Hello there,

I am a new player to X-Wing. I recently purchased the Force Awakens Core Set, the Rebel Aces pack, the Imperial Aces pack, a TIE Phantom, and an E-Wing. I was looking into purchasing either the Rebel Transport or Tantive IV sets next, but I was wondering if adding a huge ship so early into my playing of this game would be bad. Like would it hinder me developing my skills with the smaller ships? If not, which one should I get first? I am mostly interested in playing this game for casual fun with my gaming group. I am not really big on tournament play when it comes to tabletop games, nor using metagame strategies.

If u play casually, just go for whatever your group thinks is fun. Huge ships are very casual oriented.

If you're playing mostly/strictly casual, then the epic ships will be a blast for you. Although, with the small Imperial force that you have, a CR-90 and a small handful of rebels would probably easily win consistently. The Transport doesn't really have any offense, as it's meant for more of a support role(very fun to fly), and the cards that come with it do more to support the rest of your collection than those in the CR-90. So I would personally get the Transport and the original core set in your position. The extra core is to give the Imperials a couple extra Ties, and for an X-wing that can be used with many of the cards in the Transport pack. Extra bonus is getting more dice, templates, and asteroids.

Only get epic ships if you really love them or have a friend also into the game, I'd say.

I really like my Raider and all the upgrades for TIE Advanced it came with, but I don't play epic very much.

The single-ship expansions come with different pilots than the core set and aces pack.

For the next purchases, buy the TIE Interceptor expansion for the pilot cards, and then you can play a 3 Interceptor list, which is lots of fun.

Also get the T-70 X-wing expansion, it comes with new upgrades and new pilots.

I would purchase Large ships before Huge ships.

The Lambda Shuttle and Slave-1 are the expansions to get if you like Imperials. (Lambda Shuttle with Engine Upgrade is really good)

YT-2400 and Millenium Falcon if you like Rebels.

The main point to keep in mind is that you should buy what you like to fly.

The CR-90 is good for EPIC play but if you don't have the 200-300 points of Empire or an Empire EPIC ship then you will have a game piece that you can't use very well.

If you want to collect in a balanced way you need to keep in mind that Empire requires more ships to run effectively as they have a 2 to 1 operating strategy.

I would opt for one small ship expansion pack of each ship as you want until you have enough points to get into EPIC. At that point I would go Transport first and then the new Assault Carrier for the Empire. They both give you other small ships and upgraded pilots and droids. And if you like the EPIC play then you can go for the strictly EPIC large ships like the Tantive and Raider.

I wouldn't get an epic ship this early. Epic is a lot of fun, but I don't think it's actually possible for you to hit 300 points unless you start throwing in junk upgrades just to reach 300. In your position, I would grab a couple more ships I don't already have and then look into an epic ship later. Defenders are pretty unique, and the YT-2400 is a lot of fun to fly. I would advise against is getting another E-Wing, right now they basically exist because Corran Horn exists. If he's not flying it then why would anyone use it?

Also, the TIE Advanced is really weak without the upgrades that come with the Raider. If you can't proxy upgrades I would ignore it entirely for now. When you do go for an epic ship, I would suggest starting with the Raider because it makes owning four TIE Advanced a good thing and the Raider itself is scary as hell in epic.

The Transport is cheaper and comes with plenty of fun non-Epic cards, as well as another X-Wing. I'd go with that, unless you really want to take Han and C3PO to a tournament.

Huge wont hinder you since Epic play is so rare to begin with. You'll mostly play 100 point matches.

What is your favorite ship?

Huge wont hinder you since Epic play is so rare to begin with. You'll mostly play 100 point matches.

What is your favorite ship?

My favorite ships that have a game version are the TIE Interceptor and the Y-Wing, so I guess I will pick them up next. The Standard TIE Interceptor pack I mean.

Thanks for all the advice everyone, very helpful.

Oh, how necessary are the official playmats and do they offer anything I couldnt get if I just make my own 3 x 3 play area out of like black cloth? I dont like the prospect of paying $40 for a mere playmat. Do they ever sell for cheaper?

I have several pieces inexpensive black artist cardboard, sprayed/sprinkled with stars i different patterns on both sides. 2 of them together are a play-area. Fully sufficient for casual play, and cheaper then cloth.

Playmats are for completionists and shouldn't worry you for casual play. Any 36 x 36 black piece of anything will do.

Playmats are a great extra, you don't have to buy one.

Welcome to the greatest plastic crack addiction ever created by FFG, you'll start off trying to be sensible but if your like most of us on these forums you end up with 2 of EVERYTHING!