It occurs to me, as I look back at when I used to have opportunities to play this game, that I never developed any plans or strategies around how I intended to move.

Now I like to think maneuvers are one of my strong suits. And obviously, once you're in the thick of it, many of your decisions are based on your opponent's ships.

But discussions here repeatedly show that there are general rules and strategies surrounding movement and formations that get the most out of ships. Slow roll the Hound's Tooth, Finger 4 the A-Wings, etc.

I'm curious if anyone would share their movement strategies by ship.

I will note that I'm slightly less interested in formations because I don't tend to use many of the same ship- any formation larger than 3 ships is unlikely to make one of my builds, and if it did I'd certainly be using the Squadron Templates.

This is a very simplistic breakdown of how things sometimes move leading up to 1st engagements with things that joust.

https://fort-hyperspace.blogspot.com/2020/08/ramble-8-1st-engagement-types.html?m=1

This is a better breakdown of moving things with purpose.

http://starfightermafia.blogspot.com/2018/12/article-6-x-wing-basics-3-coordinating.html?m=1

I'm especially curious about maximizing a ship based on the role another ship is playing. Example: escort. Should a Y-Wing be flown trailing behind an X-Wing? Should a Bomber clear space for Defenders?

4 minutes ago, saturnflight said:

I'm especially curious about maximizing a ship based on the role another ship is playing. Example: escort. Should a Y-Wing be flown trailing behind an X-Wing? Should a Bomber clear space for Defenders?

This varies considerably depending on your list and the matchup. Also roles are not super defined in xwing. Most ships can do many different things and the roles vary from round to round.

Give us a full list your running and a possible opposing list and we can talk through concepts with some visuals etc

28 minutes ago, Boom Owl said:

This is a very simplistic breakdown of how things sometimes move leading up to 1st engagements with things that joust.

https://fort-hyperspace.blogspot.com/2020/08/ramble-8-1st-engagement-types.html?m=1

This is a better breakdown of moving things with purpose.

http://starfightermafia.blogspot.com/2018/12/article-6-x-wing-basics-3-coordinating.html?m=1

Those were excellent reads. Thank you.

To give you some more general concepts. Roles in X-Wing are more typically broken down into specific "moments" or "choices" in a round or in a series of rounds leading up to and immediately after initial combat. Movement after initial combat is not something you can plan ahead for in detail, you just plan general scenarios that you think might work and then try to engineer them into happening to give your self the maximum # of options from one phase to the next unless narrowing those options is clearly beneficial. There are rarely specific roles assigned to a ship at the start of the game. There are exceptions but they are few and far between (think support ships like the LAAT or Lambda, those have legitimately niche roles). Just about everything else does many different things depending on need and board state. Everything in your list represents points to trade or points to protect. Sometimes specific pilots are referred to as "End Game" ships (i.e. points to protect), but even that is an oversimplification (all ships are precious to your win condition). Which ships your willing to sacrifice and which ships you know you need to see through to 75 min informs your movement strategy but it can change dramatically round to round.

Imagine your playing Vader + Duchess + 3 Tie Advanced Barons

• Vader serves as an initiative kill threat, end game ace, spike damage, dial flanker (i.e. commits to a lane and due to his limited mobility he depends on the rest of his list to demand enough attention that it facilitates a flank for him ). He is also a jouster (i.e. can reliably fly straight at a priority target and trade ideally not defending against all of the opponents possible shots ). And Vader can function as a blocker against other i6 ships, or space occupier against lower init ships.
• Duchess is less capable of offensive damage spikes and more dependent on fully flanking via her mobility or strategic choices to dive to Range 1 for a bit more dmg output (easier to do if you engineer a full flank). Unlike Vader duchess cant park in many arcs and come out of it fine (shes not 3 agility + 3 force charged). So Duchess depends even more on the rest of the list to keep the heat off. Her mobility is so extreme that her defense boils down to how well you abuse outrageous mobility using Adaptive Alerons to watch opponent movement and opt out by choosing generic maneuvers that commit as little as possible until as late as possible.
• The 3 Tie Barons can serve as a points bunker for end game scenarios adding to the pts total of whatever "Ace" your opponent allows to the end game, and in terms of movement on the table they can construct a kill box for your opponent to walk into thanks to those nifty 1 hard turns and their ability to focus boost or roll. The Barons often operate as a screen game to protect Vader who may be trailing behind them early or Vader may be trying to build a flank on his own with the Barons presenting enough of a threat to an opponent if they go ignored that it frees Vader up to get a bunch of uncontested shots in at a target. The Barons are wildly effective and durable blockers as well who can tie up an opponent for long periods of time while Vader and Duchess go to work.
• How all of the above moves, where it goes in relation to everything else, and what roles each "element" of your list plays will vary a great deal depending on what your facing. I play the above list completely differently against Boba Fenn than I do against 8 ship CIS Swarm. Even against the same list over multiple rounds I play the above list completely differently depending on what my opponent does in the first 1-3 rds of movement. They can overcommit or undercommit to board locations which can quickly change how you want to move and where/when you want to be at a particular spot. The when matters a great deal. X-Wing movement is often more about timing of when your ships arrive somewhere than it is where they are in relationship to each other (though the concepts are related).
• At its best X-Wing is kinda complicated since what you want to do or achieve can vary so much from game to game in terms of whats optimal. That is what makes it fun. Figuring out how all your ships should coordinate their movement together to meet their win condition is 99% of what is interesting about X-Wing.

7 minutes ago, Boom Owl said:

At its best X-Wing is kinda complicated since what you want to do or achieve can vary so much from game to game in terms of whats optimal. That is what makes it fun. Figuring out how all your ships should coordinate their movement together to meet their win condition is 99% of what is interesting about X-Wing.

That is a fascinating bit of insight into how you think about your squad. And I've snipped this last bit because it's exactly what I haven't spent the time digging into, but I have such a sense that it's there and I know once I start gaining awareness of it I'll find the game so much more engaging!

I think it was Fort Hyperspace that talked about commitment points that helped clarify for me some thoughts on approaches and obstacle setup. This touches both on your own approach and your opponents' approach.

@saturnflight

These two blogs have some info that might help:

Before Setting Dials: A Turn Zero Guide pt. 1

Before Setting Dials: A Turn Zero Guide pt. 3