I’ll start this discussion off simply, the Hyperspace format is effectively a large banlist. The largest “local” event that most players will travel to will be a Regional/Hyperspace Trial, and to accommodate training for those, many smaller events will likely be Hyperspace as well. This, combined with the fact that the newly-released ships will always be in Hyperspace, will make it be the predominantly played format.
Star wars has historically been drastically under-representative of both women, and people of color. Women of color are especially lacking in the setting, with literally zero appearances in media in the OT, and only starting to be added to the newer canon recently. While the original underrepresentation may be unintentional and not malicious, the setting should try to be as inclusive as possible going forwards.
I came into x-wing semi-recently. I had been pointed to the books/Comics involving Admiral Sloane by a friend, who said that there was a strong black female character in star wars. I initially doubted them, but found them to be enjoyable and the character to be well written. Star wars finally had a character I could associate with as another black woman in some form other than a throwaway background character in an EU book.
The same friend then mentioned that she was a playable character in the X-wing miniatures game, and that she was not simply a token character inserted to fill a slot: Her abilities were game-defining in how squadrons under her command would fly. I had played a couple games of X-wing with said friend, and decided I would try to take the plunge into the game on a larger scale. I bought a conversion kit
With Admiral Rae Sloane’s removal from the Hyperspace format, FFG has effectively banned the game’s only black woman.
