I dropped out during the great 1.0 power creep. Creep wasn't the right word, that indicates it was moving slowly. Anyway, the point is, I got 2.0 core and Imp/Reb upgrade sets for 50% off in a store closing. Now if the ffg media machine is to believed, everything should be more balanced. Given that premise, are the classic movie ships (i.e. X, Y, A, B, TIEs) competitive again? I get that some upgrades may be required to makes certain builds/lists work, but are the ships in general good enough unlike in 1.0 where they were display models only?

As one might expect, it varies by ship and pilot and some are in better spots than others, but in general, yes.

I can't really think of a better example than the World championship just gone. The final table had 8 ships involved, half of which were movie ships (a TIE Advanced, an A-wing, a B-wing, and a X-wing), and three more (a TIE Advanced Proto and two Z-95s) that are TV canon, if not movie ships.

2.0 is far from perfect, but if you're interested in being able to fly a pretty wide array of your models, it is succeeding pretty well.

The top 32 at worlds as a whole was exceptional! Very diverse and every single list had a shot IMHO. No auto wins!

Things are much more balanced now; very few ships are unusable, and the notion of 'mandatory' upgrades to make ships work/viable is pretty much dead.

There are outliers (the JumpMaster 5K is widely regarded as being crap), but times are good for the iconic ships.

Yes - movie ships are largely quite playable. The only unplayable ships are, ironically, the worst offenders of 1.0

Granted, some are mostly one or two pilots - generally t65 xwings on table are Luke or Wedge. Jake and Arvel are really the only As that see play.

Nearly all the ships see competitive play these days, except a few outliers like the E-Wing, Aggressor, Scyk and Jumpmaster. The Worlds final saw an X-Wing, an A-Wing, a B-Wing and two Headhunters face off against a TIE Advanced x1, a Phantom and an Interceptor. No Nymranda in sight!

Edit: Wait, I'm misremembering. Swap out one of the Empire ships for a TIE Advanced v1. TV show ship is close enough to a movie ship though, sort of?

2 X-wings, 2 B-wings and a Y-wing can do some serious work for you.

The game is in a really good spot and I've got some high hopes for January's point change.

Plus Epic Scenarios and Huge Ships can really shake up the monotony of 200v200 dogfights.

• Rebels: Pretty good. The [?]-Wing ship power rankings are probably B, U, X, A, Y. Falcon is playable but not busted.
  • Best non-movie ship: Z-95? Rebels don't fly much which isn't movie, at least not in meta lists.
• Empire: Vader is one of the best ships in the game. Soontir is solid. TIE Fighters are playable. Bombers and Strikers are decent filler. Lambda is great, but probably best at supporting TV-show ships.
  • Best non-movie ship: TIE/v1 Prototype from Rebels, or TIE Phantom.
• Scum: Boba Fett is amazing, and Koshka Frost is pretty good. Firespray is the only classic movie. Scum Falcon not so hot.
  • Nearly everything Scum is non-movie, but that's scum. Fang is from Rebels, and 4-LOM is an ESB Bounty Hunter, even if we never saw the Mist Hunter on screen. But Starvipers and Kihraxzes and HWKs are all old extended universe stuff.
• Resistance: Well, Resistance isn't amazing, but it's technically all movie.
  • Best lists seem to have Finn; not so much the other mains.
• First Order: Similar, but a bit better than Resistance.
  • Kylo is one of the best pilots.
• Republic: Like Resistance or First Order, but even stronger.
  • Big-name movie characters have typically been the best pilots--Anakin, Obi, Mace, Ric Olie (he's a bit of a stretch, but he's in the most iconic ship of the prequel trilogy).
• Separatists: Vultures and Nantex are solid.
  • I don't recall the Belbullab on the big screen (I mostly just forgot it), but it's typically a 1-of, along side movie ships.

More importantly with the move to 2nd Edition there are fewer "doesn't matter what the dice were here are five hits" combos and such. Passive mods and action economy are still important but there are more options for getting it. It is more difficult to win in list-building. In my opinion though when they say things are "diverse" be careful not to take it as any pilot but more as any model with a "correct" pilot. You can fly a TIE Interceptor... if it's Soontir. You can fly the TIE Advanced... if it's Vader.

Generally, if you have a reasonable concept of how the game works in your list-building you are not beaten before ships are deployed. Someone said above X-wings are usually Wedge and Luke. Wedge and Luke have passive mods. Flying counts more and there isn't anything even vaguely as abusive as things at the end of 1st but you still need to look for passive mods and action economy preferably at high initiative. It is still X-wing. It is parsecs and parsecs away from combo-wing though.

14 minutes ago, theBitterFig said:

• I don't recall the Belbullab on the big screen, but it's typically a 1-of, along side movie ships.

Grievous' ship, that Obi Wan takes after killing him to go and meet Bail Organa and Yoda in that asteroid field.

At 2:55 mark in this video:

16 minutes ago, theBitterFig said:

I don't recall the Belbullab on the big screen, but it's typically a 1-of, along side movie ships.

It is fairly prominent in Episode III. Grievous tries to escape Utapau in it and his fight with Obi-wan happens around it. Obi-Wan leaves Utapau in it. The ship also makes appearances in Clone Wars animated. It is very much a ship from the screen. Not Falcon or X-wing level but neither was it dug out of the background.

31 minutes ago, theBitterFig said:

• • I don't recall the Belbullab on the big screen, but it's typically a 1-of, along side movie ships.

I was gonna say the same thing as @Frimmel below.

7 minutes ago, Frimmel said:

It is fairly prominent in Episode III. Grievous tries to escape Utapau in it and his fight with Obi-wan happens around it. Obi-Wan leaves Utapau in it. The ship also makes appearances in Clone Wars animated. It is very much a ship from the screen. Not Falcon or X-wing level but neither was it dug out of the background.

2 hours ago, theBitterFig said:

• Separatists: Vultures and Nantex are solid.
  • I don't recall the Belbullab on the big screen, but it's typically a 1-of, along side movie ships.

Belbullab is very much a movie ship, while the Nantex isn't, as far as I know.

2 minutes ago, NilsTillander said:

Belbullab is very much a movie ship, while the Nantex isn't, as far as I know.

Only slightly above Quadjumper-levels of movieness.

3 minutes ago, XPav said:

[Picture]

I stand corrected, thank you!

A quadjumper appeared in background of the latest episode of Mandalorian

33 minutes ago, Silver_leader said:

A quadjumper appeared in background of the latest episode of Mandalorian

FFG needs to reprint it to keep up with the Mandalorian merch demand!

Even if they're not ERMAGUD TOPTIER, every rebel named pilot in an OT ship (i.e, distinctly NOT Saw's x-wings) is more than capable of pulling their weight...except maybe Porkins

Also, the Nantex actually flew around and shot at + killed a thing, so it's WAY above the Quad