12 hours ago, thecactusman17 said:

New starter sets and "Armada 2.0" with a goal of changing core game elements to speed up gameplay and attract the X-Wing crowd. The first part of this feels like a necessity to improve market share, the second seems like a distinct possibility if FFG is still to make the game play faster.

I'd rather not have this. I play Armada and not X-Wing because of the distinctly more deliberate gameplay. There are more decisions to be made, which I like. I'm also not keen on the rage monsters that inhabit the X-Wing community in greater frequency than here. I'm getting a taste of that with the emerging Legion community and it's dampening my enthusiasm before the game is even out.

I'm not too concerned with market share. Yes, Armada sales dipped last year, but FFG also only had one release in that time where they have previously had two. Meanwhile, the size of Regionals attendence grew significantly this season by significant margins.

1 hour ago, Truthiness said:

I'm not too concerned with market share. Yes, Armada sales dipped last year, but FFG also only had one release in that time where they have previously had two. Meanwhile, the size of Regionals attendence grew significantly this season by significant margins.

It would be VERY strange if Armada sales did NOT go down in 2017, seeing as how little was released

We ALL know the something big is the Secutor-class Star Destroyer Conqueror with none other than Mr Dodd Rancit himself commanding it

As a newcomer, I'm really enjoying the collective mass-hysteria generated by the potential for that mythical "something big".

14 hours ago, thecactusman17 said:

2: New starter sets and "Armada 2.0" with a goal of changing core game elements to speed up gameplay and attract the X-Wing crowd. The first part of this feels like a necessity to improve market share, the second seems like a distinct possibility if FFG is still to make the game play faster.

I know that this might be an unpopular opinion, but FFG can easily speed up the gameplay by dropping the time for a tournament round. As of now, the vast majority of what I have seen is that games often go to time but always finish 6 turns. That generally means there is some wiggle room to cut the fat.

A lot of stuff could be changed to save time here and there, like adopting the flotilla tabling change for example. But nothing's gonna cut the time down to an hour or whatever.

Seriously, I'm gonna address the elephant in the room.

It's obvious that "something Big" can be summed up in two words:

Porg Army

Just now, moodswing5537 said:

Seriously, I'm gonna address the elephant in the room.

It's obvious that "something Big" can be summed up in two words:

Porg Army

Come on, we all know a Gungan fleet would be far superior and much more likely seems as they actually have arms.

Just now, Admiral Litje said:

Come on, we all know a Gungan fleet would be far superior and much more likely seems as they actually have arms.

But look at the TEETH man!

2 minutes ago, moodswing5537 said:

But look at the TEETH man!

B-but extendable tongue.. three toes, huhuh.

7 minutes ago, Admiral Litje said:

Come on, we all know a Gungan fleet would be far superior and much more likely seems as they actually have arms.

“There is a fleet of Bongos in Orbit sir.”

”There not moving.”

”No, sir. They’re submersibles. I’m not even sure how they got them in orbit.”

”Are they armed?”

”No sir. And their hulls are organic. Wait, I’m picking up a transmission.”

”Dis Bombad Admiral JarJar Binks. Weesa bein targeting you, and showin no mercies!”

”You May Fire when ready. Wipe them out...all of them. “

15 minutes ago, GrandAdmiralCrunch said:

“There is a fleet of Bongos in Orbit sir.”

”There not moving.”

”No, sir. They’re submersibles. I’m not even sure how they got them in orbit.”

”Are they armed?”

”No sir. And their hulls are organic. Wait, I’m picking up a transmission.”

”Dis Bombad Admiral JarJar Binks. Weesa bein targeting you, and showin no mercies!”

”You May Fire when ready. Wipe them out...all of them. “

And yet, in the end.... you are the one who loses...

1 minute ago, Drasnighta said:

And yet, in the end.... you are the one who loses...

I could see that happening.

Jar Jar, frightened by the incoming fire, begins running around his ship, causing it to tumble. A nearby explosion knocks it away from the rest, and it rockets it towards the enemy ships. In a confused attempt to evaid it, the enemy ships collide with each other causing the catastrophic destruction of the entire fleet. Jar Jar remembers the escape pod, and lands back on the planet where he is immediately promoted to bombad grand admiral.

1 minute ago, GrandAdmiralCrunch said:

I could see that happening.

Jar Jar, frightened by the incoming fire, begins running around his ship, causing it to tumble. A nearby explosion knocks it away from the rest, and it rockets it towards the enemy ships. In a confused attempt to evaid it, the enemy ships collide with each other causing the catastrophic destruction of the entire fleet. Jar Jar remembers the escape pod, and lands back on the planet where he is immediately promoted to bombad grand admiral.

But in the end, he dies alone and forgotten, a street performer entertaining children for spare credits...

#SpoilerAlert

15 minutes ago, Drasnighta said:

But in the end, he dies alone and forgotten, a street performer entertaining children for spare credits...

#SpoilerAlert

Too true.

im not sure I can see an entire Faction coming from this, but a single rebel unit... that could be interesting. It can’t move on it’s own, and can’t fire, but if at any point it is damaged, the player who damaged it looses the ship that damaged it and all friendly ships within close range.

Just make it a big floating mine that the Rebels can pull through the battlefield.

25 minutes ago, Drasnighta said:

And yet, in the end.... you are the one who loses...

And yet, in the end, we ALL lose Armada loses all credability as a serious game (of plastic spaceships).

I Think that the “something Big” was the wave we just received. It was two large ships = something big.

2 minutes ago, GilmoreDK said:

I Think that the “something Big” was the wave we just received. It was two large ships = something big.

FFG said it wasn’t at GAMA

6 minutes ago, Drasnighta said:

FFG said it wasn’t at GAMA

Did they actually say, "It wasn't"? Or did they just duck the question? All I can remember is someone confirming that, "something Big" had been said and then saying that he had said too much, and someone else saying, "Correct!"

here you go....

So, were are basically all waiting for Godot, is what you are saying? ^^

If they do bring out a new “huge” catergory, they could do worse for the Rebels than the battlecruiser prototype of the Star Defender Viscount - it’s only about twice as big as an ISD. It came in the core set for that appalling WotC miniatures game that I spent way too much money on. But it would be a nice step up in scale without getting silly like the SSD size...

4 hours ago, ImpStarDeuces said:

I know that this might be an unpopular opinion, but FFG can easily speed up the gameplay by dropping the time for a tournament round. As of now, the vast majority of what I have seen is that games often go to time but always finish 6 turns. That generally means there is some wiggle room to cut the fat.

You'd need to change the game in some way to substantially reduce play time. There are a few ways - possibly dropping the point cap is one way to do it, although maybe a better idea is just putting a cap on the number of units on the table. (IE., "No more than 4 ships and no more than 8 squadrons")

What takes time in an Armada game is managing the number of units - the more distinct things you have on the table, the more you have to plan ahead for maneuvering, fiddle around with maneuver templates (probably the single biggest time sink next to...) fiddle around with squadron placement (which is the biggest time sink), etc. FWIW, this has pretty much always been true in X-Wing, too. 7x or 8x TIE Fighter swarms just take longer to play than a Falcon + wingman list. Of course, swarms are no longer viable lists in X-Wing, so you don't really see games over there taking as long, as it remains true in that game that the number of different things moving on the table is what takes time to deal with.

So...if you capped the unit count for tournaments , you'd do wonders in reducing the play time. I mean, heck, look how fast dual-ISD vs dual-MC80 games go - I've seen those wrapped up faster than an X-Wing match. Once you have one player pushing an MC80 and 6 transports and the other player running an ISD and half dozen Gozers...those games take FOREVER to resolve. Probably 4 ships max and 8 squadrons max would make the most sense if you wanted to change the tournament round time to half what it currently is, but I could see some arguments for variation in that.

15 minutes ago, xanderf said:

You'd need to change the game in some way to substantially reduce play time. There are a few ways - possibly dropping the point cap is one way to do it, although maybe a better idea is just putting a cap on the number of units on the table. (IE., "No more than 4 ships and no more than 8 squadrons")

What takes time in an Armada game is managing the number of units - the more distinct things you have on the table, the more you have to plan ahead for maneuvering, fiddle around with maneuver templates (probably the single biggest time sink next to...) fiddle around with squadron placement (which is the biggest time sink), etc. FWIW, this has pretty much always been true in X-Wing, too. 7x or 8x TIE Fighter swarms just take longer to play than a Falcon + wingman list. Of course, swarms are no longer viable lists in X-Wing, so you don't really see games over there taking as long, as it remains true in that game that the number of different things moving on the table is what takes time to deal with.

So...if you capped the unit count for tournaments , you'd do wonders in reducing the play time. I mean, heck, look how fast dual-ISD vs dual-MC80 games go - I've seen those wrapped up faster than an X-Wing match. Once you have one player pushing an MC80 and 6 transports and the other player running an ISD and half dozen Gozers...those games take FOREVER to resolve. Probably 4 ships max and 8 squadrons max would make the most sense if you wanted to change the tournament round time to half what it currently is, but I could see some arguments for variation in that.

I agree with your point that the number of things is the cause of the time issue. But I don't want a limit on the number of STUFF I can bring in a match.

19 minutes ago, xanderf said:

You'd need to change the game in some way to substantially reduce play time. There are a few ways - possibly dropping the point cap is one way to do it, although maybe a better idea is just putting a cap on the number of units on the table. (IE., "No more than 4 ships and no more than 8 squadrons")

What takes time in an Armada game is managing the number of units - the more distinct things you have on the table, the more you have to plan ahead for maneuvering, fiddle around with maneuver templates (probably the single biggest time sink next to...) fiddle around with squadron placement (which is the biggest time sink), etc. FWIW, this has pretty much always been true in X-Wing, too. 7x or 8x TIE Fighter swarms just take longer to play than a Falcon + wingman list. Of course, swarms are no longer viable lists in X-Wing, so you don't really see games over there taking as long, as it remains true in that game that the number of different things moving on the table is what takes time to deal with.

So...if you capped the unit count for tournaments , you'd do wonders in reducing the play time. I mean, heck, look how fast dual-ISD vs dual-MC80 games go - I've seen those wrapped up faster than an X-Wing match. Once you have one player pushing an MC80 and 6 transports and the other player running an ISD and half dozen Gozers...those games take FOREVER to resolve. Probably 4 ships max and 8 squadrons max would make the most sense if you wanted to change the tournament round time to half what it currently is, but I could see some arguments for variation in that.

I'd agree if people weren't getting 6 turns in. That tends not to be the case in Armada. Most other games with time limits tend to make people hustle. Armada let's people contemplate or dawdle depending on your point of view. Drop the time and people will learn to automatically move faster.

2 minutes ago, geek19 said:

I agree with your point that the number of things is the cause of the time issue. But I don't want a limit on the number of STUFF I can bring in a match.

*shrugs*

Question is just whether it's important to reduce the tournament play time or not. I don't see any useful way of doing that without either materially impacting the game (undesirable, IMHO) or putting some external limit on what you can bring to a match. It's certainly something other games have done - Star Fleet Battles, for one, has very much a list-building element like Armada, and regular scenarios would involve a half dozen ships a side easily. Yet, the tournament scene for that game (which was honestly pretty large for its day, nothing like X-Wing now, but probably comparable to Armada's current state at its peak) used "tournament cruisers" which were not only always one ship and one ship only, but they were modified ships from the standard game to perfectly balance them (IE., every single ship ended up with 30 warp boxes and 4 impulse boxes and etc - regardless of whether the original had 30+5 or 32+4 or etc). And that worked to get tournaments that followed the standard rules of the game well enough to totally embrace the flavor of each faction, which still playing very quickly (matches were 60 minutes including setup time).

I don't think Armada needs anything like that, but if you did want to reduce tournament time - putting a limit on the ship count would be one way to do that. I do understand that this might homogenize list types a bit more than desired, so...maybe there could be some way to balance the options out with some variant choices? IE., the 4 ship + 8 squadron, but you can sacrifice one ship for 4 more squadrons or sacrifice 4 squadrons for one more ship? I dunno, something along those lines.