My friends and I only managed to play about 3 games of this so far but there's a bunch of stuff that already stands out to me

The first being I really thought there would be swarms of faceless TIE fighter pilots vs character rebel pilots but I find myself as a rebel player constantly dropping down to the generic rebel ships trying to scrounge up points while the Imperial player is packing Mauler Mithel and Howlrunner easily because of how cheap they are. I guess 1 advantage is that I can stop using Grey and Red squadron ships as the skill of 4 rarely has an impact.

Which brings me to my second thing, why are Y-wings so expensive? 18 points for a Gold squad pilot vs 13 points for an Obsidian Squad TIE? The Y-wing may take a bunch of hits to drop but it's never going to an impact on the game outside taking hits unless it's paid another 5 points for the Ion cannon.

By looking at the rebel ships I get the strong feeling that at first there might of been some sorta "at the end of the turn roll a die on an evasion regenerate 1 shield" that got dropped but the points stayed high

I just viewed the preview of the A-wing and TIE interceptor, A-wing is 2 attack, 3 defense, 2 hull and 2 shield. Basically a 20 something point TIE fighter with 1 more HP while the TIE interceptor is 3 attack, 3 defense, 3 hull

Overall we've had a lot of fun playing it, we played wings of war and feel like the X-wing system is overall much better than they way wings was done (fiddly movement cards are hard to keep straight, overlapping planes and we like the dice instead of just drawing cards each time)

winters_night said:

The logic is that an A-Wing has less hull than an X-wing and that the Tie Interceptor has the same Hull as a Tie Fighter. Maybe Tie's should have only had 2 Hull points while Tie Advanced 3?

It's fine that it has 2 hull and 2 shield but why does it need to cost what appears to be over 20 points? It's slightly better than a TIE fighter, it could be the actions I suppose as the Interceptor looks to be 18ish

My main concern is that the Y-wing is practically worthless against TIEs with it's 2 attack dice, how is the A-wing going to be any better when it's only targets have 3 defense each?

winters_night said:

We'll have to wait and see what the special rules are for the A-Wing before passing judgement.

The boy has no patience, always looking to the future…

People don't realize you might not be able to upgrade the tie interceptors at all, it doesn't show any upgrade available for them, and I don't think any of the basic ones will be able to. Maybe the highest pilot will be able to, but the A-wing will more likely have a special ability.

Harleequin said:

I find that highly unlikely, considering there are two new upgrade cards that come in the pack. The only card I think you can tell is 100% not taking upgrades is the Recruit pilot on the top of the pile of pilot cards in the preview.

I'm sure the Baron will be taking an Elite upgrade. The basic TIE Interceptors will not likely get any, but then neither did the basic TIE Fighter, or even some of the unique pilots.

cleardave said:

Precisely why I said it'll probably only be the highest pilot card, most likely not more than one since it's already so powerful for such a low cost.

In answer to your concern about Y-Wings being underpowered and over costed…

I think you need to play all of the pilots and ships a bit before being so quick to pass judgement. Y-Wings are best at longer ranges with torpedoes and the ion cannon. Try taking Dutch with R2D2 and tell me he isn't good!

Each ship is good for its purpose. A ship should be measured by its use to the squadron, not its individual capabilities in a pitched battle vs enemies of equal points.

An example I have is I played two Y-Wings vs 3 Tie Fighters. I won with the two Y-Wings pretty easily. I had one with an Ion Cannon and one that was basic. 50 point game. The thing that makes the Y-Wing so good is the fact that it rolls 3 defense dice vs 2 dice for Tie Fighter attacks. 8 Damage to 3 is almost ludicrous when it comes down to it. I hit 5 times with the Ion Cannon both giving the one damage and limiting the movement for the next turn. This made his Tie a sitting duck to my Second Y-Wing Swooping in for the kill at range 1. It is really a game based on tactics, and the die rolls really matter if you use your actions correctly. Great game to me. -Sean

timewalker03 said:

Why 3 defense dice? The Y-Wing has only an Agility of 1, so it is one defence die.

A lot of this stems from the TIE fighter, TIE advanced and TIE interceptor all having defense 3 and only the X-wing having attack 3. The X-wing has a slight advantage as there is 1 more hit on the attack dice than there are evades on the defense dice. This goes back to attack 2 on the two TIEs being parody to the X-wings defense of 2 and better than the Y-wings defense 1. With the interceptor coming out with attack 3 it's has a flat out advantage over the X-wings defense 2, a monstrous advantage over the Y-wings 1 and the slight advantage over the A-wings defense 3. MEANWHILE the A-wings attack 2 is just as worthless as the Y-wings attack 2.

that's my point though, unless your dropping another 5 points on a y-wing for an ion cannon it's a pointless model. torpedos are really iffy, spending 1/3rd the points of a TIE to rack some damage on them is meh to me. If you ever find yourself with 18-20 points the Y-wing is NOT an option unless you have another 5 points to get that ion cannon, the imperial player will simply ignore it as it's not a threat while they kill your other ships off. Meanwhile as a rebel player you can not ignore a 12 point TIE fighter they will eat you

Daveydavedave said:

This is exactly why you need to think of your list as a squadron, not a collection of individual ships. A Y-Wing with an I-Cannon is an asset to the Squadron as it can disrupt the TIEs and provides some rear defense. Xs are your dog fighting masters. Wedge being the best of the best. if you're going to use Torpedoes, placing them on a Y, especially Horton with his free blank reroll is a good platform for them. But you need to look at them in terms of how they mesh together to see their real value.

Also there's tactics rebs have that TIEs don't and vise versa.

Rebels should use target locks as often is is feasable! Rerolls for your attacks means increasing your potential of thinning the Imp herd out quicker which removes their numbers advantage. And always use Locks with your Ion Cannon if you can. Just getting one more hit than your opponent rolls evades is all you need, rerolls help you get it.

For TIEs, use your evades and barrel rolls to keep you alive, use your speed and better maneuver dial to get where you can do the most damage, range band 1 and stay there as long as possible. Focus is best used when you think you'll have a good target to hit, but aren't sure if you'll end up being a good target. If you expect to be in a reb's fireing arc, take the evade over a focus every time.

Both sides: Don't forget to take your actions and use your special abilities at every opportunity. They'll save your bacon.

-DavicusPrime

winters_night said:

A lot of this stems from the TIE fighter, TIE advanced and TIE interceptor all having defense 3 and only the X-wing having attack 3. The X-wing has a slight advantage as there is 1 more hit on the attack dice than there are evades on the defense dice. This goes back to attack 2 on the two TIEs being parody to the X-wings defense of 2 and better than the Y-wings defense 1. With the interceptor coming out with attack 3 it's has a flat out advantage over the X-wings defense 2, a monstrous advantage over the Y-wings 1 and the slight advantage over the A-wings defense 3. MEANWHILE the A-wings attack 2 is just as worthless as the Y-wings attack 2.

I see you left out shields(2-3 extra hits and crit protection while they're up), astromech droids upgrades(cheap and can be useful depending on your build), base pilot skill (moving second and shooting first is huge), and the Y-wings hull advantage (it's built to take hits, not dodge them) in your comparisons.

DavicusPrime said:

To expand on your point about always dropping Target Locks if you can; activating the re-roll isn't an action, and it's done in the combat phase. This distinction is important for times when you're denied actions because of Critical Hits and collisions, or other situations where you desperately need your action for something else. Especially if you Target Lock on a turn where a shot wouldn't be practical anyways, you can save it to ruin the TIE's day on a later turn.

Also, to shake a Target Lock, your target would need to be using Expert Handling, and spend THEIR action on using it. So adding the Target Lock on a TIE with Expert Handling can get them to not Focus or Evade for that turn. If you've got the TIE in your firing arc that turn, it means you get your X-Wing to hit them with the 3 Attack dice, putting the TIE (typically) at a disadvantage to defend in you're in 1-2 Range. Range 2 baits the Expert Handling to avoid the Torpedo, and Range 1 gives you 4 Attack dice with a full re-roll they may want to avoid.

Whether on Rebel Ships or a TIE Advanced, using missiles or regular weapons fire, I like to think of a Target Lock as investment planning for the future.

I cannot agree more. Target Locks are powerful and leave you a lot of tactical options. When my son figured out how to use target locks in conjunction with the I-Cannon when it hadn't occurred to me before, I was a proud Papa.

-DavicusPrime

cleardave said:

Interesting. I hadn't thought about using Target Locks to force TIEs to use the Barrel Roll when they don't want to. When I played Imperial I ditched that target lock all the time. And "Dark Curse" doesn't even need Expert Handling because Rebels can't even reroll against him. But I can see for some of the other pilots that getting locked onto all the time could really get annoying.

Parakitor said:

I haven't really thought of it either, I'm usually the imperials! Hunt that rebel scum! Now your tactic to force us into barrel rolls is forfeited and you will never catch us!

Parakitor said:

Yes, it's a good harasser. Dark Curse is immune to the Target Lock's ability to re-roll your attacks, but he still gets ruined by a Torpedo as easily as any other TIE Fighter. Also, he can't use Expert Handling to shake the Target Lock.

The only TIE Fighters that can are Howlrunner, Mauler Mithel, Black Squadron Pilot. So, one third of the uniques, and one third of the non-uniques. The Target Lock threat works best if you have the threat of a Proton Torpedo to back it up, but your Primary Weapon is just as good, with the exception of scaring off Dark Curse.

But then again, if you didn't have Torpedos, there's not really a point to target locking Dark Curse, unless it was some situational thing, where Dutch was empty on Torpedos, and Dark Curse was the only thing in range, so Dutch Target Locks Dark Curse, then uses his (his being Dutch's) pilot text to give another nearby pilot a chance to acquire a Target Lock of their own, at another target, if it spaces correctly.

There's so many funny things like that you can use, and I always enjoy looking at the tech you can put together in a list.

Basically, having Torpedos can be handy as a good way to mess up a TIE pilot with Expert Handling, just to get them to keep the action on deck to use the Target Lock and bait their evasive maneuver.

Oh, this game. So many possibilities.