The meta in my area seems to be a good place right now. There are a huge variety of entries and winners in post-faq tournament results.

I've been around since Wave One, and I think this is the most balanced the game has ever been.

I'm alternating between Palp Defenders and Poe/Wes/Biggs and having a blast.

There are a huge variety of entries

You mean a huge variety of aces to combine with a palp shuttle ?

Two weeks ago, we had 32 show up for a normal store tourney, and PHX Squadron brought a Hott Mixx of pilots. Vets was super fresh and was modestly represented, I flew crack tomax with homing missiles, the Countess and Quizzie. One near mirror match, but I also faced BBXX, a 75ish pt RAC and OL, and Vader deathfire and soontir. There were brobots, toilets, s&v potpourri, 2x ghosts, double D's, etc.

It feels like there's finally enough tools in the shed so that you can build a tournament-worthy list out of anything. Or at least a list that's competivitve enough so that in an "any given Sunday" sort of way; given good piloting, kind dice, nice matchups, and whatnot; any list has a chance (and can be thrilling to fly).

Yeah and I also feel the best lists at the moment reward skillful play. Palp Aces is still the leader, but doesn't that represent the era of Star Wars in which this is set? If you want to win, you need to take down the Emperor. But even T-65's can take it down with Wes, Wedge and Biggs. I'm tempted to crack out Luke Skywalker again

Yeah and I also feel the best lists at the moment reward skillful play. Palp Aces is still the leader, but doesn't that represent the era of Star Wars in which this is set? If you want to win, you need to take down the Emperor. But even T-65's can take it down with Wes, Wedge and Biggs. I'm tempted to crack out Luke Skywalker again

Lemme know how that goes for you.

Half sarcasm, half not. If you do win i wanna know how, and if you can replicate that success.

But the bit about skillful play doesnt really strike me as true. All Palp Aces has to do is not hit rocks or other ships. Most good lists are good because they make the game easier for you. And Palp Aces are very easy to fly.

Congrats.

There's 0 variety here.

0.

Acewing, goddamn acewing!
For some brief moment we had the great meat meta with generics

IMO, Contracted Scouts and TLT is still ruining the environment.

I can beat Aces anyday of the week with anything slightly more manoeuvrable than a Lambda.

Once Turrets **** off and the game comes back to flying again it'll all be good.

I'm sick of games where its bump the opponent and grind out in the dice off.

Variety's solid over here

Not sure how much of that me being crazy enough to actually run conners so not everyone is piling on Palp aces, and how much it's just people flying the ships they like

Seriously, if AceWing is getting you down, fly the Dengaroo from Nationals. Manaroo runs, Fengar kills them all. It's obscenely good. Our meta is shifting to things that beat both, which opens up a lot of lists.

Our last two local tournies were won by a crack swarm (18 players) and brobots (32 players)

My local meta is no longer Dash Rendar all day every day, so it is a marked improvement.

Seriously, if AceWing is getting you down, fly the Dengaroo from Nationals. Manaroo runs, Fengar kills them all. It's obscenely good. Our meta is shifting to things that beat both, which opens up a lot of lists.

Our last two local tournies were won by a crack swarm (18 players) and brobots (32 players)

1 Warden with a-SLAM extra conners and auto-blaster turret

Miranda with TLT sabine and two seismics

r4-d6 integrated biggs

eats aces and craps out their ruined hopes and dreams

and actually has beaten every other list it's come up against...except scouts

It will be perfect when they strip the EPT from contracted scouts.

It won't be perfect until there are more ordnance carriers with EPT.

because screw aces.

It won't be perfect until there are more ordnance carriers with EPT.

because screw aces.

we got two more

problem is for some hitherto unfathomable reason the Baron of the Empire has an unexplained 1 point mark-up

so really it's just the Scout and the Gamma Vet

For casual, tuesday night at the store, sure, the meta is healthy with variety, tests, etc. People just got new toys, so they are trying them out.

For tournaments, our local meta is overflowing with Imperial aces, Palpatine and such (Imperials compose 73% of the latest tournament). This makes life a bit more boring on that level.

X-wing is incredible right now. Every ship in imperials is being played at an extremely competitive level (except for the punisher...poor punisher), a bunch of different list with jumpmasters (dengaroo, uboats, tel trevura stuff, etc), dash builds for rebels, control builds for rebels, ghost builds, brobots, a-wing swarms, tie swarms, tlt-swarms, scum control lists -- it is amazing! Anyone complaining either has a crap playgroup, or has not looked at list juggler and seen how diverse the meta has become.

The variety on this side is good. For some reason we're not seeing a flood of Palp Aces or the like. People tend to play what they enjoy.

Sadly my world is run by Palp Aces and U-boats. Bring anything else and you may as well accept being in the bottom third. I'm taking non-Dash Rebels to our local's monthly tournament on Wednesday. If I magically run into something different it will be a banner day. But I'm not holding my breath.

just about everyone is doing defender lists around here. Part of the reason im insisting on running bombers both because homers > x7 defenders and im not running the same **** thing everyone else is.

Faced like 6 different trip defender lists. The only one to give me gak is the one that did 2 xD's 1 x7 instead of trip x7's. That mainly gave me issues because of those **** FLETCHETTE CANNONS lol those things really annoy bombers.

There are a huge variety of entries

You mean a huge variety of aces to combine with a palp shuttle ?

Huge variety of aces means huge variety.

Sadly my world is run by Palp Aces and U-boats. Bring anything else and you may as well accept being in the bottom third. I'm taking non-Dash Rebels to our local's monthly tournament on Wednesday. If I magically run into something different it will be a banner day. But I'm not holding my breath.

Triple aces my friend, triple aces.

ive actually only seen one palpace player since vet drop. Everyone is doing trip defenders or tomax shuttle lol.

Funny thing is the trip defender meta is really owning the spacecow that is palpmobile. Highest PS is an xD with tractor, it fires first, almost always lands and makes it agi0. Now the 9-12 depending on range attacks that are oddly precise go through. Ive seen that cow die a few times in a single round in the past week lol. Without ordnance.

just about everyone is doing defender lists around here. Part of the reason im insisting on running bombers both because homers > x7 defenders and im not running the same **** thing everyone else is.

Faced like 6 different trip defender lists. The only one to give me gak is the one that did 2 xD's 1 x7 instead of trip x7's. That mainly gave me issues because of those **** FLETCHETTE CANNONS lol those things really annoy bombers.

You should also insist on bombers because they're pretty **** good

And the gamma vet model is drop dead gorgeous