Why have objectives in X-wing? This is a game of fighter combat. In real life, and even Star Wars, fighter craft do nothing other than establish air superiority so the actual troops can do their jobs.

Take this concept forward, and soon you'll be asking yourself. Why even have Bombers in an Air Superiority Game?

Why have objectives in X-wing? This is a game of fighter combat. In real life, and even Star Wars, fighter craft do nothing other than establish air superiority so the actual troops can do their jobs.

Take this concept forward, and soon you'll be asking yourself. Why even have Bombers in an Air Superiority Game?

Maybe we're all just trying to unsuccessfully fill the need for a decent fix since they're never going to remake X-wing vs TIE Fighter

Maybe we're all just trying to unsuccessfully fill the need for a decent fix since they're never going to remake X-wing vs TIE Fighter

Don't look at me. I don't even play X-Wing

I guess I've been looking at this all wrong.

Why have objectives in X-wing? This is a game of fighter combat. In real life, and even Star Wars, fighter craft do nothing other than establish air superiority so the actual troops can do their jobs. Even the shining X-wing moment in A New Hope had to be fabricated by a ridiculous piece of plot. "This moon sized death ray has a port we can cram a torpedo into a blow it away! Let's all fly down this trench to do it too! Never mind spacecraft can fly in three dimensions and we could just fly right at it!" How lame.

Even in other games fighter combat gets washed over. Look at Armada. It's boiled down to "those two entire SQUADRONS are close enough, roll some dice and be done with it." While it's important in the grand scheme of things, its goals (or objectives) are not detachable from the goals of other forces.

Since X-wing is a game about individual fighter combat and not connected to any other type of warfare like ground, there's no reason to have objectives. The game is too simple in concept.

And if you want to add more to it, just imagine that the last time you saw two squadrons go at it in Armada that's what is being played out in detail on an X-wing table. Otherwise it's a pointless game, attracting possibly pointless people. You know the type, the ones that just smashed their action figures together as children because one was bad and one was good without any other rhyme or reason.

To be fair, you're thinking of air superiority fighters. Ground attack and bombers have missions unrelated to clearing the sky of enemies fighters. Their analogous space equivalents would be bombing runs against capital ships, something Armada has in spades. Especially for the Imperials, where the primary fighter wing consists of bombers, Rhymer to give those bombers increased range, and jumpmasters to keep bombers from being engaged via a special rule. Simulating that in X-Wing, though, is difficult. Can't really think of a good way to do that, without making the map significantly longer and having a big target at the end.

That ignores the silliness of space bombers harming capital ships in the first place. These things are massive, and have massive power generation capabilities to generate enormously strong shields and hurl large bursts of energy at opposing capital ships. If a few small missiles were capable of actually harming one, capital ships would simply bristle with missile launchers instead of turbolaser batteries. The only real use they would have is keeping shield deployment honest. Can't redirect all shields to the starboard when a few squadrons are sweeping around to your port, ready to slam your shieldless hull if given the chance. Actually blowing up capital ships ala Rogue Squadron? Blegh. /rant

I guess I've been looking at this all wrong.

Why have objectives in X-wing? This is a game of fighter combat. In real life, and even Star Wars, fighter craft do nothing other than establish air superiority so the actual troops can do their jobs. Even the shining X-wing moment in A New Hope had to be fabricated by a ridiculous piece of plot. "This moon sized death ray has a port we can cram a torpedo into a blow it away! Let's all fly down this trench to do it too! Never mind spacecraft can fly in three dimensions and we could just fly right at it!" How lame.

Even in other games fighter combat gets washed over. Look at Armada. It's boiled down to "those two entire SQUADRONS are close enough, roll some dice and be done with it." While it's important in the grand scheme of things, its goals (or objectives) are not detachable from the goals of other forces.

Since X-wing is a game about individual fighter combat and not connected to any other type of warfare like ground, there's no reason to have objectives. The game is too simple in concept.

And if you want to add more to it, just imagine that the last time you saw two squadrons go at it in Armada that's what is being played out in detail on an X-wing table. Otherwise it's a pointless game, attracting possibly pointless people. You know the type, the ones that just smashed their action figures together as children because one was bad and one was good without any other rhyme or reason.

To be fair, you're thinking of air superiority fighters. Ground attack and bombers have missions unrelated to clearing the sky of enemies fighters. Their analogous space equivalents would be bombing runs against capital ships, something Armada has in spades. Especially for the Imperials, where the primary fighter wing consists of bombers, Rhymer to give those bombers increased range, and jumpmasters to keep bombers from being engaged via a special rule. Simulating that in X-Wing, though, is difficult. Can't really think of a good way to do that, without making the map significantly longer and having a big target at the end.

That ignores the silliness of space bombers harming capital ships in the first place. These things are massive, and have massive power generation capabilities to generate enormously strong shields and hurl large bursts of energy at opposing capital ships. If a few small missiles were capable of actually harming one, capital ships would simply bristle with missile launchers instead of turbolaser batteries. The only real use they would have is keeping shield deployment honest. Can't redirect all shields to the starboard when a few squadrons are sweeping around to your port, ready to slam your shieldless hull if given the chance. Actually blowing up capital ships ala Rogue Squadron? Blegh. /rant

Makes sense when you look at what it's modeled after, not so much the "reality" behind it.

Also, your early statements just show how X-wing could never represent realistic styled objectives that represent the use of fighters in any kind of warfare other than "inexplicable furball"

People just get sick of flying against the same 3 lists around the same 6 rocks.

May I ask what people?

Because my local X-Wing community grows wildly, despite us playing deathmatch all time, every time. What's more, overwhelming majority of local active players prefers 100 pts deathmatch format.

I understand that someone might be burned out on the game, but I wouldn't want to introduce objective based game as standard for X-Wing just to please this tiny group of players - you can organize games and tournaments on your own, without forcing your "proper vision" of X-Wing on others.

Sure. There will always be people that prefer death match and don't want to do other types. I'd say they are about 25%. The majority will play games that are what's played at the tournaments. If the tournaments went mission based, they would be happy to play mission based (as long as they were done alright and didn't suck). I'd say that this was about 50% of all the X-wing players. I've been playing for 4 years and built my local scene. I also see about 25% of players that get into the game and just end up quitting after a few months for a number of reasons. Sometimes it's that it gets boring. Other times it's that they just don't like the cut throat atmosphere of the game. That leaves 25% of players that play the game, but wish there were missions in the tournament scene. Or...they don't play the tournament scene.

From experience with other games systems and with X-wing specifically, I think the vast majority of players will play whatever format is the tournament standard....as long as is done well enough to be accepted. If FFG came out with some crappy system that wasn't thought of well, then most people would just go back to death match. If it was done well enough and became the tournament standard, then most people would switch to it because that's what the tournaments do.

I've talked to a lot of people about the game and gotten a lot of feed back from different types of players. There are those players that do get bored with tournaments and/or 100 pt death match. Oh, they might not be the largest block of players. I never said they were. They do exist and it is more than just a couple of guys.

Do I want FFG to change the format? Sure. Do I think they will? No. Do I think it would ruin the competitive scene if they did? No.

That is a lot of numbers. Where did you get them from?

Because, as I said earlier, from my anecdotical evidence, huge majority of players from my local scene (I am speaking about Warsaw) prefers death match. It completely opposes your claims.

You said that there is a group of people that would play anything as long as it is officially supported so you made assumption (without any proof) that they would accept objective based tournament play - but maybe X-Wing wins over so many players, as no other miniature game right now, is because of death match being official tournament mode?

Death match is a purest form of rivalry - there is no bull, no useless fluff or objectives - just you against your opponent, trying to outsmart him and wipe him out. It is exactly like in racing - and people love racing.

I can tell you when I wasn't even playing X-Wing I watched a lot of tournament games on Youtube - and the fact that pure form of deathmatch is main tournament mode won me over and in the end I started collecitng this game.

You shouldn't 'replace' Death Matches - they're simple, elegant, easy to understand and are part of the appeal of the game.
Nevetheless, some extra scenarios which can be used for alternate events would be fun.

Epic games are a very different experience - not simply "I've got 300 points therefore I'll take punishers" but because when you change the constraints of the game, different things become good*. And it's refreshing and fun for that.

But scenarios which have the same size and time constraints as 'normal' 100 point dogfights make for interesting variations. One of the first 'scenarios' we did in a non-dogfight game night kit was essentially just a straight dogfight but with double the normal number of asteroids (this was pre-debris). I wouldn't recommend it in a game now containing Dash Rendar, Tractor Beams and Seismic Charges, but it made for very tense and interesting games.

Blowing up all of the enemy ships as quickly as possible. You see it in video games all of the time. Any objective-based game mode without respawns almost always ends because the enemy team died, not because you completed the objective.

But not in tabletop wargames. I've lost count of the number of 40k games I've "won" as a handful of cowering termagants sat amongst the butchered remains of my army on an objective defiantly blowing raspberries at an armoured force they can't even hurt...

Can it be explained to me how Palp Aces or Dengaroo or U-Boats or any of the other top tier squads wouldn't just dominate these alt formats anyways?

You still have invincible ships (that are also good offensively), what is essentially a one ship build with great offense and good defense too, and pure alpha.

I'm not saying they wouldn't, but other forces would have options they don't, and some of those options are very effective.

Objectives are hard for this game because they force players to build specific teams.

Don't necessarily 'force', but certainly some scenarios suit specific ship types. The trick is either to let people build theirs squad to scenarios, or else to let them build one squad for all the scenarios (so they don't automatically loose because they can't build a legal squad for 'x') or let them have a sideboard or something similar.

I'd probably recommend the first option: when playing the missions Game Night Kit we essentially said what scenario each round would be, and had people prepare a squad list for each.

Attack Wing Organised Play forces to you play missions but 7/10 times it is simply easier to gun for your enemies two ships and blast them into oblivion. After all, it is far easier (and safer) to beam your captain down to the planet to search for resources when there are no enemy ships around.

A lot depends on how the missions are done. If they are designed so that just running around and blasting your opponent doesn't win you the game, then it's fine. If you design the missions poorly enough that all people do is just fly at each other and kill each other, then you haven't done a good job.

Agreed. A big driver is the turn/time limit. If I have enough time to blow away the enemy squad first, then it's a bad scenario because it's a deathmatch with a pointless bolt-on.

Let's take an example: Political Escort.

The Senator's Shuttle has (in a 100 point game) 6 shields and 6 hull, and moves at a maximum of speed 2 (more like speed 3, actually, because it's a long rectangle) - so you've got 6 turns to kill it (give or take blocking and turns).

Imagining a Palpatine/Aces force, you're very hard to hurt and very manoeuvrable - but you've got 3 3-dice attacks per turn. You've got a hard maximum of 18 attacks to kill the shuttle with - and you'd need something like 8 '3 dice with focus attacks' to do it with. You can't afford to 'dance and pick apart' like Aces want to, because if the Senator's shuttle goes up the centre at speed 2, you're going to struggle to get through the escort first. Protect is also a problem. Imagine a swarm of TIE bombers flying wing for the shuttle - that ship's going to have 6 evade tokens. Shooting at it is a waste of your time. But chewing through 6 TIE bombers takes too long - even if you kill 1 a turn, you're only starting your first shots on the shuttle when it calmly flies off the board.

Dengar/Manaroo has the same problem. Yes, Dengar has his awesome double-tap.....but if the shuttle's not shooting at him, he can't trigger it. Equally, whilst he has all the tokens in the world, they're coming from Manaroo - he has no actions himself - meaning no way to hand 'protect' evade tokens to the shuttle.

Jumpmasters...... Well, yes. Three plasma torpedoes are scary as buggery. But are you firing them at the escort ships or the shuttle? Especially if the shuttle has a load of evade tokens on it?

Whilst the specific rules of a scenario vary, this is key to making it interesting; that you've got to achieve something other than just killing the enemy squad, or they win . In this case, protecting the shuttle - you can 100-0 the enemy squad and still lose, if the shuttle makes it off the board whilst you're doing that.

Also, Escort - the Force Awakens version - has an extra twist to it. The Squadmate has two less shields (booooo) but automatically gets a focus token each turn, which probably works out the same in the long run - if it takes two turns to kill, and gets to spend the focus defensively each time, you've broken even as a minimum - plus it also has a 2-dice primary attack. This isn't great, but since the easiest way to slow the thing down is blocking it.....because it moves first, blocking it next turn means parking in range 1 ahead of it this turn....which means giving it a range 1, 3-die attack on you. Devastating, no, but not something you can blithely disregard when it's in addition to the rest of the squad's fire.

Taking a second example: Cutting The Cord.

This is a very extreme scenario - in that a squad literally cannot play the 'defender' if it doesn't meet the prerequisites. the prototype must be a non-unique small based ship, which the attacker has to kill. Which sounds easy, but the prototype gets such ridiculous bonuses (for example - 'can't be attacked with secondary weapons' is going to make Contracted Scouts spontaneously wet themselves) from the ground stations that if you don't knock out the ground stations first - i.e. 'play the mission' - you're facing a ship worth half the value of your squad by itself.

Taking a third example: Preystalker

This falls somewhere between the two. Any ship can be 'the bounty', but its squad value is doubled. So taking a 'good' ship costs you far more than it should, and since killing the 'bounty' is an instant win for the attackers, not having a decent escort is fatal.

The best ship for this scenario is a mid-tier ace (you know the ones they're forever telling us are useless?) - where the doubled cost doesn't bite you in the ass too much, and where 10 points of free upgrades and getting two [Elite Pilot Talent] icons (regardless of how many you normally start with) is gaining you the most - most aces & better generics have one, whilst the PS5-6 pilots usually have a really good pilot ability but no talent slots - being able to bolt on two free EPTs to a ship that normally gets none makes for some amazing combinations (see HotAC players for suggestions). Even just being able to slap Veteran Instincts/Adaptability on a normally low PS ship can go a long way to making it nasty in a fight.

* Example cases - the argument of Soontir Fel/Palpatine's invincibility is not one I'm going to argue with Paragoombaslayer - he's not incredibly dangerous (there's a reason that Soontir Fel is probably the most commonly used pilot in the history of the game), but part of his toughness is an underlying assumption that only so many ships get to fire at him at once thanks to Boost, Barrel Roll, PS9 and that bloody dial. When you double the board size but triple or quadruple the amount of guns (300 & 400 doubles epic games respectively), the 'density' of fire arcs you have to avoid increases. And not even a fully augmented Soontir Fel can shrug off 200+ points of ships firing on him in one turn. By comparison, 'big area effect' abilities that were of so-so value with small games become amazing. Corran Horn is a bad choice in epic as he suffers from not being Etahn A'Baht, rather than the other way around.

That is a lot of numbers. Where did you get them from?

Because, as I said earlier, from my anecdotical evidence, huge majority of players from my local scene (I am speaking about Warsaw) prefers death match. It completely opposes your claims.

The numbers I gave are based purely on my perspective and on my local scene. I never claimed to have hard facts at my disposal. I use my experience and observations to make educated claims about what I see. I can be wrong or things can be different in your area. I don't argue with that. Also, please understand that I'm not trying to argue or "win" an internet debate with you. I'm just talking about the idea of missions. Whatever we say or do here won't matter one fudge to FFG and whatever they decide. I'm merely talking about what I experience on my side.

I will say that I've been playing mini games for a very long time and in a number of different game systems. I think it's getting on 20 years? I've seen gamers and game systems. I've seen competitive environments. I think the biggest correlation has to do with Warhammer Fantasy Battle and how GW decided that 8th Ed missions would be standard and required for tournament play. There was a very big tournament scene for WHFB back in the day when this was done. Many podcasts and online communities. Many people stated it would kill the tournament system and how it was a terrible idea. The game was great for being "pure" as it was. Well, the change came and it actually didn't kill the tournament system. It actually got larger. I've done competitive for different game systems and I think I have a decent idea of what gamers and game systems are like. I'm not an expert, but I'm not just some random guy who has no idea what he's talking about.

I've also really worked to build my local scene. It used to be just me and one other guy in a game store playing, but we now have X-wing regular nights in around 5-6 game stores in my general area. There are over 140 members on our Facebook page. I've actively encouraged people in the game and talked to them about it. I've seen people join and jump into the tournament scene. I've seen people buy minis...and then back out. I've talked to a lot of people about their experiences on the game and what they like or don't like. I think I've met a good mix of people that like different aspects of the game. I think I have a good idea of what my local community likes.

Do I think FFG will introduce missions? Not any time soon. Do I want them to? Yes, but I'm fine if they don't. Do I think there are a significant number of people that would be fine if they did introduce missions? Yes, and more so than people who would quit if it happened.

At this point, I'm merely debating the validity of people able to have missions in a tournament setting. I know there are a lot of people that would hate the idea. I know there are a lot of people that would like the idea. I don't have any hard numbers and it's purely based on my time playing the X-wing game and chatting about it.

Let's take an example: Political Escort.

The Senator's Shuttle has (in a 100 point game) 6 shields and 6 hull, and moves at a maximum of speed 2 (more like speed 3, actually, because it's a long rectangle) - so you've got 6 turns to kill it (give or take blocking and turns).

The one thing about Political Escort that can balance it out is the Protect action (or whatever it's called) that allows one ship to give a free Evade to the shuttle. So, you could go with a Z-95 swarm or Tie Academy swarm that would pump out 7 Evades a turn for the shuttle. That alone would stop Imp Aces from being able to kill it in those few turns. Same for U-boats. If a mission is done right, there can be a balance to things. I'm not saying any particular mission right now is amazing and perfect for tournament play, but there are ways you can build the mission to be balanced.

What if there were 4 missions.

I loved this aspect in Malifaux, however I think that with variable missions in X-Wing you require a much larger squad to "tech" for/against certain objectives. For instance there might be a mission that requires you to touch all 4 corners of the map, you might want to include a fast ship otherwise be screwed out of it.

Isn't that the point of missions though - you build a squad to complete an objective or stop your opponent from doing the same. Not that touching all corners would necessarily be a standard mission but why not build a squad to stop your opponent rather than win the mission yourself?

Isn't that the point of missions though - you build a squad to complete an objective or stop your opponent from doing the same. Not that touching all corners would necessarily be a standard mission but why not build a squad to stop your opponent rather than win the mission yourself?

Depends what you mean by 'stop them' - taking the example above (which I'm not wild about as a mission but what the hey), take an example of a squad of four Push The Limit Royal Guard Interceptors. Such a squad has enough speed for any of them to complete the mission but can be at four places at once. Which is instantly a problem if they split up and you've only got two 'fighting ships' in your squad (Dengar & Manaroo, Palpatine & 2 Aces, double IG-88s)

The numbers I gave are based purely on my perspective and on my local scene. I never claimed to have hard facts at my disposal. I use my experience and observations to make educated claims about what I see. I can be wrong or things can be different in your area. I don't argue with that. Also, please understand that I'm not trying to argue or "win" an internet debate with you. I'm just talking about the idea of missions. Whatever we say or do here won't matter one fudge to FFG and whatever they decide. I'm merely talking about what I experience on my side.

I don't try to win "internet debate" either. I just disagree with your idea that missions are the way to go for X-Wing tournaments - and because we are on the forums I did it publicly in the form of posts, bringing my arguments to the table.

Disagreeing with someone doesn't exclude being polite.

I will say that I've been playing mini games for a very long time and in a number of different game systems. I think it's getting on 20 years? I've seen gamers and game systems. I've seen competitive environments. I think the biggest correlation has to do with Warhammer Fantasy Battle and how GW decided that 8th Ed missions would be standard and required for tournament play. There was a very big tournament scene for WHFB back in the day when this was done. Many podcasts and online communities. Many people stated it would kill the tournament system and how it was a terrible idea. The game was great for being "pure" as it was. Well, the change came and it actually didn't kill the tournament system. It actually got larger. I've done competitive for different game systems and I think I have a decent idea of what gamers and game systems are like. I'm not an expert, but I'm not just some random guy who has no idea what he's talking about.

Well, as a former WFB player who played this game for a 15 years (also in tournaments) I can tell you that bringing missions to WFB in 8th edition did nothing for competitive scene. In my country majority of tournaments were played using pitched battles rules (i.e. simple death match) - and polish WFB community was the most competitive in the whole world. What is more, composition rules as written were largely ignored and "ETC comp" was used. So if anything, WFB proves that official format won't always prevail. In WFB commonly accepted format was deathmatch format and this format was used in the most competitive WFB tournament - ETC Tournament.

I don't try to win "internet debate" either. I just disagree with your idea that missions are the way to go for X-Wing tournaments - and because we are on the forums I did it publicly in the form of posts, bringing my arguments to the table.

Disagreeing with someone doesn't exclude being polite.

I'm glad it's civil. I was just concerned your previous post might be leaning towards ugly, but I wasn't sure. I've had people get ugly on these forums.

I will say that I'm more of the opinion that I would like X-wing to go with missions, but I'll refrain from saying it's "the way to go". I think it's great, but I don't believe it's going to happen or required to make the scene grow.

You guys were lucky with the ETC Comp in Poland. My area didn't have anything and it was pretty ruthless. It was the "smash your face and play a real list" type attitude. Missions did a lot to improve game play in my neck of the woods. I also paid attention to many podcasts around the world where people did switch to missions and it was a good thing.

The problem I have with this idea (based on Attack Wing doing the exact same thing) is that it is still far easier to just kill your opponent.

Attack Wing Organised Play forces to you play missions but 7/10 times it is simply easier to gun for your enemies two ships and blast them into oblivion. After all, it is far easier (and safer) to beam your captain down to the planet to search for resources when there are no enemy ships around.

Only time this doesn't happen is on the odd mission where it is a race to destroy/capture Deep Space Nine or the Borg Cube.

People just get sick of flying against the same 3 lists around the same 6 rocks.

May I ask what people?

Because my local X-Wing community grows wildly, despite us playing deathmatch all time, every time. What's more, overwhelming majority of local active players prefers 100 pts deathmatch format.

I understand that someone might be burned out on the game, but I wouldn't want to introduce objective based game as standard for X-Wing just to please this tiny group of players - you can organize games and tournaments on your own, without forcing your "proper vision" of X-Wing on others.

The problem is that X Wing has a strong "there can be only one!" vibe going on when it comes to tournaments. Most other wargames have a range of tournament types available, and while some are more common and popular than others, there's no "us and them" divide like there is in X Wing. So IMO, saying things like "you can organize games and tournaments on your own" isn't terribly helpful. We know that, and most of us who don't prefer 100/6 games (and there's more of us than you I'd wager you think) already do that. I can't speak for everyone, but what I'd like to see is more diversity encouraged in X wing by the complete abolition of official FFG tournament rules. So that EVERY group of players would have to "organize games and tournaments on [their] own". I'm absolutely certain that leading popular formats would evolve, but I'm also certain that like in every other wargame that doesn't have a single 'official' way to play, that there would be HEAPS more diversity in the range of games on offer.

from my anecdotical evidence, huge majority of players from my local scene (I am speaking about Warsaw) prefers death match. It completely opposes your claims.

This is one of those tricky things to measure, because we can't actually go back in time to change the required variables to measure their impact. All your local players say they love the deathmatch format, but do they ACTUALLY love the deathmatch format or do they simply love whatever the official way to play is, as per FFG publication? If FFG had said the official way to play was 150 points with random scenarios, do you think your group would still have developed (and love to the exclusion of all else) the 100/6 format?

I doubt it. As heychadwick mentioned earlier, people have a propensity to lean towards whatever the perceived standard game mode is.

So if anything, WFB proves that official format won't always prevail. In WFB commonly accepted format was deathmatch format and this format was used in the most competitive WFB tournament - ETC Tournament.

Right, but it's important to note that for many years after they canned their GT system, there WAS no official way to play WHFB. The ETC stepped up to create a community based tournament system that was very popular, but certainly not global or exclusive in the way the FFG tournament system is. And that's what I'd like to see in X Wing: For FFG to get their noses out of tournament play, and let the various communities develop whatever tournament formats they want. I mean, it would be hard going since the 100/6 format has been artificially grafted into our collective consciousness as the only official way to play tournaments, but I think over time we could see some more diversity appear.

Actually, FFG already has their noses out of the tournament system. Local groups are free to play whatever they want. Most tournaments aren't Store Championships or Regionals or above.

And besides, FFG tournaments grow this game's community. People go out if their way to travel to big ones, they practice constantly for them, people chase after the prizes and just winning in general, new players go too. So we should get rid of all that because a handful of super casuals would enjoy it more if the senator shuttle token was used?

Ok.

Maybe I just want to destroy my opponent's ships and enjoy the core gameplay mechanics and not have to worry about defending some stupid shuttle or whatever the objective would be.

People just get sick of flying against the same 3 lists around the same 6 rocks.

May I ask what people?

Because my local X-Wing community grows wildly, despite us playing deathmatch all time, every time. What's more, overwhelming majority of local active players prefers 100 pts deathmatch format.

I understand that someone might be burned out on the game, but I wouldn't want to introduce objective based game as standard for X-Wing just to please this tiny group of players - you can organize games and tournaments on your own, without forcing your "proper vision" of X-Wing on others.

The problem is that X Wing has a strong "there can be only one!" vibe going on when it comes to tournaments. Most other wargames have a range of tournament types available, and while some are more common and popular than others, there's no "us and them" divide like there is in X Wing. So IMO, saying things like "you can organize games and tournaments on your own" isn't terribly helpful. We know that, and most of us who don't prefer 100/6 games (and there's more of us than you I'd wager you think) already do that. I can't speak for everyone, but what I'd like to see is more diversity encouraged in X wing by the complete abolition of official FFG tournament rules. So that EVERY group of players would have to "organize games and tournaments on [their] own". I'm absolutely certain that leading popular formats would evolve, but I'm also certain that like in every other wargame that doesn't have a single 'official' way to play, that there would be HEAPS more diversity in the range of games on offer.

There are plenty of side events during biggest X-Wing tournaments. And you know what? There is only fraction of participants in comparison to main "100 pts, 6 rocks - deathmatch" event Why? There is simple explanation - people like deathmatch the most. Other formats are interesting only for a small group of people. As I said earlier deathmatch is the purest form of rivalry, similiar to racing or boxing - and people, especially men, who are majority of X-Wing players, love rivalry (I am one of them).

There is no vibe, no one is putting gun to your head and force you to play deathmatch. You can play whatever you want.

from my anecdotical evidence, huge majority of players from my local scene (I am speaking about Warsaw) prefers death match. It completely opposes your claims.

This is one of those tricky things to measure, because we can't actually go back in time to change the required variables to measure their impact. All your local players say they love the deathmatch format, but do they ACTUALLY love the deathmatch format or do they simply love whatever the official way to play is, as per FFG publication? If FFG had said the official way to play was 150 points with random scenarios, do you think your group would still have developed (and love to the exclusion of all else) the 100/6 format ?

I doubt it. As heychadwick mentioned earlier, people have a propensity to lean towards whatever the perceived standard game mode is.

But here is a problem. It is only your assumption.

I actually doubt there would be as much players as there are currently, if official format would be objective based or required more than 100 pts. In my opinion X-Wing is as popular as it is, among others things, because of simple, fast and effective offical tournament format.

Do you really think that FFG just pulled this format out of nowhere? Without playtesting or consulting gamers? Because I am pretty sure playtests showed that this is the best way to play this game.

So if anything, WFB proves that official format won't always prevail. In WFB commonly accepted format was deathmatch format and this format was used in the most competitive WFB tournament - ETC Tournament.

Right, but it's important to note that for many years after they canned their GT system, there WAS no official way to play WHFB . The ETC stepped up to create a community based tournament system that was very popular, but certainly not global or exclusive in the way the FFG tournament system is. And that's what I'd like to see in X Wing: For FFG to get their noses out of tournament play, and let the various communities develop whatever tournament formats they want. I mean, it would be hard going since the 100/6 format has been artificially grafted into our collective consciousness as the only official way to play tournaments, but I think over time we could see some more diversity appear.

Lack of official support was horrible for WFB. And it killed this game in the end. There were many tournaments with imbalanced rules and stupid scenarios like "there is big jumping dummy in the middle of the battlefield, the one who is closer to him with his cheapest remaining unit on the table wins!!!" or some other similiar nonsense - at least until ETC format became popular. In tournament community there was a lot of clique mentality - shape of the game was decided by small group of people - some of them were too vain to listen to others or admit to errors. In the end better games, with better organized, official tournaments , like X-Wing, caused WFB to end it's life.

What are you talking about? What vibe? There are plenty of side events during biggest X-Wing tournaments. And you know what? There is only fraction of participants in comparison to main "100 pts, 6 rocks - deathmatch" event Why? There is simple explanation - people like deathmatch the most. Other formats are interesting only for a small group of people. As I said earlier deathmatch is the purest form of rivalry, similiar to racing or boxing - and people, especially men, who are majority of X-Wing players, love rivalry (I am one of them).

There is no vibe, no one is putting gun to your head and force you to play deathmatch. You can play whatever you want.

Oh, come on dude. There is only ONE way to play an X Wing tournament. Other formats effectively don't exist.

That's a pretty strong 'vibe'.

But here is a problem. It is only your assumption.

Right.

I actually doubt there would be as much players as there are currently, if official format would be objective based or required more than 100 pts. In my opinion X-Wing is as popular as it is, among others things, because of simple, fast and effective offical tournament format.

And that is only your assumption.

Like I said, we can't retrospectively measure just how much impact FFGs statement of the 'official' way to play had on the popularity of that format. You believe that it would have been an unstoppable juggernaut regardless, and I disagree, but neither of us can actually be any more convincing about the matter than "Well, I think you're wrong."

Lack of official support was horrible for WFB. And it killed this game in the end. There were many tournaments with imbalanced rules and stupid scenarios like "there is big jumping dummy in the middle of the battlefield, the one who is closer to him with his cheapest remaining unit on the table wins!!!" or some other similiar nonsense - at least until ETC format became popular. In tournament community there was a lot of clique mentality - shape of the game was decided by small group of people - some of them were too vain to listen to others or admit to errors. In the end better games, with better organized, official tournaments , like X-Wing, caused WFB to end it's life.

Lack of official support is what let the ETC flourish. It never would have existed if the official GT circuit had continued running, because people love to play what they are told is the official way to play. Without an official way to play they (the competitive community) splintered and created hundreds of different ways to play, all with varying popularity. For all the purported dominance of the ETC, you could still find and play in non-ETC events in Europe. Far more than you can find non 100/6 X Wing tournaments.

And it wasn't lack of tournament support that killed WHFB. It's instructive to me that you think tournament support is so crucial to a games success that the lack of it killed WHFB.

What killed WHFB was being the first and largest company to make models used purely for a specific game, and rules tied to those models. Old players had hundreds, perhaps thousands of painted models and didn't need many new ones. New players were daunted by the cost of starting a new army, and didn't buy in. No one was buying WHFB models, and the company couldn't afford to keep making and stocking them. It had nothing to do with tournaments!

And I think there are FAR more people than you realise, who buy and play X Wing, yet never go to a store, and never go to a tournament, because for them X Wing is about bonding with friends and family and enjoying the Star Wars universe, not competitive play against relative strangers. You don't see those people because... well they don't go to stores or tournaments. They're not interested in the meta, or cutting edge list-building so they aren't strong presence online (although there's a few of us here) so it's easy to fall into the trap of thinking that your tribe is the biggest (and therefore most important) because it's the most visible to you, but be aware that IS a trap.

There are plenty of side events during biggest X-Wing tournaments. And you know what? There is only fraction of participants in comparison to main "100 pts, 6 rocks - deathmatch" event Why? There is simple explanation - people like deathmatch the most. Other formats are interesting only for a small group of people. As I said earlier deathmatch is the purest form of rivalry, similiar to racing or boxing - and people, especially men, who are majority of X-Wing players, love rivalry (I am one of them).

There is no vibe, no one is putting gun to your head and force you to play deathmatch. You can play whatever you want.

...

I actually doubt there would be as much players as there are currently, if official format would be objective based or required more than 100 pts. In my opinion X-Wing is as popular as it is, among others things, because of simple, fast and effective offical tournament format.

Do you really think that FFG just pulled this format out of nowhere? Without playtesting or consulting gamers? Because I am pretty sure playtests showed that this is the best way to play this game.

I do think that people play whatever is the official format. They want to participate in the largest event to test their mettle vs. the best of the best. If the only official way is death match, then that's going to be the biggest event. It is my opinion that if FFG changed the official rules to be mission oriented....and a year later (giving people time to try things out) there was a big tournament weekend that had a death match tournament and the official mission based one...I would bet the official tournament would be the one most people play. Whatever the official tournament rules are is what people will play.

I know you have the ETC for WHFB, but that also came out due to unbalanced army books and such. I don't think something like that would happen if FFG went to missions. This is my opinion, of course.

...

As for playtesting and such, FFG has already stated that they had figured people would be getting bored with death match by now and were surprised that it was still as popular as it is today. So...they did play testing and I think they found that people wanted missions and such in the play testing. They just figured it would come later.

Another side item. You mentioned your opinions are based on what you see in your local area at your tournaments and such. What I've found is that the majority of people who play X-wing don't actually go to tournaments. I'll say that out of all the local people in my area, most of them don't go to tournaments. Oh, there is a healthy tournament scene, but there are a lot of people who don't go. I do talk to these people a lot. I read their posts on the forums as they are usually ignored for their low post count. I have people contact me due to my casual podcast and tell me their story. If you only talk to the people at the tournaments as they are now, you aren't talking to everyone. I know there are people out there that would prefer tournaments to have missions.

And besides, FFG tournaments grow this game's community. People go out if their way to travel to big ones, they practice constantly for them, people chase after the prizes and just winning in general, new players go too. So we should get rid of all that because a handful of super casuals would enjoy it more if the senator shuttle token was used?

If tournaments went mission based, why do you think that's getting rid of the tournament scene? You seem to think that going to missions would some how stop tournaments from happening? Or would kill the tournament scene?

The assertion that "super casuals" would go to a tournament with missions is wrong, too. Super casuals would probably not like any tournament environment, no matter how it was based. That is....if they were super casual.

The idea that it's only a handful of people that want missions is wrong as well.

What are you talking about? What vibe? There are plenty of side events during biggest X-Wing tournaments. And you know what? There is only fraction of participants in comparison to main "100 pts, 6 rocks - deathmatch" event Why? There is simple explanation - people like deathmatch the most. Other formats are interesting only for a small group of people. As I said earlier deathmatch is the purest form of rivalry, similiar to racing or boxing - and people, especially men, who are majority of X-Wing players, love rivalry (I am one of them).

There is no vibe, no one is putting gun to your head and force you to play deathmatch. You can play whatever you want.

Oh, come on dude. There is only ONE way to play an X Wing tournament. Other formats effectively don't exist.

That's a pretty strong 'vibe'.

No, you just deny the basic facts. There is not only ONE way to play X Wing at the tournaments - just check official tournament rules or current tournament programs - epic, escalation, etc. There are official alternative ways to play X-Wing, but classic 100 pts IS the most popular - the simplest explanation and the most rational one is because people like it the most.

I actually doubt there would be as much players as there are currently, if official format would be objective based or required more than 100 pts. In my opinion X-Wing is as popular as it is, among others things, because of simple, fast and effective offical tournament format.

And that is only your assumption.

Like I said, we can't retrospectively measure just how much impact FFGs statement of the 'official' way to play had on the popularity of that format. You believe that it would have been an unstoppable juggernaut regardless, and I disagree, but neither of us can actually be any more convincing about the matter than "Well, I think you're wrong."

You just speculate and presents opinion to prove that " people doesn't like deathmatch - they are just brainless drones that will play whatever official mode company will throw at them " Are you serious?

Also you didn't answer my question:

Do you really think that FFG just pulled this format out of nowhere? Without playtesting or consulting gamers?

Lack of official support was horrible for WFB. And it killed this game in the end. There were many tournaments with imbalanced rules and stupid scenarios like "there is big jumping dummy in the middle of the battlefield, the one who is closer to him with his cheapest remaining unit on the table wins!!!" or some other similiar nonsense - at least until ETC format became popular. In tournament community there was a lot of clique mentality - shape of the game was decided by small group of people - some of them were too vain to listen to others or admit to errors. In the end better games, with better organized, official tournaments , like X-Wing, caused WFB to end it's life.

Lack of official support is what let the ETC flourish. It never would have existed if the official GT circuit had continued running, because people love to play what they are told is the official way to play. Without an official way to play they (the competitive community) splintered and created hundreds of different ways to play, all with varying popularity. For all the purported dominance of the ETC, you could still find and play in non-ETC events in Europe. Far more than you can find non 100/6 X Wing tournaments.

Why do you assume that solid official support wouldn't be better for this game than what ETC Commitee did? It is completely baseless.

And it wasn't lack of tournament support that killed WHFB. It's instructive to me that you think tournament support is so crucial to a games success that the lack of it killed WHFB.

What killed WHFB was being the first and largest company to make models used purely for a specific game, and rules tied to those models. Old players had hundreds, perhaps thousands of painted models and didn't need many new ones. New players were daunted by the cost of starting a new army, and didn't buy in. No one was buying WHFB models, and the company couldn't afford to keep making and stocking them. It had nothing to do with tournaments!

Then tell my why in almost all competitive board, card and miniature games (MtG, Heroclix, Warmachine/Hordes, Infinity, Star Trek: Attack Wing, and countless others) tournament rules and tournament play are officialy supported?

Why computer games like DotA or LoL got officially supported e-sport communities?

I will tell you why. Because supporting competitive play in given system is one of the best ways for this system to achieve commercial success. GW ignored competitive aspect of their games for many years - meanwhile all other publishers of miniature games officialy supported their products - as you can see WFB is long dead, yet Warmachine/Hordes and Infinity are in good shape.

And I think there are FAR more people than you realise, who buy and play X Wing, yet never go to a store, and never go to a tournament, because for them X Wing is about bonding with friends and family and enjoying the Star Wars universe, not competitive play against relative strangers. You don't see those people because... well they don't go to stores or tournaments. They're not interested in the meta, or cutting edge list-building so they aren't strong presence online (although there's a few of us here) so it's easy to fall into the trap of thinking that your tribe is the biggest (and therefore most important) because it's the most visible to you, but be aware that IS a trap.

And again, baseless assumption.

From where did you get info that for those casual gamers deathmatch isn't their favourite format? Because it may be as well that casuals, who never attend tournaments, like deathmatch as much as competitive types.

I will repeat my question:

Do you really think that FFG just pulled this format out of nowhere? Without playtesting or consulting gamers?

No, you just deny the basic facts. There is not only ONE way to play X Wing at the tournaments - just check official tournament rules or current tournament programs - epic, escalation, etc. There are official alternative ways to play X-Wing, but classic 100 pts IS the most popular - the simplest explanation and the most rational one is because people like it the most.

You just speculate and presents opinion to prove that " people doesn't like deathmatch - they are just brainless drones that will play whatever official mode company will throw at them " Are you serious?

Now there are other formats for tournaments, but it all started with one format. It has always been THE format to play. We have few enough tournaments for X-wing in my area and not a lot of organizers for such events. All the events in my area are done by stores that buy the tournament kits. It's run by employees who don't want to do more than they have to. I don't see anyone attempting to organize tournaments besides stores.

Epic takes too long to play a game. Escalation is too annoying to try to figure things out between games. People are lazy and just want to fly the same list each round.

Death match has always been the official tournament type. It's the go-to one that everyone plays. I understand your assertion that it's this way because it's the best and it's the one everyone loves. I say it's the one that's easiest and there hasn't really been one with missions. It's the one that everyone started with and everyone just does. I know this is a difference of opinion. I'm OK with that.

I do think that people will play whatever is the predominant tournament format. If FFG made a huge and official change away from death match, then everyone would be playing that new format. I don't think there would be some player movement that would create a death match version of tournaments and play with that.

I don't think that the majority of people don't like death match. I think that it's just what there is and there is no real alternative. There isn't in my area.

As for playtesting and such, FFG has already stated that they had figured people would be getting bored with death match by now and were surprised that it was still as popular as it is today .

You see, you just proved my point. Deathmatch is not popular because publisher imposed said format onto players. It is popular because people like it and it is their favourite, much to suprise of publisher.

As for the second sentence of your quote:

So you think - there is no evidence just assumption.

Meanwhile the most logical and rational explanation is that FFG playtested this game, found out that standard format of 100 pts is the best and went along with it.

I used to run a HOTAC game and mostly found that the people scared out of tourneys got discouraged by more competitive lists blitzing them and then staying out.

This would still happen with missions. The powerful lists are varied and multifaceted, far from what people percieve.

People just get sick of flying against the same 3 lists around the same 6 rocks.

May I ask what people?

Because my local X-Wing community grows wildly, despite us playing deathmatch all time, every time. What's more, overwhelming majority of local active players prefers 100 pts deathmatch format.

I understand that someone might be burned out on the game, but I wouldn't want to introduce objective based game as standard for X-Wing just to please this tiny group of players - you can organize games and tournaments on your own, without forcing your "proper vision" of X-Wing on others.

The problem is that X Wing has a strong "there can be only one!" vibe going on when it comes to tournaments. Most other wargames have a range of tournament types available, and while some are more common and popular than others, there's no "us and them" divide like there is in X Wing. So IMO, saying things like "you can organize games and tournaments on your own" isn't terribly helpful. We know that, and most of us who don't prefer 100/6 games (and there's more of us than you I'd wager you think) already do that. I can't speak for everyone, but what I'd like to see is more diversity encouraged in X wing by the complete abolition of official FFG tournament rules. So that EVERY group of players would have to "organize games and tournaments on [their] own". I'm absolutely certain that leading popular formats would evolve, but I'm also certain that like in every other wargame that doesn't have a single 'official' way to play, that there would be HEAPS more diversity in the range of games on offer.

There are plenty of side events during biggest X-Wing tournaments. And you know what? There is only fraction of participants in comparison to main "100 pts, 6 rocks - deathmatch" event Why? There is simple explanation - people like deathmatch the most. Other formats are interesting only for a small group of people. As I said earlier deathmatch is the purest form of rivalry, similiar to racing or boxing - and people, especially men, who are majority of X-Wing players, love rivalry (I am one of them).

There is no vibe, no one is putting gun to your head and force you to play deathmatch. You can play whatever you want.

from my anecdotical evidence, huge majority of players from my local scene (I am speaking about Warsaw) prefers death match. It completely opposes your claims.

This is one of those tricky things to measure, because we can't actually go back in time to change the required variables to measure their impact. All your local players say they love the deathmatch format, but do they ACTUALLY love the deathmatch format or do they simply love whatever the official way to play is, as per FFG publication? If FFG had said the official way to play was 150 points with random scenarios, do you think your group would still have developed (and love to the exclusion of all else) the 100/6 format ?

I doubt it. As heychadwick mentioned earlier, people have a propensity to lean towards whatever the perceived standard game mode is.

But here is a problem. It is only your assumption.

I actually doubt there would be as much players as there are currently, if official format would be objective based or required more than 100 pts. In my opinion X-Wing is as popular as it is, among others things, because of simple, fast and effective offical tournament format.

Do you really think that FFG just pulled this format out of nowhere? Without playtesting or consulting gamers? Because I am pretty sure playtests showed that this is the best way to play this game.

So if anything, WFB proves that official format won't always prevail. In WFB commonly accepted format was deathmatch format and this format was used in the most competitive WFB tournament - ETC Tournament.

Right, but it's important to note that for many years after they canned their GT system, there WAS no official way to play WHFB . The ETC stepped up to create a community based tournament system that was very popular, but certainly not global or exclusive in the way the FFG tournament system is. And that's what I'd like to see in X Wing: For FFG to get their noses out of tournament play, and let the various communities develop whatever tournament formats they want. I mean, it would be hard going since the 100/6 format has been artificially grafted into our collective consciousness as the only official way to play tournaments, but I think over time we could see some more diversity appear.

Lack of official support was horrible for WFB. And it killed this game in the end. There were many tournaments with imbalanced rules and stupid scenarios like "there is big jumping dummy in the middle of the battlefield, the one who is closer to him with his cheapest remaining unit on the table wins!!!" or some other similiar nonsense - at least until ETC format became popular. In tournament community there was a lot of clique mentality - shape of the game was decided by small group of people - some of them were too vain to listen to others or admit to errors. In the end better games, with better organized, official tournaments , like X-Wing, caused WFB to end it's life.

From reading your posts your going off your local area, which I'm afraid does not count for the rest of the world. You do ndt know for certain if the game would be more or less or just equally as popular

I know from talking to players in my area that they'd still play objective tournaments. In fact people are getting tired of the standard 100 pt 6 rock death match.

Also I've seen the argument that XWing is simple and fast to get into. Adding an objective would not change that fact much. What gets most I believe into XWing from what I've read on numerous occasions, isn't just the simplicity of the rules, but 1)it's star wars 2) no painting or glueing required. 3) cost. All three of these things would still appeal to those who have gotten into it for these reasons.

I would also like to add that death match is kind of not what star wars is all about. Having more support for objectives (and I'm not talking about the ones that come with expansions as to me they feel more like a tutorial) would feel more star wars. The rebels never try to go toe to toe with imperials. They rely on hit and run tactics. Giving ffg experience with the game I'm sure they could balance it out in some way. Making all sides equal with the objectives. Maybe not all objectives, but I'd love to see it, and I know many others who would as well.

Actually i think it would help in my area, as there is no XWing community. I've tried, and it succeeded for a short time, then everyone just went back to magic. I think if the game had more scenerios it would help. A lot of people I knew were right into role playing, and that I feel death match just gets boring for them.

Anyway that's my rant.

Edit

Instead of quoting a bunch more I just want to add, yes there is only 1 official tournament format. When you go to a store championship, regionals, national, or world's, it's all 100pt death match. It's not escalation or anything else but.

I'm afraid you are wrong.

Yes people can have their own tournament and ffg had provided different formats, but when it comes down to the high lvl premier events it's all the same, hence why most just stick with that

You see, you just proved my point.

No he really didn't but you are apparently so blinded in the need to prove your point you can't see past it.

Deathmatch is not popular because publisher imposed said format onto players.

But it is the format that has been imposed on players since the start. It is and always has been the official format for tournament games.

It is popular because people like it and it is their favourite, much to suprise of publisher.

Which doesn't actually prove that people prefer it over all other viable options, it only proves that people prefer what is seen as the official method to play.

All you've done is twist things to suit your argument and committed a number of logical fallacies.

The 100 point DM is the standard way to play. It is also the most popular way to play. But that does not prove that the 100 point DM would be the most popular method, if it were not also the standard tournament format used.

You see, you just proved my point.

No he really didn't but you are apparently so blinded in the need to prove your point you can't see past it.

Deathmatch is not popular because publisher imposed said format onto players.

But it is the format that has been imposed on players since the start. It is and always has been the official format for tournament games.

It is popular because people like it and it is their favourite, much to suprise of publisher.

Which doesn't actually prove that people prefer it over all other viable options, it only proves that people prefer what is seen as the official method to play.All you've done is twist things to suit your argument and committed a number of logical fallacies.The 100 point DM is the standard way to play. It is also the most popular way to play. But that does not prove that the 100 point DM would be the most popular method, if it were not also the standard tournament format used.

Well said