TLT seems to be all about the dice variance, though.

TLT seems to be all about the dice variance, though.

Consider, the native ability of twin laser is in the domain of Han's Pilot ability or the Gunner upgrade. Which were both about eliminating dice variance by the same method: shoot so much that something hits eventually. I've heard it called 'dice cycling'. I call it 'slot machine effect'. Same thing in the end.

Also there's no cinematic gain for the dice variance you do get. It's just pass fail, with the same reward every time. Might as well be a skill check in Imperial Assault.

I find it interesting people are skipping part one of MJs post.

I think a torpedo slot upgrade that essentially gives you 2 Torps at a discounted cost, but the discount isn't relative to the price of the munitions... I'll try and explain, ideally I'd like a 3 point upgrade, let's call it T65-Weapon Loadout, that is explicitly 2 proton torpedoes, no more no less, however it is only available to generic fighters, because otherwise it would boost named pilots to higher levels then necessary.

This would mean for 25 points, you would get a Rookie pilot, R2 unit, integrated astromech, and T65-Weapon Loadout.

Doesn't complicate things like a added boost/ shield because that's what we got in the T70 because we want to make the T65 viable, not a carbon(ite) copy

accidentally hit the back button on my mouse losing everything. I know your pain...

1. TLT Y-wings are so efficient for turrets that they have put all vanilla generic ships on the endangered species list.

They went extinct long before that, during the Phantom Menace era.

2. The X-wing with I.A. is almost, but not quite, as cost efficient as a naked B-wing.

​You're saying it as if it's a problem.

Here are the jousting numbers using updated non-public MathWing analysis (including a real action economy model), but still using the legacy meta assumptions from over a year ago. These numbers will change once I pull in TLT as a defining attack type in the wave 7+ meta. These are "absolute" efficiency numbers, so they are NOT derated for Pilot Skill. I threw in Vader and Fel for kicks because, despite being PS9, they have an efficiency that nearly matches tier 1.5 PS1/2 jousters.

And are seen in 90% of imperial lists.

Z-95: 100.0% (reference)

TIE Fighter: 99.3%

B-wing + FCS: 95.3%

Y-wing + TLT + BTL: 94.2%

TIE Adv + ACC: 93.9%

A-wing + Refit: 93.1%

B-wing: 92.5%

X-wing + I.A: 91.3%

Vader + ATC: 90.4%

X-wing: 86.3%

Y-wing + TLT: 85.7%

Fel + PtL + SD + AT: 85.5%*

* Fel's efficiency will go up with wave 7 meta assumptions where AT will matter more vs the flood of TLT attacks that I'm not modeling yet. Note this doesn't even consider that he is PS9 or has access to boost and barrel roll. It's just looking at "turtle Fel" approach of double focus + evade every round.

Not even Drea Rental with smiley 4-11 droid can't reliably push through.

It requires 3 TLTs with Agromechs to push through his tokens and autothrusters.

Or a single stress-Y.

Disclaimer: analysis still in progress, final numbers subject to change, terms and conditions apply, etc etc etc.

Conclusion: for the X-wing to be viable, they need:

• TLT Y-wings to not exist at 24 points Stress-Y will still be there, it's utility . merc Unhinged Y-s will die.
• The X-wing still needs to be more cost efficient at low PS even than with I.A. +1 Hull for free as I had suggested a year ago in my House Rules would be OK. Integrated Astromech for 1 point (droid cost) is a step in the right direction, but it won't quite be enough. ​In Epic it's THE most efficient ship right now. And that's where joust still lives, unhinged by boostwing meta.
• The high PS ships need a repositional capability, at an absolute minimum barrel roll is required for PS8+ to have any sort of positional advantage. ​PTL+EU+BB-8 Wedge looks cool. Try him.

Therefore, steps to "fix" the X-wing:

1. FFG hires me as a Consultant Technical Director. ​....
2. Errata TLT to 7 points. ​I you just want them to be Rebel-Stress-only.
3. Change Integrated Astromech to also reduce the cost of the astromech by 1 point to a minimum of 0, and grant the barrel roll action if your action bar does not include the boost action. (text won't all fit on the card, but that's still what it needs) You want to see meta overflown with X-wings? because that's how you get a meta overflown with X-wings.

None of these however are likely to happen.

Who knows...

I find it interesting people are skipping part one of MJs post.

Thats because this is a thread about the X-Wing. The part about TLT does warrant a seperate discussion, though. I am inclined to believe that efficiency can overcome the turret advantage, but with how incredibly popular post manouver movement aces are I may very well be wrong. The store championship season will be interesting. But as I said, this is not the place for that discussion.

I saw a squad with Wedge and a freaking RED SQUADRON make the cut at the Nova Open Championship. I think the X-wing is a bit better than many feel.

It was flown by Ron Brannan. He's good. He was #19 at Worlds this year.

Just to be sure. MJ's number are 1.2% difference. Do you feel this is game breaking? Will it ever be possible to get to a perfect 100% balance of every ship?

The point is not to get all the ships at the same 100% raw cost efficiency. The point is to make all the the ships viable in some reasonable competitive capacity. The cost efficiency is just one metric (albeit the biggest one) to determine whether a ship is viable.

Exactly what I got from that. It's so ******* close as to literally not matter especially considering how many other factors exist. Or in other words.. close enough, unless we want yatzee.

They are very close, but for good game design (both for balance and thematically) you want the X-wing to be just a little more cost efficient than the naked B-wing. This is the only scenario in which they would both be truly equally viable.

Since I recall that the PS2 T-65 X-wing was specifically costed at 21 points as it was thought to be overpowered to allow a squadron of 5 X-wing at 100 points. Now that the error has been realized, what would be so bad about dropping the PS2 to 19 and the PS4 to 20? (The mechanic could be a "Rebel Modifications" Title and Modification card - to consume both of those "slots" - to help reign this approach in from being overpowered.)

How would that change things, MajorJuggler?

RogueMorgan

A fair price for an X-wing with Integrated Astromech (plus the obligatory 1 point mech) is about 21 points. If you go to 20 points then it would be 100.4% jousting efficient, AND you would be able to field 5 of them in a list to get a super-jousty list. So 21 points is the right number to err just slightly on the side of caution.

1. TLT Y-wings are so efficient for turrets that they have put all vanilla generic ships on the endangered species list.

They went extinct long before that, during the Phantom Menace era.

That's a common misconception that is not actually backed up by the data. 50% of all points spent in Worlds 2014 Top 32 were spent on vanilla generic pilots.

Honestly I don't think people will be satisfied until the X-Wing has the maneuverability of the TIE Interceptor and totally dominates the meta.

I think the problem is that the game is called X-Wing Miniatures. If it had been called Tie Fighter Miniatures or even Star Wars Miniatures, there would be less forums on this topic, especially since the Tie has become the benchmark for what is properly costed and what isn't.

I feel the game is remarkably balanced in general and many ships/pilots that dont see a lot of high level tournament play are still great and fun in epic and casual play.

Still, sometimes its fun to imagine that Wedge can solo a 12 ship sqaudron of Ties by auto killing 3 at range 5 with his protons and then swoop and deke and dive circles around the rest of them while regening 2 shields a round, like he does in the Legends books.

Quite agreeing to the first 3 sentences of the 2 posts together

However "Still, sometimes its fun to imagine that Wedge can solo a 12 ship sqaudron of Ties by auto killing 3 at range 5 with his protons and then swoop and deke and dive circles around the rest of them while regening 2 shields a round, like he does in the LEGENDS books." [emphasis by me]

It's legends, it's plot armor, it's probably bad(?) fan fiction, haven't read/seen it. Even though it might be fun THERE, imagine that would be realised in game: how much fun would it be for the non-Wedge player? Maybe once or twice for a casual game friend with friends and snacks/pizza/pretzels, but other than that totallly silly and thus zero fun.

Again - a long thread about how bad the T-65 is, before IA is out offically - sigh.

It is a generalist. The Jack of all trades is Master in none.

Plus lot of options to fine-tune with astromechs, this actually enhanced by IA, in compliance with the theme and game's name!

Those complaining here: How many of you have flown with proxied IA? How many of you have flown both T-65 and Khiraxz (3att 2 agi 4hu 1sh generalist), being able to compare?

The T-65 with IA is solid, at least it were in the games I played.

And rebel player routinely tend to forget how fine shields are, you ignore a number of crits, which cripple most small imperials and scum early.

As for with IA being some fractions of percentage below vanilla B: A B-wing is easily outflown or down-focussed, as is so **** slow, more difficult to do with a T-65. Just don't joust with B:s.

You have to remind yourself that this game is huge, you cannot just "fix" something without looking at the effects on other game parts.

Overdo the T-65, and it gets OP in Epic.

Overdo the T-65, but then quit whining about that Scum only ever fields Brobots or TLT-Ys (or maybe in future the flying toilet seat), because by overdoing the X-65 you kill of the Khiraxz. With a dead Scyk (apart from 1-max2 thin glass flanking cannon snipers) and half-dead Z-95 (who just can't push damage through in game where everything new gets 3 dice) Scum has no other options left.

Honestly, I think the title of this thread should be "What would it take to make the X-wing the gatekeeper". The top of the top.

call it a T-70 and there X-wing is on top of the top. After all there was an X-wing in the winning list of Worlds.

The ideal state of the game:

At least 1 ship per faction at 100% raw jousting efficiency.

Every other ship in the game should have ~95% jousting efficiency + some cool tricks that- when properly leveraged- bring their adjusted stats above 100%.

Right now the X-Wing (T-65) itself is under 95%. When IA drops it will _still_ be under 95%. It also lacks the cool tricks it should need to increase its absolute efficiency above 95% when played well.

It isn't in a terrible spot. It merely needs a tiny bit more of a nudge than it looks like IA will be. We're still going to see a lot of Biggs in 2016. And (unless something major happens) we're going to see more T-65s than Defenders.

if X-wings get free "discard damage card" free astromechs (suddenly the dial is greener than Interceptor's)

And barrel rolls they immediately outperform B-wings, BTL-Y's and even Defenders.

At 21 points.

The high PS ships need a repositional capability, at an absolute minimum barrel roll is required for PS8+ to have any sort of positional advantage. ​PTL+EU+BB-8 Wedge looks cool. Try him.

He's cool, but not worth anything close to 35 points. See Worlds results.

Why wedge when there's Poe with autothrusters, regen and SP10?

sure thing.

But this wedge build is solid as long as there's no stress-dumpers around.

and Tactician stress-dumpers don't make him squeal. Only the Stress-Y does.

Problem is that "fixing" things by nerfing TLT doesn't hamper the main TLT users out there because they are unique.

And TLT lists aren't even close to powerhouse levels.

Enough to win nationals when people didn't expect them, but not nearly as strong to compete with meta tops.

If you start adding layers onto a B-wing, it gets more and more expensive. But it doesn't get Horn-level upgrade synergy, and E2 is a mod, not a title.

B-wing trades 1 evade die for 2 shields (let's consider IA is just a shield, although it IS better)

It's nearly a fair trade unless 4+ dice attacks start flying or Single Turbolasers get used.

If an X-wing is more effective than B-wing, B-wing goes extinct.

And now exclude all the TLT-user "vanilla generic pilots" from there, and how may were Jouster ships.

I somehow don't see that many jousters, where are they?

1 BBBBZ list

1 Obsidian Howlie-swarm list

1 miniswarm with Whipster

1 black Crack list

Jousters are dead for good. IV episode wave Phantom Menace, V-VI wave Boost-PWT-Pancake and current Ace+TLT Eras don't let them see that much use.

Major Juggler..

Your post says X-wing + IA - with the astromech cost - have you worked it out for the benefit of the various astromechs?

Did you distinguish from taking 2 crits, and being able to use IA on the worst of 2 crits?

Really what it seems like you would want is a way to use the older pilots. It doesn't even really seem like the t-65 is the issue. Why not just make a 3-5 point modification card that says for all intensive purposes this ships is a t-70, but you get to keep your pilot ability. We'll call it the t-69 test. They could do the same for Tie/fo's, thus giving the player more options. I say 3-5 points because Wedge in a t-70 could be busted. You'd be in a t-70 but your mod slot would be taken.

Every time a new Astromech gets released, the T-65s get better.

The T-65 is not as bad as pre-title Advanced.

Is this just the younger players with their sense of entitlement from the preschooler highschools and daycare colleges speaking?

Just want to point this out.

There are 5 PS9 Pilots in the game. Soontir, Vader, Han, Wedge and Talonbane.

At Worlds, Soontir was used in 30 lists, 2 of which made top 16.

Vader was used in 29 lists, 4 of which made top 16.

Han was used in 6 lists, 0 of which made top 16, highest Swiss rank was 33.

Talonbane was used in 1 list, Swiss rank 175.

Wedge was used in 1 list, Swiss rank 215.

What are the go-to ships in Imperial?

The PS9 Imp ships just happen to have the best ways to keep themselves alive, there aren't any shield regenerating shenanigans to be had on Imperial side.

The numbers stay the same no matter how short the bus is implied to be.

And the Pilot known as Twin Laser Turret showed up over 100 times.

45 of those were Syndicate Thugs.

I guess Darth Vader needs another buff because he doesn't get played as often as Syndicate Thug.

Of three factions, only 1 can't take TLT. If Empire could take TLT you wouldn't see as many Soontirs or Vaders.

Of three factions, only 1 can't take TLT. If Empire could take TLT you wouldn't see as many Soontirs or Vaders.[/size]

I think you'd see soontir + TLT

Of course I can´t find a link *grumbls*

But I do seem to recall an interview with (one of) the designers, where it was stated the T-65 didn´t need so much as a fix, but more of a boost. It was about getting more choices for your X-wing, buffing it a bit.

Low and behold, there is the T-70, which is better in stats, but also more expensive point-wise.

But also included are some fine upgrades, none to expensive, which will buff your T-65.

With an integrated astromech and then the wide array of astromechs to choose from (and also making them more thematic) you can build them the way you like. I am all for it.

Now, FFG, my humble repetitive request and a chance to include more pilots giving synergie to others:

-Please develop a T-65 aces pack, including one T-65 in Wraith Squadron colours and one in Corsec Green colours, include Corran Horn, Whistler, Gara Pethothel, Myn Donos, Tycho Celchu, ´Piggy´, Tonin, Mynock, Generic R2´s and R5´s, Targeting Astromechs, Integrated Astromechs, and the list goes on

I know, it is all legends and stuff, and there is a new movie with newer T-70´s, but it never hurts to ask right? Please?

Again - a long thread about how bad the T-65 is, before IA is out offically - sigh.

It is a generalist. The Jack of all trades is Master in none.

Plus lot of options to fine-tune with astromechs, this actually enhanced by IA, in compliance with the theme and game's name!

Those complaining here: How many of you have flown with proxied IA? How many of you have flown both T-65 and Khiraxz (3att 2 agi 4hu 1sh generalist), being able to compare?

The T-65 with IA is solid, at least it were in the games I played.

And rebel player routinely tend to forget how fine shields are, you ignore a number of crits, which cripple most small imperials and scum early.

As for with IA being some fractions of percentage below vanilla B: A B-wing is easily outflown or down-focussed, as is so **** slow, more difficult to do with a T-65. Just don't joust with B:s.

You have to remind yourself that this game is huge, you cannot just "fix" something without looking at the effects on other game parts.

Overdo the T-65, and it gets OP in Epic.

Overdo the T-65, but then quit whining about that Scum only ever fields Brobots or TLT-Ys (or maybe in future the flying toilet seat), because by overdoing the X-65 you kill of the Khiraxz. With a dead Scyk (apart from 1-max2 thin glass flanking cannon snipers) and half-dead Z-95 (who just can't push damage through in game where everything new gets 3 dice) Scum has no other options left.

As a jouster, the X has been overshadowed by the B since its release, being overall just more effective/efficient for the points - plus having a much better range of upgrade options.

Fine tuning with astro mechs sounds lovely, but what does that mean? Until now most of the droids were more effective on the Y than the X. The TA and R7 are equally corner case apart from Tarn. There still is not a really good choice for a generic droid which helps the X Wing in particular along with IA (which is X Wing only) - which is why I think a lot of people were hoping for more from TA. I am deliberately not counting uniques in here as they can only affect 1 ship - taking multiple generic X Wings is perfectly acceptable and is thematic, because they were the mainline Rebel fighter (No one bats an eye when Imperial builds feature multiple TIES). The generic droid upgrade slot is still one of the least developed options and remains one of only three (including title) possible upgrade slots available for the T-65s. So it has to carry a fair amount of weight to make a points inefficient ship like the T-65 work - which IA perfectly illustrates.

I own 14 T65s, I play epic and similar size games (only way to get 14 X Wings in there ) and have flown them a lot. They remain my favorite ship in SW. I have proxied IA and yes, it does give them a boost. But as I have said before it avoids helping the X wing directly and instead tries to make droids central to the ship. I don't like that approach mainly because the droids don't really offer the T-65 much at the moment and it kills diversity because it actively discourages people from flying a naked T-65 - which seems wrong compared to every other viable naked ship. Why not just fix the **** ship in the first place?!

I also have 5 Kxvhythngxvxsz and have flown them too. I get your argument about the Ksjfhsfbsnksf vs the X Wing, but actually I think the K-thing's price is the strongest argument for the X to have been cheaper originally as it is about the most similarly balanced ship you can find overall and 20 points is reasonable for a rookie X as MJ math says.

Also Imperial players also seem to forget that they can spam hull onto the field far more easily than rebels - rebels need shields because they can quite easily have significantly less total HP compared to Imperial lists and because most Imp ships have evade and more green dice, whereas rebels survive by the grace of green dice....or not! Obviously YMMV depending on meta, but the Academook TIE remains one of the most efficient ship choices available.

B wings can be focused down, in the same way that any ship can, they are just more reliable because there is less margin for the green dice to abandon them. That predictability is part of what makes them excellent jousters.......that and FCS.

The problem is that the Xwing needs to be slightly MRE efficent thanthe Bwing to make up for the Bwing's repositional capability.

It's the same reason Z95s needed to be more efficent than tie fighters- tigh fighters can arc dodge, Zs cannot, so Zs make better jousters.

Many if not most people are saying the X-Wing needs repositional capability. In fact many say that all of the Rebel ships should have repositional capability as well as action economy. If true then what would be the point of even having other factions except for target practice?

A fair price for an X-wing with Integrated Astromech (plus the obligatory 1 point mech) is about 21 points. If you go to 20 points then it would be 100.4% jousting efficient, AND you would be able to field 5 of them in a list to get a super-jousty list. So 21 points is the right number to err just slightly on the side of caution.

Interesting. Do you err on the side of caution?

There are several ships that are still more cost efficient than the I.A X-wing, in Epic or otherwise, as listed in my earlier post....

And there are several more other faction ships less efficient than the I.A. X-Wing. Shouldn't they be of more concern?

Just to be sure. MJ's number are 1.2% difference. Do you feel this is game breaking? Will it ever be possible to get to a perfect 100% balance of every ship?

The point is not to get all the ships at the same 100% raw cost efficiency. The point is to make all the the ships viable in some reasonable competitive capacity. The cost efficiency is just one metric (albeit the biggest one) to determine whether a ship is viable.

MJ I have a lot of respect for your work; seriously I do. I think your skills are amazing to have figured all of this out. I would not have the time to devote to doing this and I'm not sure I'd even have the skill set without a bit of study. I don't mean my comments as rude, insulting or disrespectful in any way. It's just I can't seem to understand how so many people are devastated by a 1.2% difference in efficiency and how game breaking they perceive it to be. I know my opinions are just that and limited by my knowledge of the facts. So I'm sure there is something I'm missing. But the distance between math and practicality seems enormous right now.

Nevertheless I'm still surprise to hear you say "the cost efficiency is just one metric (albeit the biggest one)".

Would you say that cost efficiency is more important than just good flying; cost efficiency is more important than predicting your opponents next move; cost efficiency is more important than knowing how to play the game; cost efficiency is more important than knowing the capabilities of your squad as a whole and individually? Isn't there any point where the numbers are simply close enough? I would think that if something has 50% the efficiency of most other ships it could use a fix. But we are at a point where plus or minus a few percentage points has gotten many up in arms screaming from roof tops (metaphorically speaking) and demanding that FFG fix the obvious fractional percent difference and perceived error.

A 1.2% difference in the B-Wing and people are citing this as a major flaw that is insurmountable making the X-Wing unplayable. Isn't there some point in simple game play where the math should say the following ships are within 15% to 20% of each other making the ships dependent on the people fielding the squad and how they play.

I do want to say again that I respect your work and don't mean this rude.

[Edited for grammar and spell'in]

It's mainly because people don't really try to understand what he is saying. They just see X is better than Y.

What does it take to make the T-65 competitive?

A skilled player who flies it very well, crafts a strong list they are experienced flying, and a little bit of dice luck.

Spot on as a platitude, but the lack of T-65's in tourney builds would suggest that it isn't quite as cut and dried as this.

It actually is. Those that are highly competitive are the same as those that are some-what competitive... they like to play with the new toys. And yes, when going against the best, you want to bring your A game and try to swing the odds to your favor in all ways. If you can't fly the "championship list" then it is not going to help you win.

I have no doubt that if we told Heaver and Eide that all they could fly is T-65s next year that both would end up in the top 4 and one of them would still win Worlds.

It's simple the b-wings can barrel roll, they have a sensor slot and they can if you so choose take crew, the x-wing has an astromech slot.

The b-wing gives you more options for the same price bracket.

Bear in mind mj's not even trying to account for pilot skill of the player because there's no way to quantify that solidly, his work covers two ships going head to head not two ships dogfighting.

And as he and I have both said it's not the difference in efficiency but the x-wing's inability to reposition that's holding it back, boost and barrel roll are irrelevant at low level but for aces are a massive advantage.

There are several ships that are still more cost efficient than the I.A X-wing, in Epic or otherwise, as listed in my earlier post....

And there are several more other faction ships less efficient than the I.A. X-Wing. Shouldn't they be of more concern?

Are you being deliberately obtuse? Do you not understand what 'jousting values' mean?

Earlier you hilariously point out that Soontir Fel has a lower Jousting efficiency than an X-wing, and ask whether that means the Interceptor needs a fix. So either you were just being facetious, or you don't know what the numbers mean.

Jousting values tell you how good a ship is at jousting, which means for every shot you make, you receive an incoming shot.

Soontir Fel has numerous actions and upgrades that allow him to NOT JOUST, and so he does not have a high Jousting value.

A Z-95 does NOT have access to any of the tools that Soontir has to avoid getting shot, and so they have a higher jousting value.

The problem with the IA X-wing (with a one point droid) vs a B-wing is that the X-wing is still worse, and the B-wing even has repositional capabilities. SO THE X-WING WOULD NEED TO BE BETTER AT JOUSTING THAN THE B-WING TO MAKE UP FOR THIS.

I think, and this is only my two cents; If the X-Wing is overcosted, the obvious choice is to make its points more worth it. I DON'T like the idea of giving it a boost since that suddenly makes it a T-70, yes you have a different dial and all that, but if the X-Wing gets a boost suddenly everyone will be saying every ship needs a boost. The X-Wing is the standard multipurpose starfighter, people rarely take torps on it, but nearly always have an EPT if it has one, or an astromech....so:

Rogue/Red Squadron Veteran - Title - Cost: 0

If you do not have an EPT slot, your upgrade bar gains an EPT slot. Any EPT assigned to your ship has its cost reduced by 3 to a minimum of 0.

This DOES make R2-D6 obsolete for the X-Wing, but he does have some use on Y-Wings I guess. Alternatively, you can drop the benefit of granting an EPT slot from the title and just have the cost reduction. This allows X-Wing pilots to take most EPTs for 0 points while the more expensive ones cost 1.

Counterpart Level Integration - Title - Cost: 0

Any astromech upgrade assigned to your ship has its cost reduced by 3 to a minimum of -1.

So you have to chose where you get the reduction, do you take a cheaper astromech, or a cheaper EPT, you can't get the benefit of both. Furthermore as you can see the reduction can go into negative squad points. This would allow a Rookie pilot to take R2 astromech and other cheap 1 and 2 point astromechs...and get reduced down to 20 points, allowing you to take 5 Rookies in one list while having the benefits of the astromech.

and just to give that torp slot some use

Dual Torpedo Launchers - Title - Cost: 0

Add a torpedo slot to your upgrade bar. You may equip 'Extra Munitions' for free in one torpedo slot.

After performing a torpedo attack you may immediately perform an additional torpedo attack against the same target at -1 attack die. You do not need to have or spend a target lock to make this attack.

I'd also like to see some new EPTs and astromechs to take advantage of this.

Formation Flying - EPT - Cost: 5 - X-Wing only.

If at least 2 friendly ships are in range 1 of you, your agility and attack value are +1.