Ok, recognizing that x-wing is a mix of atmospheric flight maneuvers and newtonian physics, anyone wonder why they didn't include a loop maneuver? Such as a 4 or 5 template that you put on the back of your miniature base, then move the miniature so it's front touches the template? Seems like it would have been easy and would have been a pretty good maneuver to have in your bag. Anyone use this as a house rule?

They did. It's the Koiogran turn (Immelman). It's on at least the 3, 4, and 5 straight templates. You move straight along the template and then turn your ship so the front is at the end of the maneuver template, facing the direction you came from.

Jim

Emrico said:

You would need to do that twice to complete the loop though, really just moving 1 straight forward has the same effect as looping.

Never mind. I see what you were getting at now.

Jim

I'd want to test the heck out of it before making it a house rule.

It has to be a red maneuver.

I can't think of a way to indicate it on the maneuver dial, so you'd have to come up with some other method for choosing it during the Planning phase, or create custom dials.

Oh my that would be a great maneuver, allowing you to suddenly move behind the fighter tailing you. I don't think the X-Wing can do that to a TIE fighter though, maybe the TIE to the X-Wing but not the other way around.

ArcticSnake said:

I feel that both ships would be able to perform that maneuver but the Tie would have a tighter turning radius. For example the X-Wing might be able to perform the loop at only a range 4 where the Tie could choose a 3 or 4 range.

I've wondered at the absence of this maneuver myself. I have to assume they considered it since it's one of the more basic and classic dogfighting maneuvers. Thus I concluded that they thought it through and decided the game worked better without it. Yes, it would be very nice to have in your bag of tricks. But when I imagine how it might fit into the game, I see people just swapping or duplicating their positions over and over. I think it would ultimately detract from the strategy of movement in the game. Potentially anyway. Or at least make it less interesting. I think this is one of those things we just have to shrug and concede it's "for the sake of the gameplay", even though it makes sense to have it. But I could be wrong. Playtesting it ourselves couldn't hurt.

Loops are slow and impractical, and are already in the game. Just make 4 sharp turns in a row. Seriously, just boot up a flight sim and try to do a loop on your own (not a canned animation like some arcade sims do).

I believe the move you're looking for, especially in space combat, is a dead stop, where you'd reverse thrusters and your pursuer would overshoot you, giving you the upper hand.

consider the scene… a tie is tailing an x-wing. the x-wing starts to pull up to begin the loop manouvre. The tie, being able to turn more tightly, simply aims slightly ahead of the x-wing, turning along with it (even if it took a second to realise, the Tie could catch up due to a tighter and faster turning ability) and spraying it's blasters all over the top of the ship (where the pilot is sitting) which stays exposed to the Tie at all times during the loop.

Result? Tiny pieces of X-wing spread out 1 micron thick over the entire universe… or… the X-wing gets lucky and ends up face to face with the tie at close range… alowing the tie to dash off with its increased agility and spray the X-wing…

Emrico said:

A Koiogran turn is neither a loop or an immelman. It is a newtonian flight maneuver where you change the direction of your ship 180 degrees without changing its vector. IE, you keep going straight but end up with the nose pointed in the other direction. The Immelman is an atmospheric flight maneuver where you pull into a vertical climb, climb straight up as far as you want, need, or have the ability to, rotate around your long axis, then either pull back or push the nose over to level flight again. Essentially a half loop with a twist. Its opposite is the Split-S.

A loop, in this game, would put you either at or behind your original starting point, facing the same direction. As someone pointed out, using the 1 straight template is probably the best approximation in the game so far.

R2D2:

Yes, in real life, atmospheric flight, a loop can be an easily predictable maneuver, although countless WWII pilots used it (WWII flight being essentially what Star Wars space combat mostly mirrors, except for the occasional proton torpedo). But, in this game, since everyone picks their maneuver beforehand, then everyone does them, you have no ability to see which maneuver your opponent starts to do and adjust to it.

In real life, if your opponent starts to break right, you can adjust your movement accordingly. Not so here. If you are dead astern of another ship in this game, and you decide to use a bank right maneuver while he chooses to bank left, tough cookies. In the setting of having no ability to adjust to your opponents move on the fly, a loop could be fairly useful.

AIKusanagi:

4 sharp turns does not a loop make. If that were the case, loops would never have been considered valid combat flight maneuvers, which they are. And yes, I have tried one, both in combat sims, and in real life (aerobatic flight training). Depending on the power plant pushing your bird, loops can be slow or very very quick. I would assume that an X wing, with presumably a lot of power and without that pesky gravity to worry about could pull a loop in a heart beat.

A dead stop would give up speed which would probably put your enemy out of guns range before you could re-accelerate and engage them. The beauty of a loop, especially disregarding gravity, is that it can get you behind your opponent while maintaining forward speed (again, kind of a moot point since this is not a fluid game).

Thanks for the discussion!

I watched Star Wars A New Hope on Spike last night, and I don't think they show a loop once. Every time an X-wing had a tie on his back he either needed a wingman to shoot it off or he died. (I don't think you see a loop in Jedi or ESB, besides Han doing a noncombat move into the asteroid cave)

So not having loops in the game also keeps the Star Wars feel.

The Death Star trench run would have felt very different if Biggs and Wedge could have done a loop to engage those pesky Imperials chasing them.

Space Battles are vastly 3D so a turn and a loop are the same move in different parts of the battlefield. For game play they keep some terrestrial based logic to simplify the game, and I said seems to fit with the space combat theme seen in the movies.

Yeah, in a true 3D environment with no gravity, orientation doesn't matter. Since we are, sadly, limited to our tabletops. However, if someone comes up with a game like that, woohoo, count me in.

Dr. Jay said:

Limitation of a board game vs a electronic simulator game.

At the same time the Game board allows for a lot of narrative storytelling and sets up for the imagination to take over what is happening on the board.