All buffs and no nerfs makes X-Wing a dull game.

By Razgriz25thinf, in X-Wing

Since we're all voicing weird and unpopular views as to what is hurting X-wing ATM, let me drop this one:

I hate the Scum faction. If I had my way they would be removed from the game.

Someone's gunning for a JBR7 'Bad Post'.

- - - -

(JFTR - I, for one, like the Scum)

Since we're all voicing weird and unpopular views as to what is hurting X-wing ATM, let me drop this one:

I hate the Scum faction. If I had my way they would be removed from the game.

I like the idea of the Imperials hiring Boba Fett, and various other unsavoury characters to fight/hunt the Rebels. I also love Han Solo and other lovable rogues with hearts of gold assisting the Rebels to fight the Empire.

I absolutely despise Scum being there own faction. Thematically it doesn't make all that much sense, they've got all the lamest lists to play against (Bro-bots, Uboats, Quad-TLT, Dengaroo), and they've some-what pushed the Rebels out of the meta. Also they have all the ugliest ships.

And whether the lists are fun to fly against or not isnt the factions fault, its the design if anything. And Id rather fly against uboats and maybe even dengaroo over palp aces for the 5000th time

Some of their ships also happen to be my favorite (looking) in the game :P

Edited by VanderLegion

Warpman your far too aggressive that's why no one falls for your posts.

At least I'm not the "you are wrong because I said so" kind of poster.

Better be aggressive and have arguements for the position then play gekko every time.

Oh really, so you say Arcdodgers must excell against both turrets and jousters? Wrong, think again.

AT didn't make dodgers that already ate jousters alive super-effective against turrets? Wrong, think again.

TLT is good against 3(4) evade token-stackers that can even stay in the donut hole half of the time? Wrong, think again.

As a dedicated aggressor player I can definitely say you are 146% wrong assuming IGs can outgun Defender list. white\green K-turns, 2(3) actions against red turns, huge base prone to blocks and asteroids, and 1(2) actions per turn. Go check your math first.

1. Autothrusters exists because the design of the primary weapon turret (something I maintain to this day was a design mistake) completely negates the mechanic the TIE interceptor relies on to survive: arc dodging. Its gameplay prior to PalpAces was about avoiding getting shot at all because three hull doesn't last long. The rise of the Fat Falcon killed the TIE interceptor off because a Falcon is impossible to arc dodge: Wave 5 was the final nail in that coffin. Autothrusters was made to give arc-dodgers a limited ability to dodge turrets. The idea is that a turret then has to try to keep the interceptor in arc as much as possible. Post Wave 5 PWTs have also always had mechanics to encourage arc use through pilot abilities or superior secondary weapons: the turret is a weaker backup weapon rather than the ship's main damage mode.

2. It makes them more effective against a turret that refuses to adjust but it's still an unfavourable matchup. PalpAces isn't what's keeping the Outrider, Decimator and Falcon out of the metagame.

3. TLT only needs to hit Soontir three times and it gets eight shots a round. If you go into the donut hole that's still six. TLT Spam gets burned by ordnance alpha strike, not by PalpAces.

4. Are you sure you mean outgun? You're talking about dials.

And Interceptor can easily avoid usual arcs. If a game has 3 types of behavior, none of them may be good against both others. If you can dodge arcs, you must die to those who don't care about them. Just as the turret should die under concentrated mass fire from jousters.

ah, yes, EU that made PWTs arcdodge.

Turret>Arcdodger>Jouster>Turret. add EU into it and you get Turret>Arcdodger>Jouster<Turret

and you see the times when people had Han, Dash or RAC in every list.

Then AT hit

and we get it Turret<Arcdodger>jouster<Turret

that's why there are so many imperial aces around.

Nope, it simply made it impossible to penetrate the dodger with a turret outside the arc. You must make it 4\4 and hope dodger blanks out.

A game design that makes offense lower than defense is a bad game design promoting long and dull games.

And yes, when was the last time we've seen PWTs? Dengaroo, I presume. And the only reason we do see them is because Uboats and Palpaces ate all the TLTs.

As with PWTs, it relies on getting all hits and then hoping soontir blanks out. It might happen on attack #1 or might not happen at all.

I've seen 4 full-modded torpedoes failing to hit a **** Inquisitor. In a row. Precisely yesterday at 3-20 PM. and you say TLTs are a bad matchup?

It's not the YYYY that scares soontir, it was always the stress.

When it comes to jousters, you WILL have to K-turn, S-loop and so on.

Defender has 2(3) actions every turn even when K-turning, and has the same 3-3 stats.

Aggressor has 1 action every turn if we have Adv sensors, or 1,5 actions every turn if we have FCS.

And sadly a large base is not exactly helping the aggressor. THE only place where it can have the upper hand is punching through with FCS+Crack+HLK even through Soontirs. When it comes to chewing through, it already failed.

But every X-Wing world's has been won by the best list at the time.

Wrong.

Weeeeell, philosophically - a list that has beaten all opponents at a World Class event is by it's nature, the very best list at that moment.

Now, could that same player have beaten the themselves using a "better" list... we'll never know.

I disagree. Give me Paul Heaver's list, send me to Worlds and I will lose.

Winning Worlds is a combination of a good, versatile list, a good player and passable luck. If X-Wing were decided solely by the metagame what'd be the point in playing the game itself?

Aside from the usual mudslinging; this has been a fairly interesting read. My personal view is as follows.

Nerfing is a better way to keep balance than constant buffing and power creep in this situation but it's such a hard thing for FFG to implement. Once the printed material is out there; it's stuck out there. Nefing things already printed can lead to the occasional DQ from a tourney or simply not playing as you turned up without a legal list due to going off the printed material instead of the FFG FAQ (as an example). So for FFG the easiest and least complicated way to maintain balance is to buff. I do agree that this simply band aids the main problem rather than remedying the actual issue.

For me; this is exactly why I'm not looking to really buy much of Wave's 9 or 10. I already have a ton of binder chaff and ships that never see play so don't really want more. I love the game's core mechanics and I love the fact that it's Star Wars but I do feel like it's becoming bloated and feels different from the game I started playing back in Wave 3. I really don't see the point in keeping buying more ships just for the 5 minutes in the sun they have before being power creep'd back into oblivion. I already have 3 T-70's and 2 YT-1300's that I hardly ever use. Why do I need HotR? So I can suddenly run a triple YT list? No thanks, I'll just save my money for other games right now.

I still really enjoy casual games but tournaments are really becoming less and less fun right now. I think balance is only part of this tough, power gaming seems to be on the rise in the community as more wargamers come over from other systems. I'm seeing an increase in folks who are turning up for the win rather than the fun. I think the community is shifting a bit and the balance issues are only exacerbated by this shift as more players seek to exploit the balance issues for competitive purposes.

HotAC has been great fun. I've really enjoyed playing this and it's really brought back some of the fun I've been missing from tournies recently. I don't need new ships or cards for this and some of my binder chaff is even seeing use. There's more than 1 way to play the game and I'm going to be exploring those whilst I'm disillusioned with 100pt DM tedium. If I start to notice the meta opening up again and things becoming less stale; my interest may switch back but right now i want to play Epic and HotAC way more than practice for the next tourney or have another 100pt dogfight. Not entirely sure what my point is but that's the musings of my mind anyways.

TL;DR - Nerfing is good but hard to achieve in this instance. Play other formats. PEW PEW everything and vote with your monies.

In my humble opinion, I think PTL Arc Dodgers have been too powerful lately. The idea of the high PS PTL Arc Dodger was that you could get out of arcs of almost any ship and be able to fire at them in return. This really ruined the game in a number of ways. You can always stress them or bump them, but sometimes that's hard to do. Stressing someone often meant actually firing at them in the first place, which can be hard for PTL Arc Dodgers. The power level of the PTL Arc Dodger pretty much created:

  • The PS War (also Tie Phantoms did).
  • The death of the Jouster

There are so many threads about fixing the T-65 (or the Kihraxz, Starviper, or B-wing). These are all jouster ships (you may think the Starviper is a PTL Arc Dodger, but it's not). When you remove the ability for jousters to be effective, you pretty much remove them from the game (except for some special guys, like Biggs). Can you win with T-65's vs. PTL Arc Dodgers? Yes, but it's not an easy game. It's an uphill struggle.

If you nerf the ability of the PTL Arc Dodgers, then you should be able to bring back Jousters. I think FFG recognizes this and has worked towards this idea. Many new ships have abilities that work when you are in the firing arc of another ship. So, they are encouraging you to actually joust. Also, there have been a ton of upgrades and new pilots that hurt PTL Arc Dodgers (the most infamous being BMST, but not the only one). It is my opinion that FFG has recognized this issue and has been working towards fixing it with the latest ships and upgrades. It's not so much a nerf directly to PTL Arc Dodgers, but it's direct counters to those ships. It's a smart way of "nerfing" the situation.

There will always be Arc Dodging. It existed in Wave 1 with the Tie Fighter, even though people now don't consider it a real arc dodger. I think arc dodging will always be a thing. I am under the impression that PTL Arc Dodgers are too powerful for the game and really drive us to where we are today. You need to have something to beat the PTL Arc Dodgers, but you also have to beat U-boats. There has been a narrow strip of options until Wave 9 comes out officially.

The return of the Jousters will bring back a lot more options into the game. The T-65 had two main issues; not efficient points, and not re-positioning vs. PTL arc dodgers. Integrated Astromech fixes the first part. Oh, I know some people don't think so, but I believe it does. It's much better than it was. If PTL Arc Dodgers are nerfed, then the whole issue with the T-65 is resolved.

U-boats are still a counter to Rebel Shield Regens, which is great, as that list type is really freakin' annoying. Now, people don't have to face off 80% of the time vs. either Imperial PTL Aces or U-boats. They can build a jouster list that can burn down a U-boat before it can fire.

Nerfing a boardgame isnt easy, and since it requires reprints it either means huge pricesink on your end because you're cool to your customers and just go "Heres the new rules!" which when you have to buy the cards and the cards are being changed that makes no sense, or you piss off a lot of customers because you go "These cards have changed. Your current prints of these cards are now illegal and you must buy new ones to keep using them."

Furthermore, when you nerf in a tabletop game it can easily remove that asset from the game entirely, which can make people feel robbed. Nerfing in a videogame rarely has this problem because it came with the original game. How would you like if you ran Dengar all the time and they decided his pilot ability was too OP so they completely changed it to something almost as dumb as imperial boba? He would virtually vanish. And now all the people that bought the ship (or multiples) feel robbed and pissed off.

40k does this all the bloody time. Any idea how absolutely INFURIATED i was when my Ork Killa Kanz and Deffdredds became utter trash and you cant even bring them as a joke anymore? Ive tried to use them since 6th ed dropped, you simply CANT use them anymore. And since orks are numbers and the price doesnt reflect the numbers, thats ~300 bucks i feel robbed of on those models alone not to mention the other gak i cant use anymore (or at least not very easily).

i would rather watch a model just get phased out by overshadowing than nerfed. When it gets overshadowed, it just got old and theres better options. When it gets nerfed, i feel robbed. Yes some nerfs are justified and are beneficial to the game (see cloaking), largely nerfs dont do this...they either didnt phase the model/unit in question or utterly crucified them.

Edited by Vineheart01

*kisses the old print of Daredevil*

There's a merit to having old prints, they are sometimes better and have more interesting opportunities

In my humble opinion, I think PTL Arc Dodgers have been too powerful lately. The idea of the high PS PTL Arc Dodger was that you could get out of arcs of almost any ship and be able to fire at them in return. This really ruined the game in a number of ways. You can always stress them or bump them, but sometimes that's hard to do. Stressing someone often meant actually firing at them in the first place, which can be hard for PTL Arc Dodgers. The power level of the PTL Arc Dodger pretty much created:

  • The PS War (also Tie Phantoms did).
  • The death of the Jouster

There are so many threads about fixing the T-65 (or the Kihraxz, Starviper, or B-wing). These are all jouster ships (you may think the Starviper is a PTL Arc Dodger, but it's not). When you remove the ability for jousters to be effective, you pretty much remove them from the game (except for some special guys, like Biggs). Can you win with T-65's vs. PTL Arc Dodgers? Yes, but it's not an easy game. It's an uphill struggle.

If you nerf the ability of the PTL Arc Dodgers, then you should be able to bring back Jousters. I think FFG recognizes this and has worked towards this idea. Many new ships have abilities that work when you are in the firing arc of another ship. So, they are encouraging you to actually joust. Also, there have been a ton of upgrades and new pilots that hurt PTL Arc Dodgers (the most infamous being BMST, but not the only one). It is my opinion that FFG has recognized this issue and has been working towards fixing it with the latest ships and upgrades. It's not so much a nerf directly to PTL Arc Dodgers, but it's direct counters to those ships. It's a smart way of "nerfing" the situation.

There will always be Arc Dodging. It existed in Wave 1 with the Tie Fighter, even though people now don't consider it a real arc dodger. I think arc dodging will always be a thing. I am under the impression that PTL Arc Dodgers are too powerful for the game and really drive us to where we are today. You need to have something to beat the PTL Arc Dodgers, but you also have to beat U-boats. There has been a narrow strip of options until Wave 9 comes out officially.

The return of the Jousters will bring back a lot more options into the game. The T-65 had two main issues; not efficient points, and not re-positioning vs. PTL arc dodgers. Integrated Astromech fixes the first part. Oh, I know some people don't think so, but I believe it does. It's much better than it was. If PTL Arc Dodgers are nerfed, then the whole issue with the T-65 is resolved.

U-boats are still a counter to Rebel Shield Regens, which is great, as that list type is really freakin' annoying. Now, people don't have to face off 80% of the time vs. either Imperial PTL Aces or U-boats. They can build a jouster list that can burn down a U-boat before it can fire.

This has made me think a bit. When I first started the game there was a lot on these boards about the 3 pillars of X-Wing. Jousters, arc dodgers and PWT's. With the introduction of engine upgrade to PWT's Han, RAC and Dash (ableit with the secondary weapon caveat) all had the opportunity to become arc dodgers as well as PWT's. this allow's PWT's to mitigate against their weakness against jousters. Arc dodgers have autothrusters and Imps have Palp mitigating their weakness against PWT's. Jousters had very little to mitigate their weakness against arc dodgers until we got the J5K. This ship blur's the lines again as it's a jouster with a PWT (I guess this helps with it's weakness against arc dodgers a little) but really shows how power creep has set in. Triple jumps are the best jousters we see right now. They're main aim is to get you in arc and annihilate you but have the hit points to withstand a beating (like b-wings used to be), the PS to unload the payload before dying to most other jousters and make excellent blockers with tools to hurt the blocked ships too(feedback array, APL, ion projector). So now we have the 3 pillars V2. If you want to run jousters you have triple jumps with PWT elements in the list. If you want to run PWT's you have arc dodger elements in the list and if you want to run arc dodgers you can mitigate the variance to basically nothing. It seems that by patching or band aiding the pillars weaknesses the game has become much LESS varied than with each pillar having a counter out there floating about you could run up against at any time. What we are now left with is basically 2 viable list archetypes at the top with super jousters that have dice mods to the point of guaranteeing high damage output with PWT's built in and we have arc dodger lists with variance capped out to the point where it's not really a thing anymore.

Breaking down the weaknesses of each pillar has amalgamated them and really reduced the variety in the game. Building a list to deal with both archetypes is nigh on impossible which unfortunately means you will see more and more of these 2 main archetypes until the meta is cracked open again. A lot of people used to complain about how "rock, paper, scissors" the meta was but now it's more like "rock or other rock". Be careful what you wish for as you might just get it...

I'm okay with nerfs if I can get free cards to replace my invalid ones. Otherwise, nope.

I'm okay with nerfs if I can get free cards to replace my invalid ones. Otherwise, nope.

Right, which no company would do unless it was already giving you the cards anyway via PDF (Warzone Resurrection does this).

FFG makes most of their money because of the cards. How many times have you bought an expansion purely for the ship? I think ive done this once because i wanted a third TIE Adv for Vader's V Formation. Every other purchase was "i want that ship but i also want those cards..." or "I WANT THOSE CARDS"

if FFG starts reprinting cards, even if they offer them all in a single box for ~15 bucks, i'd be upset. Many people would be upset. Because we all bought several expansions because we wanted a 2nd copy of whatever card. Which, if they did do that, theres no way they'd give us multiple cards of things like Gchips, Autos, or TLTs in there, so we'd have to buy that card pack multiple times..just like the ships that became invalid.

I hope FFG never EVER starts doing that.

Triple jumps are the best jousters we see right now. They're main aim is to get you in arc and annihilate you but have the hit points to withstand a beating (like b-wings used to be), the PS to unload the payload before dying to most other jousters and make excellent blockers with tools to hurt the blocked ships too(feedback array, APL, ion projector).

Well, I think things might have gotten down to sub-groups within the pillars. For Jousters, you have sub groups that are Shield Regenerators and Ordnance Carriers. I think these difference do matter.

I don't think Triple U-boats are the best jousters right now. They are the best jousters that can deal with PTL Arc Dodgers. As long as there are enough ships that can fire before U-boats can fire, you should be able to burn them down enough. Look at something like 4 Dagger Squadron B-wings. They have the firepower to burn down a U-boat before it can fire and they can withstand the ordnance pretty well. BBBB just can't do well vs. PTL Arc Dodgers.

Triple jumps are the best jousters we see right now. They're main aim is to get you in arc and annihilate you but have the hit points to withstand a beating (like b-wings used to be), the PS to unload the payload before dying to most other jousters and make excellent blockers with tools to hurt the blocked ships too(feedback array, APL, ion projector).

Well, I think things might have gotten down to sub-groups within the pillars. For Jousters, you have sub groups that are Shield Regenerators and Ordnance Carriers. I think these difference do matter.

I don't think Triple U-boats are the best jousters right now. They are the best jousters that can deal with PTL Arc Dodgers. As long as there are enough ships that can fire before U-boats can fire, you should be able to burn them down enough. Look at something like 4 Dagger Squadron B-wings. They have the firepower to burn down a U-boat before it can fire and they can withstand the ordnance pretty well. BBBB just can't do well vs. PTL Arc Dodgers.

B-Wings melt to Plasma Torpedoes.

Also, 4 Dagger Squadrons are nowhere near guaranteed to take down a Uboat before one fires. Assuming range 2 for everything, you have to push 9 damage through with 12 red dice vs 8 green dice, and the Scout can use Overclocked R4 to get mods for each defense if the player feels the need.

And yeah, this changes at range 1, but good luck getting to range 1 flying with a B-Wing dial against a Jumpmaster dial.

Edited by WingedSpider

Triple jumps are the best jousters we see right now. They're main aim is to get you in arc and annihilate you but have the hit points to withstand a beating (like b-wings used to be), the PS to unload the payload before dying to most other jousters and make excellent blockers with tools to hurt the blocked ships too(feedback array, APL, ion projector).

Well, I think things might have gotten down to sub-groups within the pillars. For Jousters, you have sub groups that are Shield Regenerators and Ordnance Carriers. I think these difference do matter.

I don't think Triple U-boats are the best jousters right now. They are the best jousters that can deal with PTL Arc Dodgers. As long as there are enough ships that can fire before U-boats can fire, you should be able to burn them down enough. Look at something like 4 Dagger Squadron B-wings. They have the firepower to burn down a U-boat before it can fire and they can withstand the ordnance pretty well. BBBB just can't do well vs. PTL Arc Dodgers.

I see your point but don't fully agree. 4 Daggers vs triple jumps will have a hard time. I'm not too hot on my maths but that would involve all daggers having good dice and the J5k having poor defence dice with out OCR4 and focus. I don't think bloody daggers would be anywhere near the raw jousting efficiency the wolfpack would be in terms of numbers. A skilled BBBBZ player set up blocks and kill boxes for aces but it takes time and patience. They will, however, melt to ordinance carriers.

The other nasty thing about that matchup is after the initial joust, the B-Wing player is at a massive disadvantage. Jumpmasters have amazing dials and PWTs, B-Wings have terrible dials and 1 agility. That 2 attack might not look impressive, but it does provide a large advantage there as the chip damage builds up and the B-Wing player is forced to try and reengage.

Edited by WingedSpider

In a joust between full health B-wing and full health Jumpmasters I think the B-wings have the advantage. The turret and dial of the Jumpmaster give it a positional advantage so it can try to arc dodge them and that turns the match into a contest of who maneuvers better with the advantage being hard to call.

The problem is that Plasma Torpedo alpha strike is going to rip into those B-wings like a superlaser into Alderaan and make the joust much more even. If that damage makes the joust an even fight then that's advantage to the Jumpmasters because they can arc dodge more easily than the B-wings. If it shifts the joust significantly in favour of the Jumpmasters then the B-wings are flat out screwed: as a generic spam list they have very few options for regaining their joust advantage.

[...]

In my opinion once a ships reaches comfortable mid-tier, with decent options but exploitable downsides, it's balanced. This is extremely important, so take note of that. In the Star Wars universe, every single ship served a role in one way or another. Ships like the X-Wing were multirole ships, and did a lot of stuff but didn't do all of those things as well as a specialized ship could, but cost less than those specialized ships. One way or another though, they had things they did well, things they did poorly, things that they would beat in a 1-on-1, and things they would lose to in a 1-on-1.[...]

This is the way I hoped/wished X-Wing to be.

This post may just get passed up and ignored, but remember the limitations that exist in any game, you can't have everything. If you want them to consistently come out with ships, they need to push the game in some way, in order to make them worth buying, and we'll years later old ships are going to fall out of favor, idk his this can be avoided.

X wing, wave one, and they have tried to revamp it twice. I'm sure it will be boosted again sometime in the near future.

B wing, killer ship for years, it's out of favor now, but hey it has had its day in the sun for sure

They will never make people buy new cards for old ships, it's just not practical for this gamr. They can only ban and change rules, and even banning cards will poss some people off.

Idk why everyone wants to hate arc dodgers, they have not one a single worlds, the first had vader, but he was just ps boosting ties in that list. And it didn't win at gencon,

IF You think imperial arc dodgers are the problem, go try to place in a tournament with 3 aces, do it, because the only broken thing about aces is palp, not autothrusters, without autothrusters Tlt rips their azz, range 3 missiles will break your interceptors.

Plus we are all about to get 4 new expansions to try and reshape the meta with, we are just burnt out on The current meta because we have had it for a while. Let it shift, then judge it

Argh....the X-wing probability page won't display on my new phone. I can't calculate: 3 red dice w/ TL (or focus) vs. 2 green dice (only one having a Focus). So, 4 dice shooting with TL usually means 2.25 expected dice, I think, but I could be wrong. That should do it, right? I don't think it's too far off or relying too much on luck to make it happen.

If the B-wings can fire first and blow up one U-boat, then I don't see 2 Plasma Torpedoes destroying a B-wing in one turn. Even if it did, I'm fine with that. I'd trade one B-wing for one U-boat. That would leave only 2 Plasma Torpedoes left.

I don't really see an issue with the 4 B-wings being able to joust one U-boat early on. The U-boats need to get the approach right and they move first, so it shouldn't be that crazy or hard.

Personally, I wouldn't do BBBB, but that's just an example. I'd probably do something like:

Tala Squadron Pilot (13)
Concussion Missiles (4)
Guidance Chips (0)
Tala Squadron Pilot (13)
Concussion Missiles (4)
Guidance Chips (0)
Tala Squadron Pilot (13)
Homing Missiles (5)
Guidance Chips (0)
Dagger Squadron Pilot (24)
Dagger Squadron Pilot (24)
Total: 100
That list should have no problem burning down a U-boat before it fires. It is less susceptible to the ordnance attacks from the U-boats. It also has a better chance against swarms, as well.

They will never make people buy new cards for old ships, it's just not practical for this gamr. They can only ban and change rules, and even banning cards will poss some people off.

I acknowledge what you mean here is requiring people to buy errata but isn't Imperial Veterans technically requiring a new purchase to bring an old ship up to the current standard?

Argh....the X-wing probability page won't display on my new phone. I can't calculate: 3 red dice w/ TL (or focus) vs. 2 green dice (only one having a Focus). So, 4 dice shooting with TL usually means 2.25 expected dice, I think, but I could be wrong. That should do it, right? I don't think it's too far off or relying too much on luck to make it happen.

Checked it out.

Three reds with a target lock vs 2 greens without focus

JuzhBML.png

3 reds with a target lock vs 2 greens with a focus

sw3qd7r.png

Yeah, I don't see 4 Dagger Squadrons taking down a Uboat first turn.

Meanwhile

5KjgFHR.png

Edited by WingedSpider

its one thing to release an "update" which is what the imp vets box was.

Its another to release a 'replacement' which REQUIRES the purchase to play the ship. Imp Vets is purely optional

Thanks for checking the math. I've been blocked from the website and couldn't check it out myself.

Any difference if it's X-wings instead of B-wings?

Edited by heychadwick

its one thing to release an "update" which is what the imp vets box was.

Its another to release a 'replacement' which REQUIRES the purchase to play the ship. Imp Vets is purely optional

So's the Raider, but you don't the TIE advanceds without it.

But thats the thing.

You CAN use the TIE Adv without the Raider, theyre just nowhere near as good.

Again theres a difference between an update and a replacement. If i cannot legally use my ship without a 2nd box, thats a replacement and is utter bullcrap. If i can legally use it but it isnt that amazing without another expansion hey thats x-wing in a nutshell anyway.

I ran TIE Advs several times before i got the raider. Yeah, they sucked, but they were playable. I didnt lose every single game i played. Same for Defenders, i ran them before Vets several times and they still function theyre just not an insane monster like they are with vets. You dont NEED the 2nd expansion for any ship in this game, but afaik Omega Leader and Inquis are one of the FEW ships that are capable of being played with only whats in that singular expansion and do very well, and even they take cards from other expansions anyway (PTL, Stealth Device, Autothrustors)