What if either side could hire mercenaries?

By Ken at Sunrise, in X-Wing

The best mercenaries charge more than the bad ones. "Pay squad points equal to the normal cost, plus extra points equal to the pilot's skill" You can get a Binayre Pirate for cheap, but if you want Talonbane, it's going to cost you. This might help with the balancing.

Would make anything more than PS 1 horrendously overpriced. You're already paying for the high PS- that's part of a ship's cost.

Yep. But otherwise I would fly scum with everything. If there isn't an increased cost, then the factions start to just blend together way too much. I like the idea of being able to hire mercenaries, but I also like to keep scum as a distinct faction.

Then when your only faction ship gets blown up you lose regardless of how much scum

The best mercenaries charge more than the bad ones. "Pay squad points equal to the normal cost, plus extra points equal to the pilot's skill" You can get a Binayre Pirate for cheap, but if you want Talonbane, it's going to cost you. This might help with the balancing.

Would make anything more than PS 1 horrendously overpriced. You're already paying for the high PS- that's part of a ship's cost.

Yep. But otherwise I would fly scum with everything. If there isn't an increased cost, then the factions start to just blend together way too much. I like the idea of being able to hire mercenaries, but I also like to keep scum as a distinct faction.

Yeah but then when your only faction ship gets blown up, you immediately lose the game regardless of wheter you had 80 pts of scum still on the table and your opponent had 1 TIE left.

Then when your only faction ship gets blown up you lose regardless of how much scum

The best mercenaries charge more than the bad ones. "Pay squad points equal to the normal cost, plus extra points equal to the pilot's skill" You can get a Binayre Pirate for cheap, but if you want Talonbane, it's going to cost you. This might help with the balancing.

Would make anything more than PS 1 horrendously overpriced. You're already paying for the high PS- that's part of a ship's cost.

Yep. But otherwise I would fly scum with everything. If there isn't an increased cost, then the factions start to just blend together way too much. I like the idea of being able to hire mercenaries, but I also like to keep scum as a distinct faction.

Yeah but then when your only faction ship gets blown up, you immediately lose the game regardless of whether you had 80 pts of scum still on the table and your opponent had 1 TIE left.

Fair enough. Luckily for the world, I'm not in a position to make the rules. I would personally use a bit of both for my own house rules. Make the scum ships cost at least slightly more. But I see your point.

I still think Scum and Villany should have been usable by both imperial and rebel players instead of a 3rd separate faction.

It was a thematic tournament I organized in Belgium:

150 pts (Empire OR Rebel only) but you can hire up to 50 pts of S&V in your squadron.

Very fun to play

I still think Scum and Villany should have been usable by both imperial and rebel players instead of a 3rd separate faction.

Thank heavens that didn't happen.

Add 10-20% to the cost of the merc, when compared to a standard S&V list.

When both players want a named pilot allow bidding.

Only for campaign/ casual plsy.

House rules. In fact, now is the time to prune the firespray off the imperial faction and replace it with the Delta JV-7.

Been doing that for close to a year now.