Besides scale and available factions, could someone help me get an idea of the differences between armada and x-wing?
Is the community for Armada as easily to find as x-wing?
prospective player questions
X-wing is checkers, Armada is chess. In X-wing there is a ton of RNG, in both offense and defense. X-wing is a more traditional move-and-shoot style (XCOM) where Armada is shoot-then-move. To further abuse the XCOM comparison, think how careful you would have to position your team if you only ever got Overwatch/ambush shots.
The community is smaller than X-wing but there are spikes of activity in some places where it is more popular. Mostly due to folks championing it with free-to-plays and running beginner tourneys and campaigns.
Ok now I miss my local scene...
Armada is fleet battles, like sailing ships passing by one another.
X-wing is sports cars trying to avoid one another's shots whilst still getting to shoot their enemy.
Both are fun. The other big difference is time needed to play: x-wing takes around an hour and Armada needs 2 hours. Online versions are slower though.
13 minutes ago, Gilarius said:Armada is fleet battles, like sailing ships passing by one another.
X-wing is sports cars trying to avoid one another's shots whilst still getting to shoot their enemy.
Both are fun. The other big difference is time needed to play: x-wing takes around an hour and Armada needs 2 hours. Online versions are slower though.
Gotcha that helps a lot thank you ( still don't know which to pick) how does campaigns work in armada
Edited by gamefreak180I recently made the same decision. I wasnt sure if i should play X-Wing or Armada but ultimatly settled on Armada.
As a huge Star Wars Fan there is just nothing like commandeering an Imperial Star Destroyer and rolling like 10 dice just blowing up a little Corvette.
Having played a little X-Wing online, I also found that i enjoy the depth in Armada gameplay a lot more.
But both are games in which you can sink a high amount of time (and Money) and you can have a lot of fun with.
5 minutes ago, Jansen007 said:I recently made the same decision. I wasnt sure if i should play X-Wing or Armada but ultimatly settled on Armada.
As a huge Star Wars Fan there is just nothing like commandeering an Imperial Star Destroyer and rolling like 10 dice just blowing up a little Corvette.
Having played a little X-Wing online, I also found that i enjoy the depth in Armada gameplay a lot more.
But both are games in which you can sink a high amount of time (and Money) and you can have a lot of fun with.
What is the difference of depth are the ships more customizable? And what about named characters?
For one in X-Wing you got like 3 X-Wings against 3 Tie-Fighters. In Armada you have like 4 Capital Ships and like 10 Fighters on both sides. Besides that i find the shot-first move-last gameplay way more tactical.
Both have a lot of named characters. In X-Wing the Ships are mostly named after them. In Armada they act as upgrade cards, like commanders or officers.
41 minutes ago, gamefreak180 said:What is the difference of depth are the ships more customizable? And what about named characters?
They both have plenty of upgrades to customize your ships and plenty of characters both in upgrades and as pilots. X-Wing has obviously more pilots than Armada, but Armada has at least all the most important ones.
Other distinction is the number of factions as X-Wing has 7 if I'm not forgetting any and Armada only 2 but will be getting at least 2 more when Clone Wars arrive, if everything goes well, by end of this year.
Gamewise, if you like fast paced and more dice dependant games, go with X-Wing. If you like more slow and tactical games, go with Armada. Armada also have dice, but only for attack. As X-Wing has also dice for defense, I found that the luck factor is greater.
In my completely subjective opinion I'd recomend Armada as it's one of my favorite games (or probably my numer 1 favorite) while I never ended up liking X-Wing too much. Have plenty of ships as the models are great but the game itself didn't catch me.
1 hour ago, gamefreak180 said:Gotcha that helps a lot thank you ( still don't know which to pick) how does campaigns work in armada
To preface: every game has a bit of a narrative, because the first player chooses 1 of the second player’s 3 objective cards (special scenarios with win conditions.) For example, a Rebel fleet might try to protect 2 stations of unarmed civilians from an Imperial battlegroup. Or the Empire might try to seize an abandoned mining facility to deny a Rebel supply raid.
There are currently 2 dedicated campaign expansions (both of which are good to own for the components alone.) The Corellian Conflict is basically a 3v3, with a star map full of planets to fight over with unique benefits and pitfalls. The campaign often culminates in a clash between 2 mega fleets, with reinforcements periodically jumping in from hyperspace.
The other campaign, Rebellion in the Rim, has a lot more moving parts and seems to focus on a skirmish format, but I’m not well-acquainted yet (curse you covid.) I’ve seen some great narrative-focused battlereports from @RedCastleGames .
Also, the game practically begs for home brew campaigns once a player is familiar enough with balance.
Is there a distinctive play style between factions. My other star wars game is legion so been looking for a good companion for it
18 minutes ago, gamefreak180 said:Is there a distinctive play style between factions. My other star wars game is legion so been looking for a good companion for it
Not really. There are enough ships on each side that you can assemble whatever play style you’d like. Though if you want to generalize the Imperial fleets tend to have access to more large ships and anti-fighter squadrons, while Rebels have a few more small ships and slower bomber/multi role squadrons.
One comment on depth of play: you have to plan ahead in Armada more than X-wing, due to the command dial mechanic (if you have larger ships). You might regret setting a particular command 2 turns ago, or you might relish your foresight as you reveal exactly what you need!
As others have said, Armada is much more of a slow thinking game that rewards having a plan. The big ships move like big ships. They are hard to speed up or slow down and hard to turn around.
X wing is a fast paced, think on your feet game. The ships move like nippy fighters where doing a complete 180 is only a move or 2 away.
To further the comparison, Armada usually goes for 6 turns over the course of 2-4 hours. X wing has dozens of turns in the course of a single hour.
8 minutes ago, Flengin said:As others have said, Armada is much more of a slow thinking game that rewards having a plan. The big ships move like big ships. They are hard to speed up or slow down and hard to turn around.
X wing is a fast paced, think on your feet game. The ships move like nippy fighters where doing a complete 180 is only a move or 2 away.
To further the comparison, Armada usually goes for 6 turns over the course of 2-4 hours. X wing has dozens of turns in the course of a single hour.
So armada is going to be a great companion to legion then sweet. Is there any particular buy order other than hold off on the super star destroyer and save it for last?
1 hour ago, gamefreak180 said:So armada is going to be a great companion to legion then sweet. Is there any particular buy order other than hold off on the super star destroyer and save it for last?
The most important thing to buy after the core set is an extra pack of dice.
An extra maneuver tool is also good as you can build it to being only two notches long, which is very handy when moving slow moving ships in a cramped situation.
After that, buy what you love. Every ship is distinct. Though it does depend on what your aims are somewhat. Eg. Are you looking to win torments, play campaigns, just having a fun time playing certain types of fleets in casual play etc.
In the beginning, I had bought both X-Wing and Armada but ended up sticking with Armada because whereas I could use X-Wings in Armada, I couldn't use a Star Destroyer in X-Wing. It's a combined arms thing. However, I do like the miniatures in X-Wing better because of their jewel-like quality.
1 hour ago, Flengin said:After that, buy what you love. Every ship is distinct. Though it does depend on what your aims are somewhat. Eg. Are you looking to win torments, play campaigns, just having a fun time playing certain types of fleets in casual play etc.
All 3. With preferably empire which seem to have more firepower and TIEs then again rebels could be fun too well from aesthetics and the millennium falcon
Edited by gamefreak18011 hours ago, gamefreak180 said:Is there any particular buy order other than hold off on the super star destroyer and save it for last?
Generally you can get the ships you like the most. For myself i found that there are a few nice expansions to get into Armada. Namely the Chimaera Expansion for the Empire or the Profundity for the Rebels.
Espacially the Chimaera is nice as it comes with 2 Mandalorian Squadrons and its just a beautiful and powerful ship.
As for the dice packs and maneuver tools. Be sure to get atleast one of each with the Core Set. It makes playing much more easy and enjoyable.
10 hours ago, gamefreak180 said:All 3. With preferably empire which seem to have more firepower and TIEs then again rebels could be fun too well from aesthetics and the millennium falcon
Ok, so the other things I would suggest you buy are 2 packs of flotillas (Rebel Transports and Imperial Assault carriers) for each side and both campaign packs.
Each campaign pack comes with an additional 12 objectives to add to the core set's 12. On the one hand this'll help with the competitive side as it'll give you access to the strongest objectives for your fleet. On the other hand the objectives will contain some great inspiration for how to build scenarios that can play side by side with a game of Legion. While there are some other cool things in these packs as well, be warned that they don't come with any actual ships or squadrons.
The flotillas look weak at first glance but (particularly the Rebel ones) are actually some of the strongest options available competitively speaking. To illustrate, they come packaged with an inherent weakness but since their release they've had to receive three additional nerfs to stop them from dominating tournaments. One of these nerfs can be found here:
There are also two tournament rules that you can only put two flotillas into a fleet and that they can't hold the table by themselves.
Beyond that, buy what appeals to you. Though good luck finding some of the expansions these days. Some of them are just plain hard to find for a decent price.
I am tempted to get some empire and the starter just to get my feet wet and then go clone Wars once it comes out since that is my focus for Legion. Nah ill probably stick to empire i saw i could get tie defenders and admiral thrawn and that is going to be awesome. I'd only play droids if they had trench, dooku, and grievous. As well as the malevolence.
Most of what I would say is covered - I will add that 85% of the time when I lose a game, it's because I forgot about something my fleet/upgrades could do, or I had misplayed because I was 'going too fast.'
Armada really rewards setting up well, having a plan, thinking your turns through, and leveraging your upgrades/ships/squadrons.
It's not always easy to do because, you've got a player on the other side trying to win, but in my experience when you hit everything right, Armada is an amazingly satisfying experience. (Even when you don't - when I lose I want to play again as soon as possible, lol. It's an itch that must get scratched.)
ok so which faction is better for squadron spam? it seems like with the carrier and the shuttle the empire would be better for it but what about the scum i mean rebels? Speaking of is there a golden ratio for squadrons to shuttles and carriers using the empire ships as the example? speaking of who has the better bomber spam?
You can play whatever side you want, squads work for both sides well. Its really more personal preference
20 minutes ago, gamefreak180 said:ok so which faction is better for squadron spam? it seems like with the carrier and the shuttle the empire would be better for it but what about the scum i mean rebels? Speaking of is there a golden ratio for squadrons to shuttles and carriers using the empire ships as the example? speaking of who has the better bomber spam?
You can squadron spam with both factions, in my opinion it's easiser to do with the Empire. Overall, their squads are cheaper and ships like the ISD 1/2 and Quasar have really high squadron values. Empire squads also syngerize really well together, while fewer Rebel squads synergize.
Rebels have better bombers, between the cheap and spammable Y-Wing or the powerful B-Wing, and their aces like Luke, Norra, Dash, Lando, are really good at giving ships a bad time.
On 5/4/2020 at 9:28 AM, eliteone said:You can squadron spam with both factions, in my opinion it's easiser to do with the Empire. Overall, their squads are cheaper and ships like the ISD 1/2 and Quasar have really high squadron values. Empire squads also syngerize really well together, while fewer Rebel squads synergize.
Rebels have better bombers, between the cheap and spammable Y-Wing or the powerful B-Wing, and their aces like Luke, Norra, Dash, Lando, are really good at giving ships a bad time.
If you just want to spam generics - I dunno, I think the Rebels do that better. The X-Wing is just an all-around solid fighter. It's a capable bomber, if you have a flotilla nearby with Bomber Command, and it's a great fighter. Enough hit-points to almost never be at risk of being one-shotted, and while not terribly fast - isn't awfully slow, either. It's not the best at anything, but it's GOOD at EVERYTHING.
IMHO, that makes for good spam.
The problem with the Empire's fighters is that they are much more role-focused. If you want a bomber, the TIE Bomber is amazing and cheap...but now if you needed a fighter for this next opponent, oops, no luck, the TIE Bomber is useless in that role. You want a fighter, the TIE Fighter is solid and cheap...but now you need a bomber against your next opponent? Out of luck, TIE Fighter can't do squat.
One difference that I don’t think anyone else mentioned: “Armada” comes at the beginning of the alphabet while “X-wing” is nearly at the end.
Alphabetically, Armada is far superior.