Hi everyone,

I wanted float an idea based on something we'd been doing in a few games at our local group a couple times to great effect (and fun). We instituted a house rule called "field promotion" that gave any small ship with PS 4 or greater, if it did not already possess an EPT, an EPT.

I gotta be honest, we didn't see any major downsides to this, and a lot of the midrange pilots saw more effective play. We weren't trying to run ultra-competitive lists, but it seemed to break up the PS race to the top a little bit?
We have yet to run into something particularly overpowered. I thought K-wings would become OP, but in the end the low agility still weighs them down.

What am I missing here? What breaks? Do things break if you make it even more aggressive at ps3?
Interested to hear your thoughts.

PS3 breaks Black Squadron and Ruthless Freelancers; both have a higher PS generic ship whose entire point in life is rocking an EPT.

Any ship PS4+ is an interesting one, but I'd have serious concerns about Zeta Ace (PS12 arc-dodging, kids!), Zeta Leader (Destressor with PTL, anyone?), Backstabber (was already pretty nasty; now with Crack Shot!), and Wampa (Calculation, anyone?)

I'd also have some caution regarding K-wings and Punishers. I'm not sure any actively break, but even interesting picks aside, I'm not sure how enthused I am about dealing with a PS9 Miranda for the same price as current.

This is an idea that's come up quite a bit, to be honest - often as, eg, a 0-1pt modification - and it has great potential for so many mid-PS pilots to finally hit the table if it were to happen. But in recent times, the designers have started slipping in cool new powers to some of the mid-PS pilots, and some of them really do demand caution lest we break things.

Sounds like quite an interesting casual twist on the game.

My only concern is that it might throw the points balance off a little; All those PS4+ pilots without ept's are (for the most part) a point or two cheaper than they would otherwise be precisely because they don't have an ept slot.

I think for a variant like this, game balance would be best preserved by having a small points tax (1 point, maybe 2 at a push) when adding an ept to a ship that otherwise couldn't have one.

Otherwise all the non-ept aces might just eclipse the aces with ept's because they're so much more points-efficient.

They would all have:

1.) A PS variance of -1 to +2

2.) Cost more

3.) Both 1 and 2

4.) Neither 1 or 2

Good point on dark curse,
What if to address both adaptability, crackshot and VI, you just made it as follows?

"You may equip 1 <elite> that costs 2 points or more. You cannot equip this if your upgrade bar contains an <elite> icon, or your pilot skill value is "3" or lower."

We hadn't played a game with Dark curse, but honestly, we saw ships I'd never seen played before, but many of them still struggled against the Fels, Vaders, and Poes. I know it messes with the points, but it actually brought ps4 and ps5 generics into the game, which was kinda cool. And strangely didn't feel unbalanced?

Juke Red Ace might be broken in a different meta. Ditto for a few others.

K-wings and publishers were designed around their lack of an ept.

Juke Red Ace might be broken in a different meta. Ditto for a few others.

K-wings and publishers were designed around their lack of an ept.

Yep, although at ps6, around 32 points with the comms relay, it's surprisingly close to an x7 defender (Glaive).

With Punishers, or K-wings, are there any EPTs that would really break them if you can't take anything that costs 1 point?

They might improve, but that being the whole point as well. I guess the thing was we found (especially the Ks) once you started sinking EPT points into them it balanced itself out anyways. I mean, yes, a predator TLT is pretty deadly, but then again, at 34 points for a guardian, or 38 for miranda, shouldn't it?

So it becomes very nasty, but if you charged say, 1 pt for the extra slot, you're now up to nearly 40 points for the K-wing. And if they can't take 1pt slots ,no deadeye shenanigans either.

I'm not disagreeing with you here, and I know they were designed without an EPT in mind, but I'm still surprised that giving these ships an EPT didn't really unbalance them at all, just made them more versatile.

If Miranda is good the predator Miranda would be significantly better. She is balanced and costed around that not being an option.

When you are looking at high-end play the difference that such a huge buff to output would make is large. Find some of these guys who took Miranda into cuts in the U-boat meta and give them Predator. They'll be monsters.

I have always been a little miffed that certain ships did not feature a generic pilot with an EPT. . .

As an A-wing fan, I really hate the fact that Gemmer Sojan and Arvel Crynyd have no native EPT slot. They see so much less play than Jake or Tycho for that very reason. I also feel the lack of an EPT on Hobbie pretty keenly. I do think that most ships could also use a mid-PS generic.

I do think there's a problem with giving pilots pets across the board though. Some ships need it, some would be broken with it. Some pilots *need* the help, some are already excellent without it. As somebody else mentioned above, Wampa does NOT need access to Calculation.

I honestly think most of the named TIE fighter pilots have *great* abilities as is and shouldn't be fiddled with. They are wonderful little Micro-Aces on their own and perfectly competitive.

But I do think a lot of marginal pilots would benefit from an EPT slot.

So am I the only person who pictured a bunch of game systems with push the limit?

Here in Boss' Battle Parlor at PS 3 you get 1 MOD and 1 1 point EPT. It jumps up from there.. been doing this for over two years...

Palp Aces is still the best list.

Triple Jumpmaster still great.

Rebels can field 7 Tala Squadron Pilots, 7 Crackshots with a 2 point initiative bid.

Interestingly, Quad Dagger Squadron, quad Crackshot is possible. I wonder how that would fare if Daggers actually had EPTs.

The problem with this format is that it's not really changing much. The things it does buff aren't the mid tier named pilots, but the PS 4 generics and ships that are specifically supposed to NOT have EPT's like the Ghost and Miranda.

If you want to play a format that's decently well balanced and resembles the way the game originally played and was meant to be played, try playing the Top Gun format.

90 point lists.

Each ship can be no more than 30 points.

No unique pilots, no unique upgrades.

3 ship limit.

No large base ships.

The LGS in my area mixes up the rules slightly. You're allowed to mix factions (but faction specific upgrades are still locked to their respective faction's ships), you're allowed to field more than 3 ships but no more than 2 of each ship type so that TIEs and Z's and other ships have a role. We also have each player bring 5 obstacles, and the obstacles are placed outside of range 1 instead of 2 like normal.

This is a format where a Scyk with Mindlink, heavy Scyk, HLC, Hull Upgrade is top tier.

So what if it was something formal like this, different training available per faction

Advanced Flight Training
Imperial only, small ship only

You may equip 1 <elite> that costs 2 points or more. You cannot equip this if your upgrade bar contains an <elite> icon, or your pilot skill value is "5" or lower.

Junior Officer Training
Rebel only, small ship only

You may equip 1 <elite> that costs 2 points or more. You cannot equip this if your upgrade bar contains an <elite> icon, your pilot skill value must be between "4-7"

Black Sun Mentorship

Scum only, small ship only

You may equip 1 <elite> that costs 2 points or more. You cannot equip this if your upgrade bar contains an <elite> icon, or your pilot skill value is "5" or lower.

crackshot rebels yes please

mostly, you'd break the **** out of the Tala squaddie and you might make Red, Gray and Dagger squadrons actually playable

Ks wouldn't be op, you'd just have the ultra sexy PS 10 Miranda. Esege would still suck a fat one

mainly, if you're looking to add epts to certain ships, you need to take all the generic non-z95 PS 4s without epts and give it to them

then find the rebel named Ys and give them their overdue well deserved epts

then toss r2-d6 in a blender

There are already ships with EPTs at PS4 that don't see much play. There are also several ships that don't have PS 4 ships not to mention all the unique ships that have PS 4+ but without and EPT.

So lets just say for scenario purposes we gave all non-uniqe ships of PS >4 an EPT these are the ships that would gain an EPT. Ships with no EPTs on unique pilots Imperial Rebel S&V

• TIE Advanced (Storm squadron)
• X-wing (Red Squadron)
• Y-wing (Grey Squadron)
• B-wing (Dagger Squadron)
• TIE Bomber (Gamma Squadron)
• TIE Phantom (Shadow Squadron)
• Z-95 Headhunter (Tala Squadron)
• Scum-wing (Hired Gun)
• K-wing (Guardian Squadron)
• TIE Punisher (Black Eight Squadron)

So ignoring the ships that don't have EPTs in their pilot pool (Y-wings, K-wings, and TIE Punishers) that would give 3 Rebel ships, 2 Imperial Ships and 1 S&V ship an EPT. Also the S&V ship is the only ship that the rebels don't have that will have an EPT. The 5 ships with no EPTs are the

• Y-wings
• Lambda Shuttles
• K-wings
• TIE Punishers
• VCX-100

Ships that would not have generic(non-unique) ships with an EPT will still be the

• E-wing
• TIE Defender (After Imperial Veterans)
• Star Viper
• HWK-290 (and scumhawk)
• Every large base ship with the exception of the Firescum (Mandalorian Mercenary) and the Jumpmaster, also ships without non-unique pilots for obvious reasons.

Then Lt. Lorrir would be almost playable.

Human sacrifice, dogs and cats living together... mass hysteria!

I would be fine with this change. Literally none of the combos listed in this thread are scary in the least and some are quite interesting. It would make a huge difference and fix some early wave oversights.

Noooooooooooooo That's worse than crossing the streams.

I think the game would be better if no ship with less than PS8 had an EPT, and they all became unique. We could rely on our flying skills rather than endlessly ptl boosting/rolling/actionwhoring.

There are daily please fix, this is broken, this is overcosted etc etc threads yet people are saying oh these ships have been costed based on not having an ept. Honestly the points are costed in the ball park and theres years of badly costed ships to completely trash any concept that somehow they are balanced out of FFGs design studio and the sudden notion of giving a ship an ept wrecks the game.

Epts for all would go a long way to helping out those unlucky buggers who have a decent pilot ability but the lack of ept and having a mid level PS means they are never fielded.

There are daily please fix, this is broken, this is overcosted etc etc threads yet people are saying oh these ships have been costed based on not having an ept. Honestly the points are costed in the ball park and theres years of badly costed ships to completely trash any concept that somehow they are balanced out of FFGs design studio and the sudden notion of giving a ship an ept wrecks the game.

I get what the OP is trying to say, now in the latter waves we are starting to see ships with the "veteran" level pilots now having EPT slots. Along with the Ace and Top Level pilots. While in the very first days where no non-unique ships had an EPT with the exception of the lightly kitted interceptors.

There is also a big power disparity of unique pilots with an EPT slot from unique pilots without an EPT Graz the Hunter was dead on arrival and Latien has a better pilot skill than Serresu but with no EPT most players grab the TPVs. Also the mere mention of the name Horton is enough to get Fans of the Y-wing up in arms.

However there are plenty of ships that are seen in the meta with no EPTs. The Lambda shuttle is the best example, and the efficiency of the TIE Fighter is another that is seen without EPTs. Still much like you I would like FFG to try and curve the power creep with the EPTs adding 0 point cost upgrade now makes the slot an automatic plus where as before you had to spend precious points and sometimes you cant afford them. I guess I see the EPT slot now as the game designer's fall back where if the pilot might suck add an EPT slot and it will be better. Yet pilots like Prince Xizor has proven against that fallacy. Still it is a given the EPT slot is the most powerful upgrade slot in the game.

Now back on EPTs I wouldn't mind say some Red/Gold Leader titles that give an EPT slot maybe with the restriction must be on the highest pilot skill of that ship and cannot already have an EPT. Might be thematic to have 1 Grey out of 3 Golds to have an EPT or a Red Squadron with EPT leading a couple Rookies.

^good post.

JFeel the OPs idea would do more good than harm, if miranda with an ept is the worst case then I would be happy with that.