One of the things I've noticed trying to grow the Star Wars Armada community locally is that new players struggle to overcome the initial core set purchase price.

Here in Australia, the core set is anywhere from $120-$180 depending how far the ocean is from you and if you are in a capital city or not. For a lot of people here thats over a days pay worth of working.

So they see us regulars at the store clashing with fleets that contain ISDs, MC80s, GSDs, GR75s and all the different types of squadrons and they get excited and this what happens:
1. they look at the core box

2. see the triple digit price

3. realize all those other ships and squadrons they saw are an extra investment on top

4. realize most of the ships (because thats all they can see from the core box) are not used often in the games they see around the store.

5. have a hard long think where a days pay could go, and then move on.

Now of course this happens in most other games too with large price tags for core sets, but looking over to FFGs newest game Runewars, they're releasing something call and essentials only pack.
https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2017/4/10/runewars-miniatures-game-essentials-pack/

Its basically only the core components that you need to have game working without models such as upgrade cards, maneuver tools, terrain and tokens at a fraction of the core set price and frees up the player to buy whatever expansion suits them.

Can't we have something similar for Armada? Something thats just the damage deck, maneuver tool, ruler, tokens, obstacles and some upgrade cards? You can even make it cheaper to produce by making it cardboard only and removing the maneuver tool and dice as they are sold seperately anyway.

I think this would be an inexpensive way for FFG to expand the Armada community as it opens it up to newer players on a budget who can now borrow ships and squadrons from regular players, because lets face it i know most of us collect both factions (or theres always at least 1 dude in the FLGS community that does). And over time as they enjoy this awesome game they will start buying their own expansions over time because they'll want to go to tournaments and have their own stuff. All because the opportunity cost to enter the game was far better at the beginning.

Anyways just my thoughts.

Vet.Cap Ken signing out

o7

For similar reasons, I think it would be a good move for them to lower the threshold to entry. The Core Set should be the cheap gateway drug that gets you addicted. Or the cheap inkjet printer as a vehicle to sell ink cartridges.

But good ideas do not always produce the results.

I literally just built an essential kit for a friend who wants to play but was stressing over the initial cost. I found the obstacles, objectives, ruler, setup markers, initiative token, damage deck, as well as a maneuver tool, dice, 6 tie squads and a couple command dials for roughly $30 so now she can spend that money on expansions. Better yet her BF is even paying for the ISD so that $80-$90 can pick up a hell of a lot to start.

Until they release that kit, sometimes you gotta be the one to push to build that community! Lol

6 minutes ago, Darth Sanguis said:

I literally just built an essential kit for a friend who wants to play but was stressing over the initial cost. I found the obstacles, objectives, ruler, setup markers, initiative token, damage deck, as well as a maneuver tool, dice, 6 tie squads and a couple command dials for roughly $30 so now she can spend that money on expansions. Better yet her BF is even paying for the ISD so that $80-$90 can pick up a hell of a lot to start.

How did you go to compile that material? Are you selling things from your second/third core set that you don't use. If so, why on earth did you buy a second/third core set?

That said, I do think it would be a great thing for an Armada community-building entrepreneur to be a used-Armada ships salesman. Buy up stuff from people getting out of the game to repackage material to help others get in. I did a little bit of that about a year ago.

16 minutes ago, Mikael Hasselstein said:

How did you go to compile that material? Are you selling things from your second/third core set that you don't use. If so, why on earth did you buy a second/third core set?

That said, I do think it would be a great thing for an Armada community-building entrepreneur to be a used-Armada ships salesman. Buy up stuff from people getting out of the game to repackage material to help others get in. I did a little bit of that about a year ago.

No I actually got on trade threads here on the forums and buy/sell/trade groups on Facebook and pieced it all together. It took a few hours of my time, some negotiating, and about $30 but ultimately it's going to mean a regular player.

What we as a community really ought to strive for is convincing the leaving members to let go of their extra core set essentials....

I see so many bulk sellers who refuse to part out who could really help a new player by giving up the $30-$40 they're charging for the core and selling it separate....

Just my opinion but, I think we ought to encourage it...

Definitely agree. This would be a big help. I think its a better move than moving the core set "up" to including an ISD and an MC80 to make it more appealing for example.

I think when the core set first came out there was a general thought based on Xwing at the time that multiple cores was a good way to build a fleet up quickly and economically. So there were quite a few that I think did load up on multiple cores.

Then of course Wave 1 by itself negated that as a feasible approach. Not only the ship restrictions but the upgrade cards meant more than one core was not helping much.

By now you also have a second market - which is that some of the core set components are pretty hard to replace if you lose them, especially the terrain, and also the range rulers - yes there are tournament packs and some third party suppliers but the quality and accuracy is pretty variable! (looks at my 2016 range ruler from the nationals set... argh!!). I haven't seen any third party terrain in common acceptance. There is the oft lamented space rocks of course, but even they never quite crossed over into full tournament acceptance.

About the only draw back to this is that it may result in the actual core set being almost irrelevant going forward.

51 minutes ago, Darth Sanguis said:

Until they release that kit, sometimes you gotta be the one to push to build that community! Lol

Believe me, i know about community pushing. I've done similar things like that and more

All i'm saying is the more waves that come out, the harder and harder it is for new players to get into the game. FLGS are even still holding core set stock from back in wave 1.

As someone who has a vested interest in getting more ppl into this great game, I would love for this to happen. Unfortunately if FFG did an essentials pack, no one would ever buy their core set so it's not gonna happen.

What I can see happening though, is a revised core set, most likely with Sequel Trilogy theme akin to the X-Wing TFA core set. They can do it in one of two ways:-

1) To reduce the buy in cost, the revised core should only include 1 small ship and a handful of sqds for each faction.

or

2) Allow the cost to be shared between two players by including 2 sets of all the essential game tools(dmg deck, templates,etc) in the core set.

To add another point why I think it should be revised, is that the current core set is unfavorable to would be Imperial players because they get one, and only one, lackluster ship (unless you also get an Arquittens) and a difficult to use, overpriced commander, whereas the Rebels get pretty decent stuff out of the box.

Agreed. GW has made many, many mistakes over the years, but having a cheap(ish) core set for a long time (not nowadays) and then a starter army set for every army was very smart. You could start the faction you wanted without having to buy a starter set you wouldn't use.

16 minutes ago, Wraithdt said:

To add another point about the current core set, would be Imperial players get a bad deal out of it because they get one, and only one, lackluster ship (unless you also get an Arquittens) and a difficult to use, overpriced commander, whereas the Rebels get pretty decent stuff out of the box.

Indeed. The Empire just keeps getting the short end of the stick.

The game is rigged, yo!

A few things to keep in mind:

1. Runewars has been around for about 7 years now, so a lot of players already had RuneWars minis and only needed the updated rules.
2. Armada needs a new starter pack primarily because most of the Imperial-focused upgrades are nearly unplayable against competent Rebel players, even in its own pack.
3. An Armada starter pack should be at a reduced cost and feature 2 large ships that can be augmented by smaller squadrons and support ships. An example might be an ISD, an MC80 Home One, and squadrons for both sides to command to their strengths.
4. An Armada starter pack would allow the game to update to Armada 2.0, and offer some changes to speed up game mechanics and make balance changes in a way that is easier to spread to the rest of the community without making a mass errata document.

1 minute ago, Mikael Hasselstein said:

Indeed. The Empire just keeps getting the short end of the stick.

The game is rigged, yo!

To be fair, back then none of us could've known the VSD would end up being a lackluster ship, including FFG. But the game evolved and with every new Wave of ships the VSD became less and less appealing as viable choice in Imp lists until we got Moff Jerjerrod. Even then, it's only decent when Moff JJ is around.

21 minutes ago, Wraithdt said:

To be fair, back then none of us could've known the VSD would end up being a lackluster ship, including FFG. But the game evolved and with every new Wave of ships the VSD became less and less appealing as viable choice in Imp lists until we got Moff Jerjerrod. Even then, it's only decent when Moff JJ is around.

I think that they must have seen it going south as soon as they started testing the ISD.

I don't know, I realized it was crap after one game. The total lack of maneuverability was obviously crippling.

Out of curiosity, if there was a new core set (in the same vein as the TFA core set for X-wing), what would you put in there for ships? The VSD is pretty poor as a starting platform, but there's not really any equivalent, and the Neb-B/CR90 combo was always underpowered in a "core ships only" introductory game. I feel like the ship choices for the core were pretty much "what's iconic" rather than "what's a good starting point".

If something smaller could be put together for a cheaper price, it may well work in the game's favour. I feel like the biggest barrier for entry I've heard from people is the initial outlay of the core versus other games. The core goes for about €120 here, which is about three times the price of the X-wing core that it sits beside. Players unsure whether to go with one or the other, very quickly dive toward X-wing as a result, and then pretty much immediately end up spending €120 between two cores and a couple of expansions anyway. I've found Armada to be considerably cheaper than X-wing on a per-wave basis, but getting into it - and playing catch up with expansions - can be very costly, and that's the bit that new players really become overwhelmed by, I think.

46 minutes ago, NakedDex said:

Out of curiosity, if there was a new core set (in the same vein as the TFA core set for X-wing), what would you put in there for ships? The VSD is pretty poor as a starting platform, but there's not really any equivalent, and the Neb-B/CR90 combo was always underpowered in a "core ships only" introductory game. I feel like the ship choices for the core were pretty much "what's iconic" rather than "what's a good starting point".

If you want to make people feel comfortable right away with the ships for Rebels it would need to be a MC80, probably Home One and then either a CR90 or you could do a single Hammerhead (if we are doing some new titles and other cards). The Imperials either unfortunately stick with a VSD but really to make it iconic and awesome you want an ISD in there with an Acquitens.

Unfortunately you don't want ships that aren't Legends or not seen yet and while the VSD isn't seen it is recognizable as an Imperial triangle ship but really you'd want an ISD in there because that is the ship every person who loves the Empire wants to play with.

A armada essentials set should include

Game rules booklet

Range ruler

Damage deck

Dice

Manouver tool

Obstacles

Command tokens

And thats it i think, then you still want the core set for upgrades and ships, so both the consumer and FFG are happy

Thats my opinion

14 minutes ago, Grujav said:

If you want to make people feel comfortable right away with the ships for Rebels it would need to be a MC80, probably Home One and then either a CR90 or you could do a single Hammerhead (if we are doing some new titles and other cards). The Imperials either unfortunately stick with a VSD but really to make it iconic and awesome you want an ISD in there with an Acquitens.

Unfortunately you don't want ships that aren't Legends or not seen yet and while the VSD isn't seen it is recognizable as an Imperial triangle ship but really you'd want an ISD in there because that is the ship every person who loves the Empire wants to play with.

The problem there is it doesn't make the core set cheaper. If anything, that more than doubles the price. Of course it's easy to say you should pack an ISD and MC80 in beside two smaller ships and some squadrons, but that's just adding to the trouble of marketing the game to new players. It's tough enough to sell when the game is price over €100 on a good day, but if you walked into a shop and saw a board game of any type with a €200+ price tag that didn't literally have gilded metal pieces and someone to bring you a beer while playing, you'd walk right past it.

A pack with something like an MC30, Gladiator, and a flotilla each, along with a selection of squadrons (4 X/TIE, 2 A/Interceptor, for example). It may not be anywhere near as iconic, but it could be cheaper, and could form the backbone of considerably more lists. The introductory games would be shorter, for sure, but that might actually work in the favour of learning to play.

4 minutes ago, NakedDex said:

The problem there is it doesn't make the core set cheaper. If anything, that more than doubles the price. Of course it's easy to say you should pack an ISD and MC80 in beside two smaller ships and some squadrons, but that's just adding to the trouble of marketing the game to new players. It's tough enough to sell when the game is price over €100 on a good day, but if you walked into a shop and saw a board game of any type with a €200+ price tag that didn't literally have gilded metal pieces and someone to bring you a beer while playing, you'd walk right past it.

A pack with something like an MC30, Gladiator, and a flotilla each, along with a selection of squadrons (4 X/TIE, 2 A/Interceptor, for example). It may not be anywhere near as iconic, but it could be cheaper, and could form the backbone of considerably more lists. The introductory games would be shorter, for sure, but that might actually work in the favour of learning to play.

Sorry, I wasn't clear. I was meaning an Imperial starter of ISD, Acquitens and some TIEs and a Rebel Starter of MC80, CR90 and some X-Wings. Not one big starter but as was suggested an 'essentials' pack for each side. These would still clock in near what a starter does already but it is iconic and just your side.

41 minutes ago, NakedDex said:

Out of curiosity, if there was a new core set (in the same vein as the TFA core set for X-wing), what would you put in there for ships? The VSD is pretty poor as a starting platform, but there's not really any equivalent, and the Neb-B/CR90 combo was always underpowered in a "core ships only" introductory game. I feel like the ship choices for the core were pretty much "what's iconic" rather than "what's a good starting point".

If something smaller could be put together for a cheaper price, it may well work in the game's favour. I feel like the biggest barrier for entry I've heard from people is the initial outlay of the core versus other games. The core goes for about €120 here, which is about three times the price of the X-wing core that it sits beside. Players unsure whether to go with one or the other, very quickly dive toward X-wing as a result, and then pretty much immediately end up spending €120 between two cores and a couple of expansions anyway. I've found Armada to be considerably cheaper than X-wing on a per-wave basis, but getting into it - and playing catch up with expansions - can be very costly, and that's the bit that new players really become overwhelmed by, I think.

My suggestion would be two large ships and a small number of squadrons, similar to what we have now for Imperials. An ISD vs MC80 (Home One) with a collection of TIE Fighters and X-Wings to support them would be pretty iconic, but also demonstrate game elements that the current setup doesn't. Both ships are powerful, but are also very different in how to use effectively. It's also easier to then support two large ships with smaller ship purchases afterwards and fill out to 400 points per side.

I think the alternative would be to have a single major ship expansion for each side in an upcoming wave that would come with a damage deck, objective cards and a new RRG with rules updates and errata. I think it should also come with an official acrylic range/distance ruler.

Also if the Core Box eliminated the 90% air and wasted space in the box, it might be cheaper to ship to Australia too.

12 minutes ago, thecactusman17 said:

My suggestion would be two large ships and a small number of squadrons, similar to what we have now for Imperials. An ISD vs MC80 (Home One) with a collection of TIE Fighters and X-Wings to support them would be pretty iconic, but also demonstrate game elements that the current setup doesn't. Both ships are powerful, but are also very different in how to use effectively. It's also easier to then support two large ships with smaller ship purchases afterwards and fill out to 400 points per side.

I think the alternative would be to have a single major ship expansion for each side in an upcoming wave that would come with a damage deck, objective cards and a new RRG with rules updates and errata. I think it should also come with an official acrylic range/distance ruler.

So the problem with this is that, again, it's actually increasing the cost of the core. The major issue with the core is already the price, and any move upward - no matter how much value there may actually be in it in the long term as a ship choice - is only going to put people off the initial outlay further. If the price can be driven down somehow, the outlay doesn't seem as wallet crippling, and you may well see a higher uptake of the game. You do have to offer some ships in the box, I think, as very few people are going to buy a box of rules, no matter the price. The trick is in balancing that price to being a tempting entry point, and also having value for money ships in the box.

34 minutes ago, Grujav said:

Sorry, I wasn't clear. I was meaning an Imperial starter of ISD, Acquitens and some TIEs and a Rebel Starter of MC80, CR90 and some X-Wings. Not one big starter but as was suggested an 'essentials' pack for each side. These would still clock in near what a starter does already but it is iconic and just your side.

I see what you mean now, and it's not a bad idea. I'm trying to wrack my brain for any miniatures game having a core set featuring only one side, though. Even among FFG's own games, everything comes with enough to play both sides in the box, but perhaps a faction-specific one to hook people in that already have access to gaming groups wouldn't be a bad idea.
The one problem I see is that a core with an ISD and an Arq would probably run you about the same money as the existing core. A VSD and an Arq, maybe? An AFMk2 and a CR90?

Maybe it's more in the wording; rather than being a Core set, you simply call it a Fleet set. Throw in an ISD, GSD, Arq, and a selection of squadrons, or an MC80, MC30, CR90, and a bunch of squadrons, and have a ready-to-fly set. Maybe a flotilla each, too. The price on that may well go up, but it becomes inherently more valuable as a kick-start box to someone who may have already played a few games with a group, and decided to go with a single faction.

1 minute ago, NakedDex said:

So the problem with this is that, again, it's actually increasing the cost of the core. The major issue with the core is already the price, and any move upward - no matter how much value there may actually be in it in the long term as a ship choice - is only going to put people off the initial outlay further. If the price can be driven down somehow, the outlay doesn't seem as wallet crippling, and you may well see a higher uptake of the game. You do have to offer some ships in the box, I think, as very few people are going to buy a box of rules, no matter the price. The trick is in balancing that price to being a tempting entry point, and also having value for money ships in the box.

My point is actually to make the core set identical to its current price but drastically improve the value proposition. Make a second core set that involves only two ships, which you can more easily manufacture in bulk, and also the related cards and upgrades. By confining it to large ships only, you also reduce the cost of additional items such as uniform plastic bases for all ships and squadrons, and make followup/expansion expenses cheaper. All of these things can help ultimately reduce the cost of the initial expense by streamlining costs.

2 hours ago, NakedDex said:

Out of curiosity, if there was a new core set (in the same vein as the TFA core set for X-wing), what would you put in there for ships? The VSD is pretty poor as a starting platform, but there's not really any equivalent, and the Neb-B/CR90 combo was always underpowered in a "core ships only" introductory game. I feel like the ship choices for the core were pretty much "what's iconic" rather than "what's a good starting point".

Make it a Rogue One themed Core set- White ISD I model with ISD I/II classic cards and a bunch of TIEs, Director Krennic, then MC-75 and single Hammerhead corvette with say 3 X-Wings and a Y-Wing under Raddus. Bump the Price to $120 to compensate for the much larger ships.

Again, that's increasing the price for the sake of putting in a larger ship. It's not adding major value to a new player, it's just raising the barrier of entry further.

17 minutes ago, thecactusman17 said:

My point is actually to make the core set identical to its current price but drastically improve the value proposition. Make a second core set that involves only two ships, which you can more easily manufacture in bulk, and also the related cards and upgrades. By confining it to large ships only, you also reduce the cost of additional items such as uniform plastic bases for all ships and squadrons, and make followup/expansion expenses cheaper. All of these things can help ultimately reduce the cost of the initial expense by streamlining costs.

The actual base price is more expensive, however. Large ships are nice, and really iconic, but they're expensive in their own right. Looking at the ships in the core, you can get the CR90 and the Neb-B for the cost of either the ISD or MC80, and still have nearly enough change for a pack of squadrons. The ISD and MC80 alone would be about 80% of the cost of the entire core set.

The other thing is that one large ship vs one large ship isn't really all that enthralling as a game. Even with squadrons thrown in, without anything to activate them, it's largely a dice off to victory. The medium and small ships of the game, while not as iconic, are considerably more demonstrative of the mechanics and positional nuances of the game, along with their ability to actually utilise fighter screens. Arqs, GSDs, Raiders, CR90s, Neb-Bs, MC30s are all top notch for both learning the game, and starting a collection from by purchasing literally any medium or large ship as a compliment. VSDs are poor overall, especially without upgrades like Jerjerrod to make them somewhat viable, and the Interdictor is something of an outlier, but the AFMk2 isn't bad at all, and one could argue the Quasar Fire might be fun for a new player too. There's so much to choose from without having to rely on sticking two large ships in the box at the sacrifice of all other gameplay experience, just for the sake of them being iconic. This is, after all, a miniatures game , not a collectors set.