I have the Gozanti cruiser and the Raider now but haven't played them yet. When I outkit the Gozanti it comes to 60+ points. The Raider is about 140+ points when outkitted.

Can these ships pull their weight in an Epic fight? Is the Gozanti going to be worth 60+ points in an Epic fight? Is the Raider going to be worth 140+ points in an Epic fight?

Or, in an Epic fight, is it just better to take 10 TIE Fighters and 10 TIE Interceptors for 300 points?

The nature of epic games is that they're not uber competitive. Have fun with it. Field ships that feel cool.

Epic rules presume you and your opponent will be fielding at least one Huge ship. Consequently, many if not most of the armaments and upgrades available to Huge ships were designed to combat other Huge ships (and their accompanying escorts.)

You can field 300 points of snubfighters in an Epic game if you choose, but it's only going to be fun for you.

Bigger ship = more squad points = more fun.

I don't see the problem.

As with most other 'larger than standard' formats they're as good as they are contextually allowed to be. When playing epic both sides can either be on the huge ship fun plan or the 300 points of power plan and those two don't mix well. A good analog is EDH/commander in magic. The super powerful combo hardcore decks do not play well with the fun socialite decks usually.

To be fair, the Epics just got a huge overhaul with all those Gozanti upgrades.

Exactly, we don't know the re balance yet.

But many of us are excited to find out!

Also, some of us are currently REALLY bummed they can't throw frigates into fighter fights.. ...

Just played an Epic game with the new stuff last night, and the Gozanti additions (plus rules changes to Epic over the last year) have made these things a LOT more viable than they started. If built with a plan they can shred Aces from across the map, pummel a swarm into ion-filled oblivion, or mete out piles of buffs and debuffs all while drawing wildly disproportionate fire away from your other ships.

One common issue that you touched on seems to be this idea that Epic ships have to be cranked up all the way. A 108 point Raider can still do some serious damage, and your whole fleet will benefit from the Rhymer or Palpmobile you buy with the spare points. 38-45 point support transports can absolutely turn the tide, and while swarms beat Epic ships to a pulp, like many other instances in this game, good flying can render a lethal close range TIE squadron little more than an expanding cloud of debris.

Epic ships may still be noticeably less efficient than their normal play counterparts, but we also have years of buffs and rules changes that have seen a tiny fraction of the experimentation and perfecting people's normal lists have. It's a future ripe for enterprising minds and piles of oversized toys.

I find that just as there are small/large based ships that perform very well with only half their possible upgrade slots used, epic ships for me are the same. Sure you can completely load them up with every possible upgrade, but then it becomes a juicy target with no Agility for your opponent to pummel. As others have noted, they work best from my experience when built with the whole squad build taken into account.

I love Epic and will certainly be flying it more, now that I've picked up my Gozanti. The ability for it to go into the middle of the fight, and then drop multiple fighters is just too tempting for me not to try at least once.

Captain Oicunn - the early years.

Hopefully this Christmas goes alittle smoother.

Please explain the advantage of Epic ships to me.

the table looks way cooler with them on top than without. there.

*more or less serious*

Epic ships are also great narrative/campaign tools. and the GR-75 is still a wicked piece of kit.

Definitely did that once as a child... wasn't on purpose though.

The larger epics used to be a bit underpowered relative to their weight in starfighters because of their energy troubles. Optimized Generators and Ordnance Tubes fix this by either improving energy efficiency or reducing the need for it.

The smaller one card epics have always been good and are better now they get two actions with Automated Protocols.

all these years I was wondering why parents would buy their kids such a thing...

now I know.

The Transport's always been good because of all of it's support jazz.

At least that's what I hear, I've never fielded mine.

Have you ever run Vader on a Decimator before?

Would you pay five more points and -1 PS to make that Decimator able to use the Recover action after Vader uses his ability?

Would you also like to be able to use that Decimator as a launching platform for Major Rhymer and a buttload of Advanced Homing Missiles?

The rest of Epic is largely about being able to build your ships to counter that monstrosity.

I'm hesitant to admit it, but Epic is the way X-wing was meant to be played.

more casual, less compromise with lists means you can use ordnance, field all your favorite pilots/ships.

It's the future of X-wing.

The big thing the biggest Epic ships have to keep them competitive is more than one attack. I found the CR90 to be fairly effective as long as I could keep the cost around 125 points and made 3 attacks a turn. That's 40ish points per quality shot, which isn't too bad overall. The problem I encountered was the limited range bands and energy constraints, which are two areas the Ordinance Tubes really help with. They make it much more reasonable to get 4 shots a turn and with much more flexible output with relatively little additional points investment.

The big thing the biggest Epic ships have to keep them competitive is more than one attack. I found the CR90 to be fairly effective as long as I could keep the cost around 125 points and made 3 attacks a turn. That's 40ish points per quality shot, which isn't too bad overall. The problem I encountered was the limited range bands and energy constraints, which are two areas the Ordinance Tubes really help with. They make it much more reasonable to get 4 shots a turn and with much more flexible output with relatively little additional points investment.

Yeah. Ordnance Tubes and Optimized Generators make it much easier to use the energy-hog hog weapons. A Raider or CR-90 can reliably pull in six energy per round between Generators and Engineering Teams. Or a Raider can go heavy with missiles, using a combination of the Impetuous Title and Weapons Engineer to help you get targets while giving plenty of energy to do repairs and recoveries.

Now we just need a crew member that lets you keep your old target locks when you acquire a new one (maybe limit it to 3 total?) and baby, you've got a stew going.

Hm, I wonder if this falls into the realm of:

If you have to ask, you can't understand.

If the game is just about competitive edge to you; out-building, outflying, and outthinking your opponents, and not about the Star Wars, then epic probably isn't for you.

...... and while swarms beat Epic ships to a pulp, like many other instances in this game, good flying can render a lethal close range TIE squadron little more than an expanding cloud of debris.

One thing I have noticed going up against Huge Ships, its that you darned well better make sure your approach is right - and that you at least disable a section on your first attack run - because if you screw up either of those, a few things are likely to happen.

1. You'll get steamrollered by the huge ship

2. By the time you've adjusted for another attack run it will have recovered all or most of its shields

3. you'll disengage straight into the face of its figher escort