Thoughts-

The Tie seems a little too unimaginative. Nothing to me is really "striking". When I saw it, I thought, "Oh, I'm pretty sure there are a number of Star Wars fans who's imaginings as a grade schooler look nearly identical to this." Just another rudimentary shape, stuck on the side of a Tie cockpit. Woohoo.

X-wing wise, also a bit disappointing, as it's probably just yet another Tie variant with a 12-18 point generic to muddle up the Imperial fleet and give us one or two named pilots that will see use while the generics sit and watch. Hopefully they can do something to separate it. I think this one has a good chance to be the first ace-type Imperial ship to have a boost and not a barrel roll, so there is that at least.

The U-wing, while not breathtaking, I feel fits in to the Rebel identity well. The prongs are maybe a little too pronounced for my liking (reminding me of a tuning fork), but if I'm honest with myself, I'm not sure I would enjoy the Y-wing or B-wing very much if I had an opportunity to be critical of them upon first seeing them. And speaking of being critical- Can we all at least agree this is a much better option than the absolutely hideous Resistance transport? If this saves us from getting that in the game, I am alllllllllllllllllllll for it.

I can't decide if this is large ship territory or not. It's yet another ship that will be a coin flip as to whether it gets a large or small base, where if FFG had just decided to make a medium sized base, it would surely fit well there along with the IG, K-wing, Punisher, Misthunter and Punishing One. Man. What a missed opportunity...

Suddenly spending almost 100 Euro on Mel's Gunboats, Avengers and other stuff seems like a smart idea.

Frankly neither those new designs or alleged leaks from the IXth wave make me excited.

Imperial Veterans in this year is enough I guess.

Thoughts-

The Tie seems a little too unimaginative. Nothing to me is really "striking". When I saw it, I thought, "Oh, I'm pretty sure there are a number of Star Wars fans who's imaginings as a grade schooler look nearly identical to this." Just another rudimentary shape, stuck on the side of a Tie cockpit. Woohoo.

Fair, but on the other hand can they really introduce a radically different design? They're stuck in the TIE rut; they have been since the decisions in Empire and Jedi, when they introduced the bomber and the interceptor, which are no more different from a TIE fighter than the striker is now. If they put a completely new design in a movie now, it would not be immediately and recognizably Imperial in the way that this ship is.

It's a catch-22 situation. They've got limited design space within the TIE archetype, but if they move out of the archetype they run the risk of the ship not seeming Imperial. Try to find a non-TIE design in the EU that feels thoroughly Imperial. Maaybe the Assault gunboat, since it's an offshoot of the Lambda shuttle.

The U-Wing looks very cool, but... if they wanted an old war horse, they could just canonize the R-41 Starchaser instead (even if they changed a little the design)...

It's a catch-22 situation. They've got limited design space within the TIE archetype, but if they move out of the archetype they run the risk of the ship not seeming Imperial. Try to find a non-TIE design in the EU that feels thoroughly Imperial. Maaybe the Assault gunboat, since it's an offshoot of the Lambda shuttle.

In a way they are because audience must know that something is imperial.

But... they could quite easily throw something different with some smart writing like about a new design which was scrapped indirectly thanks to the efforts of the Rogues.

Just one 15-30 second piece about this new/experimental thing failing expectations so TIEs are given full priority and alternative projects losing support.

The U-wing and TIE Striker could appear to be possible early-style predecessor/prototypes of their respective X-wing and TIE interceptor.

The U-wing does have stubby S-foils and the engines look to have support struts for each one (as shown on the engineering drawing).

The TIE Striker with only two wasp-like wings has just two laser cannons mounted under the cockpit (no lasers mounted on the wingtips), but still has a higher speed than that of the TIE Fighter.

Rogue 1 is set, what, months before A New Hope? I wouldn't have thought there'd be time for the U-Wing to be a predecessor of the X-Wing.

My guess is days/hours

It's a catch-22 situation. They've got limited design space within the TIE archetype, but if they move out of the archetype they run the risk of the ship not seeming Imperial. Try to find a non-TIE design in the EU that feels thoroughly Imperial. Maaybe the Assault gunboat, since it's an offshoot of the Lambda shuttle.

In a way they are because audience must know that something is imperial.

But... they could quite easily throw something different with some smart writing like about a new design which was scrapped indirectly thanks to the efforts of the Rogues.

Just one 15-30 second piece about this new/experimental thing failing expectations so TIEs are given full priority and alternative projects losing support.

That's 15-30 seconds of vindication for those gunboaters and that just won't do.

Thoughts-

The Tie seems a little too unimaginative. Nothing to me is really "striking". When I saw it, I thought, "Oh, I'm pretty sure there are a number of Star Wars fans who's imaginings as a grade schooler look nearly identical to this." Just another rudimentary shape, stuck on the side of a Tie cockpit. Woohoo.

Fair, but on the other hand can they really introduce a radically different design? They're stuck in the TIE rut; they have been since the decisions in Empire and Jedi, when they introduced the bomber and the interceptor, which are no more different from a TIE fighter than the striker is now. If they put a completely new design in a movie now, it would not be immediately and recognizably Imperial in the way that this ship is.

It's a catch-22 situation. They've got limited design space within the TIE archetype, but if they move out of the archetype they run the risk of the ship not seeming Imperial. Try to find a non-TIE design in the EU that feels thoroughly Imperial. Maaybe the Assault gunboat, since it's an offshoot of the Lambda shuttle.

But the Tie Fighter, Int, Bomber and Adv all did enough to separate themselves from each other. Tie Fighter is the basic, blow up easily type. Interceptor is the deadly speed variant, as fast as sin and deadly, but risky to pilot. Bomber is their munitions carrier. And the Advanced is a superior fighter, the next step in the evolution of the Tie series. Between those 4 ships, they had most of their bases covered.

The Tie Phantom and Defender do enough to distinguish themselves in my mind. Phantom is an experiment with the cloaking, and the Tie Defender takes what the Tie Advanced is trying to do, but to a further enough extreme to separate itself.

Maybe this new tie will do enough in the film to distinguish itself, but as of right now, based on design, it seems to be falling in the same crowded space that the Tie/fo and Tie adv proto have been stuffed in to.

That's 15-30 seconds of vindication for those gunboaters and that just won't do.

IT LOOKS SOOOO GOOOOD!!! Yes the Ties design is not the most original, but as others has mentioned, the designers are kinds stuck in what they can do. It had to be something other than a tie fighter and not be the Tie Interceptor.

The U-wing looks ike a worhy addition to the old ships we know.

Also those new rebel aliens and that Imperial droid look AWESOME... I am so stooked about Rogue One !

OK....I look at the article that has the U-wing listed and see the whole bit about Rebel ships mixing speed with firepower of Proton Torpedoes. It looks like a Y-wing cockpit thrown on it. Why don't people think that this thing won't have Torpedo slots? I figure it's going to be fast, have bad slow options, and Torpedoes. It will also have less Hull than a Y-wing. I think.

I'm sure the Tie Striker will only have 2 Attack as it's got the same guns as a regular Tie Fighter. I really, really hope it doesn't have 4 green dice natively. That would be stupid, in my opinion. I think it will probably have Boost and a better dial than the Tie Fighter. Probably no Shields or it would be too similar to the TAP V1.

Thoughts-

The Tie seems a little too unimaginative. Nothing to me is really "striking". When I saw it, I thought, "Oh, I'm pretty sure there are a number of Star Wars fans who's imaginings as a grade schooler look nearly identical to this." Just another rudimentary shape, stuck on the side of a Tie cockpit. Woohoo.

Fair, but on the other hand can they really introduce a radically different design? They're stuck in the TIE rut; they have been since the decisions in Empire and Jedi, when they introduced the bomber and the interceptor, which are no more different from a TIE fighter than the striker is now. If they put a completely new design in a movie now, it would not be immediately and recognizably Imperial in the way that this ship is.

It's a catch-22 situation. They've got limited design space within the TIE archetype, but if they move out of the archetype they run the risk of the ship not seeming Imperial. Try to find a non-TIE design in the EU that feels thoroughly Imperial. Maaybe the Assault gunboat, since it's an offshoot of the Lambda shuttle.

If anything it was the Interceptor that sealed the fate of TIEs. It was a lazy design, just swapped out the old wings with new dagger wings with guns on them. The Bomber was a huge deviation from the previous TIEs, only the front viewport and the bent wings were borrowed from the first film. TIEs should have continued this line of functional design.

And what I really want to to is put three more wings on the Striker and make it a STRIKERBOAT.

Rebel U-wing? Better hope the Empire doesn't produce a Tie Pippen...

I like the U wing. Don't care what it is or does, I'd buy it. Actually same goes for the Striker. Even if it's just a slightly different LN with missiles or hamster launchers.

The Tie looks ok, but the "U-wing" just looks stupid. "Lol lets put X-wing engines on a Y-wing cockpit, throw on some metal pieces jutting out and call it a ship!"

hamster launchers

Someone needs to theorycraft this upgrade QUICK

In ROTJ we learned that 'Manny Bothans' died... maybe the alien in this pic is Manny himself.

But it looks like it's just 'Jaun Bothans'.

Manny survives this mission and dies getting the plans for Death Star II- even more Deathier.

In ROTJ we learned that 'Manny Bothans' died... maybe the alien in this pic is Manny himself.

But it looks like it's just 'Jaun Bothans'.

The many Bothans is RotJ. Death Star two. This is before ANH. Death Star one.

Honestly, I think both new fighters look like they could be interesting to fly. The U-wing looks like a midground between the X-wing and Y-wing, so, maybe low maneuverability, decent attack, a couple of ordnance slots, crew, higher durability than an X, not quite as durable as a Y...

3/2/4/2; 1 crew, 2 torp. Focus, TL.

I did originally wonder if this U-Wing thingymabob was more of a transport rather than a snubfighter, but I guess not.

The cockpit section is very Y-Wing-ish.

It reminds me of the snow speeder

I just don't get the reasoning behind the four engines. On the X-wing they separate but why four for this?

Same engines as X-Wing. Parts and training commonality - that's a big thing for a little guerilla group with minimal resources.

Thoughts-

The Tie seems a little too unimaginative. Nothing to me is really "striking". When I saw it, I thought, "Oh, I'm pretty sure there are a number of Star Wars fans who's imaginings as a grade schooler look nearly identical to this." Just another rudimentary shape, stuck on the side of a Tie cockpit. Woohoo.

Fair, but on the other hand can they really introduce a radically different design? They're stuck in the TIE rut; they have been since the decisions in Empire and Jedi, when they introduced the bomber and the interceptor, which are no more different from a TIE fighter than the striker is now. If they put a completely new design in a movie now, it would not be immediately and recognizably Imperial in the way that this ship is.

It's a catch-22 situation. They've got limited design space within the TIE archetype, but if they move out of the archetype they run the risk of the ship not seeming Imperial. Try to find a non-TIE design in the EU that feels thoroughly Imperial. Maaybe the Assault gunboat, since it's an offshoot of the Lambda shuttle.

If anything it was the Interceptor that sealed the fate of TIEs. It was a lazy design, just swapped out the old wings with new dagger wings with guns on them. The Bomber was a huge deviation from the previous TIEs, only the front viewport and the bent wings were borrowed from the first film. TIEs should have continued this line of functional design.

And what I really want to to is put three more wings on the Striker and make it a STRIKERBOAT.

Lack of design commonality leads the cluster-mess that is the Prequel Trilogy. Oh look, a toy robot with big eyes! Oh look, a toy robot with six legs! Who do they belong to? Who cares!? Help mummy my eyes are blinded by bad CGI!

Keeping design count down or using similarities is very important in movies, especially when you will only see the designs for a few minutes.

nvm.

If anything it was the Interceptor that sealed the fate of TIEs. It was a lazy design, just swapped out the old wings with new dagger wings with guns on them.

Honestly, I think both new fighters look like they could be interesting to fly. The U-wing looks like a midground between the X-wing and Y-wing, so, maybe low maneuverability, decent attack, a couple of ordnance slots, crew, higher durability than an X, not quite as durable as a Y...

3/2/4/2; 1 crew, 2 torp. Focus, TL.

I'd say 2 red dice. Maybe 2 green, but maybe 1. Otherwise I agree.