I pitched an idea similar to this a few months ago and shared in another thread recently but I have kind of thought about it more with all of the posts regarding "I'd like to this pilot in the game but it probably isn't feasible" or "I wish I could get more stuff without the ships, i.e. base chips, cards, upgrades" and "How do we fix this ship/get that ship on the board more often?"

My suggestion: Squadron packs.

They would be a pack containing a "Squadron" card that each list could only take one of. They could be a great way to buff specifically unused ships/upgrades or ships that just need a little love.

For example (again just an example I'm not saying this is the way to do it just an EXAMPLE)

Rogue Squadron

-You must have at least two T-65 X-wings in your squad

-At least one ship must have "Expert Handling" equipped

If you do all friendly ships gain the barrel roll action

You could also throw new pilots in the packs to help incorporate stuff from the movies that got skipped over, stuff from rebels, the comics, or add stuff to existing epic ships without having to rerelease them i.e. add titles and modifications. While I think this is extremely unlikely it is my suggestion to help "tune" the game between releases and boost ships that need some attention. What do you think?

EDIT: I have realized by some of the comments that follow I wasn't as clear as I'd initially hoped to be and more information was assumed implied than probably should have been. These packs would not contain ships they would be cards and cardboard packs to bolster existing products as not to delay the release of new products with fixes and tweaks. Ideally you'd see them under $7 American MSRP.

I don't think X-Wing needs formations...

I don't think X-Wing needs formations...

I don't think it needs broken ships or upgrades that wait 8-9 waves to get any use

What is this 40k?

I will go into a little more detail. X-Wing squad building has always had just a few rules: 100 points, one faction. Sure, there are nuances that make this whole concept much deeper (unique cards, limited cards, restrictions to faction or ship, upgrade slots, etc) and yes, not every single ship is as effective as every other.

However, pulling a GW and introducing formations (because that's exactly what these are) wil serious rub a lot of people the wrong way. Even if it's done out of the purest motives, a lot of folks won't see it that way.

Horrible ideal. This is not GW or 40K

Fair enough and you are entitled to your opinion. Just seems like an easy way to introduce many things people have been asking for. We have fundamentally different stances on this issue and I doubt either of us could convince the other but thank you for explaining your opinion in greater length. We are all guilty of just answering "No" to certain posts but your second post is how we have a dialogue.

As in GW limited edition $400-plus-severed-limb formation type squadrons?

Yeah, that would be a terrible idea. No one would fly a regular squad, all you would see is these types of lists. Luke Skywalters Skytalon Thunderhammer Annihilation X-Wing Force, brand new, limited edition, only 500000000 copies worldwide! Get yours now for the low low cost of the Canary Islands bought outright from whomever owns them! Buy now and save!

Yeah, no thanks. FFG's partnership with GW is frightening enough. I really do wish that dinosaur would die, that way FFG could just concentrate on worthwhile ventures. Has anyone even considered playing Warhammer Discs? I thought they were coffee coasters, no ****.

I thought the post was about bundling ships together in larger packages under some sort of theme, like for example 4 X-Wings in a box plus all the requisite cards to give the buyer some options for squad building. Now that would be something cool to get behind. Like Ace or Veteran packs, but with more ships!

I think this is a good idea. We started doing this about 15 months ago. 3-5 ships forms a "squadron". Some limits when deploying, after this, free flight. No "coherence" W40k rules. The ships share a unique common advantage. Endless options...

TL Huge Ships range 1-5 ( Anti Ship training ), Ignore hits when flying over Asteroids ( Rock Freak flight ), sharing an EPT, equip a upgrade card not allowed... When writing scenarios, you can be creative.

Y wings with Sensor Jammers, Interceptors with Cluster Misiles... What is "weird" perhaps will be "normal" in wave 11

Think about Y wing title, Y wing with bombs, the TAP, new bombs...

This is not GW or 40K

I'm perfectly aware of that. And many GW games are plagued by issues of balance. X-wing is not though, they carefully plan their release (most of the time) in an attempt to keep a fresh meta and balance. There is no reason to suggest they wouldn't treat something like this the same way. I will turn your attention to the fact though that even with the gross lack of balance in 40k or fantasy they were at one point in time the pinnacle of wargaming. They must have gotten something right to have had the level of success that they did. Food for thought.

As in GW limited edition $400-plus-severed-limb formation type squadrons?

Yeah, that would be a terrible idea. No one would fly a regular squad, all you would see is these types of lists. Luke Skywalters Skytalon Thunderhammer Annihilation X-Wing Force, brand new, limited edition, only 500000000 copies worldwide! Get yours now for the low low cost of the Canary Islands bought outright from whomever owns them! Buy now and save!

Yeah, no thanks. FFG's partnership with GW is frightening enough. I really do wish that dinosaur would die, that way FFG could just concentrate on worthwhile ventures. Has anyone even considered playing Warhammer Discs? I thought they were coffee coasters, no ****.

I thought the post was about bundling ships together in larger packages under some sort of theme, like for example 4 X-Wings in a box plus all the requisite cards to give the buyer some options for squad building. Now that would be something cool to get behind. Like Ace or Veteran packs, but with more ships!

No as in a $10 card pack that takes chump ships and upgrades and makes them semi competitive with top teir, meta dominating lists. Balance.

Additionally you wouldn't release them for everything or every pilot. You aren't going to buff soontir or poe. But the scyk, ORS, generic low ps interceptors? They could use some love that is a ways out if it is ever coming.

I too think that it's a nice idea. As long as there are no coherency rules during the game involved I could see the squadron rule being applied to the squad building process only. Similar to Youngsters or Brobots ability, actually, one carrying an upgrade that several may use. With a squad card pack you could introduce upgrade cards that occupies several slots (like mod and title at once), and hand out effects to the squad members.

There's potential here. I don't see any GWish demons crawling up (and I really don't like GW).

Unless these squadron upgrades demand otherwise suboptimal builds I can only see them reducing variety rather than increasing it. And if they did it'd reduce variety of those suboptimal configurations: if the X-wing "fix" demands two X-wings then that prevents you from buffing the lone X-wing.

Unless these squadron upgrades demand otherwise suboptimal builds I can only see them reducing variety rather than increasing it. And if they did it'd reduce variety of those suboptimal configurations: if the X-wing "fix" demands two X-wings then that prevents you from buffing the lone X-wing.

That was just an example, maybe it is an xwing and a ywing, maybe it is ps2 and under, ps3-6, or maybe just generic pilots. It opens the door to a lot of options. In my mind they don't necessarily take a slot up on their own but are just a "take one if you want one" kind of deal and could even cost squad points if FFG wanted them too but ideally in my mind they would take the point deficit that under performing ships have and figure that into the ability.

Another example might be something like:

Scum Only

"Recon Team"

If at least 2 of your ships have "cloaking device" equipped they may reduce the speed of their decloak maneuver by 1" (phrasing allowing for weird cloaking pilots later to be used"

Or

"Wingmen"

When a friendly pilot with "Wingman" equipped is destroyed assign one focus token to all other friendly ships with "Wingman" equipped.

Just examples, I'm not purporting to be as good at balancing a game as the design/testing teams at FFG. Just an idea I thought could kill multiple birds with a single, affordable, stone.

I don't know about the exact implementation, but I could get behind title cards that allow ships to share common "squadron" abilities -- much like the IG2000 title or Attanni Mindlink work.

I've thought this would be neat for scyk's.

Title: Hutt Connections. 0 points. Scyk only.

Reduce the cost of this ship by 2 for each illicit upgrade in the squadron to a maximum reduction of 6.

I can see what the OP is aiming for. X-wing is a very free-flow game at a small level. The OP is aming for something at squadron level, and X-wing just can't do that at the 100-point game level. At best, the average squad is representing a flight of ships, not a squadron. Even when you scale the game up to Epic and start including many more ships, it's not quite the squadron level game that he's aiming for.

The size of the play area and the scale of the models themselves semi-prohibits the larger scale battles that could be possible. If someone created models about half the size, with templates to match, then you could buzz around the play area with flights of 3-4 ships in formation or on a movement tray quite easily. You could have a named pilot leading each flight and the wingmen would get taken out as casualties before the named pilot as the battle progresses. It would be great to place an entire squadron of 12 X-wings down and another squadron of A-wings or B-wings.

This could be aimed at a game level somewhere between the combats of X-wing and the combats of Armada. It's quite possible, just not with the scale of the models we have at the moment. X-wing is a skirmish game between individual ships, and Armada represents an entire squadron but lacks the intricacies required for a squadron level game. You can't just make the points total more and keep adding models, because the gameplay slows down radically. I've seen ridiculous games of 40K where the players have decided on 10,000 points for a game and the amount of models on the table made it almost impossible to move. That's the style of game that GW invented Epic 40K for. Large scale combats require smaller scale models.

The OP has an idea. It may not be feasible within X-wing's limitations, but it's a concept that could grow into an entirely new game, nevertheless.

I think the only reason people don't fly squads is because the meta is Large ships and Aces. That's just the way it is. Trust me, if four T-65 Xwings was a viable, list, I would totally fly them around in formation, because it would be sick!

Formations are the devils tool, seek them out at the peril of your sooooooooooooole.

About variety, this "squadrob" idea works fine to give life to those Punishers and PS 2 Yt 1300 that are only rarely seen.

The 100 pts frame is quite limiting but this idea can not be used in the competitive 100 pts world. Try something different from time to time even if you are a competitive player, in friendly games.

Punisher with experimental Targeting Sistems that gives you one extra red when firing Proton Torpedoes...but if you roll 2 original blanks, misfire. While protecting a Senator Shuttle, a trio of T 65 Reds sharing Biggs skill if the enemy aims at the Shuttle, etc

With a basic mechanic easy and simple, there are endless ways to write interesting scenarios. If you are a Pro player who likes to lead a Meta optimal squad go ahead. But when a playing with a friend some cold afternoon... Try that weird idea.

I'm just saying, formations made Tactical marines worth their points. Tactical Marines, long regarded as the worst troop choice in 40k for their points.

However, I can see this thread becoming the new 'we hate GW thread' where all the salty 40k players come to complain about 40k.

I'm not even sure what needs a formation for the Imperials. FOs and Tie Fighters can swarm former has OL, Interceptors have quite a few decent aces, even if the not-Soontirs have mostly fallen on the wayside. The Advanced just got buffed, the Bomber and Defender are getting buffed, the shuttle can either be a buzzsaw, a palpmobile, or suicidal. The Decimator is pretty good other than maybe generics. The Phantom is still pretty good, I mean they are winning tournaments in SoCal. The Punisher is alright, I guess. Maybe the Firespray could use something? A three bounty hunter formation, maybe?

Y'know, what cracks me up about this is that it's not even originally a 40k thing. Warmachine was doing it for years before GW ever added it to 40k, and someone was probably doing similar "select a certain force, gain a bonus!" stuff before Warmachine was.

Personally I see potential here and I would caution shutting down a discussion with words like ick, 40k, and hell no I'd rather gnaw my hand off. With some tinkering squadrons could be really spiffy. As a thought, this would be great in a multiplier match. In that case squadron cards or lists would be ideal.

This is not GW or 40K

I'm perfectly aware of that. And many GW games are plagued by issues of balance. X-wing is not though, they carefully plan their release (most of the time) in an attempt to keep a fresh meta and balance. There is no reason to suggest they wouldn't treat something like this the same way. I will turn your attention to the fact though that even with the gross lack of balance in 40k or fantasy they were at one point in time the pinnacle of wargaming. They must have gotten something right to have had the level of success that they did. Food for thought.

The reason they were successful early on was that there were not any other options. I started 40K and Fantasy in 1988, I still remember reading Rogue Trader.... anyways I digress. I have seen the slide of GW as a hobby company to a company that sells games, there is a massive difference. GW's way of marketing was to get the people to buy the next best thing that would smash the last best big thing. People do not want to see any game go the direction of any GW game. They have killed off a lot of fantastic games.

We suffer "40k sindrome". Writing an scenario where a B wing "squadron" ( 4 ships ) share a common special feature is not related to going 40k style. And many FFG scenarios modify the ships, so it is not new.

Example, FS 31 Scenario. One of your ships gains 2 EPT slots...

Simply, write your own stuff for casual play