Confirmed. 8 players. 6x12 table. Intensive 12 hours of gameplay. I must think about this parameters and write one "simple" but interesting Cinematic.

Imps vs Rebel. Each side must deploy a squadron of capital ships. 3 CR 90. 3 Raiders. At least one GR 75 and one Gozanti. No complex interactions. Limited Named pilots. So many options... your ideas?

Wow. That sounds like too much fun. I have limited Epic experience, and only with 300 points per side. But. The thing that pops immediately into my head is to add some Objectives. By all means, play to total destruction. But add a little something else to add some spice to the game.

Or, say, if one of the "capital" ships is on its last Hull or two, if it makes it to aboard edge and "jumps to hyperspace," perhaps the opposing team only gets half points. A little more flavor - because it's not common for ships of that size to fight to the death if they actually have a way out, right?

And lastly - and this *is* from experience - consider having each player control a nearly equal number of ships. In our last Epic game, one player controlled a fully-kitted Raider (150 points), while the other player ran a couple TIE mini-swarms and a support Lambda. The Raider player got sooooo bored waiting for his partner to drop dials and make maneuvers and roll dice and so on. Granted, when his turn came around to activate the Raider, he was very busy and even forgot about some of his triggers as there was frankly too much happening on a 150 point Raider. But still.

I love that you are putting limits on Aces. A few for flavor is nice, but swarms of ships are so much fun in Epic.

You could also add the "Flagship" title to one of the Epics. That makes them worth extra points and gives that ship something unique like extra energy, slighty more shields, etc..

Limiting the use of aces is a great idea. You might want to even use the new tourny rules to limit the number of types of ships and upgrades that can be used. That would really get some people to think about how to build their lisits.

A good way to limit it in a thematic way would be to force people to field wings of the same ship with max one unique pilot each. So little mini-squads of at least four small ships, all kitted out the same way, at best one unique pilot acting as wing leader.

4 experienced X Wing players. 2 who stopped wargaming due to parenthood. 2 Rookies with limited experience. But at least 5 or 6 Epic games under the belt

"Special" X Wing day, megabig and memorable (I hope). No problem about equilibrated list buildings... This is part of my job as scenario designer.

Every player will control one Huge ship plus some small ships. Circa 250 pts per player. Good advice "nearly equal number of ships". This is important if you play Team Epic... 300 pts or 1000 pts.

When we play Epic we see on the table max 25% Named pilots, if there are no good reasons to see Aces on parade.

I like the idea of one "Flag Ship" per side. Perhaps one Named high ranking crewmember per Flagship plus one custom Mod to enhance that ships defence. We will see ALL the 2 cards Huge ship's Titles on the board. 3 CR 90 plus 3 Raiders.

Give me your ideas please. All welcome. This must be a great game. Not about or optimal builds. Simply Star Wars.

I would recommend some sort of "reinforcements" mechanism. I would let each side keep some ships off the board at the start (say up to 250 points). Then after each round the team could decide to bring the ships onto the board. They would have to roll a dice to determine position (say 12 sided dice for each 1 foot section of player side). This would keep it from being a total furball where it's just a mess of ships. It would also speed up the start of the game because there wouldn't be so many ships on the board. And to keep the team from just saving the points off the board say that they must enter after 5/6 rounds.

Think about the practical aspects of the game. Is the 6'x12' table ALL game-space? If so, where will players be placing their many, many cards and tokens? How inconvenient will it be to move ships in the center of the table? 3' is a pretty long way to stretch and lean, and if a lot of the movements and measuring happen here, it could get really obnoxious. Make sure when lists are set that players show up with their list pretty much ready to go -- you don't want to waiting on folks to dig through their collections and get their 200pts of stuff ready onsite. How will snacks/food breaks be handled? Are chairs present for those who wish to sit?

These things would be my biggest points of advice -- this is the "little stuff" that makes all the difference in the world when it's go time.

A practical concern; depending on fleet position, you might wish to divide the field in "quadrants". If for example, Imperial player #1 and Rebel player #3 are so far away from other players that they cannot affect them, have them play the round amongst themselves, not taking care of what happens elsewhere on the field. Everyone plays the same round at the same time, but you don't have to wait for each PS ship to play at the same time. This will speed things up.

Next, you might consider an "in system jump" type of mechanic. If a capital ship has no enemy ships within range X, he can do a double move, emptying all energy reserves on the ship card and having no actions. This might help a player get back in the game should his "side" win, instead of waiting 8 turns to get back in the game.

2 hours ago, AllWingsStandyingBy said:

Think about the practical aspects of the game. Is the 6'x12' table ALL game-space? If so, where will players be placing their many, many cards and tokens? How inconvenient will it be to move ships in the center of the table? 3' is a pretty long way to stretch and lean, and if a lot of the movements and measuring happen here, it could get really obnoxious. Make sure when lists are set that players show up with their list pretty much ready to go -- you don't want to waiting on folks to dig through their collections and get their 200pts of stuff ready onsite. How will snacks/food breaks be handled? Are chairs present for those who wish to sit?

These things would be my biggest points of advice -- this is the "little stuff" that makes all the difference in the world when it's go time.

I agree with AWSB on all these things. I played X2K once. . .and it was a blast!!

A. 6x12 is a lot of space. The 2 problems you can run into with that are (a) ships have to move several turns before anything happens, and (b) the battle could boil down into several mini battles. The second part might not be a bad thing, since as micro-battles resolve "reinforcements" arrive from those battles into other battles. I have wargamed on a 6X6 table a lot, and have never found the 3' reach a huge problem. In fact, I made the board 6x6 because 3' was the longest reach that wasn't too inconvenient. Handily, that works out to 4 x-wing mats

B. Set up and break down will take awhile. . .like even an hour plus if people are not on the ball. If this is taking place at home, set the board and all obstacles up before hand. DO NOT LET ASTEROID DEPLOYMENT BE A PLAYER THING. To be fair, let the "visiting" team choose their table edge to make the fact that they didn't deploy asteroids a neutral effect.

C. People should show up with everything ready. Dials, ships, chits, cards. Have them get all the rummaging done at home and only bring what their list requires. It will save valuable time, and you all can get to playing immediately (after the inevitable 30-60 minutes of social time--at least that's what happens with my group).

D. In the begining, don't be too finicky about dials. If one player's movement will have no influence over another's, have them move at the same time.

E. Post photos here! I wanna see!!

I'm sorry but this reminds me of some meme on 40k Apocalypse. And if they can have a Warlord Titan in their games, we can have an Imperial Class Star Destroyer in our game!

Be sure to post pics of the game after it is over

Thanks a lot.

1. No problem about extra tables. We are a group of veteran wargamers but now we simply can't play monster wargames. 6x12 is not Huge, simply Large (sorry). 2 decades ago we played "simple little games"... Linked Europa Series, War in the Pacific, etc. We needed two tables and sometimes not enought. Many, many Epic games played on a 5x9 mat. Our favourite 600 pts 2vs2 Epic. So plenty of space to display cards, dials, etc. Also one "snack table" near the freezer.

2. When playing 2 vs 2 or 3 vs 3 it is common to see simultaneous moves. You can move 4 Obsidians while one of your opponents maneuvers with his Rogue Squadron 5 feet to your side.

3. We play at home. Single, no kids, plenty of room. My cat never enter the War Room (but he is persistent). So I will display all the elements needed days before. While playing Cinematic one guy designs not only objectives, set up, etc. Also the ships involved.

Of course, there will be "Reserves" involved and probably "Hiper Jump entry points", "Gas Clouds" to hide small ships there out of view until one enemy ship scans the cloud, etc. You need SPACE to play with hidden units, etc. Of course 2 or 3 turns without Pew Pew but..."I know Whisper is lurking. 99% sure he is either into that Gas Clous or into ambush position landed on that rock. But.. Where?"

4. Players will be informed of what to expect days in advance. Choose what "Squadron" to lead. One Huge (perhaps 2 if both 1 card) leading his forces. Objectives. Limited info about the enemy. How to deploy. Friendly tricks like hidden units, perhaps one use tricks like Jammed Comms...

5. 6 foot wide. This is a problem if you play with kids. But grown and well feed adults. After so many years playing monster wargames only a minor one. A problem in a competitive environment. But we are long term friends playing casual. If that ship goes 1 ctm. long, really does not matter.

And photos, of course. This will be special. Because one of our long term friends will start this summer a new life married to a superb woman but far, far away. I suspect our last game together.

So this must and will be pure Star Wars fun.

6 minutes ago, Marinealver said:

I'm sorry but this reminds me of some meme on 40k Apocalypse. And if they can have a Warlord Titan in their games, we can have an Imperial Class Star Destroyer in our game!

Be sure to post pics of the game after it is over

Only once played really big Apo. A nightmare. Hours to deploy. So cramped that there was no maneuvering, no tactics. Simply 2 waves of Guardsmen plus Space Marines vs Orks, Chaos Space Marines and... Jajaja... Tau.

"General Chang, perhaps we are fighting the wrong side..."

"Stay silent and reload. Thousand Sons behind us"

Tons and tons of d6 rolling. And 80% unpainted minis...ohhhh man... W40K was really a game hard to newcomers.

1 hour ago, Hexdot said:

Tons and tons of d6 rolling. And 80% unpainted minis...ohhhh man... W40K was really a game hard to newcomers.

Oh, this used to drive me crazy. To the point where I made my brother give me his whole collection, said "what colors?" and painted his army for him.

It was ruining my photos!!!

I'm so glad XWM is painted.

Pictures. We need pictures.

20 hours ago, Darth Meanie said:

I agree with AWSB on all these things. I played X2K once. . .and it was a blast!!

A. 6x12 is a lot of space. The 2 problems you can run into with that are (a) ships have to move several turns before anything happens, and (b) the battle could boil down into several mini battles. The second part might not be a bad thing, since as micro-battles resolve "reinforcements" arrive from those battles into other battles. I have wargamed on a 6X6 table a lot, and have never found the 3' reach a huge problem. In fact, I made the board 6x6 because 3' was the longest reach that wasn't too inconvenient. Handily, that works out to 4 x-wing mats

B. Set up and break down will take awhile. . .like even an hour plus if people are not on the ball. If this is taking place at home, set the board and all obstacles up before hand. DO NOT LET ASTEROID DEPLOYMENT BE A PLAYER THING. To be fair, let the "visiting" team choose their table edge to make the fact that they didn't deploy asteroids a neutral effect.

C. People should show up with everything ready. Dials, ships, chits, cards. Have them get all the rummaging done at home and only bring what their list requires. It will save valuable time, and you all can get to playing immediately (after the inevitable 30-60 minutes of social time--at least that's what happens with my group).

D. In the begining, don't be too finicky about dials. If one player's movement will have no influence over another's, have them move at the same time.

E. Post photos here! I wanna see!!

This. All of it. I had a hard time reaching stuff when I played on a 5X9 table.

Encourage squadrons. Examples: Luke with 3 Red X's, Tycho with 3 Green Squadron A's, Backstabber with 3 Black Squadrons.

I love the idea of reserve forces. Each player could hold back about 50 pts of fighters that could hyperspace in. Could even make it interseting. Roll a red die. On a hit they are deployed at R1-2 of that player's huge ship. On Blank or Focus they deploy at the original starting edge. On a crit. They are delayed in hyperspace, roll again next turn to see if they arrive.

And pictures. In fact you probably just need to hire a photographer.

With 8 people have you thought about a u-shape table? That way you’d have several points of access at any battle point. Also you could do a warp-thing that either end warps to the other side.

You could do strategic tv tables for cards and tokens and such.

"Warp Wormhole". Fantastic. W40K "Dark Millenium" Vortex grenade templates.

Thanks, Sir. Perils of the Wormhole. Perhaps a small chance of delayed arrival (blank result) or dangerous route (Crit result).

one thing is that with so many Huge ships, if you play on a narrow table the fighters might just get run over with nowhere to go. 8 huge ships is a lot of flight paths.

then again, 3 raiders focus firing a CR90 will pop it guaranteed in a single turn. huge ship pilot skill might actually decide the batle.

Id jst make a wall of 8 gozantis/raiders and fly them forward with 2 inches between them. steamroll all the fighters, literally crush the rebellion

5 hours ago, Vontoothskie said:

then again, 3 raiders focus firing a CR90 will pop it guaranteed in a single turn. huge ship pilot skill might actually decide the batle.

Yea, I'd probably add a house rule that the PS of huge ships cannot be altered, so that CR90s and Raiders have an opportunity to return fire on one another. Otherwise, if one side uses tricks to increase their huge ships' PS, with three gunships firing first they could PS-Kill a lot of the opposing huge ships, since it'd be hard for any huge ship to withstand the fire of three huge ships in one round.

Even then, Initiative will be huge, because crits can be do devastating to huge ships, so whichever side is firing their Huge Ships first has a decent chance to pile some crits onto the opposing huge ships, stripping its energy and attack dice and upgrades before it can return fire. So, bid large and choose first player, I guess, so all those PS4 gunships can fire first. (NOTE: The simultaneous attack rule for huge ships means even if a section gets crippled at it's PS Value before it's had a chance to shoot, you don't flip the ship card until it has also had a chance to shoot).

Can't wait for the results.

On 1/23/2018 at 12:49 AM, SpikeSpiegel said:

Pictures. We need pictures.

Also this, we need a lot of this.

Instead of spending half a day organising and then tidying away cards, everyone should print off their lists and simply cross out shields as they are removed and upgrades as they are used. The only exception would be ships with shield regen or upgrades that can be flipped back up after they are used.

Maybe have some kind of extra token system next to the models to show which ships have activated or not. It will take a few rounds to get on top of the order of activation and even then expect some ships to be missed and played out of order by mistake.

This is a problem, but we solved this long ago. Simply a "Checklist" with all the ships involved, lowest PS first. Activation Phase downwards and Combat Phase upwards. Quite easy.

Ban harpoons, proton bombs, assault missiles and Ion torpedoes. The splash damage is absurdly strong in such a target rich environment.

I'd encourage the use of mid-cost ships (like 30 points) to speed up gameplay. Flight upon flight of TIEs sounds amazing, but the maneuver time is going to make the game take 4 hours longer.

On 1/22/2018 at 12:24 PM, AllWingsStandyingBy said:

Think about the practical aspects of the game. Is the 6'x12' table ALL game-space? If so, where will players be placing their many, many cards and tokens? How inconvenient will it be to move ships in the center of the table? 3' is a pretty long way to stretch and lean, and if a lot of the movements and measuring happen here, it could get really obnoxious. Make sure when lists are set that players show up with their list pretty much ready to go -- you don't want to waiting on folks to dig through their collections and get their 200pts of stuff ready onsite. How will snacks/food breaks be handled? Are chairs present for those who wish to sit?

These things would be my biggest points of advice -- this is the "little stuff" that makes all the difference in the world when it's go time.

This is what I invisioned just now:

Have it deploy in Waves. Approx 300 points out on turn 1, another 300 turn 3, and last 400 turn 5. Each round can bring out no more than 2 epics. It gives the board time to clear so that more of the board is being used all at once, lets strategy happen, and makes it realistic like. I see the star wars approach when they attacked at Scarif coming out of hyperspace at different intervals.

A boost thought might be to have a reason they engaged in the fight. I'd suggest using more preset debris (kudos if you can make it look like ships) with numbers underneath. They are approaching a previous battleground because of the rumored "Secret Plans." any ship can sacrifice an attack to try and tractor beam a debris (we left debris there, but used the number to determine what they found.) Secret plans were a plus to either "intercepting" or "securing" team (we did a 10 point destruction bonus). We used a standard attack die versus a 1 defense die. Range 3 was 1 attack die, 2 was 2, and 1 was 3. It created for us a bit of a scenario, though it wasn't a 1k vs 1k.