I've been running a fantastically unscientific poll over at Wikia (scroll down on our front page, in case you want to participate):

Which Future Change Interests You Most?

1. Buffed T-65 X-Wing
2. Buffed U-Wing
3. TIE Reaper
4. Just Nerf Harpoon Missiles!

Being the salty bastard that I am, I put in the first vote at #4 because I feel like Harpoons are not fun at all to fight (and I'm still grumpy about recently losing my Decimator in a single combat round to harpoons).

Fascinatingly though, people are voting for the T-65 instead, and on review, I'm realizing I agree with the sentiment. As of this writing, 27 out of 44 votes are for the X-Wing, 7 for U-Wing, 6 for nerfing Harpoons, and just 4 for the Reaper. 44 votes is not a large sample size, and it's possible the Wikia community is distinct enough to slant the results one way or another... but still it's interesting that the results are so heavily weighted toward X-Wings.

Harpoons suck to fight against and they feel like blatant, mindless power creep. I'd certainly love to see them nerfed even though I have little optimism it would ever happen (they feel like the new damage norm and everything needs to be buffed to that level now). But it turns out that saltiness isn't the norm. The promise of finally buffing the namesake of the game and restoring them to their rightful place in the meta? That has a lot of people excited, and for good reason.

What are your thoughts?

Harpoons may be a pain for some lists, but they make arc-locked ships competitive again.

I wouldn’t mind seeing frequent matchups of harpoon gunboats vs T65s and less turret combo-wing.

The Uwing is in the Renegades pack solely to make FFG more money. It’s the same concept as when they put the advanced fix and Palp in the Raider pack, just less expensive a tax. (The fact I’m one of those nuts who will still try and fly it somewhere is irrelevant... I also get use out of my huge ships).

9 minutes ago, Wazat said:

• TIE Reaper

TIE Reaper

A choice you can depend on.

Go to the polls! Vote for TIE Reaper now!

Harpoons gotta go. ordnance has been stupid from the beginning because chance to hit and damage are the same stat in X-wing.

this means a missile/torp is OP or worthless based on its comparison to primary attack value, and basically cant be balanced. the exception is control weapons like ion torpedos etc.

in short if a missile/torp does more damage for the points than a primary, its an auto include. less, its unplayably bad.

that isnt how it should work. in real life dogfights ceased to exist when guidance systems became viable because the longer range missile wins 100% of the time. star wars os WW2 combat in space, and in WW2 air to air missiles didnt exist.

so in the current format we should either have expensive high risk/reward missiles or none at all. the game system cant accomodate cheap powerful ordnance and 2 dice primary weapons both

Haha, feels like that should be a meme -- Empire propaganda posters telling you to vote for the TIE Reaper.

(edit: that was in reply to Celestial Lizards)

If the T-65 is OP I’ll be happy. It’s a low-PS arc-locked jouster. If that’s the meta, it’s a game I want to play.

I’m almost more excited for the U-Wing because I frickin love that ship, and right now it’s just below meme tier. I can put some flavor of X-Wing on the table if I really want, but I just can’t manage to bust out the U’s.

The Reaper I think will have one of the best possible effects on the meta. Imperial aces will be much stronger with a better Palp shuttle and Krennick, and more aces means more arc-locked ships.

And I won’t derail the thread with a Harpoons argument, since there’s already ten redundant and salt-filled pages of that in another thread.

There is a Uwing build that is working right now.

30 minutes ago, Vontoothskie said:

Harpoons gotta go. ordnance has been stupid from the beginning because chance to hit and damage are the same stat in X-wing.

this means a missile/torp is OP or worthless based on its comparison to primary attack value, and basically cant be balanced. the exception is control weapons like ion torpedos etc.

in short if a missile/torp does more damage for the points than a primary, its an auto include. less, its unplayably bad.

that isnt how it should work. in real life dogfights ceased to exist when guidance systems became viable because the longer range missile wins 100% of the time. star wars os WW2 combat in space, and in WW2 air to air missiles didnt exist.

so in the current format we should either have expensive high risk/reward missiles or none at all. the game system cant accomodate cheap powerful ordnance and 2 dice primary weapons both

While I'm not sure I agree with hit and damage being different stats, I do agree with pretty much the rest of the sentiment. Ordnance development has been all-or-nothing and torps/missiles need to be more than just an alternate to your primary weapon attack. Three ways to differentiate torps/missiles are:

A. The weapon inflicts a special attack (ion/jam/stress/etc.)

B. The weapon has a different range than primaries (for example, out to 4).

C. The weapon has a different arc than primaries (all targets in a 180-degree arc).

The few things that people generally like is that Harpoons

-**** defense stacking
-Deal lasting damage to rebel regen cancer.

-Make small-base ships with only a primary arc matter.

The issue is that Rebel Damage mitigation (Fat Regen aces, Fat Turrets) have gotten super ******* strong to the point that anything capable of touching them blows bad ships like the Firespray, TIE Fighter, or T-65 out of the water.

If you touch Harpoons without heavy, and extensive, nerfs to Fat Turrets, Bombs, Regen, and damage mitigation, you will have practically no ships that use just their main firing arc that have a primary goal of using it to do damage

The other issue is people complaining that it's better than Conc- Conc missiles were terrible already, so that's a bit of a **** comparison. Releasing another upgrade at that level would be a mistake- You just have **** Assault Missiles then.

I was just wondering, as a casual player, where the threads are that should be frothing at the bit to find out the plans for Saw G's X Wings...

Maybe that is the problem though.... The fix is going to make all future (playable) X Wings officially Partisan. Rogue squadron and the rest of the rebel X wings don't cut it in this game universe unless they join Saw G's mob. Sad really...

I still want to know what it is though .... (add one more to T65 fix... )

7 minutes ago, Darth Meanie said:

While I'm not sure I agree with hit and damage being different stats, I do agree with pretty much the rest of the sentiment. Ordnance development has been all-or-nothing and torps/missiles need to be more than just an alternate to your primary weapon attack. Three ways to differentiate torps/missiles are:

A. The weapon inflicts a special attack (ion/jam/stress/etc.)

B. The weapon has a different range than primaries (for example, out to 4).

C. The weapon has a different arc than primaries (all targets in a 180-degree arc).

ive made and tested a ton of custom cards and I cant find anything that works balance wise without seperate to hit/damage.

missiles are fun idea, just not thematic or priced at a point where they work in game.

there are 3 missiles fired in the entirety of the original trilogy, all 3 fired at death stars. why the **** is this whole game ordnance wars all of the sudden

2 minutes ago, Vontoothskie said:

there are 3 missiles fired in the entirety of the original trilogy, all 3 fired at death stars. why the **** is this whole game ordnance wars all of the sudden

Because this game isn't based on the original trilogy, it's based on the PC game it took it's name from, in which ordnance played a prominent role.

7 minutes ago, Kaptin Krunch said:

The few things that people generally like is that Harpoons

-**** defense stacking
-Deal lasting damage to rebel regen cancer.

-Make small-base ships with only a primary arc matter.

The issue is that Rebel Damage mitigation (Fat Regen aces, Fat Turrets) have gotten super ******* strong to the point that anything capable of touching them blows bad ships like the Firespray, TIE Fighter, or T-65 out of the water.

If you touch Harpoons without heavy, and extensive, nerfs to Fat Turrets, Bombs, Regen, and damage mitigation, you will have practically no ships that use just their main firing arc that have a primary goal of using it to do damage

The other issue is people complaining that it's better than Conc- Conc missiles were terrible already, so that's a bit of a **** comparison. Releasing another upgrade at that level would be a mistake- You just have **** Assault Missiles then.

to each their own, but I havethe exact opposite experience. the ships using the missiles are countering everything that shuts down rebel regen, and dont have a counter themselves.

harpoons counter swarms, tanks, jousters, regen, aces, agile ships, arc dodgers, low ps, etc.

harpoons are countered by higher pilot skill ordnance

Just now, FTS Gecko said:

Because this game isn't based on the original trilogy, it's based on the PC game it took it's name from, in which ordnance played a prominent role.

eh I played X-wing and Tie Fighter when they came out, and blasters were the main weapon. I beat both games and im pretty sure the only thing i used missiles for was taking down objectives

Adv missiles were key to popping agile enemies in the initial joust in the XvT series of games in my experience. Likewise all ordnance was critical in keeping bombers from firing, especially "large" ones. Point blank torps or heavy missiles, no targetting, were also essential in taking down heavy targets like B wings and larger ships quickly.

At least, that's how I played 'em....

3 minutes ago, Vontoothskie said:

eh I played X-wing and Tie Fighter when they came out, and blasters were the main weapon. I beat both games and im pretty sure the only thing i used missiles for was taking down objectives

Yeah, I played X-Wing and TIE Fighter when they came out as well, and I used them all the time. Concussion Missiles and Proton Torpedoes were both used extensively in X-Wing (both by you and against you by TIE Bombers and Gunboats). TIE Fighter introduced Advanced Concussion Missiles, Advanced Proton Torpedoes, Mag Pulse Warheads, Heavy Rockets and Heavy Space Bombs as well.

As @Larky Bobble said, use of ordnance was key in all the X-Wing games to quickly take down bombers attacking objectives. See a squadron of Gunboats exiting hyperspace or Bombers being launched from a Star Destroyer? Throw out some missiles to destroy them ASAP from long range or at the very least force them into an evasive action and away from their target.

And you cannot tell me you played the X-Wing games without seeing the infamous "Missile Warning: Key To Target" message.

1 minute ago, Larky Bobble said:

Adv missiles were key to popping agile enemies in the initial joust in the XvT series of games in my experience. Likewise all ordnance was critical in keeping bombers from firing, especially "large" ones. Point blank torps or heavy missiles, no targetting, were also essential in taking down heavy targets like B wings and larger ships quickly.

At least, that's how I played 'em....

yeah I think thats just what you were flying. the heavy fighters could chew through bomber petty quickly and the only real issue I remeber was escorting squishy targets and protecting them from big waves. i never played X-wing vs Tie fighter, but in X-wing the goal was ussually to get behind something and guess their trajectory while leading it. you were ussually up against dozens of fighters with a couple missiles at most, no way you could use missiles as your primary weapon

Harpoons are fine. Completely and utterly fine.

My big concern for T-65s is, will the boost actually put them back in the meta? Let alone keep them there for any notable period of time?

Because we've seen very ambitious, even aggressive boosts like Vaksai that still fell quite short overall.

3 minutes ago, FTS Gecko said:

Yeah, I played X-Wing and TIE Fighter when they came out as well, and I used them all the time. Concussion Missiles and Proton Torpedoes were both used extensively in X-Wing (both by you and against you by TIE Bombers and Gunboats). TIE Fighter introduced Advanced Concussion Missiles, Advanced Proton Torpedoes, Mag Pulse Warheads, Heavy Rockets and Heavy Space Bombs as well.

As @Larky Bobble said, use of ordnance was key in all the X-Wing games to quickly take down bombers attacking objectives. See a squadron of Gunboats exiting hyperspace or Bombers being launched from a Star Destroyer? Throw out some missiles to destroy them ASAP from long range or at the very least force them into an evasive action and away from their target.

And you cannot tell me you played the X-Wing games without seeing the infamous "Missile Warning: Key To Target" message.

I didnt say I never used them, I said they werent what the game was about.

P.s. Its been nearly 25 years since I played the game, so my recollection might be off.

P.P.S. why the **** hasnt there been a new Star wars dedicated flight sim since the 90s? wtf

4 minutes ago, Wazat said:

My big concern for T-65s is, will the boost actually put them back in the meta? Let alone keep them there for any notable period of time?

Because we've seen very ambitious, even aggressive boosts like Vaksai that still fell quite short overall.

"The meta" is what everyone whines about. The best thing for a component is not to be The Meta.

5 minutes ago, Stay On The Leader said:

Harpoons are fine. Completely and utterly fine.

you'll love the new torp then!

$$$ munitions: 0 points

if your collection is worth more than your opponents, you may roll attack dice equal to the difference in value

28 minutes ago, Vontoothskie said:

you'll love the new torp then!

$$$ munitions: 0 points

if your collection is worth more than your opponents, you may roll attack dice equal to the difference in value

I always like getting a good bang for my buck. . .

17 minutes ago, Vontoothskie said:

to each their own, but I havethe exact opposite experience. the ships using the missiles are countering everything that shuts down rebel regen, and dont have a counter themselves.

harpoons counter swarms, tanks, jousters, regen, aces, agile ships, arc dodgers, low ps, etc.

harpoons are countered by higher pilot skill ordnance

This entire thread can be summed up with the below-

Yeah, it's a problem that fat turrets named Nym and Miranda can use Harpoons as well- If you nerf Harpoons, they still have their secondary weapon turrets, multiple bomb placement locations (EI, Traj Simulator, Genius, etc) regen, and re-positioning, and they switch immediately to Homing missiles.

In order-

harpoons counter swarms (Which died when Deadeye got nerfed, as they preyed on Deadeye Scouts, Deadeye Scouts ate Dengaroo, and Dengaroo Ate swarms?)

tanks (AKA 'fat' ships, which is a good thing?)

jousters (Not really- Harpoons are the jousters now. Also, with even basic range control, you can avoid any non-turret-bomber harpoon shots)

regen (Which we are all desperately asking for?)

Aces, agile ships, arc dodgers (If your Vader or Soontir eats a Harpoon and takes damage from it, you straight-up got outplayed)

low ps (Only low-PS ships that can't reposition, which were dead already?

If you are fighting against **** like 3 Nus and Quickdraw and losing to it, legitimately and unironically get good.

Your asking for harpoons to get nerfed because some fat bombing turrets can use them is a really roundabout way to nerf fat bombing turrets.

I get it, you want to have your **** like XXBB be viable and 3BQD destroys it. I'm still mourning the loss of the TIE swarm- Harpoons aren't what is keeping it down, fat turrets and bombs are. The issue is that 3BQD kills you fast when you make mistakes infront of it, while you get to flop around for 75 minutes vs Nym Miranda eating bombs and turret fire, and maybe a harpoon, and then lose a game you never had a chance at winning. I'd be on board with a harpoon nerf, but all of the cancer needs to be nerfed into oblivion as well.

It's like Chemo- Chemo isn't fun if you have cancer, but you need it to stay alive. If harpoons go, watch the meta turn into NymMiranda and Wookiee Wonderland overnight and player counts plummet like they were before the Genius nerf.

@Kaptin Krunch: That's a pretty elitist and abrasive way to describe people who don't agree with you, or even, haven't yet agreed with you. Yes, multiple things need to be nerfed with Harpoons, including rebel regen and other fortress builds. But you're not going to garner much agreement with your choice of wording. You seem more focused on insulting people than convincing them, which feels like severely underplaying your argument, even poisoning it. That can't be your intent, can it?

And the Genius, Advanced SLAM, Jumpmaster nerfs... these happened without a total rehaul of the entire game. They were targeted nerfs to remove specific problems. They were not held back until the entire game could be rebalanced with them, and the resurgence of their enemies is a problem but not worth withholding the fix. Nerfing harpoons shouldn't have to be withheld until all other potential problems can be anticipated and solved. And saying "please nerf harpoons" doesn't mean we're all too stupid to also want nerfs to rebel regen and friends. It just means we feel the harpoons considerably more intensely than, say, Miranda or Wookies. Harpoons are the new enemy, and new threats can sure as **** leave people nostalgic for the problems of the past, the good old days when we were mainly worried about shield regen or fat tanks. That... wow, that doesn't make anyone here ore elsewhere nearly as ignorant, stupid, or dismissable as you insist.

And another point that gets glossed over for meta discussions: Right now, if you're fielding munitions that aren't harpoons (other than tracers?), chances are you're playing casual. Sure you can get other munitions to work (mainly Proton Torps), but not as well as harpoons. Not even close. The question now is, will FFG nerf harpoons, or rebalance other munitions to operate at that level, or leave the situation as it is (one objectively correct munition choice to rule them all). My guess is Harpoons have been left alone to let gunboats have their fun, but eventually FFG will have to address them one way or another.

As for their effect on the rest of the meta, they feel at least as ugly as rebel regen and other meta evils. Sure, you can play in a way that outplays the harpoons, "git good or get out". But that applies to everything that dominates the meta: correctly build and fly a specific counter-play, or you're doing it wrong; get out. That's independent of whether it's a problem worthy of a nerf. Rather, dominant fleet designs forcing rigid counter-plays and eschewing everything else is what FFG usually targets with its nerfs. Certainly what they should target, IMO.

And on that same note, I wonder if any sane buff to the T-65 can make/keep them relevant... time will tell. People sure freaked out about the "OP" Vaksai title, but it never quite delivered. Same concerns extend to the U-Wing... I worry that in the current meta of X-Wing, U-Wings and X-Wings themselves are just not well-suited. Pump them with new abilities, even ones that sound OP, and there could still be something missing once they hit the table.

And yet, I still find excuses to fly Wedge and Wes in OT tournaments, so honestly, I think there's a lot of reason to hope. Even as X-Wings have been left behind, many of us have found excuses to play them simply because of fun pilot abilities, or their iconic status. So here's to hope!