A simple fix would be a title that increases its primary attack to 4. A few ships have 4 primary attack now, and as the above discussion illustrates, a 4 primary attack would suit the role and design of the B-Wing well. It might even make it worth taking a ship into battle that melts in 2 or 3 rounds.

The title might need to cost a point or two, but could fit in with the Blade Wing and its special cannon, or if you want an Epi. 6 throwback, make it an A/SF-01 title.

To take it step further, maybe the title increases primary attack to 4 permanently, but to build off of The Blasted Samophlange, you can increase primary attack to 5 for a round, but you take a stress and a damage at the start of the combat phase.

In other words... GIVE IN TO THE RED DICE POWER CREEP!

10 hours ago, Sonikgav said:

But surely the Dial has more to do with how a ship handles than the agility?

If so the B-Wing is being punished twice for its 'poor handling'. Hell the Defender is built as a straight line fighter. It goes straight, turns around and comes straight back yet it warrants 3ag AND a free Evade action? At least give the B-Wing the free Evade. Its not a huge fix, but its something.

Re-inforce action would also be considerable if it proves useful on the wookiee gunship. I wouldn't mind having a system slot that offers re-inforce actions if your agility is 2 or lower (doesn't turn Corran into more of a monster, helps the punisher).

12 hours ago, cannj12 said:

Ok I can see sacraficing firepower but I don't get the agility of a "1"...to me that just doesn't make sense.

I'm sorry but the stats of the ships in XWTMG are not accurate. That's because, before creating a ton of new maneuvers, actions and mechanics, FFG tried to make ships more unique by tweaking the stats.

B-Wing would have something more like this: (card for an alternative rule set I was making)

(and maybe even with 2 Agility)

PS: that new action icon is for "hyperspace capability".

12 hours ago, Sonikgav said:

But surely the Dial has more to do with how a ship handles than the agility?

If so the B-Wing is being punished twice for its 'poor handling'. Hell the Defender is built as a straight line fighter. It goes straight, turns around and comes straight back yet it warrants 3ag AND a free Evade action? At least give the B-Wing the free Evade. Its not a huge fix, but its something.

It's not really "punished" - the standard is set. Bs have strong engines, so they can go decently fast, though their ability to turn on a dime is pretty poor. Similar with the Y, they aren't well known for making rapid course corrections or minute adjustments, they take hits and hit hard (unfortunately, as a game X-Wing focuses entirely on the dogfighting benefits of many ships, something Bs have also never been depicted as amazing at). TIE fighters are always depicted as both quite fast and nimble besides. They have light bodies, small frames and make good use of them. Of course, at various points they've been considered as fast or as maneuverable as an X-Wing, but that's where the mechanical standard comes in. TIE Fighters have less armament than an X-Wing, so they get a smaller attack value, and clearly they are more fragile (thus cheaper), and get the edge in defensive dice (not that that's a huge deal, we all know green dice aren't as good as red dice). Defenders are expensive superfighters, they retain high speed and maneuverability common to TIEs (though they fly like space lawndarts) while still being pretty toughly armored and shielded. They also cost 8 more points than a B-Wing and about twice as many credits to build (according to AoR, anyway). The free evade from the x7 is because that prototype doesn't have the added weight or power draw from the cannon or missile systems and is STUPIDLY quick - but it already has the maximum distance of straight maneuvers which are all green - instead the result is that it's likely moving at such speeds and acceleration it's almost like they took deliberate action to be evasive.

Comparisons to the Defender will also probably be poor - it has always been a terrifying monster fighter (which FFG has toned down) in it's original appearances in video games and even in reappearances in Rebels.

Title reducing the cost of equipping a cannon by 4 points, plus adds a red 3-K.

Doesn't help durability or maneuverability much, but improves the lethality without completely obviating the cannon slot (which an increase to four attack dice would do).

I thought for a while that giving more greens to the b-wing would be a neat way to fix it. it's a pretty good ship design for rotating around it's center mass, but not that great at actual maneuvers. High agi and a bricky dial would represent that very well.

16 hours ago, cannj12 said:

If there is already a thread on this can someone point me to it?

I'm curious as to why the B-wing has only a "1" agility and why has FFG not given us an upgrade card giving this ship the firepower seen in Rebels?

I guess from my point of view tgis thing should at minimum have an agility value of "2" if not really a "3". I mean the quad boost engines and the way we see it dance in ROTJ and Rebels really makes this game piece seem way dumbed down to me in the realms of agility.

The B-wing expansion was released before Disney bought Star Wars, which means its stats were based on the old EU depictions which portrayed it as a heavy fighter/gunship that was not as maneuverable as an X-wing or A-wing. In ROTJ the B-wing gets about 3 seconds of screen time because they had problems making them look good and comprehensible on bluescreens during the busy battle of Endor scene. So you see them in the approach of the rebel fleet but at no point do you see one during the battle itself.

As far as the Rebels depiction goes, that was a later addition to the B-wing 'lore' which added a prototype version with a super powerful quad laser. FFG may yet release some other B-wing release that adds it as a title or modification or something.

On 2017-5-27 at 9:42 AM, Sonikgav said:

I do kinda want them to give the B-Wing a Mod similar to the Defender that allows it to gain an evade or +1 Agility if you Barrel Roll.

(not a Mod, and doesn't help the generics, but...) ... Intensity

On 5/26/2017 at 10:17 PM, NakedDex said:

A cheap 3Atk ship with 3Agi and 8HP and some action efficiency would warp the game. Gameplay > fluff.

Besides, the B-wing in the game was designed more along the lines of the one shown in the old flight-sim games; slow, but fairly nimble, with decent firepower and some alternate attack options

Ok, so give it 3Atk and 3Agi and reduce the HP to 4. If sacrificing the weapons laser array why make it an 8HP? The ships profile from a headon dogfight should be just as hard to hit as the Protectorate and it has a 3Agi. Just my opinion but I just feel the B-wing got the short end of the stick on Agility.

Thanks guys for the great response and suggestions. I appreciate the feed back, thank you.

7 hours ago, cannj12 said:

Ok, so give it 3Atk and 3Agi and reduce the HP to 4. If sacrificing the weapons laser array why make it an 8HP? The ships profile from a headon dogfight should be just as hard to hit as the Protectorate and it has a 3Agi. Just my opinion but I just feel the B-wing got the short end of the stick on Agility.

But 3Atk and 3Agi with 4HP on a ship with a systems slot and native repositioning is an E-wing. That's also a pretty much dead ship (with the exception of Corran, the B-wings have seen more table time than E-wings ever did).

I get that you want to boost the B-wing, but you're just outright rebuilding it to suit an idea of how it should perform in your head. It's supposed to be a big, slow, capital ship killer. It can turn on a dime if it needs to because it's not going particularly fast, but that doesn't equate to pure agility because turning that fast causes it stress. The profile is thin- ish when approaching from dead on the X-axis, but from the Y and Z it's a giant sail. From any point off X=0 it's equivalent to most other ship profiles. The reason it was given so many shields was because it couldn't avoid fire, so it had to have the ability to soak it up.

You can't just throw dice at it and call it a day. It has to be balanced and make sense. Right now the only thing stopping it from being competitive is the dice creep that exists elsewhere in the game, and turrets. Arguably, a TLT nerf would do more for the B-wing than adding 1Agi to it's statline ever could.

2 minutes ago, NakedDex said:

But 3Atk and 3Agi with 4HP on a ship with a systems slot and native repositioning is an E-wing. That's also a pretty much dead ship (with the exception of Corran, the B-wings have seen more table time than E-wings ever did).

I get that you want to boost the B-wing, but you're just outright rebuilding it to suit an idea of how it should perform in your head. It's supposed to be a big, slow, capital ship killer. It can turn on a dime if it needs to because it's not going particularly fast, but that doesn't equate to pure agility because turning that fast causes it stress. The profile is thin- ish when approaching from dead on the X-axis, but from the Y and Z it's a giant sail. From any point off X=0 it's equivalent to most other ship profiles. The reason it was given so many shields was because it couldn't avoid fire, so it had to have the ability to soak it up.

You can't just throw dice at it and call it a day. It has to be balanced and make sense. Right now the only thing stopping it from being competitive is the dice creep that exists elsewhere in the game, and turrets. Arguably, a TLT nerf would do more for the B-wing than adding 1Agi to it's statline ever could.

Fair point. So really my issue is (and again I am very new to the game) I may not be balancing the B-Wing properly to suit my style of play, which I'm still figuring out.

I've thought the B-wing should have an autorotation, or a barrel roll, when a green maneuver is performed. This would highlight the stable cockpit but moving frame.

41 minutes ago, cannj12 said:

Fair point. So really my issue is (and again I am very new to the game) I may not be balancing the B-Wing properly to suit my style of play, which I'm still figuring out.

I think the issue is - and I swear I'm not being snarky when I say this - you're using B-wings. I love the B-wing. It's one of the very few ships in SW I actually care about in any way, but it's simply been left behind for exactly the same reasons the X-wing has been.

Now, if you're trying to house-rule a new B-wing to suit your style of play, go nuts. Give it the mega-death-lazorz and 10Agi if that's what gives you a smile. If you're trying to create a fix for it in regular competitive play... you might be in for some shocks when you look at why it needs one. You could argue that since it's nimble, it should be 2Agi, but the Y-wing is faster, so surely that should be 2Agi as well? If they're 2Agi, then the X-wing surely needs to be 3Agi because it's both faster AND more agile. And now we're suddenly into defensive dice creep as a counter to attack dice creep, which is how we end up with ants Attack Wing, and nobody wants Attack Wing.

The problem isn't the B-wing, so much as the ecosystem it's in. If it makes you feel any better, in Armada, the B-wing is a thing to be feared by any capital ship. They're also pretty great in Epic games for the same reason. X-wing 100/6 style has just sort of... left it behind, unfortunately. There are some outlier lists (2B2ZY, for example), but you're going to have a rough time in any competitive game with them.

32 minutes ago, NakedDex said:

I think the issue is - and I swear I'm not being snarky when I say this - you're using B-wings. I love the B-wing. It's one of the very few ships in SW I actually care about in any way, but it's simply been left behind for exactly the same reasons the X-wing has been.

I don't take your comments as snarky by any means. I've only been playing x-wing for about 3 months and its really only been my neighbor and myself playing. I guess in all fairness I'm still learning the pros/cons of each ship in regular play and we've just started to dip into Epic play as well. Much like you I love the B-Wing and really have not played enough to understand where its best used.

I appreciate all the feedback. Its really helped.

why does a freighter have an agility of 2? thats like saying a c-130 can out maneuver an F-15 or any fighter for that matter??

An F-15 is primarily a superiority frame, so normally by standards of this game, it would have an Agility rating of 2-3 comparing it to some other ships. The ships with low agility tend to be bulky attack craft.

And the only "freighter" which has an AGI of 2 is noted explicitly as having a lot of space which can be converted to more powerful engines and other systems. And for 1 Agility, the Falcon is a pretty spry ship. Well, and the HWK, but they're actually pretty lean and mean, and probably not what people think to complain about since they're also a small ship.

I think the best route is one which plays up its unique strengths, for example its low speed maneuvering. Like a title that gives a free action when you reveal a speed 1 or 2 maneuver.

2 hours ago, UnitOmega said:

An F-15 is primarily a superiority frame, so normally by standards of this game, it would have an Agility rating of 2-3 comparing it to some other ships. The ships with low agility tend to be bulky attack craft.

And the only "freighter" which has an AGI of 2 is noted explicitly as having a lot of space which can be converted to more powerful engines and other systems. And for 1 Agility, the Falcon is a pretty spry ship. Well, and the HWK, but they're actually pretty lean and mean, and probably not what people think to complain about since they're also a small ship.

HWK has 2 defense dice, unless your making the point it seems way more manuvereable than it would appear like freighter of its class should.

Lot's of big ships have 2 agility. Firespray makes sense, Dash you mentioned above, also makes some sense. The jump master even, for as whacky as it moves does make sense to have 2 defense dice, although if they were to ever tweak the stat line I feel it should be dropped down to 1.

Agree with the F-15 analogy, it would be more like the X-wing if it was in game. B-wing would fall in line with the super hornet(best example I can think of). It can dogfight, but super hornet's are BVR (beyond visual range) type dogfighters, they can't quite pull off the moves the F-22 raptor can. So while they can dogfight, they do excel in other areas, like dropping bombs/ launching air-to-ground missiles.

I would make the argument the B-wing is like an A-10 (lots of health, cannon slot, ordnance launchers...) but B-wings fill that awkward role in the star wars universe of Rebel Fighter/bomber, while the A-10 is more or less regulated to the role of ground pounding.

And as for overall playstyle with the B-wing, try equipping collision detector and bring debris clouds. Force your opponent to come to you, or give yourself an extra die because the attacks obstructed. I haven't run this yet so idk how good it is. Also small issue of needing multiple(if you need multiple that is) collision detectors which only come with the TIE S/F.

If the A-10 is anything in this game, I'd suggest it's the ARC. B-wings are possibly more along the lines of the F14/D; slower and chunky, but able to turn remarkably sharply, and carrying a suite of tech and weapons payload that make many others pale in comparison. (I somehow feel like the comparisons are easier to make with WW2 craft given the source materials was based on it. X-wing becomes the Mustang, B-wing becomes the Hurricane, A-wing becomes the Spitfire, T70 becomes the Mustang after they finally upgraded to the Merlin engines).

The T70 is probably the F22, though, in that it has all the latest gear, and is technically superior, but somehow manages to never work in real life situations.

Pretty sure that between the X, A, Y and B, the B-Wing was the biggest and least agile one of the bunch. They already gave the Y wing a 1 so they can't give the B-Wing a 2.

I'm mostly surprised it has barrel roll. Just because the cockpit spins, doesn't mean the ship itself is any more agile.

12 hours ago, UnitOmega said:

An F-15 is primarily a superiority frame, so normally by standards of this game, it would have an Agility rating of 2-3 comparing it to some other ships. The ships with low agility tend to be bulky attack craft.

And the only "freighter" which has an AGI of 2 is noted explicitly as having a lot of space which can be converted to more powerful engines and other systems. And for 1 Agility, the Falcon is a pretty spry ship. Well, and the HWK, but they're actually pretty lean and mean, and probably not what people think to complain about since they're also a small ship.

You can put the most powerful engines in the world on ANY transport/cargo aircraft and it still wont out maneuver even the least maneuverable fighter.. like the F-104. (Y-wing should be able to barrel roll (figuratively) around the falcon with ease same goes for B wing.!! . now you could purpose build something fast for a freighter "concord" but it still wouldn't be maneuverable. particularly if in the atmosphere. Even attack aircraft are maneuverable and still way more maneuverable than any cargo/transport/freighter. All the big base ships in the game ought to have 1 agility... of course this being starwars we have the PFM factor..lol