectly ok, because the players aren't against each other and it's co-op fun. Hell, we've done that sort of stuff in Eldrich Horror. AND IT'S AWESOME!

"Biggs would only fly the X-Wing, of course."

That right there is why your idea to de-couple pilots from their ships is a really bad one. When you complicate the mechanics of a game like that, you risk losing a lot of its design elegance. Why is this a bad thing?, you may ask. Well, you experience inelegance as tiring, poor design, rule lawyering, and it feels bad to play an inelegant game.

You also have to acknowledge that Biggs may not be the only pilot who would be utterly broken under your scheme. I feel pretty sure that if you were to sit down with a few players for 30 minutes you could come up with at least 10 utterly broken combinations. So now, not only to you have to post-hoc rule on ten+ pilots, making list building clunky, you've put a really serious brake on game design, meaning it will necessarily tend towards conservatism, to avoid further post-hoc rulings. You'd also drastically increase the number of tweeks FFG would need to make to keep the game on an even keel.

That's not to mention that it would drastically reduce the variety of ship builds in the game! the most efficient ships + the best pilot skills = the best choice for your list. No-brainers sprout up and soon you have utter hegemony, and therefore utter boredom.

Finally, this idea would remove one of the most tantalising aspects of list building, and playing, X-wing; pro/con calculations. You see a really nice synergy between two ships, but one is on a slow lumbering beast, and one is a tissue-thin speed monster. How do you make them work together? What's the magic third ingredient that will make this list into a world-beater? Don't be under any illusions: this maze of list-building, and the huge amount of fun that it represents, wasn't brought about by blind luck - it's **** good game design.

That deals with your first point, I think!

It looks like the simply words "did wrong" offend a lot of people here.

Simply saying "did wrong"? No.

Going on to make a load of hindsight criticisms of balance, presenting some design ideas you thought up and suggesting they were wrong not to use them three years ago, and then to say they were wrong not plan out seven waves in advance?

Feedback backed up with good arguments, nobody has an issue with that. Baseless criticism combined with a poor understanding of the realities of design however? That's everywhere on this forum and it's really, really annoying.

Ya sorry OP #1is a definite no no....NOOOO!!!!! Corran horn in a falcon or outrider?! Really? You want to break this game haha. After the first point I really just stopped reading.

Ya sorry OP #1is a definite no no....NOOOO!!!!! Corran horn in a falcon or outrider?! Really? You want to break this game haha. After the first point I really just stopped reading.

You didn't read the first point very well, it looks.

There is only 1 tech slot card in the new core set...but we do not yet know what else is coming down the line in the future...I'm sure they are designing more cards for this slot right now and we will see them next year. Just because something is not immediately useful or in huge quantity does not mean it is useless or a failure...it's part of design space in the game...it gives the designers room to add new things to the game and that's a good thing.

The same applies to the new maneuvers they've added; I imagine they added them exactly when they wanted to add them, giving new ships new maneuver options. It helps keep things interesting and not every ship should have the same list of maneuvers.

I rather like the idea of the card and pilot being one. It gives the game a more "personal" feel as this is more of an individual dogfighting game, which is person vs person. Having separate ships and characters works well in Star Trek Attack Wing (well might be a poor term choice lol) since they are using Starships that sometimes have a thousand crew members aboard and fixing the captain to the ship card would be a bit weird.

There is only 1 tech slot card in the new core set...but we do not yet know what else is coming down the line in the future...I'm sure they are designing more cards for this slot right now and we will see them next year. Just because something is not immediately useful or in huge quantity does not mean it is useless or a failure...it's part of design space in the game...it gives the designers room to add new things to the game and that's a good thing.

The same applies to the new maneuvers they've added; I imagine they added them exactly when they wanted to add them, giving new ships new maneuver options. It helps keep things interesting and not every ship should have the same list of maneuvers.

I rather like the idea of the card and pilot being one. It gives the game a more "personal" feel as this is more of an individual dogfighting game, which is person vs person. Having separate ships and characters works well in Star Trek Attack Wing (well might be a poor term choice lol) since they are using Starships that sometimes have a thousand crew members aboard and fixing the captain to the ship card would be a bit weird.

I know there will be more "tech" cards in the next expansions, but it really is just another "system" upgrade, restricted to the new ships. I also think there should be at least one more of these cards in the new core set, because all ships there are able to use it.

The new maneuvers few like not planned additions, but ways to differentiate the new ships. A-Wing and TIE Interceptor area extremely maneuverable ships and don't have S-loops and T-rolls...

About the pilots, I feel it is important to give them a face (not only in promo cards). I never proposed fully interchangeable pilots, in the first place, just a little more flexibility for a very few characters.