Now that boarding actions will be a thing...

(something people in the past were adamant would never happen, and I only mention it in order to rub salt in their wounds, thus earning more Dark Side cred, so as to improve my dice rolls)

...I wonder if we may see assault shuttles in a future release.

I would have thought of them as squadrons, but for these Wave VI cards being ship upgrades. Therefore they would be decent for flotillas. Still, the SWU (Legends) has had assault shuttles, which were smaller than Gozantis and GR-75s. Perhaps assault shuttles might be a way to extend the range of boarding actions beyond close.

Anyway, what possibilities do you all think there might be?

No

3 minutes ago, Mikael Hasselstein said:

(something people in the past were adamant would never happen, and I only mention it in order to rub salt in their wounds, thus earning more Dark Side cred, so as to improve my dice rolls)

I was one of those nay-sayers. But I am quite happy with what the "boarding actions" are. None of that "I take control of your ISD with my CR90 crew" nonsense people want.

I could see a squadron that is an extension of one of the upgrades via a crit discard action like Flechette. So when you roll a crit, you can flip a damage card face up or exhaust a token. Or change speed. Discard a command token. Something good enough to want but not broken. Limit the attack to range 1 to prevent Rhymer abuse. And non bomber to prevent BCC rerolls. Limited design space is hard.

Maybe make an Ace that lets you discard a officer, support, or weapons team upgrade on a ship. That would open up design space a little. Instead of relying on Toryn all game, you have to factor in discarding her so you need to bring squads to screen and place her correctly. Also nips FCT abuse in the butt. Same with GT and ET. Jendon allows the best abuse though.

Maybe a flotilla with the upgrades to use boarding parties? (because we can use more flotillas)

I think the point of boarding parties being close range is both that it's a pretty perilous journey to be in a rocket propelled... well, rocket... being fired at a ship, and the further out you are the less likely you are to survive the trip before "landing". It's also to balance the fact that they're incredibly powerful and potent abilities that require your own ship to be in a rather dangerous position to pull off, too. Having them at medium range doesn't make a whole lot of sense, thematically, or in gameplay.

Besides, we haven't even actually got the upgrades yet to play with. I'd say give it a bit of time before we start calling for radical new ways to use it, at least until after we've actually used it.

53 minutes ago, NakedDex said:

Besides, we haven't even actually got the upgrades yet to play with. I'd say give it a bit of time before we start calling for radical new ways to use it, at least until after we've actually used it.

Sure-sure - but if they don't seem to do the trick, then it might be a way to buff them. I'm sure FFG will do the right thing.

53 minutes ago, Daht said:

Maybe a flotilla with the upgrades to use boarding parties? (because we can use more flotillas)

Yeah, quite possibly. I just see flotillas as being bigger ships. BUT! Perhaps a flotilla of four smaller models.

1 hour ago, TallGiraffe said:

No

I am all in favour of squadrons that can have some kind of special effect as in the boarding action cards, but absolutely against anything that involves capturing a ship and turning it against it's owners within a skirmish. I remember in Mechwarrior Dark Age, when there were waves of battle armour that simply captured other people's mechs and used them against their previous owners. It was rubbish.

7 hours ago, D503 said:

I am all in favour of squadrons that can have some kind of special effect as in the boarding action cards, but absolutely against anything that involves capturing a ship and turning it against it's owners within a skirmish. I remember in Mechwarrior Dark Age, when there were waves of battle armour that simply captured other people's mechs and used them against their previous owners. It was rubbish.

Agreed. After all the hard work i've spent to build my fleet for battle, if someone can take it over a ship at a time, i WILL flip the table

Wouldn't assault shuttles be a squadron?

Also Star Wars ships are so massive, a successful boarding action to actually take a ship isn't something I see shuttles able to do. Even when the ISD captured the Tative in IV it basically disabled it first.

If they ever came out.

2 hours ago, Hrathen said:

Wouldn't assault shuttles be a squadron?

Also Star Wars ships are so massive, a successful boarding action to actually take a ship isn't something I see shuttles able to do. Even when the ISD captured the Tative in IV it basically disabled it first.

I agree they would be squadrons.

But I imagine they would have effects like those on the cards being published in the upcoming wave.

Arguing against assault shuttles by saying boarding shouldn't be possible, because taking over a ship shouldn't be possible, sounds like you're resting your case on a moot point.

Stormtrooper Assault Transport

6 hull, speed 3, 1 blue squadron, 1 black battery. When attacking may cancel a black crit to choose and flip one face down damage card on the target face up.

23 hours ago, D503 said:

I am all in favour of squadrons that can have some kind of special effect as in the boarding action cards, but absolutely against anything that involves capturing a ship and turning it against it's owners within a skirmish. I remember in Mechwarrior Dark Age, when there were waves of battle armour that simply captured other people's mechs and used them against their previous owners. It was rubbish.

Or even the first Age of Empires, which would descend into having only a handful of usable units by the end of the game. Eminent amongst them was the unit converting priest.

I once pointed out that kludging the boarding actions like they are has a severe drawback, because there's no game rules that classify what we communally call "boarding actions" as anything. It'd be cool, for instance, to have assault shuttles as squadrons that let you use boarding upgrades against a target within distance 1 of the shuttle. But there aren't any keywords for the rules to hook onto. Boarding Engineers and Boarding Troopers are just two coincidentally named and coincidentally themed upgrades that are not mechanically related to each other.

I can see some of the heavy shuttles coming to the game... but how do you get them to do the boarding actions? Maybe a flotilla would be a good option with the Weapons Team slot over a single squadron stand. Although that could be cool too.

On 2017-6-19 at 8:22 AM, Flengin said:

Or even the first Age of Empires, which would descend into having only a handful of usable units by the end of the game. Eminent amongst them was the unit converting priest.

We played it differently then....

I could perma spawn Halbierders with 20 barracks on full production near the battle line...

10 minutes ago, Ginkapo said:

We played it differently then....

I could perma spawn Halbierders with 20 barracks on full production near the battle line...

Not quite sure we've got the same game. I don't think Halberdiers came into it until Age of Empires 2, a game I've not really played.

Unless you're talking about Hoplites and their upgraded versions (phalanx and centurion?) in which case, yep, I can totally get behind that strategy! Hoplites were some of the very few units that were usable by the end of the game (pretty much the only melee unit), but only because of their immense damage output.

18 hours ago, Nostromoid said:

It'd be cool, for instance, to have assault shuttles as squadrons that let you use boarding upgrades against a target within distance 1 of the shuttle.

Squadrons spending defense tokens steps on Sloane's toes, squadrons flipping damage cards seems bonkers.

As for other possible effects:

Doing damage to hull through shields would also be crazy good (generic Lukes!), and anything that discards upgrades would be nuts as well.

The relative cheapness of slicer tools (7 points plus a flotilla frame) makes me think a dial-changing effect could be workable. Maybe "rotate once to the right" instead of having full control, or something?

An exhaust effect could be nifty. A squadron that could exhaust upgrade cards wouldn't break the game open, but would potentially be neat against Engine Tech-ing Demolisher or in combination with Sato (fly at a ship, rotate all its cards, then throw black dice at it).

What else?

Changing speed or yaw seems a bit too good, but messing with command tokens might be on the table. It could also potentially not be too broken to have an "opponent flips one faceup to facedown, then flips one random other facedown to faceup" effect, but that would further the "gotta remember what crits that ship's taken" effect we're already getting dangerously close to. Reducing shields is ACMs / Norra's / other crit effects' turf.

Any other ship attributes we could screw with that I've overlooked?

I was expecting an expansion of the current system, ie: more expensive types of boarding cards such as stormtroopers. Perhaps even darktroopers or war droids for a commensurate increase in cost.

I guess actual squadron type units on the field would be cool as well.