Anyone who knows me knows I love me some Echo. Even in preference to Whisper. In 2.0 a price cut and a compressed Initiative level should see these two return from mothballs.

At I5 Whisper is near the top of the food chain with fewer predators. The Pilot ability is also likely to help with getting cloaked again, while potentially having a bit of extra survival.

Echo at I4 kind of gets his spot back as the ultimate arc dodging headache. While more things have repositioning options, the limit to action economy means Echo can generally do it better.

So what looks optimal and what just sounds fun when loading these two up. How strong could Imperials be if you can get both on the table with a solid 3rd Ace?

I think cloaking might need a buff to be good in 2.0. I am not talking about moving it out of system phase but something to give it some more dodging potential if it stays cloaked instead of trying to pop in and out of attack. I want a cloaked ship to be stalking their prey not just decloak, next turn cloak, next turn decloak, next turn cloak.

Its all about inquisitor and vader crew on phantoms. Gives them force when they need it to survive. Inquisitor lets then instantly cloak when a high ps ship reveals its dial, or do a barrel roll to adjust arc, or take a target lock to hit and get that evade token. Vader allows extra damage or the removal of a green token allow whisper to hit more easily and get the evade.

28 minutes ago, Marinealver said:

I think cloaking might need a buff to be good in 2.0. I am not talking about moving it out of system phase but something to give it some more dodging potential if it stays cloaked instead of trying to pop in and out of attack. I want a cloaked ship to be stalking their prey not just decloak, next turn cloak, next turn decloak, next turn cloak.

That is a good idea, and about the only thing lacking in theme of cloaking. I never liked that the location of a cloaked ship is still plainly visible. They ought to disappear somehow but I have no idea how this could be done easily.

1 hour ago, Infinite_Maelstrom said:

I never liked that the location of a cloaked ship is still plainly visible.

Well, that's why you always move when you decloak and get a bonus to evade - "it's somewhere in that vicinity, but not exactly there".

The other way you could do it - but it'd require a lot more cardboard and plastic - is to create a 'stack' of manoeuvre templates each turn - instead of revealing a manoeuvre template, you add it to the stack. When you decloak, you perform all the manoeuvres in sequence, resolving all obstacle collisions as they happen, but ignoring ship collisions on anything but the last manoeuvre.

1 hour ago, wurms said:

Its all about inquisitor and vader crew on phantoms. Gives them force when they need it to survive. Inquisitor lets then instantly cloak when a high ps ship reveals its dial, or do a barrel roll to adjust arc, or take a target lock to hit and get that evade token. Vader allows extra damage or the removal of a green token allow whisper to hit more easily and get the evade. 

Nice thought. I'd probably put the Inquisitor on Whisper - she's the one who most desperately needs 'fake' higher initiative - echo's decloak ability means you can more easily put yourself in a spot where you don't care what move, boost or whatever a PS6 ace is doing - he might avoid your arc, but isn't going to get a shot at you.

7 hours ago, Ronu said:

How strong could Imperials be if you can get both on the table with a solid 3rd Ace?

The dev's were saying that 3 Aces wobt be the strength of Imperials. I'm thinking more toolbox lists with more ships will be better. One Phantom and a number of cheaper ships.

Fluff-wise, Tie Phantoms decloak if its pilot pulls the trigger for the laser cannons.

So, why not let them decloak in combat phase, right before they fire? This would be fun. The worst pilots would be ace ;D

33 minutes ago, GeneralBergfrühling said:

Fluff-wise, Tie Phantoms decloak if its pilot pulls the trigger for the laser cannons.

So, why not let them decloak in combat phase, right before they fire? This would be fun. The worst pilots would be ace ;D

Originally in 1.0 they decloaked at the beginning of their activation. At PS9 for Whisper, that was game breaking (not dissimilar to the PS11 coordinated boost from Rau > Ghost).

7 minutes ago, JasonCole said:

Originally in 1.0 they decloaked at the beginning of their activation. At PS9 for Whisper, that was game breaking (not dissimilar to the PS11 coordinated boost from Rau > Ghost).

I play X-Wing since wave 2

2e TIE phantoms are probably the single best Juke platform in the game

Which is significant because 2e evade tokens are kinda trash and generally not worth taking the action for. As an added bonus, though...

If Phantoms are truly reduced in cost as promised by the devs, esp if they hit Xwing prices, they're gonna be STRONG provided you leverage their unique manueverability

1 hour ago, GeneralBergfrühling said:

Fluff-wise, Tie Phantoms decloak if its pilot pulls the trigger for the laser cannons.

So, why not let them decloak in combat phase, right before they fire? This would be fun. The worst pilots would be ace ;D

Because they would be broken that way.

Just now, heychadwick said:

Because they would be broken that way.

Who knows.

I'd love to test it ... Echo would be so cool

1 hour ago, GeneralBergfrühling said:

Who knows.

I'd love to test it ... Echo would be so cool

I would hate it. I refuse to play against them in 1.0 and would continue if it were allowed.

2 hours ago, GeneralBergfrühling said:

Who knows.

I'd love to test it ... Echo would be so cool

We do know though lol

11 hours ago, Infinite_Maelstrom said:

That is a good idea, and about the only thing lacking in theme of cloaking. I never liked that the location of a cloaked ship is still plainly visible. They ought to disappear somehow but I have no idea how this could be done easily.

The best way I can think of is decloaking happens in the system phase.

If you are still cloaked at the start of combat you may perform sort of a weaker cloaking positioning (using the 1 speed templates instead of the 2) at the start of engagement and receive a weapons disabled token. Mostly defense but you don't get that Wave 4 I arc dodge attack and gain +2 agility all in the same turn. IF you are attacking you should be vulnerable. IMHO The Phantom should still be Firepower 4 but I know the devs are worried about how meta breaking (you could call them the 1st domino in power creep) they were. With decloak in the system phase I don't think that is too much of a problem.

Phantoms should use the 'reserve' mechanics, to suddenly appear from nowhere in the table. Much like Bobba deploys from asteroids, or Han from thin air.

That would be a fair representation of their cloaking abilities, specially with the neutered 2.0 cloak mechanic.

Since we don't know all the cards yet, it may yet be the case.... Perhaps a with modification, system or configuration exclusive to phantoms… But if not, it truly seems like a wasted opportunity.

13 hours ago, heychadwick said:

The dev's were saying that 3 Aces wobt be the strength of Imperials. I'm thinking more toolbox lists with more ships will be better. One Phantom and a number of cheaper ships.

In this case the Phantoms crew could be part of the tools while a 3rd Ace draws attention from the Phantoms. I stress could, since we do not know what type of upgrades the Phantoms will have.

The fact swarms are being encouraged may not mean that solid players won’t make use of Aces in creative ways. Who knows maybe two of the Generics as part of a Generic Swarm is the key. Jumping around as they do while pushing with a traditional mini-swarm might create great shots. We always said, Phantoms especially the Generics suffered from too low PS and were not worth their weight now with some upgrading and compressed Initiative they don’t suffer like they used to.

20 hours ago, GeneralBergfrühling said:

Fluff-wise, Tie Phantoms decloak if its pilot pulls the trigger for the laser cannons.

So, why not let them decloak in combat phase, right before they fire? This would be fun. The worst pilots would be ace ;D

In 1e I've been suggesting an errata to cloak token for a while such that you can discard it when you activate (I.e. without decloaking) to make an attack so as to make lower ps and non-ACD cloak actually worthwhile outside permacloak builds.

No idea how applicable that would be to 2e though.

On 6/13/2018 at 8:13 AM, Infinite_Maelstrom said:

I never liked that the location of a cloaked ship is still plainly visible. They ought to disappear somehow but I have no idea how this could be done easily.

Remove the ship from it's base when it's cloaked,. put it back on when it's uncloaked. Ta-da!