Option one for me. As has been mentioned before, the imp vs imp make sense as a real world navy also trains against their own and the defector storyline and power struggles are already part of the Star Wars univers.

And for the rebels, why not?

With a rebellion/freedom fighter force there is bound to be some political, cultural and religious differences. During the Second World War the French resistance fought almost as much against each other as the German occupation.

Loathe immensely.

So far, our local meta only allows Rebel vs. Imperial. I'm enjoying it greatly.

It only takes a little bit of organization for each player to declare what faction they will bring to the next game night.

I would rather be playing a game than not, so I don't mind.

I would rather be playing a game than not, so I don't mind.

This is so much me.

Unfortunately, all I've found so far is fostering a "loathe", "hate it", or "don't do it." attitude just means someone's either being excluded from the game, or excluded from having the game enjoyed from both sides.

If its all about the story, its really not difficult to imagine the sorts of maneuvers and war games each side would be doing...

War games are the easy explanation why R vs R or I vs I would happen. No need to get wound up over "doesn't make sense" or "not MY Star Wars."

I personally don't care. I want to play the game. My only concern would be if a faction facing itself doesnt play out as a fun game. Like two super defense builds that can't hurt each other.

So far, our local meta only allows Rebel vs. Imperial. I'm enjoying it greatly.

It only takes a little bit of organization for each player to declare what faction they will bring to the next game night.

I have thought of a "commander draft" format where all the commanders are listed out and then which ever commander people pick was also the faction they played. You would have an equal # of Imperials and rebels that way. Only problem is it would be limited to 14 player tournament unless you did custom Imperial and custom rebel commander.

Blue on blue is fine for me. Since I play mostly imperials, the narrative is that it's a training and validation exercise. Did a validation exercise for iForce and cyberattack force and I''m impressed by the results

I really didn't think this was an issue. Mirror matches are a standard in pretty much every strategy game in existence. I've been dealing with mirror matches since Brood War and Red Alert, and I've never considered them anything more than another aspect of the game.

Frankly, I enjoy them as much as the Imp v Reb games. They require different strategies and approaches, and often a counter you've built for one faction may simply not work against the other, which in turn forces you to think a bit more about your tactics.

Do people object to them specifically because of gameplay, or because of story reasons?

We play the game to re-create a fun Star Wars narrative, often times even coming up with a back story as to why the fight is taking place.

I'm not opposed to blue-on-blue battles from a rules or balance standpoint. It just suits our local group to have all battles be Rebels vs. Imperials.

Me and my group don't like mirror matching. When we meet up to play we each bring our own Rebel and Imperial fleet so we always avoid playing against our own faction.