So besides the red defence die stormtroopers seem significantly inferior to rebel troopers but cost more.

White attack dice are absolute trash even if you get 1 free reroll.

Am I missing something?

Aim tokens give 2 rerolls. In my experience stormtroopers are good as long as they have an aim. They are also good for holding down objectives with their awesome defense.

17 minutes ago, bageldrone said:

So besides the red defence die stormtroopers seem significantly inferior to rebel troopers but cost more.

White attack dice are absolute trash even if you get 1 free reroll.

Am I missing something?

Not really a free re-roll, it still requires the use of an aim token.

That being said, E-11 stormtroopers have a 3/8 chance of hitting and a 1/2 chance of negating hits. Rebel A-280s have a 1/2 chance of hitting and only a 1/3 chance of negating a hit.

In melee they both use black dice. On balance the unit with more powerful defense seems more valuable.

Stormtroopers have hit-surge, so their attacks hit 3 in 8. Rebels have black attack dice, but no attach surge, so they hit 4 in 8.

Stormtroopers have red defence dice, so they save 3 in 6. Rebels have white dice and a block surge, so they save 2 in 6.

A unit of each shooting at the other does exactly the same amount of damage on average.

Difference in the matchup is in how often you use dodge vs aim. Rebels do better with dodge *if* more than one thing shoots at them. Stormtroopers do better with aim *if* they miss at least 3 shots.

...outside the matchup, Stormtrooper heavy weapons are better than the Rebels', and they'll survive better where there's no time to dodge. Rebels survive better if there's time to dodge, and hit more consistently if there's no time to aim.

And in both cases, if you're fishing for crits there's no difference, except Stormtroopers come out ahead if they're either able to aim, or toting a rocket launcher.

They're well balanced, with the tiny difference in cost justified, I think, in the Stormtroopers being tougher when you can't spare an action, and having better heavy weapon options.

Stormtroopers are way more difficult to kill and have access to better heavy weapons. They are only 1pt more. One is dependent on the aim token, the other is dependant on the dodge token. I'm actually impressed on how balanced both units are. They are very Ying/Yang. I haven't played the snowtroopers yet but their abilities seem much diminished compared to the Fleet troopers. But they are just as defensible and their steady ability could be super useful against suppression.

...STORMIES are ALWAYS worth it....(they just need a little target practice...).... wunderbar

I like the looks of Snowtroopers a lot. They've effectively got a free move action (with a two-move-action cap). A couple of proxy games have our units moving most of the time. That gives Snowtroopers a free action, in effect, to dodge or aim or even recover as required. Stormtroopers' Precise isn't worth much, IMO. I mean, you need to miss three times for it to even do anything, and you have to be aiming, and then you get what? A little less than half a hit in return. Snowtroopers get a free action, so they'll likely be aiming way more often in the first place.

But Stormtroopers are great too. They're both cool units, with solid defence and good heavy weapons. Remember that the hit-surge counts for heavy weapons. And of course aim likes better dice to re-roll. So not only do they have better heavy weapons than Rebels (Stormtroopers do, anyway. Not sure about Snowtrooper heavies...), they would be better at shooting them even if both sides had the same weapons.

1 hour ago, buckero0 said:

Stormtroopers are way more difficult to kill and have access to better heavy weapons. They are only 1pt more. One is dependent on the aim token, the other is dependant on the dodge token. I'm actually impressed on how balanced both units are. They are very Ying/Yang. I haven't played the snowtroopers yet but their abilities seem much diminished compared to the Fleet troopers. But they are just as defensible and their steady ability could be super useful against suppression.

The fleet troopers are hampered ny their shorter range band. With a range segment being 6" and the speed 2 move being 5" they can't move from outside range 3(other troopers firing range) into range 2(fleet troopers firing range) and still get a shot. Which means they have a turn where they can be whitled down.

And this is why you don't rush people other units with fleet troopers. Let the enemy come to you. Camp those corners.

But yeah if you just play with like, barricades and stuff they're boned. Really need to hide outside LOS and abuse those standby tokens.

6 minutes ago, Orcdruid said:

The fleet troopers are hampered ny their shorter range band. With a range segment being 6" and the speed 2 move being 5" they can't move from outside range 3(other troopers firing range) into range 2(fleet troopers firing range) and still get a shot. Which means they have a turn where they can be whitled down.

We've been proxying the movement thingamos, but my understanding is that it's 5" front to back of the base, with a >1" base. Which means you should be able to close the range.

But then you need to move out of cover (if you had it) in a straight line directly towards the enemy, which is terribly limited. A Trooper unit could have stood still and dodged or aimed, while still shooting. Just as bad for me, though, is that trading Nimble for Ready is bad. Who the **** readies? It's awful.

But like Omega says, it'll come down to how maps get set up. I just can't see me risking Fleeters in my armies on the off chance the map is favourable to them.

Stormtroopers are great with Veers. Use his ability to give an aim token and then still get two actions with the Stormtrooper squad when they activate.

Before factoring dodges and cover a unit with a dlt does roughly the same average damage as rebels with a z6 (2.48 vs 2.5).

It probably doesn't feel that way because imps are usually outnumbered due to the pointsinks in vader and atst's

They've got 3 re-rolls with an Aim token plus they have offensive surge conversion; this is without factoring in their superior support weapons (though with that offensive surge conversion they'd be pretty gross if they had access to the Rebel minigun).

But if the rebel troopers have aim as well they're damage would be better than the storm troopers which would mean the storm troopers would be rolling more defence dice all of which are a 50/50

the more defence dice you make your opponent roll the better in this game

also for 22 points you can add the entire firepower of a 55 point stormtrooper unit to a rebel trooper squad minus the surge conversion

54 minutes ago, bageldrone said:

But if the rebel troopers have aim as well they're damage would be better than the storm troopers which would mean the storm troopers would be rolling more defence dice all of which are a 50/50

the more defence dice you make your opponent roll the better in this game

But then you give away the ability to have multiple dodge tokens and they melt under fire with their poor defense dice when they do get hit.....

37 minutes ago, bageldrone said:

also for 22 points you can add the entire firepower of a 55 point stormtrooper unit to a rebel trooper squad minus the surge conversion

once again, the average math is the same for rebels with a z6 and stormies with a dlt before tokens and cover, you can find a coverage of the math here. the z6 only gives the rebs a higher potential output, but the the stormies are encouraged rather than penalized for taking the aim token.

so 5 = 3.65 now?

you would be rolling 3.65x 5+ defence dice for the rebels and 5x 4+ defence dice for stormtroopers. rolling more defence dice is good for the attacker

4 hours ago, Ralgon said:

Before factoring dodges and cover a unit with a dlt does roughly the same average damage as rebels with a z6 (2.48 vs 2.5).

It probably doesn't feel that way because imps are usually outnumbered due to the pointsinks in vader and atst's

I’m looking forward to Veers for that reason. More support type less heavy combat type. The savings will help bulk up the trooper numbers again.

14 minutes ago, bageldrone said:

so 5 = 3.65 now?

you would be rolling 3.65x 5+ defence dice for the rebels and 5x 4+ defence dice for stormtroopers. rolling more defence dice is good for the attacker

In theory no it's not, the end result still says 2.4vs 2.5 total damage. In practice that's another story... but we're also forgetting several important factors that are a bit too mathy for my probability skills or need far too much assumption to be made (not the least of with is perfectly balanced die's and the environment they roll on).

so your saying for 10% more points you get 2.4 damage from the stormtroopers compared to 2.5 damage by the rebels. well worth the points

no they are not, you should use the other troops choices available to you.

(yes this is me pointing out how silly this thread is)

The math on the stormtroopers does seem to indicate that FFG puts a premium on that red defense die.

It is probably just my imperial bias but it does look like for every imperial unit in the core set the rebel counterpart is just as good or better for cheaper. The demo game strait up gives the empire a 50 point advantage.

I guess we will have to trust their play testing and see how the meta data turns out.

If nobody's in cover/dodging/aiming, the better Rebel offense and the better Stormtrooper defense cancel out, and both put an equal amount of average unblocked wounds into the other. But if both sides spend an aim token; or the Stormtroopers spend an aim token, and the Rebels spend a dodge token; then the Stormtroopers come out slightly ahead in the trade.

(if I wrote my dice rolling script correctly, anyways)

3 hours ago, NukeMaster said:

It is probably just my imperial bias but it does look like for every imperial unit in the core set the rebel counterpart is just as good or better for cheaper. The demo game strait up gives the empire a 50 point advantage.

I guess we will have to trust their play testing and see how the meta data turns out.

I feel much the same way about all the core set units.

3 hours ago, NukeMaster said:

The math on the stormtroopers does seem to indicate that FFG puts a premium on that red defense die.

It is probably just my imperial bias but it does look like for every imperial unit in the core set the rebel counterpart is just as good or better for cheaper. The demo game strait up gives the empire a 50 point advantage.

I guess we will have to trust their play testing and see how the meta data turns out.

My take (as a fellow imperial player to be);

Vader vs. Luke: Vader is a lot pricier, but Master of the Force and a No-Panic bubble are both fantastic. He's not cheap (especially since I feel you need force push or force reflex), but he's definately stronger than Luke (40 points stronger? That's a bit less certain, I admit). His high point cost is going to limit imperial builds until we get Veers, though. Most of the objectives place a big emphasis on trooper units, and Vader+2 AT-STs can't field the trooper units it needs to compete on those objectives.

-Stormtroopers vs. Rebel Troopers: I think the rebel troopers have a slight edge by themselves, but the Stormtroopers have much nicer special weapons. Post wave 1, Snowtroopers will probably take the Stormtroopers place for cheap bodies (Especially since they can get precise back with targeting scopes while being only 1-2 points more expensive than an equivalent number of Stormtroopers), but since Snowtroopers have such terrible special weapons (Well, the flamethrower could be good, but it'll be situational), the Stormtrooper will still have a place in the Imperial army.

-AT-RT vs. Speeder bike: Apples to Oranges. The Speeder bikes have a generalist weapon to the AT-RT's specialist hardpoint, but firepower-wise they're about equal until damage comes into play (The Scout Troopers have much better guns for out of arc attacks, though). Armor vs. Cover and defensive surges probably favors the AT-RT, but that's the price of mobility. The big difference is how damage affects them; After 3 wounds the Speeder bikes lose half of their firepower due to a casualty, but the vehicle damage roll is unpleasant and unpredictable, and can leave the AT-RT crippled if you get exactly the wrong result. Sometimes the result will be managelable, but sometimes the result will take it out of the game while it still has 2 hull left. It's not easy to say which is stronger, but I think there's not a clear winner here.