On 10/29/2017 at 11:18 AM, Innese said:

except for acrylic asteroids or bomb tokens.

Why would they?

6 minutes ago, Celestial Lizards said:

Why would they?

Minor variations in templates are one thing, but differences in the sizing of an asteroid of bomb token could be the difference between skirting the edge and landing juuuust on it. There are some Official FFG Acrylic Bomb Tokens that are widely know to be a fair bit larger than their cardboard counterparts, and using them will usually get you quite a bit of ire.

51 minutes ago, Innese said:

There are some Official FFG Acrylic Bomb Tokens that are widely know to be a fair bit larger than their cardboard counterparts, and using them will usually get you quite a bit of ire.

Those Cluster Bomb tokens aren't exactly "official" ... they were caught immediately during the Regionals season, they were disallowed, and FFG made replacements available. The reason they were larger is that they were accidentally cut along the "bleed," not along the actual lines.

As I mentioned above, slight differences in templates will have a much larger, and more continuous, and cumulative, effect on a game than a tiny variation in an asteroid or bomb. Personally, my acrylic obstacles and bombs are perfect matches for the cardboard. There's no good reason for bombs and obstacles to be an exception to the "third-party acrylics are okay" rule ... but they are.

4 minutes ago, Jeff Wilder said:

Those Cluster Bomb tokens aren't exactly "official" ... they were caught immediately during the Regionals season, they were disallowed, and FFG made replacements available. The reason they were larger is that they were accidentally cut along the "bleed," not along the actual lines.

As I mentioned above, slight differences in templates will have a much larger, and more continuous, and cumulative, effect on a game than a tiny variation in an asteroid or bomb. Personally, my acrylic obstacles and bombs are perfect matches for the cardboard. There's no good reason for bombs and obstacles to be an exception to the "third-party acrylics are okay" rule ... but they are.

I do not have any third party obstacles, mainly due to this rule, but have many third party bombs - all of which, like yours, match the cardboard perfectly. At local events no one cares and I've seen third party bombs used.

Personally I don't see what the big deal is, even at larger events (whether we are talking obstacles, bomb tokens or alt art cards from other sources). If each player were responsible for having possession of the FFG official item (card or bomb token or obstacle) and presented it to their opponent for comparison and verification that the outsourced item did indeed match the official one then there should be no problem. I can't imagine that taking much more than a few seconds. Every other third party token is legal for play, as are outsourced acrylic templates, why are these other items such a bugaboo?

3 minutes ago, thatdave said:

why are these other items such a bugaboo?

Because you labeled it as a bugaboo.

The "no third party bombs or obstacles" bit is pretty dumb. Variations in templates can and would have a muuuch greater effect on the gameplay as a whole, and frankly the way FFG manufactures their cardboard there's already a lot of wiggle in the templates they provide. But just because FFG can't get acrylics cut to proper size *cough SC range rulers cough Regionals clusters* doesn't mean third party providers can't provide accurate acrylic representations of bombs and/or obstacles

3 minutes ago, Not_A_Shoe said:

the way FFG manufactures their cardboard there's already a lot of wiggle in the templates they provide.

I think this is the biggest reason third party templates are allowed. There is just too much variance in the official, in the box, cardboard templates to be very picky about it. Toss in the allowance for either player to request a single set of templates (or dice, which could be rolled (ugh..) into this debate), mutually agreed upon or settled by a judge, and it is hard to argue much of an advantage is gained either way.

Can you use non official shield, focus, or evade tokens?

Just now, Boom Owl said:

Can you use non official shield, focus, or evade tokens?

Yep, so long as your opponent doesn't object to them (deliberately confusing tokens or too hard to read/understand may be a factor) but I've never seen or heard of anyone saying that in a match.

the 3rd party bombs and obstacles not being tournament legal has much more to do with the thickness of them than the dimensions being off. Something about the ships not sitting on them right when you get an overlap. I don't think the FFG official acrylic bombs are super thin so I'm not sure why the call was made but from what remember, that was the reason.

3 hours ago, jwilliamson12 said:

Maybe one I’ll win a set! I play with a pretty tough crowd who usually put on a good showing at Worlds.

I will say that it's pretty daunting to go to a Store Championship and playing on the Coruscant System Open mat, as the only way to get one is to be one of eight people to attend that year's system open.