There is an obvious inequality between the number of card abilities modifying Attack Dice and the number of card abilities modifying defense dice. This inequality is necessary to a degree: the game should favor offense to keep it exciting for players. A combat game in which none of the components can blow anything up is horribly boring. Too much modification for Defense Dice is just as bad as not enough modification for attack dice. Even with three fully modified attack dice, it is difficult to hit a 3 AGI ship with a focus and an evade (I'm looking at you, X7 Defenders.) With two attack dice, a tokened up 3 AGI ship is nearly impossible to hit.

So game content must favor offense over defense, but how much is too much? The game stops being fun when every attack hits. So is Fenn Rau too much? Not really, Fenn Rau is one pilot who takes up a third of a 100 point list, and he is far from invulnerable. Added to all the other powerful offensive options in the game, Fenn Rau contributes to the perceived shortage of powerful defensive options. There number of defensive upgrades and pilot abilities is increasing, but they are not as obvious or popular. Take Sensor Cluster for example: on a T70 it might be a life saving defensive choice, but most players will spend their points on offense, because the better offense usually wins. I'd like to keep it that way.

If your brother was silly enough to joust with Fenn Rau then he deserved the education he got. You have to look at what is on the other side of the table from you and decide how best to maximize your strengths while minimizing your opponent's strengths.

And I wonder if he is right. I mean, while Fenn's ability requires a (fairly easy) set up, it's the power of a proton torpedo with no TL, and all game repeatable (I made another 1 shot kill later in the game as well.) While "If do right, no can defend" is great for a coming-of-age teen movie, I'm not sure it's so fun in a game.

At this point, beyond Soontir Tokkenschtackken and ships that get an auto-evade (TAP, x7), a ship's only chance at survival is Hull/Shields and "don't get shot/be in arc." While the latter point is certainly valid, it does not feel like Star Wars. . .Poe, Rey and Han Solo do not spend their time "circling around behind," and Wedge takes a TIE/ln out head on. "That was so close it went between my solar panels" is Star Wars excitement, and the "meaning" of a successful Agility roll.

...

It makes me wonder when green dice will catch up.

First off, I love the term Tokkenschtackken. First time hearing it and it's funny to me.

So, I do think there is an imbalance between red and green dice that is rather stark.

I do think that there is a distinct game balance between certain ships in the game. It's not always the older vs. the newer, though there are a lot more newer ships that are more "competitive". There are at least two tiers of ships in this game. There is the tier of ship that you would take to a major event and expect to do well with. Then, there is the rest of them that just can't cut it in a major tournament. Some ships are just such a power level above the rest of them.

I usually play casual games and missions and I have a lot of fun flying all the regular ships and generics. To me, that's more of what X-wing is.

Came up with Tokkenschtacken on the train on the way in . Maybe I should copyright it

And I guess that was some of my fear. . .is it getting to the point where there are 2 classes of ships: the competitive ones, that you play to win, and the rest, that you play to have fun.

Which TIE interceptor was this?

Royal Guard + VI

VI Royal Guards are terrible. I'm not surprised Fenn won against that. Interceptors need high PS and PTL to stay alive, either by arc dodging or token turtling.

I sometimes wish for the day back when you could run a list like this (below) and actually have fun with it and win some games....but alas, powercreep slowly set in. I think I was actually getting to where pilot skill made up for not having shields; but then turrets starting showing up with regen and other stuff that just sucked too much of the fun out of it. My fleet of six Interceptors rarely get out of the foam now save one at a time...sad.

Soontir Fel (27), Push the Limit (3), Royal Guard Tie (0), Stealth Device (3), Autothrusters (2) --35

Turr Phennir (25), Veteran Instincts (1), Royal Guard Tie (0), Stealth Device (3), Autothrusters (2) --31

Carnor Jax (26), Push the Limit (3), Royal Guard Tie (0), Stealth Device (3), Autothrusters (2) --34

And I guess that was some of my fear. . .is it getting to the point where there are 2 classes of ships: the competitive ones, that you play to win, and the rest, that you play to have fun.

Yep. That's it, really. Personally, I wouldn't frame it in win or fun. I put it at tournament level / casual. When I play casually, I play to win.

There is the level of game you bring to a tournament. There is a certain power level you need to be at to compete. Many pilots just can't compete at that level and you are looking at a small bracket of lists/ships that you will see at events. The rest just can't cut the mustard against firepower of this magnitude. OK...not really firepower. More "combo-ness". You need to have token stacks to really be effective.

If your brother was silly enough to joust with Fenn Rau then he deserved the education he got. You have to look at what is on the other side of the table from you and decide how best to maximize your strengths while minimizing your opponent's strengths.

OK, so the point is not that my bro is an uneducated idiot and I stuffed it to him big time. The point is, that as the game stands, there is nothing he could do to save his ship. He had no idea that this game has gotten into 6 die primary attacks--it used to be that a proton torpedo was a MAJOR attack, requiring range 1, a TL, and a focus to make it happen.. And if the game continues to Attack die power creep, it is going to become very lop-sided.

I know a lot of people like you're brother, and they drive me kinda crazy:


Player A has no idea what Card X does.
Player A flies a suboptimal build that wasn't even good four waves ago (e.g. RGP+VI)
Player A makes poor in-game decision
Player B gets very luck (less than 25% to roll no blanks on five attack dice)
Player A declares Card X (and by extension X-Wing) broken.


I'd say the same thing to your brother I'd say people at the game store: you're just being silly. One match-up, one game, one die-roll: these are not even remotely sufficient empirical data to talk about a card's overall balance within the game of X-Wing.

I remember one time a guy at the local store, after Wave 4 dropped, was flying Corran Horn with like R2-F2 and Elusiveness and lost, then spent the entire night complaining about how Corran Horn was no good and he was too expensive. As if his one incredibly lazy and ignorant game with the card was a more meaningful data point than months and months of testing. match-ups, and replays done by FFG's internal and external play-testing. FFG's process isn't perfect (*cough Jumpmaster cough*) but in reality they do a pretty impressive job compared to lots of other competitive war/mini-games. So it's a bit laughable and obnoxious to see someone like your brother decry broken power creep in these sort of situations after one game (or in this case, one die roll)...

Worlds is coming up, and it'll give us our first glimpse into the emerging world of Wave 9 meta. If Feen Rau is in half of the Top 16 builds, then we can start talking about power creep and lack of balance.

If your brother was silly enough to joust with Fenn Rau then he deserved the education he got. You have to look at what is on the other side of the table from you and decide how best to maximize your strengths while minimizing your opponent's strengths.

OK, so the point is not that my bro is an uneducated idiot and I stuffed it to him big time. The point is, that as the game stands, there is nothing he could do to save his ship. He had no idea that this game has gotten into 6 die primary attacks--it used to be that a proton torpedo was a MAJOR attack, requiring range 1, a TL, and a focus to make it happen.. And if the game continues to Attack die power creep, it is going to become very lop-sided.

If youre relying on dice to bail you out, then you deserve whatever is rolled. If youre not against a turret, you couldve done something else to save your ship. Thats the maneuver portion of the game (aka "the game part of the ******* game")

If red and green dice were made equal then, statistically, the game would literally never end

The only real red die creep as far as i can see is torp scouts. The 4 hyper modified reds for their cost are insane. Otherwise, not much has changed

Rau, for example, only equates to whisper's dice at range 1. At all other ranges, whisper hits much harder

I know a lot of people like you're brother, and they drive me kinda crazy:

Player A has no idea what Card X does.

Player A flies a suboptimal build that wasn't even good four waves ago (e.g. RGP+VI)

I think this just highlights the difference between casual gamers and tournament gamers.

The only real red die creep as far as i can see is torp scouts.

OK....you have got to be kidding, right? Fenn Rau at R1 with Fearlessness isn't red die creep? The first non-epic ship that can get 6 hits through in one shot? OK...Phantoms and the Ghost could take Expose and do it before, but let's be realistic here. The first competitive ship that can do it.

And I guess that was some of my fear. . .is it getting to the point where there are 2 classes of ships: the competitive ones, that you play to win, and the rest, that you play to have fun.

Yep. That's it, really. Personally, I wouldn't frame it in win or fun. I put it at tournament level / casual. When I play casually, I play to win.

There is the level of game you bring to a tournament. There is a certain power level you need to be at to compete. Many pilots just can't compete at that level and you are looking at a small bracket of lists/ships that you will see at events. The rest just can't cut the mustard against firepower of this magnitude. OK...not really firepower. More "combo-ness". You need to have token stacks to really be effective.

Well, sure, I loved winning. And I loved getting the drop on my bro with a shiny new ship.

But a mid-PS Squint should not be fish-in-a-barrel fodder without range 3, arc-dodged, stacked tokens. Green dice should mean something if they are part of the game.

Or, every low-level ship may as well be flow by Admiral Akbar

If your brother was silly enough to joust with Fenn Rau then he deserved the education he got. You have to look at what is on the other side of the table from you and decide how best to maximize your strengths while minimizing your opponent's strengths.

OK, so the point is not that my bro is an uneducated idiot and I stuffed it to him big time. The point is, that as the game stands, there is nothing he could do to save his ship. He had no idea that this game has gotten into 6 die primary attacks--it used to be that a proton torpedo was a MAJOR attack, requiring range 1, a TL, and a focus to make it happen.. And if the game continues to Attack die power creep, it is going to become very lop-sided.

I mean, this is still false. Let's not forget your Fenn had less than a 25% chance of even rolling five hits on his attack with only a Focus. Nevertheless, he could have:

(1) Not jousted with Fenn, instead turning away and stretching Fenn out on a chase which both makes it difficult to Fenn to get into R1 and allows the rest of his ships to potentially flank Fenn

(2) Approached more slowly, to force Fenn to fight at R2 or R3 or spend his action boosting into R1 instead of Focus-ing

(3) He could have Evaded for his action (6-(3+1)=2, which means chance of survival.

(4) He could augmented his chance at survival (3) by using PtL and Palpatine to greatly increase the chance he has F+E+Palp

(5) He could have ran Soontir Fel + Stealth + PTL instead of RGP, which would actually give him an incredible chance to either arc-dodge Fenn if he doesn't have initiative or to shoot first and perhaps strip Fenn's focus token if he does have initiative. Furthermore, Soontir+Stealth+Palp+FFE has a very real chance of only taking a single damage from Fenn's god-roll (4+1=5).

All of these things would have greatly reduced the chance his interceptor (be in RGP or Fel) could have avoided that automatic one-shot.

Not tryin' to be a jerk, just sayin' ...

Which TIE interceptor was this?

Royal Guard + VI

VI Royal Guards are terrible. I'm not surprised Fenn won against that. Interceptors need high PS and PTL to stay alive, either by arc dodging or token turtling.

I sometimes wish for the day back when you could run a list like this (below) and actually have fun with it and win some games....but alas, powercreep slowly set in. I think I was actually getting to where pilot skill made up for not having shields; but then turrets starting showing up with regen and other stuff that just sucked too much of the fun out of it. My fleet of six Interceptors rarely get out of the foam now save one at a time...sad.

Soontir Fel (27), Push the Limit (3), Royal Guard Tie (0), Stealth Device (3), Autothrusters (2) --35

Turr Phennir (25), Veteran Instincts (1), Royal Guard Tie (0), Stealth Device (3), Autothrusters (2) --31

Carnor Jax (26), Push the Limit (3), Royal Guard Tie (0), Stealth Device (3), Autothrusters (2) --34

Right. I LOVE the Squint. Always was my favorite ship. But loitering at range 3 so I don't die does not feel very. . . Imperial.

I know a lot of people like you're brother, and they drive me kinda crazy:

Player A has no idea what Card X does.

Player A flies a suboptimal build that wasn't even good four waves ago (e.g. RGP+VI)

I think this just highlights the difference between casual gamers and tournament gamers.

The only real red die creep as far as i can see is torp scouts.

OK....you have got to be kidding, right? Fenn Rau at R1 with Fearlessness isn't red die creep? The first non-epic ship that can get 6 hits through in one shot? OK...Phantoms and the Ghost could take Expose and do it before, but let's be realistic here. The first competitive ship that can do it.

Note CAN. Not likely with only 1 action unless lucky. Hoping to get lucky != competitive

Fen rau fearlessness is less creep and more of a complete joke.

I havnt seen many ships so easy to predict or destroy, or get so utterly laughably stone walled by biggs

Fearless rau is not competitive *better than expose phantoms, though*

Fir his range 1 attack of five dice, well it just isnt special

See also phantom, vcx100, jan ors buff, miranda missilea, prockets even cobra etcetcetc

Fenn dies quickly to the fickle nature of the green die and to the squad mates of the ship you have at range 1 who are at range 2. He has good agility, but without the auto evade at range 1, he will go down in a joust. A swarm should smash him dead, he will kill 2 most likely, but he will die to focus fire.

Indeed. Fenn is a beast, but a minor mistake can leave him out of range one or arc and ultimately to an an early death. I managed to one shot him with a homing missile/crack shot from Tomax recently.

Fenn is the definition of a glass cannon. He's no Soontir Fel. Especially if he's running fearlessness. If Fenn gets a range one shot on one of your ships and isn't eating returning shots, you've messed up. Especially if he had to boost/barrel roll into range 1. One wrong move and he's gone in one turn as well.

The point was not how easy Fenn could die, but that anything in his sights stands no chance.

I know a lot of people like you're brother, and they drive me kinda crazy:

Player A has no idea what Card X does.

Player A flies a suboptimal build that wasn't even good four waves ago (e.g. RGP+VI)

I think this just highlights the difference between casual gamers and tournament gamers.

The only real red die creep as far as i can see is torp scouts.

OK....you have got to be kidding, right? Fenn Rau at R1 with Fearlessness isn't red die creep? The first non-epic ship that can get 6 hits through in one shot? OK...Phantoms and the Ghost could take Expose and do it before, but let's be realistic here. The first competitive ship that can do it.

Yeah, Torp Scouts ARE power creep personified; we don't allow them in games at all, be it homes or at the LGS; I bring a baseball bat. This Fen character IDK...we'll see; it doesn't look good though.

But I got to take real issue with the latest Shuttle Tydirium Podcast! If you guys don't stop that amazing CR-90 Epic push, I might be forced to buy one; nooooo! I have held out, untainted so long!

they need love like a roast infestation needs extermination

also, green dice are kinda the reason 2-dice attacks are **** useless

I know a lot of people like you're brother, and they drive me kinda crazy:

Player A has no idea what Card X does.

Player A flies a suboptimal build that wasn't even good four waves ago (e.g. RGP+VI)

I think this just highlights the difference between casual gamers and tournament gamers.

The only real red die creep as far as i can see is torp scouts.

OK....you have got to be kidding, right? Fenn Rau at R1 with Fearlessness isn't red die creep? The first non-epic ship that can get 6 hits through in one shot? OK...Phantoms and the Ghost could take Expose and do it before, but let's be realistic here. The first competitive ship that can do it.

Forgive my insolence, but I feel like I also have to point out that it's also a ship with only 4 Hull, minimal action economy (if you take Fearlessness you have to take Manaroo for any action economy, and that's kinda like a 30 point upgrade on Fenn), and no autothrusters or arc-dodging if you want to be triggering Fearlessness.

Saying that he's "red die power creep" with Fearlessness is trivially true if you just mean that he can get access to 6 red dice via Fearlessness and his ability. But you probably mean to say that Fenn Rau both has this potential AND THAT that many red dice on this platform of ship are too good and power creep past other ships. I'm not nearly convinced of this yet. Consider that you could run Expose+Corran+JanOrs back in Wave 4 for a 6-Die and a 5-Die attack in the same turn. But just because you could do it didn't mean it was broken or too good. The jury is still out as to whether or not Fenn Rau will prove too good just because he has the capability to throw six dice. There are a lot of costs in opportunity loss to get those 6 Red dice, and they may well more than balance it out.

And I guess that was some of my fear. . .is it getting to the point where there are 2 classes of ships: the competitive ones, that you play to win, and the rest, that you play to have fun.

Yep. That's it, really. Personally, I wouldn't frame it in win or fun. I put it at tournament level / casual. When I play casually, I play to win.

There is the level of game you bring to a tournament. There is a certain power level you need to be at to compete. Many pilots just can't compete at that level and you are looking at a small bracket of lists/ships that you will see at events. The rest just can't cut the mustard against firepower of this magnitude. OK...not really firepower. More "combo-ness". You need to have token stacks to really be effective.

Well, sure, I loved winning. And I loved getting the drop on my bro with a shiny new ship.

But a mid-PS Squint should not be fish-in-a-barrel fodder without range 3, arc-dodged, stacked tokens. Green dice should mean something if they are part of the game.

Or, every low-level ship may as well be flow by Admiral Akbar

Stress tokens should mean something too, but to some ships in the current Meta they are just another thing you need to carry around.

Fenn dies quickly to the fickle nature of the green die and to the squad mates of the ship you have at range 1 who are at range 2. He has good agility, but without the auto evade at range 1, he will go down in a joust. A swarm should smash him dead, he will kill 2 most likely, but he will die to focus fire.

Indeed. Fenn is a beast, but a minor mistake can leave him out of range one or arc and ultimately to an an early death. I managed to one shot him with a homing missile/crack shot from Tomax recently.

Fenn is the definition of a glass cannon. He's no Soontir Fel. Especially if he's running fearlessness. If Fenn gets a range one shot on one of your ships and isn't eating returning shots, you've messed up. Especially if he had to boost/barrel roll into range 1. One wrong move and he's gone in one turn as well.

The point was not how easy Fenn could die, but that anything in his sights stands no chance.

Except for R4-D6 Biggs. That guy couldnt care less if youre rolling 6 dice or 6,000 dice. Unless they're crits he's only taking 2 damage.

Well, with 6,000 dice you'd expect 750 crits...so yea, R4D6 Biggs care a lot. R4D6 Biggs doesn't ever like to see more than 3 dice coming at him, unless it's from an HLC maybe.

If your brother was silly enough to joust with Fenn Rau then he deserved the education he got. You have to look at what is on the other side of the table from you and decide how best to maximize your strengths while minimizing your opponent's strengths.

OK, so the point is not that my bro is an uneducated idiot and I stuffed it to him big time. The point is, that as the game stands, there is nothing he could do to save his ship. He had no idea that this game has gotten into 6 die primary attacks--it used to be that a proton torpedo was a MAJOR attack, requiring range 1, a TL, and a focus to make it happen.. And if the game continues to Attack die power creep, it is going to become very lop-sided.

I mean, this is still false. Let's not forget your Fenn had less than a 25% chance of even rolling five hits on his attack with only a Focus. Nevertheless, he could have:

(1) Not jousted with Fenn, instead turning away and stretching Fenn out on a chase which both makes it difficult to Fenn to get into R1 and allows the rest of his ships to potentially flank Fenn

(2) Approached more slowly, to force Fenn to fight at R2 or R3 or spend his action boosting into R1 instead of Focus-ing

(3) He could have Evaded for his action (6-(3+1)=2, which means chance of survival.

(4) He could augmented his chance at survival (3) by using PtL and Palpatine to greatly increase the chance he has F+E+Palp

(5) He could have ran Soontir Fel + Stealth + PTL instead of RGP, which would actually give him an incredible chance to either arc-dodge Fenn if he doesn't have initiative or to shoot first and perhaps strip Fenn's focus token if he does have initiative. Furthermore, Soontir+Stealth+Palp+FFE has a very real chance of only taking a single damage from Fenn's god-roll (4+1=5).

All of these things would have greatly reduced the chance his interceptor (be in RGP or Fel) could have avoided that automatic one-shot.

Not tryin' to be a jerk, just sayin' ...

Yes x5. He was ill-prepared for a Fenn-tastic roll. But are 6 die primary attacks the wave of the future? Or, now that we have 6 dice, does Wave 11 need a 7 die attack to maintain the power of kewl?

Fir his range 1 attack of five dice, well it just isnt special

See also phantom, vcx100, jan ors buff, miranda missilea, prockets even cobra etcetcetc

I find that funny as all those things listed have been called power creep by more than one person that I've seen. Sure, five red dice at R1 isn't new, but it certainly continues to up the ante.

Five red dice and then adding another hit (with Fearlessness) is new, though. It might not be the most competitive or easy to see coming, but it still is a creep of increasing red dice total.

But I got to take real issue with the latest Shuttle Tydirium Podcast! If you guys don't stop that amazing CR-90 Epic push, I might be forced to buy one; nooooo! I have held out, untainted so long!

Sorry, but we are going to keep on with Epic for a bit! We are at least going to go through the CR-90 campaign and do every mission. There are 3 more epic ships, as well. We might take breaks between the different campaigns, but we are going to do them all.

Think of it this way, I bet you can pick up some New Out of Box epic ships with only the "special" cards missing for pretty cheap! Either that or convince one of those guys that bought the epic ship and never played it to actually try the missions. OK...ok....that might be hard to do with the tournament crowd (which is a shame).

Except for R4-D6 Biggs. That guy couldnt care less if youre rolling 6 dice or 6,000 dice. Unless they're crits he's only taking 2 damage.

So do I need a flow chart of who gets the drop on who so I can play this game again?

Saying that he's "red die power creep" with Fearlessness is trivially true if you just mean that he can get access to 6 red dice via Fearlessness and his ability. But you probably mean to say that Fenn Rau both has this potential AND THAT that many red dice on this platform of ship are too good and power creep past other ships.

Fine, you can use whatever game mechanics you want to say the Fenn is not the best, he's killable, it was a lucky shot, etc. But 6 freakin' dice? From a starfighter?? PTorps are 6 dice and are used to blow up Death Stars and capital ships. Capital ship primary weapons are 4 dice. The whole flipping thing seems out of scale with the rest of the game. Where did Fenn buy the turbolaser and how did he install it on his ship??

Stress tokens should mean something too, but to some ships in the current Meat they are just another thing you need to carry around.

A so everyone doesn't think my brother is a complete boob, his Squints shed stress tokens like dandruff thanks to a well-played Epsilon Ace.

Saying that he's "red die power creep" with Fearlessness is trivially true if you just mean that he can get access to 6 red dice via Fearlessness and his ability. But you probably mean to say that Fenn Rau both has this potential AND THAT that many red dice on this platform of ship are too good and power creep past other ships.

Fine, you can use whatever game mechanics you want to say the Fenn is not the best, he's killable, it was a lucky shot, etc. But 6 freakin' dice? From a starfighter?? PTorps are 6 dice and are used to blow up Death Stars and capital ships. Capital ship primary weapons are 4 dice. The whole flipping thing seems out of scale with the rest of the game. Where did Fenn buy the turbolaser and how did he install it on his ship??

I'm in on this thought, well played! I do love it when logic comes floating to the top!

This hit is so overpowering, it should be treated in a Corran Horn kinda way; dude should be attack-less for the next round after such a strike as his energy reserves come back and the guns cool down from that kinda strike.

Saying that he's "red die power creep" with Fearlessness is trivially true if you just mean that he can get access to 6 red dice via Fearlessness and his ability. But you probably mean to say that Fenn Rau both has this potential AND THAT that many red dice on this platform of ship are too good and power creep past other ships.

Fine, you can use whatever game mechanics you want to say the Fenn is not the best, he's killable, it was a lucky shot, etc. But 6 freakin' dice? From a starfighter?? PTorps are 6 dice and are used to blow up Death Stars and capital ships. Capital ship primary weapons are 4 dice. The whole flipping thing seems out of scale with the rest of the game. Where did Fenn buy the turbolaser and how did he install it on his ship??

I'm in on this thought, well played! I do love it when logic comes floating to the top!

This hit is so overpowering, it should be treated in a Corran Horn kinda way; dude should be attack-less for the next round after such a strike as his energy reserves come back and the guns cool down from that kinda strike.

Right. Like if this level of attack were on the Bladewing, and required a recharge or something. . .then kewlness. I'd even say let's have the first 8 die attack!! But when you saw an orange b-wing. . .

And I would think that it should be a unique weapon, on a unique ship, with a unique pilot.

And yet, through this thread, the notions of offence keep taking priority over notions of defense. To wit. . .

GREEN DICE NEED MORE LOVE!!

Guys the # of red dice does not necessarily translate to the raw power of the ship

Due to the massive difference a die of either color can make, red dice values are balanced around gameplay impact rather than fluff

As always, gameplay >>>>>>>> fluff

If you want a more accurate dice value to gun potency ratios, play armada