I'd suggest whomever (over six) has the most XP should GM the game.

I don't think anyone will want to sit a mission out

Thoughts on "Secure Holonet Receiver."

(1) As worded, a TLT's second attack is mandatory. Given the potentially disastrous result of destroying a relay, TLT is a little less useful than it otherwise would be.

(2) An Ion Torpedo can take out the three Sensor Arrays in one shot, with no chance of destroying one. I plan on doing that tonight. (The argument against this working is that the emplacements are not "ships." Which I could see. The problem with that is that a lot of EPTs and pilot abilities then do not work on emplacements. I don't think that's intended.)

(3) 3-attack guns are dangerous when attacking the relays. I think you have to TL, and re-roll a die if you get three hits.

Careful with that ion torpedo. That thing still does damage to the target. Potential to do 4 points.

Split the tables, maybe random rolling for who is at which table - it makes sense, if the Rebel squadron is large enough, that they'd get sent to do multiple missions at the same time to stretch the Imperial resources to the breaking point.

And I've been putting a lot of thought into balancing the T70 - partly because two of my group insist on using the **** thing and won't take 'no' for an answer.

Basically it uses two mod slots and the equivalent of an EPT for its improved dial, so I was thinking about killing one mod slot and the PS7 EPT; that makes it more of a tradeoff than a straight upgrade. Sure, you get a smexy dial with T-rolls, but you also don't get the massive EPT combos that other ships can take - a reverse A-Wing if you will.

We've been role-playing it as a small group sent to undermine the post-Endor Empire under the guise of mercenaries. It makes the occasional random pull of Defenders or Phantoms a little more believable.

Our HotAC group has grown to 7-8 players.So far we've not had more than 5 able to make it on any given night, but it looks like this week nearly everyone will be there.How do we handle so many rebel players? Split the mission over two tables? Run two missions? What do we do if one group wins and one group loses?

We have 7-8 regularly. And we've had 10 in one game. We scaled the game accordingly, (by looking at the formula for adding ships, etc) and it worked fine. Actually we havent had any troubles with the large group on a 4x4 board and correctly scaling it pu to number of players.

We tried a 6x3 once and it was realy bad in the mission where the Decimator has to attack the Rebel Transport trying to escape. We sent4 fighters to go defend it (in case any ties spawned near it), while the rest of our group stayed and fought the starting Interceptors and ties near us. We never spawned any near the transport, so the game was rather boring for those near the transport, until the last turn where a Tie Advanced group showed up near it, and they finally got some action. Also a Decmator with 12+ shields was really tough to chew through but we felt very accomplished when we did it.

Careful with that ion torpedo. That thing still does damage to the target. Potential to do 4 points.

Yep. But the Sensor Array relays are 5 hull. Hehehe.

I do have to beware of crits, though, since they do 2 damage each.

Split the tables, maybe random rolling for who is at which table - it makes sense, if the Rebel squadron is large enough, that they'd get sent to do multiple missions at the same time to stretch the Imperial resources to the breaking point.

And I've been putt

Right, but how do you balance the campaign progression with the mission deck? Would both teams play the same mission? And what if one team wins and one loses?

Chucknuckle, again try the game at 7 players, just scale the size of the board, and number of enemies. It works fine.

Chucknuckle, again try the game at 7 players, just scale the size of the board, and number of enemies. It works fine.

I'll certainly give it a go just wondering how you might go about splitting the group if it grows too large

Don't see a difference between running two different missions simultaneously rather than back to back. Just draw two cards from mission deck. Won't be from same story arc so should be fine.

Our HotAC group has grown to 7-8 players.

So far we've not had more than 5 able to make it on any given night, but it looks like this week nearly everyone will be there.

How do we handle so many rebel players? Split the mission over two tables? Run two missions? What do we do if one group wins and one group loses?

We have a lot of different people playing HotAC on different nights and such. We have had about 20 different players in the game, but not everyone has stuck to it. Some have even picked it up on Saturdays while the rest do it only on Thursday nights. It's been pretty crazy. There are people at all different PS levels, too. We just had someone else play for the first time last week that hadn't played before.

I won't play with over 5 people on a table. It's just too crazy. We will break things off. I think everyone would rather do two sets of 3 than one game of 6, anyways.

I've got 2 characters. One that I've gotten to PS 6 and he's loaded out (or did he get PS 7 recently?). The other is loaded out at PS 2 so far. He's not earned a lot of exp in his first two matches due to poor rolling. I've been using whichever pilot fits the rest of the group. If I'm too powerful, I'll just dominate the game.

When it comes to the mission cards.....well....we have kind of abandoned them. It's been impossible to keep a master deck for everyone to play, so we have just been asking everyone at that table which ones they have played. So, I think I've played most of the Tier 1 missions, but maybe only one Tier 2 mission. I'm eager to go after the higher Tier missions with my higher guy as I want some crazy.

Thoughts on "Secure Holonet Receiver."

(2) An Ion Torpedo can take out the three Sensor Arrays in one shot, with no chance of destroying one. I plan on doing that tonight. (The argument against this working is that the emplacements are not "ships." Which I could see. The problem with that is that a lot of EPTs and pilot abilities then do not work on emplacements. I don't think that's intended.)

Sweet! Thanks for this idea! I am thinking it might be worth it for my Y-wing pilot (Warhead) to get an Ion Torpedo. He's already bought 2 Proton, but I think the Ion is just so good, especially in missions like this.

"Starting everyone with A-Wings at PS2 sounds pretty brutal, lol. You lack any shield regeneration, and don't have the Elite Talents/Skills combos to offset, and your damage output is going to be so low that Interceptors will be even more ridiculous than they already are at low level. I

I feel like the biggest challenge will be balance. Ever play Warhammer Fantasy Roleplay, where an Elf or Dwarf character just eventually became nearly invincible while everyone else is just getting mulched by any enemy tough..."

"Otherwise, the smart A-Wings will just dump the TIE Fighters on the Ghost and run away, lol".

Which edition of Warhammer Roleplay are you referring to?

The only one that counts. The one with D6 dead rats and a small but vicious dog.

As far as rotating players, in my group, we just have new players (or players who missed games) get bumped up to the lowest player's XP total. It avoids all the pitfalls of radically varying Pilot Skill levels, and it prevents the veteran players from dominating the game with their upgraded abilities and ships.

I started the campaign yesterday with a friend (so, two-player-game) and we played through the tutorial and two complete story arcs over the whole day (Refuelling Station and Minefields). We won Refuelling Station and lost Minefields (the transporter was shot down directly before reaching the edge). I fly a Y-Wing, he X-Wing. We allowed the upgrade to T70 for 5 points, which is definitely underpriced and way too powerful. We are both pretty new to X-Wing (actually, we got the game mainly for the campaign) and therefore not incedibly good pilots. However, the campaign felt a bit easy so far, which leads to my fear we're doing something wrong. What I found is that the turret of the Y-Wing is extremely deadly, that Predator is ridiculously strong in the campaign since 90% of all enemies are PS1, and that said turret also scales very well with "Outmaneuver". In all our missions, I was shot down exactly once and only because I got way too cocky, and my friend was never shot down. We lost the transporter also mainly because we were too secure we'd win this easily (as it seemed we would for eight turns).

So, one thing we definitely didn't do right is that we played the missions one after the other instead of mixing the cards in the deck and drawing. I don't know how much this changes, though. Anyone's got any ideas where we were going wrong?

"The only one that counts. The one with D6 dead rats and a small but vicious dog." - VaeVictus.

Yeah i prefer 2nd edition too. Though i think your response might also refer to 1st edition, though I dont think they had small but vicious dog in it.

Though I've had plenty of characters in my campaign (the one going for 78 sessions now) human ones that are better than Dwarfs, and are as good as Elves in everything but BS and Agility. Heck if naything I've found the humans if they get to their 3rd or 4th career to be quite unstoppable, except for overwhelming numbers. Enemy heroes drop pretty quick compared to a bunch of henchmen.

"What I found is that the turret of the Y-Wing is extremely deadly"- Stefan.

Yes Ywings and turrets are flat out deadly. I learned that the first time I played it, I took an ion cannon, not the best choice for the campaign. But when itcomes to the TLT- oh God you are almost always going to get 1 exp (since youve got 2 chances to get 1 damage) and if you kill something then awesome, even more exp. I aso have gone bomb heavy with my Ywing, everyoe else is upgrading to Awings, Bwings, or Starvipers (we played a mission a member found where if you rescue an imperial captive- you can get scum vessels (the small ones) for 7exp to swap, or Scum Astromech for 1.5 times the cost as they show). But yet, I'm still in my Ywing.

Side note, the T-65 with Unhinged Astromech makes it really fast! Just wish it ha Tallon Rolls.

Chucknuckle, again try the game at 7 players, just scale the size of the board, and number of enemies. It works fine.

What's a good way to scale the number of enemies?

I started the campaign yesterday with a friend (so, two-player-game) and we played through the tutorial and two complete story arcs over the whole day (Refuelling Station and Minefields). We won Refuelling Station and lost Minefields (the transporter was shot down directly before reaching the edge). I fly a Y-Wing, he X-Wing. We allowed the upgrade to T70 for 5 points, which is definitely underpriced and way too powerful. We are both pretty new to X-Wing (actually, we got the game mainly for the campaign) and therefore not incedibly good pilots. However, the campaign felt a bit easy so far, which leads to my fear we're doing something wrong. What I found is that the turret of the Y-Wing is extremely deadly, that Predator is ridiculously strong in the campaign since 90% of all enemies are PS1, and that said turret also scales very well with "Outmaneuver". In all our missions, I was shot down exactly once and only because I got way too cocky, and my friend was never shot down. We lost the transporter also mainly because we were too secure we'd win this easily (as it seemed we would for eight turns).

So, one thing we definitely didn't do right is that we played the missions one after the other instead of mixing the cards in the deck and drawing. I don't know how much this changes, though. Anyone's got any ideas where we were going wrong?

Well, here are a few notes to this:

1) Predator is very powerful in this campaign

2) Outmaneuver only works if the target is in your firing arc. So, turrets can't use it unless they are in front of you in firing arc.

3) You only get 1 XP per round for damaging a ship. So, if you happen to use Twin Laser Turret and hit twice, you only get 1 XP no matter how many times you hit.

4) T-70's have been considered utterly too powerful for the campaign. I'd recommend just not using them.

I haven't tried the campaign with just 2 people. Maybe it's easier? I'm not sure. Maybe it was just the T-70's?

Done it with two players. No guarantee it makes it easier at all!

Some missions are pretty easy. Milk run level. Most leave you feeling good you got the win. That damned Capture Imperial Officer mission still vexes me!

Getting ready to play tonight.

I have one xwing pilot with PS3 proton torps EM, R2 and IA. He has 4 xp burning a hole in his flight suit.

Do I spend it on a 2 point EPT? Or bank 'em?

For 2 point EPT I was thinking either Lone Wolf or Maneuverability (barrel roll plus break TL).

What do you guys think?

Ptl is nice to deliver those torpedoes and you have plenty of green now. Predator is powerful early on. What's your strategy?

Edit: ignore the moron. Math fail

Save the points!

Victory for Crack Squadron!

Crack Squadron beat the imps in the Secure Holonet scenario.

The Y wings dropped bombs on a cluster of TIEs setting up a massacre in one of the early rounds. We were able to destroy the first two waves of TIEs before the reinforcements arrived. The HWK ioned the satellites and relays and discovered the target on the fourth satellite.

In the first round "Warlock" smoked a TIE with a proton torp. Then he had to hyperspace away in the 3rd round after taking a massive beating and being reduced to 1 hull. He got lucky and rolled two hits on his first try to jump.

"Nomad" the other X wing managed to do some decent clean up. When the last wave of TIEs came on he kept all but one at range 3 for 2 rounds leading them on a merry chase. By occupying those TIEs he kept them out of the fight.

After failing to slice the holonet the first time it scanned, he cracked the holonet and jumped away I the next two rounds.

The Y's with R2-D2s blocked and soaked up damage from the Strike AI interceptor while the lumbering shuttle never got the HWK in arc.

Key lessons:

Seismic bomb and extra munitions are awesome.

If you can keep the TIEs at distance and keep turning you can keep them away.

Early destruction of the initial waves are key.

Ion cannons on the Y's and Ion torps would have made the scenario much easier.

Chucknuckle, again try the game at 7 players, just scale the size of the board, and number of enemies. It works fine.

What's a good way to scale the number of enemies?

Scopes, look a the formula of enemies each mission.

Typically each line and you'll see a pattern...they usually add 1 Tie every other player, or every 2 players etc. Some add on even number of players, others add one fighter on odd numbers of players...it varies from mission to mission and line to line.

Also ships like the Lambda and Decimator, add shields per player or again per every 2 players.

Some fighters are placed or become aces depending on average of players' PS, again jsut take the average of the number of players, it wont make a difference for that if you have 10 or 2 players.

Lastly, upgrade map size to 4x4 (my group has preferred it over 6x3- said it before on here though) if you can or think it gets to crowded on a 3x3, and some missions get really crowded with Ties, not that it matters if you work well as a team, because again it works if you go with the right scaling numbers.

"The only one that counts. The one with D6 dead rats and a small but vicious dog." - VaeVictus.

Yeah i prefer 2nd edition too. Though i think your response might also refer to 1st edition, though I dont think they had small but vicious dog in it.

Though I've had plenty of characters in my campaign (the one going for 78 sessions now) human ones that are better than Dwarfs, and are as good as Elves in everything but BS and Agility. Heck if naything I've found the humans if they get to their 3rd or 4th career to be quite unstoppable, except for overwhelming numbers. Enemy heroes drop pretty quick compared to a bunch of henchmen.

"What I found is that the turret of the Y-Wing is extremely deadly"- Stefan.

Yes Ywings and turrets are flat out deadly. I learned that the first time I played it, I took an ion cannon, not the best choice for the campaign. But when itcomes to the TLT- oh God you are almost always going to get 1 exp (since youve got 2 chances to get 1 damage) and if you kill something then awesome, even more exp. I aso have gone bomb heavy with my Ywing, everyoe else is upgrading to Awings, Bwings, or Starvipers (we played a mission a member found where if you rescue an imperial captive- you can get scum vessels (the small ones) for 7exp to swap, or Scum Astromech for 1.5 times the cost as they show). But yet, I'm still in my Ywing.

Side note, the T-65 with Unhinged Astromech makes it really fast! Just wish it ha Tallon Rolls.

The Unhinged Astromech can't be fitted on the T65, since it's a Salvaged Astromech, right? I took him in the beginning until I realized my mistake and went for the generic R2. Unhinged Astromech also seems ridiculously cheap to put on a Y-Wing. And I don't get at all what you mean with the XP, can you get a bit more specific? And what's TLT?

I started the campaign yesterday with a friend (so, two-player-game) and we played through the tutorial and two complete story arcs over the whole day (Refuelling Station and Minefields). We won Refuelling Station and lost Minefields (the transporter was shot down directly before reaching the edge). I fly a Y-Wing, he X-Wing. We allowed the upgrade to T70 for 5 points, which is definitely underpriced and way too powerful. We are both pretty new to X-Wing (actually, we got the game mainly for the campaign) and therefore not incedibly good pilots. However, the campaign felt a bit easy so far, which leads to my fear we're doing something wrong. What I found is that the turret of the Y-Wing is extremely deadly, that Predator is ridiculously strong in the campaign since 90% of all enemies are PS1, and that said turret also scales very well with "Outmaneuver". In all our missions, I was shot down exactly once and only because I got way too cocky, and my friend was never shot down. We lost the transporter also mainly because we were too secure we'd win this easily (as it seemed we would for eight turns).

So, one thing we definitely didn't do right is that we played the missions one after the other instead of mixing the cards in the deck and drawing. I don't know how much this changes, though. Anyone's got any ideas where we were going wrong?

Well, here are a few notes to this:

1) Predator is very powerful in this campaign

2) Outmaneuver only works if the target is in your firing arc. So, turrets can't use it unless they are in front of you in firing arc.

3) You only get 1 XP per round for damaging a ship. So, if you happen to use Twin Laser Turret and hit twice, you only get 1 XP no matter how many times you hit.

4) T-70's have been considered utterly too powerful for the campaign. I'd recommend just not using them.

I haven't tried the campaign with just 2 people. Maybe it's easier? I'm not sure. Maybe it was just the T-70's?

1) I noticed

2) Oh, I thought it only works if I'm OUTSIDE the firing arc. ****. Have to rethink that.

3) Wait, I get 1XP for EACH damaged ship?! We played it as a once-per-mission XP that you get once you damaged any one ship.

4) Yep, noticed that as well. I'm currently thinking if it makes sense to charge you XP EVERY TIME you fly them, like 3XP or something every time. But I guess we need to get rid of it entirely.

None of this really cuts to the heart of the matter, though. Seems like I need to try to ramp up the difficulty level a bit.

And do you know whether there are any expansions (unofficial ones) for this out already?

IMO once you get to 6 or 7 players I would rather split up and do two missions on separate playmats than try to squeeze everyone in on one mat. Easier to manage and the games will go a lot quicker, possibly allowing you to squeeze an extra game in that evening.

How do Bombs work then? If your Bomb damaged multiple ships, do you get xp for each ship or once xp for causing damage to a ship that round?

If you can keep the TIEs at distance and keep turning you can keep them away.

Early destruction of the initial waves are key.

Ion cannons on the Y's and Ion torps would have made the scenario much easier.

Oh, I'll have to think about having someone as bait to have the Tie Fighters chase them away. Good idea!

Yeah, early destruction of the first waves is important. That's why my new guy got Ion Torpedo. If there are 2 waves, I'll just Ionize one while the rest of the team beats up on the other squad. I think it will make a big difference.

I still like my TLT on my Y-wing. There are a lot of missions where you need to damage something, but not kill it. I'm thinking of that captured shuttle. TLT's are good there.

3) Wait, I get 1XP for EACH damaged ship?! We played it as a once-per-mission XP that you get once you damaged any one ship.

None of this really cuts to the heart of the matter, though. Seems like I need to try to ramp up the difficulty level a bit.

And do you know whether there are any expansions (unofficial ones) for this out already?

You can earn up to 1 XP per round for damaging a ship. So...if you shoot a ship and kill it, you get 1 for damaging it and 1 more for killing it. If you somehow damage more than 1 ship a round, you only get 1 XP that turn for damaging it.

They also banned E-wings from the campaign as it's just too powerful. I think if you want to really do it, just use T-65's. I know several guys that like to use the T-70 model, but for T-65's. If you really find that they are too powerful, what about upgrading them to the different elite versions? Give them all the extra stuff that's on the pilot cards. Those guys get crazy powerful with all the bonus things you can load on them. Or maybe turn all Tie Fighters into FO's? That might work.

They have been working for a long time on an Imperial campaign. One of the things that really works for this is how long it took them to fine tune and play test. I think they have all the AI done and are really working on the different missions. There is a thread about it on here.

How do Bombs work then? If your Bomb damaged multiple ships, do you get xp for each ship or once xp for causing damage to a ship that round?

Nope. You get 1 XP max for damaging a ship a turn. TLT's only give you 1 XP , even if you hit twice. Bombs only give you 1 XP if you hit a bunch of enemy.

I might play tonight, but I'm thinking of running Dagobah Dave's Trench Run mission, instead.

Guys, I read most of this post and have a couple of observations and comments.

1) Make sure you're using the AI movement charts correctly. If not the AI will pull some boneheaded moves making them easier to destroy. When used properly, the AI can be brutally effective. This is especially true of R1 interactions. This breaks down a bit when the AI starts bumping.

2) Use the ships that have been tested for the game. No T-70s. The idea isn't to see how high a PS you can get but if you can beat the Imperials. I went through an 8 week campaign as a PS2 Y-Wing pilot but had enough "toys" to tailor my loadout for the mission.

3) Y-Wings will tend to get more points than Xs in the early missions simply because of turrets and bomb loadouts.

4) To make sure that everyone gets points, rotate your firing orders. You squad is all PS2 at the beginning so this makes sense. If there's a big gap in Pilot Skills, you might consider pooling your XPs and diving them equally with odd points going to higher skilled pilots. Don't get greedy! Remember this is a co-op game.

5) Seismic charges and Proton bombs are way better than mines. Guaranteed damage is better than 'maybe' damage with mine rolls.

6) Keep track of all your XPs. This includes attacks, protect actions and assists from the squad leader card. It also includes ion attacks that run a ship off the board. It is easier if a non-player runs the AI during a mission. It's easy to miss some points when you're in the game.

7) Have fun! This is a great change from 100 point death matches. Use it to improve your skills against superior numbers that may not fly optimally.

8) Make sure the AI ships get the actions they are entitled to! This is very important for obvious reasons.

9) Don't "stand and die". Use the jump to hyper space if youre going to get creamed. Especially if you're in enemy territory. Having your pilot killed is the worst outcome. You really don't want to start as a PS2 after 6 or 7 weeks of play. However,there may come a time when you'll need to take one for the team to win. That choice is yours.

These a just some of my thoughts on the game and game play and a response to what I've read here. If I have to condense it down to one thind it would be "Follow the Rules".