I was seriously going to post my predictions for wave 9 tonight and before I logged into the forums this news dropped.

My prediction was a three ship wave, leaving room for the rogue one ships:

TIE/sf (correct)

Fang fighter (Correct)

Shadow caster (I thought it would be rebel)

So I didn't do too bad, The real surprise was the ARC-170, I really would prefer separate republic/confederacy factions not shoehorning them into the GCW factions...

For me as a casual player; thematically this is one of the more disappointing waves, the shadow caster holds no interest for me, the ARC-170 as a rebel ship I am not interested in either. The Mandalorians haven't been explored enough in the new canon to be excited to fly them, I may bite though. The TIE/sf I will definitely be buying, but I still think it is a lazy design and will only get one. I am always excited to see new ships, but I don't think my wallet is in danger this wave.

I think you had some copy paste errors there...

ARC dial from the article: "It flies well at slower speeds, but struggles at higher speeds, featuring six green maneuvers at speeds "1" and "2," even while four of its seven higher-speed maneuvers are red."

I'm calling it:

1-speed: straight and banks, all green.

2-speed: straight and banks green, turns white.

3-speed: straight and banks white, turns red.

4-speed: straight and K-turn both red.

I think all the 3-speeds need to be red, personally. That makes it really feel sluggish. Giving it white 3-straight and 3-banks puts it at medium maneuverability, in my opinion. And green 2-banks are quite rare for fighters of this style, so I think it has decent options for shedding that 3-speed stress.

My FLGS manager has had hands on the new expansions already.

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10153417344521580&set=p.10153417344521580&type=3&theater

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10153417345046580&set=p.10153417345046580&type=3&theater

So that August release date that was suggested might not be far off the mark...

??!!!?!?!!!??!!eleven?one

Yup. I should add he's at the UK Games Expo, so these are still firmly in FFG's hands rather than out in the wild. :-)

Might be why it was so long before this wave was announced, Maybe they're trying to avoid having ship info out for months before the wave actually hits.

scum need a huge ship not a 5th large ship let alone another large ship with 2+ agility backed by good haul.

I almost get the sense FFG is content to let 4x Brobots be the default Scum Epic. And that Epic is not that much of a priority for them anymore. They had to get the Gozanti out to balance out the Imperial side, but now, it feels like they'd rather keep larger ships to Armada. Where they're smaller.

I don't think that's the case. The Gozanti brought a whole new level of tactical squad building to epic play and I think it would be foolish of them to leave that as a retroactive "fix" for previous epic ships, rather than looking forward to future epic ships. The Scum and Villainy faction needs it's own Huge ship(s) and I have no doubt that FFG will do that faction justice.

• One storyline that has not yet featured in Rebels is the 'Incom' storyline - the Rebel Fleet's acquisition of X-wings which have become their 'mainline' fighter by A New Hope and evidently exist (remember the leaked picture of a crashed x-wing on set) by Rogue One.

I know this is from way back in the threads but I wanted to bring it up. I don't believe it's an X-Wing. I believe it's the U-Wing which was shown in some leaks for the visual guide for Rogue One and leaks for new Lego sets.

What's up with all the bashing of the new stuff?

Mandalorian Fang is a wanna-be jouster in a game that doesn't really like jousters much anymore. Sure, some of the pilot abilities sound neat, but they sounded neat on Talonbane and we all saw how that worked out. "But stream, this ship has the tools to get where it wants to go!" No, this ship is going to suffer from the same issues that plague the Starviper and Khiraxz, just all together in one package. Still, I'm going to grab a few just to mix with a few Scyks. Make sure to paint them all the same and watch my opponent struggle to keep track of which ships are facing which directions. It'll be a terrible list, sure, but it'll be fun.

You say it's a "wanna-be jouster"? So, you are saying it's not good at jousting? I don't get this, especially with the title that encourages you to get in their face. A free Evade result? That's excellent. How is it not a good jouster?

As for jousting not being in the game anymore, I think it will change. I don't think there will be as many Imp Aces as there are now. There are a lot of Soontir counters these days. Add in a lot of extra firing arcs and we can see arc dodging take even more of a back seat. The Tie Defender titles will draw off a lot of Imperial players to try those, as well. Those are jouster ships. Ordnance ships are alpha strike jousters. I believe that jousting will be more important in the future than it is at the current moment.

I don't think the Fang Fighter will suffer from the same issues as the Starviper and Kihraxz Fighter. People say the Starviper is too expensive a ship, but the Fang won't be that upgradable. I still say it's not a bad ship and have flown it to good effect. The Kihraxz doesn't have a Boost or Barrel Roll while the Fang has both. It has the repositioning that people seem to be addicted to.

The title, Autothrusters, and Fearless will probably make these ships real beasts.

Mobile arc is dumb while turrets are a thing. Look at Sabine's card. No EPT, and her pilot ability relies on the Mobile Arc AND having a focus token. So she basically has to predict at least a turn in advance where her enemy will be, which is great with her craptastical PS of 5, or her pilot ability is useless. And every ability with "While in your mobile arc AND primary arc" basically make the mobile arc not a thing either. It's a dumb mechanic, but I'm guessing FFG didn't want to take flak for releasing two large base scum turret ships in a row.

I disagree that the mobile arc is dumb. The ship is also point costed cheaper than a turreted ship.

As for Sabine, she might not need to have an EPT to get her pilot ability. There is Outlaw Tech for when she does a red move. There is also other ships that can give her actions. It's also not too hard to predict where someone is going to be, especially if you are hugging a table edge.

EDIT: Forgot Glitterstim. She can take 2 doses, as well.

I also have to laugh hysterically at the "get the abilities of all IG ships in your list!"

IG-A - sucky

IG-B - Shadowcaster has no Canon slot

IG-C - Shadowcaster has no boost (hello +4 points for EU)

IG-D - maybe it has Seignors on its dial?

So basically "This card was never intended for this ship, but we ran out of ideas so here you go!"

Edit: never mind that in regular play, you can only afford 1 IG ship after the Shadowcaster anyway! Man, there has to be some other aspect they haven't shown, or this card is pretty much DOA for non-epic play. (And pretty much garbage even then!)

IG-88 A might not be so sucky. Ketsu Onyo can reduce someone's Agility before she fires at R1. I can see her easily killing ships.

IG-88 B is obviously not for this ship, but there are enough other Scum ships that have Cannon and Crew.

IG-88 C can easily be worth it with EU...especially if trying to get people in the right arc or in R1.

I also have to laugh hysterically at the "get the abilities of all IG ships in your list!"

IG-A - sucky

IG-B - Shadowcaster has no Canon slot

IG-C - Shadowcaster has no boost (hello +4 points for EU)

IG-D - maybe it has Seignors on its dial?

So basically "This card was never intended for this ship, but we ran out of ideas so here you go!"

Edit: never mind that in regular play, you can only afford 1 IG ship after the Shadowcaster anyway! Man, there has to be some other aspect they haven't shown, or this card is pretty much DOA for non-epic play. (And pretty much garbage even then!)

I think you had some copy paste errors there...

Heh. Things happen when the forum is this slow.

• One storyline that has not yet featured in Rebels is the 'Incom' storyline - the Rebel Fleet's acquisition of X-wings which have become their 'mainline' fighter by A New Hope and evidently exist (remember the leaked picture of a crashed x-wing on set) by Rogue One.

I know this is from way back in the threads but I wanted to bring it up. I don't believe it's an X-Wing. I believe it's the U-Wing which was shown in some leaks for the visual guide for Rogue One and leaks for new Lego sets.

It may or may not be, the point is sort of moot though since Rogue One is like the day before a New Hope, so i assume they didn't invent X-wings overnight and sent them all to yavin just before Luke arrived.

-While we all knew this card was coming, can we take a second to kind of roll our eyes that this is pretty much the 3 ^rd Tie which is exactly the same aesthetically. Telling FOs and standard Ties apart was bad enough. Telling these and FOs apart is going to be basically impossible at first glance.

-Oh, look at that. This one has an auto-include title as well. Interesting. Wonder why FFG decided to go this route?

... and the Star Trek ship is from Rebels??

Yep. That ship doesn't look SW at all.

As I said in another thread, it is disappointing that ships that showed up for 20 seconds at SW Rebels are included instead of an EU ship that has a follow for the last 20 years .

At least, they did a good job in this Wave. I'm afraid they are trying too hard to make ships unique (overdoing titles), though.

Well, Gunboat for Wave X.

Actually, the Shadow Caster has 2min 54sec of screen time.

And the Gunboat was on screen for 0 minutes and seconds. I know which seems more likely to get a release from a company.

Also on the topic of the auto-include titles, it makes the ships cheaper (we've seen how much actually increasing the primary stat costs with the Punishing One) and it means two ordnance-capable ships aren't getting crits from Guidance Chimps, just hits.

They have way more to think about now when it comes to who gets what red dice. Actually effects other cards and interactions now.

I hope so much this is just the beginning of Prequels / Clone Wars era Ships!

I don't have a problem with that but people will riot lol Not to mention FFG straight lied then when they said no way ever.

Now that we are getting a lot of early days of the Empire and Rebellion into the canon those ships are not just prequel ships. I'm expecting to see an ETA-2 soon with as much as Vader has been flying one.

-Oh, look at that. This one has an auto-include title as well. Interesting. Wonder why FFG decided to go this route?

There's a lot of text there. They probably wanted to make universal rules for each ships of the type, but it was too much text to put on the pilot card itself.

I don't think there are any ships with rules or abilities that apply to the ship. That is always done as a title.

I was seriously going to post my predictions for wave 9 tonight and before I logged into the forums this news dropped.

My prediction was a three ship wave, leaving room for the rogue one ships:

TIE/sf (correct)

Fang fighter (Correct)

Shadow caster (I thought it would be rebel)

So I didn't do too bad, The real surprise was the ARC-170, I really would prefer separate republic/confederacy factions not shoehorning them into the GCW factions...

For me as a casual player; thematically this is one of the more disappointing waves, the shadow caster holds no interest for me, the ARC-170 as a rebel ship I am not interested in either. The Mandalorians haven't been explored enough in the new canon to be excited to fly them, I may bite though. The TIE/sf I will definitely be buying, but I still think it is a lazy design and will only get one. I am always excited to see new ships, but I don't think my wallet is in danger this wave.

Well, the ships were leaked a while back already... So...

Article got updated, Sabine is now in the Shadow Caster spread. It still has counter measures and two tactical jammers, though.

The ARC

-Convince me on Norra Wexley’s ability. It seems similar to Weapons Guidance, which is… well, not great.

OK....so, how about Norra with Alliance Overhaul. Let's say she gets another action from PTL, Garven Dries, Kyle Katarn, Cracken, Shara Bey, R7-T1, Squad Leader, Dutch, Esege, or some other method that I didn't think of off the top of my head.

Native 2 red dice. Add one for Alliance Overhaul. Use the TL to gain another eyeball. Use a Focus and you are rolling 3 red dice and adding a hit at the end. That's potential 4 hits a turn, except at R1 where it's 5 hits.

EDIT: Oh, for all the "clone wars era" haters, how much you wanna bet that we will see some ARC-170's in the latest Aftermath novels or some of the new comics? Possibly Star Wars Rebels tv show? Once they are in that....are they really just Clone Wars ships? I mean, you are fine with Y-wings being used. Is it just where the ship first appeared and you can't separate it after that in your mind?

For those wondering about North Wesley's ability: it ADDS a focus result. This could end up giving you more hits or evades than you have dice! You just have to have TL and Focus.

Rebels have Dutch, Garven, Kyle, and Esege to help make sure she gets both tokens.

Throw C3P0 on her as well for the lulz: roll one eye, get two evades out of it. At range three, roll two eyes and get three evades out of it.

Throw on PTL, R2-D2, and Kanan or Kyle.

Tons of possibilities.

The ARC

-Convince me on Norra Wexley’s ability. It seems similar to Weapons Guidance, which is… well, not great.

OK....so, how about Norra with Alliance Overhaul. Let's say she gets another action from PTL, Garven Dries, Kyle Katarn, Cracken, Shara Bey, R7-T1, Squad Leader, Dutch, Esege, or some other method that I didn't think of off the top of my head.

Native 2 red dice. Add one for Alliance Overhaul. Use the TL to gain another eyeball. Use a Focus and you are rolling 3 red dice and adding a hit at the end. That's potential 4 hits a turn, except at R1 where it's 5 hits.

EDIT: Oh, for all the "clone wars era" haters, how much you wanna bet that we will see some ARC-170's in the latest Aftermath novels or some of the new comics? Possibly Star Wars Rebels tv show? Once they are in that....are they really just Clone Wars ships? I mean, you are fine with Y-wings being used. Is it just where the ship first appeared and you can't separate it after that in your mind?

This.

When I first saw the ARC I was like "um... Prequels" then i saw the rebellion re-fit thing and the rebels logo on the paint job and realised FFG are clearly saying "THIS DOESN'T MEAN CLONE WARS DON'T WORRY"

I think I want 2 of them so I can run "Yummy Mummies" or whatever that list ends up getting called.

Mothers I'd Like to Fly comes to mind.

(Apologies in advance for my gutter mind, and the likely possibility I've already been ninja'd on this one. Long thread...)

How would you suggest adding a unique piece of rules text to every member of a ship class, without using a title or modification?

The same way you do the complex rules of Bombs and Mines ... reference cards.

Adding something to a ship by Title is fine ... that's what an upgrade card is for.

Adding nothing to a ship by Title, because the Title is auto-include and thus should simply be part of the ship, is just unnecessarily restricting the ability to add real Titles to the ship.

Consider the A-wing Test Pilot. If done by reference card, you could have had actual Titles: Phoenix Squadron Hotshot, say, or Close-Combat Specialist. But it was done by Title, so now every. Single. Playable. A-wing is an A-wing Test Pilot.

Auto-include Titles are a bad way to do things. They've always been a bad way to do things.

The ARC

-Convince me on Norra Wexley’s ability. It seems similar to Weapons Guidance, which is… well, not great.

OK....so, how about Norra with Alliance Overhaul. Let's say she gets another action from PTL, Garven Dries, Kyle Katarn, Cracken, Shara Bey, R7-T1, Squad Leader, Dutch, Esege, or some other method that I didn't think of off the top of my head.

Native 2 red dice. Add one for Alliance Overhaul. Use the TL to gain another eyeball. Use a Focus and you are rolling 3 red dice and adding a hit at the end. That's potential 4 hits a turn, except at R1 where it's 5 hits.

EDIT: Oh, for all the "clone wars era" haters, how much you wanna bet that we will see some ARC-170's in the latest Aftermath novels or some of the new comics? Possibly Star Wars Rebels tv show? Once they are in that....are they really just Clone Wars ships? I mean, you are fine with Y-wings being used. Is it just where the ship first appeared and you can't separate it after that in your mind?

Ya I am fine with Clone War era ships as long as they try to make them align with GCW factions and have them make a big enough appearance that I can feel like they existed there. It just feels wrong to me for them to show up if they were just Prequel era ships. Count me in the group that thinks the droid ships are far far far off from getting in this game due to the fact that a) they are from the prequels and have made no real (that I'm aware of) appearances outside of it, and b) have no clear faction alignment.

ARC-170 : I really like the look of this ship, seems like there is a lot of potential in the pilots and upgrades. I don't normally fly Rebels, but the ARC has me interested. Reminds me of a Bristol Beaufighter or Me-110. I hope the Barrel Roll card is one or two points, it could help T-65s and Kihraxzes as long as it isn't too pricey.

TIE/SF: Stats are solid, aux arc is cool, I appreciate the subtle differences in the actual models of the TIE and TIE/fo and this one looks good as well. I'm not excited about it but given the fact that Imperials only have one turreted ship and the Firespray for any shots outside of primary arcs I think this ship will be pretty useful.

Fang: I am tentatively excited over this one. S&V is my favorite faction, I was just telling someone the other day that Scum needs a small, maneuverable fighter like an A-Wing or Squint. A new PS9 sounds great, the thing has a 2-Speed Talon roll, and it's stats are solid. It is hard to judge it without seeing the dial though, ships like this live and die by their dials.

Shadowcaster: Double illicit slot could be cool, moveable arc is more interesting than a 360 turret. Mostly I'm interested in the IG88 crew. Dengar with IGGY-A or D, Moralo with IGGY-B. I used to run Bossk+IG-88B, with this crew I could run B and a Mangler on Bossk or C and get a free evade every time I boost with Bossk to make him tougher to kill.

My wallet is groaning.

How would you suggest adding a unique piece of rules text to every member of a ship class, without using a title or modification?

The same way you do the complex rules of Bombs and Mines ... reference cards.

Adding something to a ship by Title is fine ... that's what an upgrade card is for.

Adding nothing to a ship by Title, because the Title is auto-include and thus should simply be part of the ship, is just unnecessarily restricting the ability to add real Titles to the ship.

Consider the A-wing Test Pilot. If done by reference card, you could have had actual Titles: Phoenix Squadron Hotshot, say, or Close-Combat Specialist. But it was done by Title, so now every. Single. Playable. A-wing is an A-wing Test Pilot.

Auto-include Titles are a bad way to do things. They've always been a bad way to do things.

What makes these titles any different than the Defender titles or Advanced titles. Heck, even the V1 title. Just because they have one title, does not preclude them adding more.

I mean, the Defender has 2 titles which compete with each other.

So no more classic EU ships? .... aww ...

Not true. EU is just now Legends, which means it's waiting for the official reboot to re-introduce all that stuff. We just have to wait for it.

Are we getting away from the Civil War? This doesn't seem like a good move for content, this looks like an attempt to get more sales. Putting out models from newer movies (Clone Wars) and the recent successful cartoon TV show.

I think a Rebel veterans with an E-wing and T-65 fix would be more more substantial than these attempts to print new content in the hopes of getting more recent newer fans.

The Rebels tv show is the Galactic Civil War, so it's not getting away from it at all. It's going further into it.

The re-vamped Clone Wars ships don't have any generic pilots and all the pilots listed are from Galactic Civil War (novels and comics). So, even the re-used Clone War era ships are still fighting in the same Galatic Civil War era. I'm not sure what exactly is your complaint.

Rebel Veterans type boxed sets are never done in an official wave. Neither are epic ships. People who are disappointed that this wave doesn't include some sort of fix for them should understand that you need to wait for that boxed set to come out outside of a wave.

Fair enough. I guess I first got into this game as a nostalgic thing. I never read any canon (that's a can of worms I will open in a different thread) or have seen rebels. I am a little butt hurt because the game is called X-wing with the image of the T-65 in the art and yet it is completely gone as a competative ship. I think with Heroes of the resistance just announced and Imp Vets yet to be released, that we would see a T-65 fix in the form of Rebel Vets or something (perhaps an e-wing as well?). But instead I see things that look like more products instead of quality or depth.

Maybe I should watch rebels.

Stand by for my rant on canon in a different thread

Sure much of this has been discussed, but gonna post this and then read everyone else's thoughts.

The ARC

-I am glad they made it very clear that this is not the prequel era ARC. Things like that help with us who, for whatever reason, despise the idea of prequel ships being in the game.

-Convince me on Norra Wexley’s ability. It seems similar to Weapons Guidance, which is… well, not great.

-Alliance Overhaul is really interesting. Is this the first time they have included an auto-include title from the get-go? There is zero reason to ever not take it, right?

-That torps header is action, not attack…. HUH????!

-Vector thrusters! Barrel roll mod! Woo hoo!

-Shara Bey with Weapon’s Engineer anyone? Maybe not fantastic, but hey, why not?

So I'm thinking Norra's ability is less like Weapons Guidance and more like Advanced Targeting Computer (it's add a Focus result right, not change to one?). With the title, that's an automatic conversion to a crit in the rear arc. The major difference is that you have to spend the target lock.

Article got updated, Sabine is now in the Shadow Caster spread. It still has counter measures and two tactical jammers, though.

Wow, it's not even the TIE Avenger or the Assault Gunboat.