It's been pretty obvious for awhile that FFG really restricted themselves and their potential design space when they first built the game. Primarily, this was a result of using low numbers - 3 attack for the X Wing and 3 agility for the TIE fighter set some basic limits on the potential range of statlines for ships, and the scale of gradation that you we're ever going to be able to introducbe between ships (this also, in turn, locked in the role dice variance would play going forward - the likelihood of any given roll being further from the expected statistical mean is higher than would be the case if all dice values were doubled). The number of points in a list was low too - by using 100 point lists, the ability of designers to price cards precisely was limited to single percentage point gradations - i.e. any given card can cost either 1% of your list or 2% (or whatever) but never in between, even if it's only really worth 1.5%. This is one factor that results in over and under costed cards.
I've been thinking lately that about another decision made in those early days had probably been equally as restrictive, but seems to have been less noted by the community - the decision to make all ships have the same size firing arc.
There's nothing inherent in the game system that requires all ships to have the same sized primary arc, and restricting all ships in that way limited FFG's ability to differentiate ships. For example, the B Wi g and the TIE Advanced could have had wider arcs than the X Wing and TIE Fighter respectively to give them more offensive capability than their weaker or less advanced alternatives without increasing their numbers of dice. Alternatively, a narrower firing arc might have been given to ships like the Y Wing as a nod to its lower manoeuvrability, or a wider arc to the A Wing as a nod to its swiveling guns.
It could also have been used as a balancing tool without concern for lore - for example, the TIE Phantom's 4 dice primary could have been balanced a little by giving it a more narrow firing arc, making those four dice potent, but relatively easier to arc dodge.
The concept could even be taken further, and arcs could have been adjusted on a per pilot basis - broadly, a more skilled pilot could have a wider arc than a less skilled pilot, but it could be adjusted to account for abilities on a case by cases basis.
Obviously, all of these represent roads not travelled, and with 10 waves of basically identical arcs behind them, I don't see FFG changing their policy going forward. It's possible that there are very good reasons for keeping arcs consistent - certainly there are potential reasons for the other apparently limiting decisions made way back during the early stages of the games design. Perhaps a desire for consistency came from a desire to make it easy for players to use all the different ships, or maybe it was as simple as wanting the arc lines to be as long as possible so as to make it easier to line up rulers when checking arcs. But whatever the reasons were at the time, with 2017 eyes, I think was a shame that this opportunity to diversify the game was never taken up.
