So I get why they wanted to get rid of draws, and implement this rule. I'm curious as to why they removed modified wins? There isn't anything particular about removing the 1 pt draw that fixes the modified win. Is it just that they were super unpopular and lame, and you might as well fix all of it at once?

They are pretty unpopular because you might as well have lost that game with only 1 point.

I totally see why they went with a random tie-breaker. It makes it impossible to play for a draw (with non-random tie-breakers, like initiative, there will be situations where the player that knows he wins the tie-breaker is encouraged to play for the draw).

What I don't get is why complicate stuff. Why all this Final Salvo, reroll ties etc. instead of just toss a coin or roll a single die?

Its to punish point fortressing. 2 Bandits and a Tala are highly likely to beat Predator EU Vader on final salvo, which is fair, as Vader has a clear edge in that situation and the Vader player failed by not closing the match. With three ships, it also is a lot harder to play for a tie.

A more extreme example: Fat Han at 60 points. Fat Han can easily play for a tie with large base and EU. Worse, whenever an enemy can attempt to break the tie, he'll also get a shot because of his PWT (btw wouldn't Turret Primary Weapon TPW make more sense?). 60 points of TIE Interceptors are seriously unfavoured in that matchup (its easy for Han to one shot one each turn), but should they manage to make it to a tie, they have triple the dice.

Playing for a tie is almost impossible to be viable with the implementation of final salvo as the ships that can do it easily are unfavoured on the tiebreaker. Its another step to ensure ties are as rare as possible and I like it.

On the other hand, even if it was a coin toss, the player who had advantage on the table (as per your described situations) doesn't want to play for draw as he's trading a situation where he has the upper hand into a situation where it's 50-50%. So I fail to see how Final Salvo rules help in this regard.

Additionally, Final Salvo puts ships that were specifically designed to be secondary weapons based (any ordnance carrier, yt-2400, ig-88, HWK) just because.

Final Salvo should not be screamed. It should be sung, to the tune of the Final Countdown. And, yes, you should start humming too.

YES YES YES

I don't know why I didn't think of that

FFG put this in the FAQ

also make a rule that if the players don't sing it they are both DQ. Because we need more rule in this game to enforce fun

Now I need a storage solution for my synthesizer.

I totally see why they went with a random tie-breaker. It makes it impossible to play for a draw (with non-random tie-breakers, like initiative, there will be situations where the player that knows he wins the tie-breaker is encouraged to play for the draw).

What I don't get is why complicate stuff. Why all this Final Salvo, reroll ties etc. instead of just toss a coin or roll a single die?

Its to punish point fortressing. 2 Bandits and a Tala are highly likely to beat Predator EU Vader on final salvo, which is fair, as Vader has a clear edge in that situation and the Vader player failed by not closing the match. With three ships, it also is a lot harder to play for a tie.

A more extreme example: Fat Han at 60 points. Fat Han can easily play for a tie with large base and EU. Worse, whenever an enemy can attempt to break the tie, he'll also get a shot because of his PWT (btw wouldn't Turret Primary Weapon TPW make more sense?). 60 points of TIE Interceptors are seriously unfavoured in that matchup (its easy for Han to one shot one each turn), but should they manage to make it to a tie, they have triple the dice.

Playing for a tie is almost impossible to be viable with the implementation of final salvo as the ships that can do it easily are unfavoured on the tiebreaker. Its another step to ensure ties are as rare as possible and I like it.

On the other hand, even if it was a coin toss, the player who had advantage on the table (as per your described situations) doesn't want to play for draw as he's trading a situation where he has the upper hand into a situation where it's 50-50%. So I fail to see how Final Salvo rules help in this regard.

Additionally, Final Salvo puts ships that were specifically designed to be secondary weapons based (any ordnance carrier, yt-2400, ig-88, HWK) just because.

The salvo punishes those players for not taking advantage of their position in time. It makes it more likely for the better player to win (because really, Han has no buisness tying with Interceptor generics, that shows really bad play).

The thing with secondary weapon users is a bit annoying, but it also isn't the worst. Final salvo is so rare that it isn't really a consideration in squadbuilding, so while it technicaly is a downside to those ships, it is one that won't come into play enough to matter. Besides, of those ships the IG-2000 is the likeliest to draw with its 50 point builds, and it loses only 2 dice from the salvo.

Actually, IGs give me another example where the salvo rule is great: In a mirror match of IGs where all cost 50 points one player eliminated one ship of his opponent and got both of his own shot down to half hull. Thats a tie, but the player with two ships is more likely to win, which is fair, since his opponent failed to concentrate his fire enough and therefor played worse. Of course he didn't play much worse, so its good that he still has a chance to take the game. A weighted coinflip based on the state and course of the game. Thats in my opinion pretty elegant!

Ended up having to use the Final Salvo yesterday in a tournament I was helping TO. The players tied due to 60 minute rounds with 1 player having 6 dice to the other players 8 dice. First roll was a tie with the re-roll going 6-5 in favor of the player rolling the 8 dice. It seems like a more fair way to determine a winner than the old initiative bid

Ended up having to use the Final Salvo yesterday in a tournament I was helping TO. The players tied due to 60 minute rounds with 1 player having 6 dice to the other players 8 dice. First roll was a tie with the re-roll going 6-5 in favor of the player rolling the 8 dice. It seems like a more fair way to determine a winner than the old initiative bid

How did the players feel about it?

I had a Final Salvo in the first night I played with Final Salvo rules active. Dengaroo mirror match. Both Dengars killed each other and then both Manaroos killed each other. 35 minutes into the round and it was time for The Final Salvo! My starter-set dice outperformed my opponent's Regional dice, which came up almost all eyeballs!

A weighted coinflip based on the state and course of the game. Thats in my opinion pretty elegant!

Except the weighing is pretty arbitrary, as the primary weapon value is not a relevant metric for many ships.

EDIT: In order for the weighing to be anything other than arbitrary, it would imply that more attack dice at the end of the game = worse in-game situation, and therefore the person that had less attack dice had a better situation, and should therefore be punished for not capitalizing on it. I don't think that is the case in the vast majority of the games.

IMO FFG simply went for 'random' and then gave it a nice coat of 'we're using game mechanics! look!'

So I get why they wanted to get rid of draws, and implement this rule. I'm curious as to why they removed modified wins? There isn't anything particular about removing the 1 pt draw that fixes the modified win. Is it just that they were super unpopular and lame, and you might as well fix all of it at once?

If you get rid of the draw then every game is now force to be win or lose. With such a binary result there is no point in having the modified win (which should have been mirrored by a modified loss that also provided points) which was representing a game that probably should have been scored as a draw in a real world tactical combat situation.

Ended up having to use the Final Salvo yesterday in a tournament I was helping TO. The players tied due to 60 minute rounds with 1 player having 6 dice to the other players 8 dice. First roll was a tie with the re-roll going 6-5 in favor of the player rolling the 8 dice. It seems like a more fair way to determine a winner than the old initiative bid

So this was during elimination rounds? In swiss the fair way to do is to award both players half a win and half a loss granted that isn't quite how the old way did it.

Ended up having to use the Final Salvo yesterday in a tournament I was helping TO. The players tied due to 60 minute rounds with 1 player having 6 dice to the other players 8 dice. First roll was a tie with the re-roll going 6-5 in favor of the player rolling the 8 dice. It seems like a more fair way to determine a winner than the old initiative bid

How did the players feel about it?

They seemed fine with it. The rolls were really close, so there was a certain sense of drama. The one player did comment that it most likely would have turned out differently if he had one more round of shooting. I would have liked the full 75 minute rounds, but this was the first tournament run at the shop and the shop owner wanted everything done by closing time. At the next tournament, I will push for starting earlier, so we can run 75 minute rounds. This should alleviate the need for the final salvo roll-offs.

So I get why they wanted to get rid of draws, and implement this rule. I'm curious as to why they removed modified wins? There isn't anything particular about removing the 1 pt draw that fixes the modified win. Is it just that they were super unpopular and lame, and you might as well fix all of it at once?

If you get rid of the draw then every game is now force to be win or lose. With such a binary result there is no point in having the modified win (which should have been mirrored by a modified loss that also provided points) which was representing a game that probably should have been scored as a draw in a real world tactical combat situation.

Ended up having to use the Final Salvo yesterday in a tournament I was helping TO. The players tied due to 60 minute rounds with 1 player having 6 dice to the other players 8 dice. First roll was a tie with the re-roll going 6-5 in favor of the player rolling the 8 dice. It seems like a more fair way to determine a winner than the old initiative bid

So this was during elimination rounds? In swiss the fair way to do is to award both players half a win and half a loss granted that isn't quite how the old way did it.

No, this was a very small tournament with only 9 players, so no elimination rounds. Hopefully, the next time there is a tournament, we will get more players, but the player pool is pretty small around here.

Ended up having to use the Final Salvo yesterday in a tournament I was helping TO. The players tied due to 60 minute rounds with 1 player having 6 dice to the other players 8 dice. First roll was a tie with the re-roll going 6-5 in favor of the player rolling the 8 dice. It seems like a more fair way to determine a winner than the old initiative bid

So this was during elimination rounds? In swiss the fair way to do is to award both players half a win and half a loss granted that isn't quite how the old way did it.

No, this was a very small tournament with only 9 players, so no elimination rounds. Hopefully, the next time there is a tournament, we will get more players, but the player pool is pretty small around here.

Ouch. Actually double ouch because 9 is such a weird number to use. Starting with 8 you're basically at single elimination over 3 rounds to begin with and even double elimination wouldn't add that many rounds.

Every time I read "FINAL SALVO" in your post, I couldn't help but think of ...

MORTAL COMBAT !!!

Believe me, I did the song but replaced it with "FINAL SALVO" while they where rolling the dice!

A weighted coinflip based on the state and course of the game. Thats in my opinion pretty elegant!

Except the weighing is pretty arbitrary, as the primary weapon value is not a relevant metric for many ships.

EDIT: In order for the weighing to be anything other than arbitrary, it would imply that more attack dice at the end of the game = worse in-game situation, and therefore the person that had less attack dice had a better situation, and should therefore be punished for not capitalizing on it. I don't think that is the case in the vast majority of the games.

IMO FFG simply went for 'random' and then gave it a nice coat of 'we're using game mechanics! look!'

The way ships work in X-Wing these days it usually is the player with less dice on his side that has the advantage on the same amount of points. Fat ships and aces are alone and therefor bring less dice to final salvo, but they will pretty much always beat several generics worth their point cost.

A weighted coinflip based on the state and course of the game. Thats in my opinion pretty elegant!

Except the weighing is pretty arbitrary, as the primary weapon value is not a relevant metric for many ships.

EDIT: In order for the weighing to be anything other than arbitrary, it would imply that more attack dice at the end of the game = worse in-game situation, and therefore the person that had less attack dice had a better situation, and should therefore be punished for not capitalizing on it. I don't think that is the case in the vast majority of the games.

IMO FFG simply went for 'random' and then gave it a nice coat of 'we're using game mechanics! look!'

The way ships work in X-Wing these days it usually is the player with less dice on his side that has the advantage on the same amount of points. Fat ships and aces are alone and therefor bring less dice to final salvo, but they will pretty much always beat several generics worth their point cost.

Do you feel 3-4 dice Imperial Aces (Interceptors and Whisper, Vessery) are at such a huge disadvantage against 2 dice Imperial Aces (like Inq or Vader) or Contracted Scouts as to deserve 50% better chance at Final Salvo? Based on what people play nowadays, these are the most likely ships to see on the table (and therefore in a draw), not fat PWTs abd generics (other than Crack Swarm)

A weighted coinflip based on the state and course of the game. Thats in my opinion pretty elegant!

Except the weighing is pretty arbitrary, as the primary weapon value is not a relevant metric for many ships.

EDIT: In order for the weighing to be anything other than arbitrary, it would imply that more attack dice at the end of the game = worse in-game situation, and therefore the person that had less attack dice had a better situation, and should therefore be punished for not capitalizing on it. I don't think that is the case in the vast majority of the games.

IMO FFG simply went for 'random' and then gave it a nice coat of 'we're using game mechanics! look!'

The way ships work in X-Wing these days it usually is the player with less dice on his side that has the advantage on the same amount of points. Fat ships and aces are alone and therefor bring less dice to final salvo, but they will pretty much always beat several generics worth their point cost.

Do you feel 3-4 dice Imperial Aces (Interceptors and Whisper, Vessery) are at such a huge disadvantage against 2 dice Imperial Aces (like Inq or Vader) or Contracted Scouts as to deserve 50% better chance at Final Salvo? Based on what people play nowadays, these are the most likely ships to see on the table (and therefore in a draw), not fat PWTs abd generics (other than Crack Swarm)

Whisper won't draw with any of these. Vessery is PS8 and should lose to Vaders PS9+ mobility. The Inquisitor won't draw with Vessery unless they destroy each other, which will be rare enough to not really matter and is then also going to involve the whole squad, where players with more ships are rewarded. That is a good thing, since lists with less ships are still too favoured. Contracted Scouts are unlikely to cost the same amount as any of the aces now that they are forced into Overclocked.

You need to visualize what details all have to come together for a draw. It is incredibly rare that ships cost the same points unless they actually are the same.

Soontir is 35 points (34 with Targeting Computer instead of Stealth Device)

Carnor is 34 (33 with Targeting)

Inq is 31 (34 with prockets)

Vader is 35

Scouts are 32(with plasma and EM), 33 if you add crew, 34 with protons and Boba

Soontir can draw with scouts, Carnor can draw with Scouts, Inq can draw with Carnor and Soontir.

The Inquisitor has an advantage in both matchups since theres no Autothrusters for the Squints. Soontir does have a PS advantage, but I don't see him going lategame with TC. Vader has the clear advantage over Soontir with actual damage and PS11. Scouts that have no more torps are at a disadvantage to Carnor and Soontir. It works!

Not saying its perfect and it will always hold up for any scenario, but in the big picture final salvo works by punishing those with an edge for not closing the game. Your examples actually demonstrate that to an extend.

The Inquisitor has an advantage in both matchups since theres no Autothrusters for the Squints. Soontir does have a PS advantage, but I don't see him going lategame with TC. Vader has the clear advantage over Soontir with actual damage and PS11. Scouts that have no more torps are at a disadvantage to Carnor and Soontir. It works!

Not saying its perfect and it will always hold up for any scenario, but in the big picture final salvo works by punishing those with an edge for not closing the game. Your examples actually demonstrate that to an extend.

Inq only has advantage if he manages to keep range 3 (very hard vs Soontir, depends on initiative vs. Carnor), it's equal at range 2, and Interceptors have advantage at range 1. It's at best even overall vs. Carnor and not even a contest vs. Soontir.

Also, scouts with no Torps are at a dusadvantage both in game and for Final Salvo.

Final salvo 'works' by punishing a player for not closing the game, regardless if said player actually has an advantage or not.

Derp, I somehow thought of several JM5ks. Okay, in that case they are punished for not taking advantage of their torps. Thats explaining it away, but I don't think many people will be sad about something that puts Boats at a tiny disadvantage.

Scouts also are extremely unlikely to be above half health when time is called, so draws aren't much of a factor.

You argue for draws being likely in the current meta, but how many have you actually played/witnessed? The prevalence of munitions makes games usually pretty extreme.

Not even once have I argued draws are common (I've only ever seen one happen once and then it was a 0-0 draw).

What I'm arguing that is: Final Salvo is just a convoluted way of saying 'if you draw, randomly select a winner', and it's needlessly convoluted while offering no advantages compared to a coin toss.

I'd say it favours squadrons that are needlessly disadvantaged, namely those with more guns than aces. Its the main reason why I like it, even though it doesn't really favour my favourite ships, the HWK and TIE Bomber.

I'd say it favours squadrons that are needlessly disadvantaged, namely those with more guns than aces. Its the main reason why I like it, even though it doesn't really favour my favourite ships, the HWK and TIE Bomber.

I agree, it favors some squads that need it, but then it also disfavors other squads that don't deserve it: bombers and HWKs like you said, but also stuff like Y-wings, K-wings, yt-2400 or Punishers.

That being said I doubt anyone 8s taking Final Salvo into account when squad building. It just irks me on an idea level.