I really don't understand what people are expecting. It's a cloaked starfighter with a special movement gimmick that lets it strike from unexpected positions.

We're not supposed to get a super ship that does everything, or some ridiculous meta warping glass cannon that started the turret dominance in x-wing. No faction is supposed to get such a thing, that's why we had to have 2.0 in the first place.

Besides, "Soft-spoken Slayer" is about the best thing that could ever happen to Whisper

2 hours ago, SEApocalypse said:

Thing is, I have seen already tons of complains that mobile arcs get you just as many shots as PWT and are basically nearly the same ... but I made that point already. So no reason to get into that again. Let's hope you are right.

Two things:

1. Mobile arcs need to be chosen at action time. Repositioning can help make sure they chose poorly.

2. Even if they didn't choose poorly (or didn't need to because you moved first), if you're flying more than one ship (and if you're flying a TIE Phantom, of course you are), then you can outflank them by sending ships in against more than one arc. Force them to choose which one to shoot at, since they can't just use Gunner and shoot at both.

There's also one additional factor: anyone building a list had to take 1.0 turrets into account. With only one ship using the Mobile Firing Arc, it wasn't something you were going to build against, as it was unlikely you were going to face a list with a mobile arc that didn't also contain a turret. That's no longer the case. There are no 360 degree arcs anymore. All turrets are mobile firing arcs. So they can now be game-planned against.

As a side note, with turrets gone, I wonder if I'll get to pull off my dream of executing a Thach Weave in this game...

1 minute ago, thebrettski said:

My dream for the big Phantom reveal is that Echo is the new PS6.

2 bankie 4 lyfe.

Or maybe she gets a benefit for going later? You know, like an Echo

5 minutes ago, Commander Kaine said:

Or maybe she gets a benefit for going later? You know, like an Echo

inb4 double de-cloak

say, now that we don't need to have a 4-point mod super-glued to our pilot card, we might actually put some interesting modifications on the phantom

like after-burners.it's only two charges, but you get two turns of utter maneuvering insanity between a decloak and boost

17 minutes ago, ficklegreendice said:

I really don't understand what people are expecting. It's a cloaked starfighter with a special movement gimmick that lets it strike from unexpected positions.

We're not supposed to get a super ship that does everything, or some ridiculous meta warping glass cannon that started the turret dominance in x-wing. No faction is supposed to get such a thing, that's why we had to have 2.0 in the first place.

Besides, "Soft-spoken Slayer" is about the best thing that could ever happen to Whisper

Especially since in the interviews the devs have talked about how the empire didn't make general purpose craft often if at all, all their craft were highly specialized. Based off what we know of the Tie Bomber and Tie Interceptor in 2.0 I expect they are all sort of built around specific roles/niches. It just puts more emphasis on Imp players during building their squad, knowing what they want the squad to do and skill flying it.

If people want general purpose fighters then Rebels will probably be more appealing since I'm guessing they will be more of a good at everything but master of none as far as their ships go for the most part.

I really like the new Stygium mechanic, it feels so much more thematic than ACD ever was. TIE phantom phases out of cloak to get off a few shots before re-cloaking, but for that few seconds it’s vulnerable to getting shot itself. Very cool.

And the decloak -> evade token -> recloak dynamic sounds very fun. It makes for some difficult choices: Do I spec for the evade to avoid taking 1 damage or do I leave it so I can cloak and get better positioning next round?

Because really, difficult choices are the funnest part of this game. Think about it- every NPE/broken combo of 1.0 was some form of avoiding/removing difficult decisions.

5 minutes ago, Animewarsdude said:

Especially since in the interviews the devs have talked about how the empire didn't make general purpose craft often if at all, all their craft were highly specialized. Based off what we know of the Tie Bomber and Tie Interceptor in 2.0 I expect they are all sort of built around specific roles/niches. It just puts more emphasis on Imp players during building their squad, knowing what they want the squad to do and skill flying it.

If people want general purpose fighters then Rebels will probably be more appealing since I'm guessing they will be more of a good at everything but master of none as far as their ships go for the most part.

Super specialized fighters does seem a VERY imperial thing to do

TIE Advance seems the most generalized that you can get, and even that has a TL gimmick

All ffg needs to do with these ships is get their points right. Once they do, these abilities will allow them to vary drastically in effectiveness depending on how well you play them

Sure all arced ships require manuevering know-how, but with empire you gotta make the most of your gimmicks with more complex and masterful (show-offy) flying.

Seems very thematic to me. After all, most TIEs are deathtraps that you have to be skillful enough to survive in

Tie Phantom is the only ship capable of stacking Focus/evade in the whole game. /Mic drop

2 minutes ago, Rakaydos said:

Tie Phantom is the only ship capable of stacking Focus/evade in the whole game. /Mic drop

I’m not really worried about any ship that is stacking focus/evade on 2 agility (or choosing to not attack me and get 4 agility) with 5 health.

25 minutes ago, Herowannabe said:

I’m not really worried about any ship that is stacking focus/evade on 2 agility (or choosing to not attack me and get 4 agility) with 5 health.

Insert "you will be" Yoda here

Phantom's best defense is not getting shot, but it's not screwed if it does

Provided you didn't do a dumb and let it get focus fired

It's not an ye old Palp ace level tank. Nothing is and nothing is meant to be

Esp because that free evade and cloak falls off if you use it. Gotta keep moving, use obstacles to discourage pursuit, hit and run, actual tactics etc.

This now seems true of all ships. Reinforce apparently only works if the enemy is completely in arc, gotta position properly. Falcon has to manage arc with red boost. Any action he takes sacrifices another capability.

Etc

2 hours ago, HolySorcerer said:

...just a bit sad to see it become a bit less special.

Aside from the whole cloak ability thing....

I will trade my 4th dice for that awesome stygum array, and not being shackled to having the top PS every single time. Echo was a joke and untakeable in anything competitive and whisper was basically unusable because if anything with ps 10 showed up you died.

If you fly the phantom well you get your cloak back. Its an example of amazingly good game design as soon as I read it I knew 2.0 was going to be awesome.

Whisper also looks crazy strong with her ability combined with the new stygum... it's just a really cool well-designed ship. Its now about you and your opponents flying in the new turret/less mods world.

@ficklegreendice I am with everything you said in this thread.

So basically, Phantoms can turn invisible, but only when no one is looking at them...

4 hours ago, ficklegreendice said:

it's hard to find a proper analogy to express just how NOT 1.0 the new falcon is. It's like when you're a tiny kid and you stumble across discarded jewelry and you think you're a millionaire because you haven't learned what cheap imitations are yet. the 1.0 falcon is what you think you're holding in your hands, the 2.0 is what's actually there

I am comparing those mobile firing arcs more to a VI-Ketsu without Latts nor Gyro. Something which still had no problem to keep my Soontir in arc and keep getting shots at him. ?
We were doing extensive testing of that ship when it came out. With single and double casters, usually against my imperial aces or scum aces. Very few rotate arc actions taken as well. Pushing damage into token stacking autothruster aces was still ... let's say hard, but that kind of defense is gone from the game as well and the phantom never had it in the first place.

So let me use your fun analogy myself. You seem to be in disbelief that the glas on my watch or on the home button of a iPhone is indeed a rather large sapphire, while it is actually the real deal. Might not be as pretty as sapphire used in jewelry nor as expensive, but it's the real deal and it's getting the job done rather well … at least as long as you are using it properly.

One thing to notice is that the re-cloack is not an action, so now you can decload, do a k-turn and cload again if needed, and if you get stressed by someone you will not be so f** up. The only bad thing is that if you start your turn stressed you will not get the free evade when you decloack

2 Tallon Roll and blue hard 1s seem pretty massive to me. With the ability to add a different mod or ept equivalent as well, this is gonna be a very different ship. Should be very interesting indeed, I'm imagining it'll be quite distinct.

The one thing point changes for balance can't do, is make a weak ship stronger. I hope that the Phantom can still be worth a decent amount of points. It seems this new one might be less of a potential beast than in 1.0. The thing I always liked about it is that it either does nothing or engages hulk mode and obliterates everything. It's a porcelin bully, which feels pretty Imperial to me

Obviously that needed finessing a lot more but it'd be a bit of a shame if it was toned down to the point of not existing.

If it's a completely different ship then, well, only the model is left of the thing we liked. But I do like the look of this completely new ship in Phantoms clothing.

2 hours ago, Cuz05 said:

2 Tallon Roll and blue hard 1s

I assumed that new dial in the picture would be for the TIE Advanced Prototype, with 2-speed Talon Rolls added.

4 hours ago, SEApocalypse said:

I am comparing those mobile firing arcs more to a VI-Ketsu without Latts nor Gyro. Something which still had no problem to keep my Soontir in arc and keep getting shots at him. ?
We were doing extensive testing of that ship when it came out. With single and double casters, usually against my imperial aces or scum aces. Very few rotate arc actions taken as well. Pushing damage into token stacking autothruster aces was still ... let's say hard, but that kind of defense is gone from the game as well and the phantom never had it in the first place.

So let me use your fun analogy myself. You seem to be in disbelief that the glas on my watch or on the home button of a iPhone is indeed a rather large sapphire, while it is actually the real deal. Might not be as pretty as sapphire used in jewelry nor as expensive, but it's the real deal and it's getting the job done rather well … at least as long as you are using it properly.

Yeah, but there is a vital difference: Ketsu's standard forward arc. Thanks to that you could always create a 180 degree arc, that you could angel to the side of your choice. Without that, the area you can cover is much more narrow which makes it easier to arc-dodge. I think that is also the reason the Falcons arcs covers two opposite sides, rather then giving your two arcs you could angle individually. It prevent you form creating a giant zone of death that your opponent could never hope to escape.

10 hours ago, ficklegreendice said:

You're coming out of cloak with a free evade

If you've dodged your opponent's fire without having to use that evade, you get to cloak (again for free)

The new Stygium what'sit is great. A 3 die phantom is going to be aokay and not something that can be ignored

And it got a hitpoint more to boot, which is not the most exciting change, but it got it nonetheless.

I really like what they did to the Phantom there.

People should also think about NOT decloaking and accept to not fire on some turns, bunkering up for defense that way

It will be a different animal, but i like what i see there.

What they seem to do in 2.0 is generally to limit offense and defense a bit (not adding results via Evade, Fearlessness, Phantom with only 3 attack, ...)

But then they make the dice you have more consistent with evades and Advanced firing comp, and they buff the health of sone ships.

7 minutes ago, ForceM said:

People should also think about NOT decloaking and accept to not fire on some turns, bunkering up for defense that way

It will be a different animal, but i like what i see there.

So how many fickle green dice should cloak be adding to be worth more than one guaranteed evade from the de-cloak?

8 hours ago, HolySorcerer said:

There is also nothing special about a 3-die attack. The 4-die attack made the Phantom special, it has now lost that. We'll have to wait and see if it is a viable ship, but it lost a bit of identity in the transition.

Maybe she will get a cannon slot to compensate?

I wonder if the venerable Heavy Laser Cannon is coming back for 2.0. So far we have seen a bunch of ships being downgraded in red (and green) dice amounts.

11 hours ago, ficklegreendice said:

You're coming out of cloak with a free evade

If you've dodged your opponent's fire without having to use that evade, you get to cloak (again for free)

The new Stygium what'sit is great. A 3 die phantom is going to be aokay and not something that can be ignored

Note that this mechanic is somewhat equivalent to Comm Relay, as you may save your evade by cloacking.

IF Lightweight Frame exists in this game, it could be very good/borderline broken on these babies....but it is not, it will be balanced, as it will simply cost more to equip on the TIE Phantom as squad cost is determined by the App.

2 hours ago, Rossetti1828 said:

I assumed that new dial in the picture would be for the TIE Advanced Prototype, with 2-speed Talon Rolls added.

Ah dang. Yeah.

........I'm still stuck on that R.A.C. with reinforce AND coordinate!

There is going to be so much more skill involved in flying those tanks well!

Can't wait.