I'm still trying to figure out why these cost so much. I just don't see them as being that great vs Imperial fighters (maybe they are in the game for something we will see later down the line?). here are my thoughts…

4pts, that's 1/3 cost of basic TIE fighter.

They require a Target Lock (using up an action)

They can only be used at Range 2-3 (not a negative, just a statement)

Vs a TIE fighter it's 4 attack dice vs 3 agility

If the TIE has agility token, even tougher to get through

So even if you get a decent number of hits, there is a good chance that they will be mostly avoided. That's a lot of points for some possible damage (but mostly none).

I can see Wedge being slightly better (4 vs 2 dice) but still a lot of investment at 4 points. Imperial concussion missiles vs the Y wing is a different story altogether. So is the proton a weapon that is still awaiting a perfect prey in the Imperial fleet? Or am I missing something entirely?

ignore, I have now found the edit button

Yea they really are not worth it unless you got extra points left over when building your squadron. I've ended up taking them just for that purpose. The extra chance to crit is a nice bonus, but I would never auto include them on any fighter and treat them as extra filler material.

Proton Torpedoes are really meant for use against larger targets and not ideal against fighters, so against slower targets they make for a nice heavy hitter, but currently when against just fast ties… not worth it.

I really haven't given them a try. My son has been playing rebels, so I haven't had a ship that could carry them, but I've grown to love Concussion Missiles which are similar. I see these as a long range sniper weapon. It avoids the Bonus Defense Die at Range Band 3. It helps ensure that you'll get at least one critical. And it can be combined with a Focus if you've got a couple turns to set up the attack.

Like I use Missiles on TIE-Adv, I would put these on a low skill pilot so that he's shooting later in the turn. You use higher skill pilots to shoot up the target and get him to burn up it's Evade/focus token. Then let the Torp shooter take the finishing blow. I would probably put them on a lower skill Y-Wing with an Ion Cannon so if the others actually kill the target early, you can just zap the closest TIE with your I-Cannon.

X's could use them in the same way to hammer on Ships at Range 3, but like my son, I'd probably spend the points on a useful droid and let the Laser cannons do the talking.

-DavicusPrime

this is why I think the concussion missile works. You have the extra ships to beat down the rebel shields first, then hit with the concussion. The rebels don't have a lot of agility dice and cannot use an evade. However, with Rebels, you don't usually have a lot of ships to knock down a TIE's evade and even then the agility dice will offset most of the torpedo attacks. And if you are using 2-3 rebel ships to knock off one TIE with protons, what are all the other TIEs doing? probably swooping in close for the kill!

You have a point. Torps have always been meant to be fairly slow but powerful missile weapons, hitting a dodgy little TIE should be difficult. I still like the idea of putting them on a Y-wing though. X-Wings seem to be much better suited to dog fighting all the little gits. the Y-Wing is a distraction unit rather than a TIE hunter. The Ion cannon tends to discourage TIEs sticking close in and they're fairly slow, so I figure they'll have more opportunity to use them and it sure beats their Fire Power of 2. especially at Range 3.

I'll post again after I get some practical experience with them to see what they can do.

-DavicusPrime

Game mechanically they are FANTASTIC.

Any dice you get over the number of dice your opponent defends with are HUGE mathematically.

Torps nearly guarantees at least one damage, and they have a better than not chance (with a focus) of one shotting a tie fighter at full life.

If you can pay 4 points to eliminate 12+ in one turn before the tie even gets to shoot, you're gonna take it.

Tips:

Use at max range (ties still only get 3 defense dice because range modifiers don't apply to secondary weapons)

Use with a focus (get the most bang for your buck, but yes it does take 2 turns to perform the actions to set it up)

Use on a ship with preferably no shields

Use with pilots that get extra offensive bonuses (like Wedge)

Empire generally wants to get in close and swarm one x-wing at a time to focus him down. Rebels can split up their x-wings to opposite sides of the map to create a situation where torpedoes work best and cant be ignored.

Here's my take on Proton Torpedo utility;

Always remember, using the Torpedo does NOT count as your action for the turn, so this lets you make use of a few scenarios to fire it off;

1)Move, Target Lock, Fire, all in one turn

2)Move, Focus, Fire (target lock acquired on a previous turn)

3)Move, Marksmanship, Fire (create potentially 2 critical hits if you get enough "focus" results on your 4 attack die)

4)Koiogran Turn, No Action (from the stress token you just got), Fire

…or basically make use of them on any turn you have a stress token, to get a decent volley of damage when you cannot focus or use another ability that requires an Action.

This can severely cripple TIE Fighters, and if used on a ship with your second-highest pilot skill, can put a hurting on a TIE Advanced that has already had its shields softened up or removed entirely by a previous attack that turn.

The Torpedos are great against Dark Curse, because the penalty that ship provides to your ability to attack it with the help of Focus tokens and rerolls is entirely bypassed by the Torpedos. I believe there is also a TIE Fighter pilot in the TIE Fighter expansion that can cancel the effects of a damage card that is dealt face up with the Pilot Resource. If someone has the card, or knows what I'm talking about, please expand upon it. Either way, that's the only TIE's hull that won't take a serious pounding from the Torpedos, and even then, it's less than half the time.

At this stage of the game, the Proton Torpedo is not a useless upgrade at all. I think the division of opinions comes from the fact that the apparently small number of ship types (2 per side) actually provides a lot of customizing options, so our individual tastes and play styles are really taking over here. Time will ultimately tell how useful the Torpedo will continue to be, with future expansion ships and pilots on the horizon, but for now, I would stand in the camp that it is certainly worth the points if applied correctly.

I'm just not seeing it.

ran through a quick scenario.

Dutch Vander and Garven Dreis equipped with protons has a TIE at range 3. Ducth target locked and gave a free TL to Garven. Garven used his focus action. Garven fires first, use focus to change an eye to a hit and another eye to a crit. Got 2 crits, 1 hit. Garven then gives focus to vander. TIe rolls 3 dice and comes up with 2 evades and uses his evade action token to negate last crit. No damage. Vander then rolls and gets 1 hit, 3 blanks. TIe rolls 1 evade. granted, 3 blanks sucks but will happen.

2 protons used, 8 points, no damage to TIE fighter. Complete waste of points. The inability to reroll misses with torpedoes (because TL used to fire them) really makes it a crap shoot (and this was with the beneficial garven/vander combo giving out free TLs and focus tokens!)

To get these proton torpedoes on the ships (have 3 total) made me drop from 4 ships to 3. I just don't see the trade off.

Ya, having 3 ships as a rebel can be rough if the Empire player takes 8 tie fighters. I prefer to take 4 ships, but by doing so you severely limit your ability to afford named pilots and gear like torpedoes.

Torps are great, they really do work. However, the points are often hard to squeeze in.

bullyboy said:

bullyboy said:

If you're getting on fine without it, then keep going that way. Like I said above, it's an option, and I don't think it's a must have, personally, but it can be useful. Wedge with Marksmanship and Torpedos can bank on getting a couple of hits off of it. Coupled with his ability to reduce his target's Agility by 1, you'll probably be putting a damage card on a TIE Fighter with that. If the TIE Fighter did an Evade, they can certainly offset a hit, but even a Focus isn't a guarantee of anything.

Also, firing at Range 3 means you're also at Range 3 for Primary Weapons, so you'll get the extra green die in case of return fire from the target if you didn't kill it.

I'd say the real strength of the Torpedo is trying to drop a Critical Hit card on your opponent's ship. Vader with one damage token isn't really any different, but with a Critical Hit card, his utility could drop significantly. Whatever the result that comes up, if its a persistent effect, it's likely going to hamper your opponent's plans. If you're lucky, you could even score a Direct Hit!

cleardave said:

I've played 11 games so far and have tried proton torps in 9 of them.

I was only really successful with them in 1 game and in that case it took 12 points of torpedoes to take out a 18 point TIE Fighter.

It's tough to get the range three target lock and either get through their Evade token or have them break Target Lock with a barrel roll.

I'm going to be skipping torpedoes my next few games and see if it helps!

bullyboy said:

You might want to use Horton Salm instead and give him both torpedos. R5Kwhatever if you can afford it if you really want free locks. The free target locks from Dutch are good, but PROBABLY not as important as the free focus action from Garven. I like the build, though. The numbers are in your favor either way, but you probably end up with unusable target locks with Dutch. It looks like you had some unlucky results.

bullyboy said:

I am attracted to them, as an electron

Hellfury said:

Are you positive about that?

I've been having similar experiences with the Proton Torpedos being less than effective, though I suspect that I've just had a string of bad luck. I'm not ready to box them up quite yet, though. Looking at them compared to a primary attack, I think they're still worth the potential payoff. As with any situation, more dice = more entropy. You might have a Torp that rolls complete crap, and one that rolls all crits. I've seen both.

To offset the potential for crappulence, I would recommend against firing Torps in the round that you acquired the Target Lock, and instead wait until you can acquire a Focus to go with them. This is why the Garven / Dutch combo works so well.

This conversation about protons has really turned costic!

Yay for science jokes! Yuck yuck yuck.

Daveydavedave said:

Don't you hate it when a debate goes nuclear?

AngryMojo said:

Youre right, let's try to keep it positive

Double post ftl

Not to try to derail this thread and get it back on track - but - well - we should lead with the old truism that statistics is for losers.

If we look at the p(kill) - i.e. the probability that a proton torpedo gets a kill, we see the following

Against a Tie/ln with focus p(kill) is about 8%

Against a Tie/ln with evade p(kill) is about 5%

Against a Tie/ln straight up, p(kill) is about 23%

So, you are unlikely to get a one-shot kill - but it does occur. Here is the strength - if you fire two torpedoes on the same round then

p(kill) for both shots if the first shot has to go against focus is about 56%

Additionally, if you fire a third shot, the p(kill) goes up to about 92%

Of course, I made some quick and dirty assumptions in making these calculations - for example - I assumed that the first shot would burn off the focus. However, with a bad attack roll, this may not be required. I also assumed that even if it didn't get a kill, it would do average damage.

I'll have to run the full stats for more accurate numbers, but I think these back-of-the-envelope-numbers are pretty close.

Not to try to derail this thread and get it back on track - but - well - we should lead with the old truism that statistics is for losers.

If we look at the p(kill) - i.e. the probability that a proton torpedo gets a kill, we see the following

Against a Tie/ln with focus p(kill) is about 8%

Against a Tie/ln with evade p(kill) is about 5%

Against a Tie/ln straight up, p(kill) is about 23%

So, you are unlikely to get a one-shot kill - but it does occur. Here is the strength - if you fire two torpedoes on the same round then

p(kill) for both shots if the first shot has to go against focus is about 56%

Additionally, if you fire a third shot, the p(kill) goes up to about 92%

Of course, I made some quick and dirty assumptions in making these calculations - for example - I assumed that the first shot would burn off the focus. However, with a bad attack roll, this may not be required. I also assumed that even if it didn't get a kill, it would do average damage.

I'll have to run the full stats for more accurate numbers, but I think these back-of-the-envelope-numbers are pretty close.

bullyboy said:

You aren't seeing it because you are basing your opinion on a scenario that has a clear lower probability of happening. Honestly that is a really bush league way to present an argument.

It is unlikely for a TiE to roll 2 natural evades on a 3 dice roll. There are simply 5 non-evade facings on the dice compared to three evades. And it is extremely unlikely to roll 3 blanks on a 4 dice attack roll. Average yield on your scenario leads to that TiE being dead more often then not.

And while you think you are stacking the deck in your favor with those two pilots, you are forgetting about Wedge and Horton. Both have a higher pilot skill allow you to set up easier locks, and easier Lock-Focus scenarios. In addition Horton being able to re-roll near secures a 3 hit roll and Wedge reducing dice is going to get that crit through if not more.

You are also forgetting the fact that this game isn't just Imp vs Rebel, but Rebel vs Rebel. Wedge can put an X or Y wing down to half health with one torpedo a second from Horton and there goes 20+ pts for the cost of 8.

Yes they can wiff horribly, but they can also one-shot a TiE from max range. Statistically speaking they do have a average yield worth their cost.

I've had Wedge open up with a first turn kill. And I've had Horton, with a focus token, score only 1 hit. I'd be foolish to take either outcome as the expected.

qwertyuiop said:

But Garven has lower skill than Horton, so since he would usually be shooting (and spending his focus token) after Horton has finished his attacks, Horton would only be able to use the free focus token for defense.

However, a few of the ways Garven would be able to pass his focus before Horton gets to attack is if he got attacked by Howlrunner (if the Imps have initiative) or by Vader, or if Wedge or Luke uses Swarm Tactics on Garven.

Torpedoes are a bit dodgy against the released Imperial ships, sure.

But remember, tournaments don't sort Imps vs. Rebels. So those torpedoes go down nicely against Rebel ships.

Also, remember that Y-Wings struggle offensively. Even Ion Cannons are more slow but steady damage than kill-shots since they only ever deal one damage if any gets through. 2 standard attack dice against 3 defense dice aren't good odds for a Y-Wing, but 4 torpedo dice against 3 defense dice gives that Y-Wing some teeth when he gets a fire arc on a TIE. And wouldn't you know, Y-Wings get to take double the torpedoes -- it's almost like this was designed as a way to make up for their natural shortcomings!

Furthermore, I suspect that torpedoes will serve quite nicely against, say, Slave I if you're looking for X-Wing vs. Imperial uses.