Just now, Rinzler in a Tie said:

I'm hoping he keeps the pilot-to-ship configuration as-is, but puts the EPT on the Pilot/Ship card instead of the Chasis

yep that's exactly it.

2 minutes ago, citruscannon said:

AC2 hasn't got green turns :), just the system slot.

Aaahhh just the straights.

1 minute ago, citruscannon said:

yep that's exactly it.

... And my axe!

48 minutes ago, citruscannon said:

yea, I've thought about it, but at the same time, the gametype is highly flexible in terms of immediate online fixes. If something is coming out of the wash as an overly powerful combo, or just really weak, it can be dealt with immediately. I'm embracing the whole "floppy points" system. That said, I'm thinking that especially after wave 2, I'll need to start thinking about jousting values and everything so it may be a good time to start investigating it.

The trouble is with the original design concept. If you start with the wrong baseline, and only realise 2 waves in what was wrong it's simply too late to fix it. For the original X-Wing game it was a plethora of poor (in hindsight) design choices:

1. A lack of dice available. Armada has 3 types for attacks alone, and I think X-wing should have at least 2 each for attack and defense. This gives you far more flexibility in design and variation in game play.
2. The small point value. If you're starting from the ground up I'd change it to at least 200 points for a massive increase in design flexibility. 1000 might be even better for fine tuning.
3. They tied a pilot to specific ships, with specific upgrade bars. Your idea here is the best I've seen for fixing this problem.

In addition, you'd want to get at least close to the correct point value for each card when you release it, in order to avoid fluctuating prices messing with the competitive meta too much. In addition, I'd get rid of PWTs entirely and replace them all with various kinds of mobile arcs.

8 minutes ago, Astech said:

The trouble is with the original design concept. If you start with the wrong baseline, and only realise 2 waves in what was wrong it's simply too late to fix it. For the original X-Wing game it was a plethora of poor (in hindsight) design choices:

1. A lack of dice available. Armada has 3 types for attacks alone, and I think X-wing should have at least 2 each for attack and defense. This gives you far more flexibility in design and variation in game play.
2. The small point value. If you're starting from the ground up I'd change it to at least 200 points for a massive increase in design flexibility. 1000 might be even better for fine tuning.
3. They tied a pilot to specific ships, with specific upgrade bars. Your idea here is the best I've seen for fixing this problem.

In addition, you'd want to get at least close to the correct point value for each card when you release it, in order to avoid fluctuating prices messing with the competitive meta too much. In addition, I'd get rid of PWTs entirely and replace them all with various kinds of mobile arcs.

All good points.
So in a sense while I'm able to make major design changes in how the game is structured, ultimately I would like this manual and gametype to be all a player needs in addition to their current collection. I would LOVE separate dice, but within this gametype, at the minute, I'm not able to. I can't easily simulate it on vassal without forking into a new module, and in person I'd need a second set of dice. Not insurmountable in either case, but at the moment, I'm wary of adding in too much too fast.
What I CAN do however very easily is to prune a lot of the dice modification that goes on. Ordnance in this gametype will throw a maximum of 3 dice. A proton torpedo for example currently throws three dice and if it hits adds another hit. The rule of thumb is that there should be only very rare cases where a defense 2 ship is unable to defend relatively well at range 3 or through asteroids.
2. Small point value is fine for me, I think. I'm undecided on this. The thing is I have free reign to tweak wordings to shift things forward and backwards, and so far that's been just fine. 100pts is sufficient granularity at the minute given this flexibility. Now, that said, I may find I'm really missing it by wave 2 or 3, and if that's the case, then I'll bump it up to 200pts. I may do this sooner rather than later, or if I find it's just not necessary, may not do it at all.
3. Pilots are pseudo-tied to ships, only insofar as preventing things from getting out of hand, but yes, I'm pretty happy with the way the system feels at the minute, glad you like it.

As for fluctuating prices, it took roughly a year for DotA to smooth out the really broken combos, I expect this will take about the same. Hope this covers all your points!

a bit more done on the ship pages.

-seebelow-

Bless you for calling it the T65 x-wing. Please also call it the TIE/ln Fighter, TIE/sa Bomber, etc.

This looks so cool!

Great effort, btw. This looks interesting.
I'd like to give this a try

X-wing pilots sorted for the first batch, I think i'm semi happy with the formatting. Something needs adjustment but i'm not sure what yet. The rest of the ships will follow this format.

-added below-

I'm kinda interested in your take on the Y-wing and TIE fighter here. The TIE fighter because of what you plan to do with it and the Y-wing because it changed a lot between release and now.

Looks interesting! When I launch X-wing Community Mod, it looks like we will both be competing for the alternate format space -- but yours is sufficiently different in philosophy and scope that we may appeal to slightly different audiences.

Who is doing your YASB fork? I'm also needing a squad builder, but my implementation is more complex from a squad builder perspective, so @sozin and guidokessels are working on a new squad builder infrastructure.

1 minute ago, MajorJuggler said:

Looks interesting! When I launch X-wing Community Mod, it looks like we will both be competing for the alternate format space -- but yours is sufficiently different in philosophy and scope that we may appeal to slightly different audiences.

Who is doing your YASB fork? I'm also needing a squad builder, but my implementation is more complex from a squad builder perspective, so @sozin and guidokessels are working on a new squad builder infrastructure.

Yea, I'm really looking forward to your community mod! It sounds fantastic. And the more the better I think. I'm rewording a lot of things, a lot of cards are getting merged or pruned, the mechanics of ship upgrading is being shifted quite a bit. The feel of the two games will be very different based on the chassis/airframe mechanic, and of course with vastly different costing and wording on upgrades, so things will play out differently between each game.

YASB fork is moi, which is the most difficult part of the project. Thankfully though, in principle it should be an even simpler version of the YASB, but I'm rubbish at coding so this will take me some time to implement. The artsy stuff I can dash off fairly quickly, the coding not so much. If I start running into real problems I'll crowdsource, attract team members with swag, or hire some help. But it's fun learning too.

if you're ever in need of manuals, cards, or design work, give me a shout, I'd be happy to trade hours on relevant areas of knowledge in the projects.

Alright, here's a peek at the pilots and variants for the X and Y-wing.

I'm going to go with "variants" and update the rules accordingly. It's the most common term in wookiepedia so seemed suitable.
X-wings, fast, maneuverable, REALLY maneuverable with droids, which I haven't released yet. The aces are going to be strong, wedge will be very very good I believe, but then again, 5 X-wings in a squad for rookies, so a blend might be important.

Y-wings are thick, stocky, and powerful in their basic form, with a shield bump and native bomb access. If you opt for the death star style gold sq. BTL-A4s, they work similarly to in XWTMG, however you also are rewarded for the most common Y-wing tactic which is accelerate to attack speed in straight lines and plow into the enemy with torpedoes and ion cannon blasting. You lose a shield however relative to the stock S3s, and start running into costs, which will compound once you start putting ordnance on there.
Conversely, the recon Y-wing was well known for being solid for scouting. To this effect it has access to special sensors via a systems slot, as well as a slightly improved turning ability from the lighter frame. As a variant of the BTL-A4 line, the guns are chained forwards, but the targeting computers have been ripped out for space and lighter weight, and so you cannot fire twice in a turn. That said, this may well be one of your better ordnance carriers owing to the ease of heavy armament.

Three variants each, three different playstyles that they reward, and different synergies that may appear with your elite pilots.

This looks fantastic - however, I must second the idea that greater granularity is needed somehow: I believe having different types of dice a la Armada is the way to go.

3 hours ago, MalusCalibur said:

This looks fantastic - however, I must second the idea that greater granularity is needed somehow: I believe having different types of dice a la Armada is the way to go.

I won't be going alternate dice in this unfortunately. I would like to, but it would require people have extra things on hand to play, which I'll have to save for a different game type. The philosophy of this is going to be as long as you have the manual or squad builder tool (and the squad builder is preferred!), you have everythingyou need to play. I will have to find ways to balance around it.

Granularity though is up for debate, but I will leave this for the time being until after the first wave goes through, and get some feedback.

There. much happier with the layout of these pages now. I've added the TIE/LN as well. Now this was a bit tricky, because I wanted swarms to be viable, but not ultra-dominant. To this effect I made your basic TIE/ln variant 1 pt more expensive, but offset it with the idea that they can really move at top speed and are very hard to hit. This effect will be repeated to an extent on the most basic interceptor, but that's for a different day.

Pilots are similar, some got bumps in their cost by a point or so. I think the only one I'm not content with right now is night beast and winged gundark. If you're only taking 1 ps5 TIE there's no point in not taking NB, and then after that you'd take WG... when, at ps5? I'm ruminating on this one a bit but I think I may bump WG to 13pts to make him the cheapest ps5, but you pay the cost of no EPT.

Now as for the other variants, you may take a training school TIE. Now this is a compromise between rebels and canon. The idea is that there is sufficient room for an instructor in this model, which is what the rebels made use of in their 'captured TIE' idea. It's cheaper, so you will be able to take a good old swarm of them, but they collapse like paper bags, even more than a regular TIE/LN, so it may not be worth it.

Later on, when rebels have access to a captured TIE, they may of course pick the TIE they want, but to get that crew slot they're going to have to take a flight school TIE.

The third and most expensive variant is the Havoc. This is an expermental M2 TIE with hardpoints for cannons. To balance this out I restricted the movement ,and these things are super rare so it's unique. There is some room to play around here with variants versus titles, because later on I may make one of the available crew members something like an Admiral Zaarin or some head of a special weapons division, where you can take multiple unique variants. Food for thought.

3 hours ago, citruscannon said:

There. much happier with the layout of these pages now. I've added the TIE/LN as well. Now this was a bit tricky, because I wanted swarms to be viable, but not ultra-dominant. To this effect I made your basic TIE/ln variant 1 pt more expensive, but offset it with the idea that they can really move at top speed and are very hard to hit. This effect will be repeated to an extent on the most basic interceptor, but that's for a different day.

Pilots are similar, some got bumps in their cost by a point or so. I think the only one I'm not content with right now is night beast and winged gundark. If you're only taking 1 ps5 TIE there's no point in not taking NB, and then after that you'd take WG... when, at ps5? I'm ruminating on this one a bit but I think I may bump WG to 13pts to make him the cheapest ps5, but you pay the cost of no EPT.

Now as for the other variants, you may take a training school TIE. Now this is a compromise between rebels and canon. The idea is that there is sufficient room for an instructor in this model, which is what the rebels made use of in their 'captured TIE' idea. It's cheaper, so you will be able to take a good old swarm of them, but they collapse like paper bags, even more than a regular TIE/LN, so it may not be worth it.

Later on, when rebels have access to a captured TIE, they may of course pick the TIE they want, but to get that crew slot they're going to have to take a flight school TIE.

The third and most expensive variant is the Havoc. This is an expermental M2 TIE with hardpoints for cannons. To balance this out I restricted the movement ,and these things are super rare so it's unique. There is some room to play around here with variants versus titles, because later on I may make one of the available crew members something like an Admiral Zaarin or some head of a special weapons division, where you can take multiple unique variants. Food for thought.

I like your TIE Fighter variants, but what about the TIE/fc, TIE/rc, and TIE/gt?

2 minutes ago, AwesomeJedi said:

I like your TIE Fighter variants, but what about the TIE/fc, TIE/rc, and TIE/gt?

huh. I'd bumped into those a long time back but missed them when I was sweeping wookiepedia. TIE/fc I figure is mostly covered by a TIE with a targeting computer added on, although you haven't got the ability to lend locks. GT and RC however I hadn't seen before. The RC only has one gun. I'd have to have a think about how you'd factor this into a squad.

I'm trying to have three title for each ship, but I'd not be averse to having 4. The recon TIE though would be some kind of intel agent ability I think, along with being difficult to hit, but it looks like its main role though was to relay pre-engagement reconnaissance data, and stay out of the fight, so it'd be pretty rare.

I'll have a good think about it, thanks for the headsup! I was mostly concerned with laying the groundwork for the rebel TIE later on, plus having one TIE you could up-gun.

I like what you're doing. And want to butt in about 2 pilots that you aren't doing yet: Jek Porkins and Fel's Wrath.

In the standard game, there is never a reason to use them. FW offers nothing at all over a cheaper generic; either he needs an EPT or his ability needs to be more useful - or both. E.g. instead of him staying on the board till the end of the round, give him Tel Trevura's ability.

Porkins simply costs too much: you can only fit up to 3 decent X-wings in a list so you use the 3 better ones, or you want a cheap filler ship, and if you really need an EPT you can use R2D6. My suggestion for him is to include his droid's ability as part of his own ability so he doesn't need an expensive 3pt droid occupying that slot and making him the (equal) most expensive X-wing pilot.

I'd also rewrite that droid (R5D8) so its ability removes either the action to trigger it, or the dice roll to get it to work. Or reduce its cost to 1pt.

Otherwise, keep going!

4 hours ago, citruscannon said:

Would "Flight School TIE/LN" still be worth it if you could only equip non-unique crew? The Rebel TIE could have it so that they can equip unique crew. I just cringe when I think of someone important like Darth Vader in just anyone's TIE Fighter.

Just now, AwesomeJedi said:

Would "Flight School TIE/LN" still be worth it if you could only equip non-unique crew? The Rebel TIE could have it so that they can equip unique crew. I just cringe when I think of someone important like Darth Vader in just anyone's TIE Fighter.

yea, great idea! I think that makes it more thematic. I'll adjust this in the next pass.

1 hour ago, citruscannon said:

huh. I'd bumped into those a long time back but missed them when I was sweeping wookiepedia. TIE/fc I figure is mostly covered by a TIE with a targeting computer added on, although you haven't got the ability to lend locks. GT and RC however I hadn't seen before. The RC only has one gun. I'd have to have a think about how you'd factor this into a squad.

I'm trying to have three title for each ship, but I'd not be averse to having 4. The recon TIE though would be some kind of intel agent ability I think, along with being difficult to hit, but it looks like its main role though was to relay pre-engagement reconnaissance data, and stay out of the fight, so it'd be pretty rare.

I'll have a good think about it, thanks for the headsup! I was mostly concerned with laying the groundwork for the rebel TIE later on, plus having one TIE you could up-gun.

I researched these TIE Fighter variants. Apparently, the TIE/FC and the TIE/GT flew together because the TIE/GT did not have enough space to have targeting equipment, so the TIE/FC variant was created to acquire targeting information for them. The TIE/FC would likely have an ability like Systems Officer for handing out target locks and one attack, and the TIE/GT would just be a slower, less maneuverable TIE/LN with a missile slot and 1 attack.

The TIE/RC variant would be useless in X-wing unless they received it had a benefit during the Setup Phase someway. However they don't participate in battle's (except for scanning them beforehand), so they don't make sense in a "combat game."

I don't think the TIE/FC, TIE/GT, and TIE/RC TIE variants are necessary in X-wing however, neither are they in the Imperial Navy. The Imperial Navy decommissioned or reassigned many of these models because they became useless as newer TIE designs like the TIE/SA and TIE/IN that were way better.

ok, there was a small error in the previous TIE section, I've fixed that and put in the TIE advanced (have to fix the custom pilots on the flight school TIE but will do that in the next one, forgot to this time.).

The targeting upgrade will be allowed as a system slot, but it will be changed slightly and costed appropriately. Since I have the chance, I'm up-gunning the TIE advanced. Why? Because it ran the same guns as the X-Wing and supposedly had an excellent targeting computer, and it opens up the space for having a ship with vader that feels even more ferocious to fly. Vader supposedly improved the guns even further on his modified TIE, but these ships should fly more like E-wings than as a cheaper medium range fighter.

The first title is.. unusual. Powerful in offense on the cheaper ships, because it rewards you for shooting last, but also REALLY good at mitigating damage from blankouts and focus fire. This can be equally handy on aces: if you're running maarek, for example, and you've spent your focus on attack, and get caught out with a bad roll in defence, like blank-focus-focus, you can burn a focus result, spend it and get one evade out of that bad roll. Alternatively, use it when you roll REALLY well and don't need to spend it for mitigating a subsequent attack.

The second title is much different, and focuses your ship towards better movement. In the current build of this game, engine upgrade is NOT a modification that will be available, and only some ships with canonical engine upgrades will have the option to do so. So in this sense, it's changing the dynamic of the ship significantly as it opens you up to be a really powerful arc-dodger and interception craft with a super fast boost at the expense of missiles. Things start to get pricy though, you're not going to be able to equip more than 3 of these.

And vader. Vader should feel like the most powerful pilot in the game, and be priced accordingly! PS 10 and vader's twin actions combine powerfully with his custom built superfighter. One-shotting Y-wings, A-wings in rebels, ripping apart epic ships, vader's ship felt great in XWTMG but I felt lacked the offensive crunch that you see in the films and show. Vader with this title is a bit like an inverse corran, but superior in a number of ways. Advanced sensors will NOT be cheap, and PS-modulated, to mitigate feelings of loss of agency. With the title and targeting computer or advanced sensors vader will be coming in around 48 points in this kind of build, and should feel like a real monster.

Nevertheless, you can run a much leaner vader that feels more like the version you see in XWTMG with one of the other titles, but no other pilot will have access to his custom ship.

It's looking better with every iteration!

I think you might be underestimating the power of a double-tap. Engine upgrade is underpriced ( a little) at 4 points, so you're basically paying 3 points to give a PS 10, high action economy ace an extra attack every single turn. Combined with the systems slot (which I'm anticipating will be quite decent) and you've got another 50-point super-ace with Defender-level durability. I think, 'receive a stress token to perform this attack twice' would make more balance sense.