I know the ship has sailed and the rules for ships are what they are, but does the Y-Wing feel like a Y-wing?

Granted, in the movies all they ever did was get blown up (I'm hiiiiiiit), but in the x-wing games, once you got the hang of them they weren't too bad. Mind you Tie Advanced zoomed around them like crazy and Interceptors were a real pain, but if you were a good pilot, Y-Wings weren't the death boxes they are in our miniatures game and sometimes you had to take them for the ion cannon until the b-wing showed up. Even after b-wing, I sometimes would take a y-wing out for a spin just for fun.


So in a perfect world shouldn't the Y-Wing have had 2 agility dice and be just really slow? Take a look at this.

Maybe limit them even further by taking away their ability to turn 90 degrees at speed 3 and give them only 2 shields?

What do you guys think, does this feel more like a y-wing to you (versatile fighter bomber) and less like a death box?

As you point out, in the movies all Y-wings do is blow up. And to quote another canon source, in the X-wing series of novels Corran Horn describes them as "blind, wallowing pigs, and slow". Granted, Corran is a fighter jock, but my memories of the X-wing computer games are also different from yours: the Y-wing always felt like a floating dumptruck with (minimal) guns, and I hated the missions where the ion cannon was necessary.

Honestly, I feel like Y-wings are exactly where they should be for this game.

To be fair to our poor maligned y-wing one did survive the 1st death star battle and one even went into the tight tunnel of the 2nd death star. No b-wing went down there. The b-wing is a bomber, the y-wing is an old fighter bomber.

As far as the computer game, once I got the hang of power allocation the y-wing wasn't so bad but it was always slow, no matter what. Personally I loved ion cannon missions. They were great because you could stun ships and stop newer waves from spawning. I use to play missions and kill everything that way, including star destroyers. Although still possible with x-wings, in some missions it would've been much harder than in a y-wing. Ties were no problem, it was just the faster ships that would always fly away that were a challenge like the Interceptors and the rare Tie Advanced.

I think FFG overcompensated with the 5 hull because of the 1 agility. 5 hull does not feel like a star fighter. The falcon has 8 hull, only three more lol! And the falcon was taking on 4 ties at once lets remember. Is the Y-wing really 5 hull compared to an average snub fighter hull of 3? I would even be ok with the y-wing having 3 hull and maybe one more shield than an x-wing, or same hull and shields and say that the y-wing never takes a crit (if you want to make it a durable ship).

The 1 agility takes away the possibility of the y-wing being a fighter-bomber because it cannot fight. Doesn't the 5 hull 1 agility imply that the y-wing is this massive ship that cannot dodge anything?

They seem pretty close to what I envision based on the Rogue Squadron novels. Salm is the only Y-Wing pilot who seems to be able to fight on even footing with the Rogue Squadron trainees when they are on training missions, and that's because Salm is a GOOD Y-Wing pilot.

I never played the video game, so I have no frame of reference there.

I see where you're coming from, but as you mentioned in your second post, I think the key to making Y-Wings more like canon would be to decrease hull and give it agility 2. I don't know if less moves is an answer- they're already pretty hard to manuever, plus like you, 5 hull seems like a ton to me. Unlike most of the other stats in the game, it seems more like a balancing reason rather than a movies/ X-Wing for PC kind of reason.

Agreed, the hull shouldn't be more than the other ships especially with 2 agility. FFG gave 5 hull for balance, not because of the movies or video game.

I do think hitting the y-wings maneuverability dial will separate it more from the x-wing and a-wing as an older ship. The y-wing should be slow no matter what kind of pilot is flying her and the ion cannon's 360 degree arc should balance this out and make the ship useful. If the y-wing has 2 agility nerfing it's movement shouldn't be insurmountable but still an obstacle.

So how about this.



A slow ship that is not maneuverable but still a viable fighter. Does this feel more like a Y-wing?

Actually, based upon a straight-line hull rating, the Y-Wing should have a hull rating of at least 6, compared to the others, e.g. it's got twice the armor of an X-Wing, and 3 x that of a Tie Fighter.

The Tie Fighter's hull rating should really only be a 2, but I presume they went with the higher 3, since they didn't want to have to put three Ties in a box vs. one X-Wing.

Overall, I think they got the Y-Wing about right in the game.

What I quibble with is its inability for the pilot to fire weapons forward, and for the separate turret gunner to use his ion cannons (if those are purchased as an upgrade), at the same time.

Where are you getting your hull ratings from? And if the y-wing should have a hull of 6, what should the falcon have?

crimzonteerz said:

Except it does dogfight. I have had plenty of TIEs get hit or even destroyed by Y-wings. They are not as good at dogfighting as the other fighters, but there aren't supposed to be.

A pure bomber (not a fighter bomber) would not have any agility.

Remember an x-wing has an agility of 2. There is no way that a y-wing is as easy to hit as an x-wing

Yes!!!!! for the love of all that is sacred please give the Y-wing 2 agility.

I agree that it shouldn't be the same difficulty to hit as the X-Wing.

For people using the video games as a reference, try approaching it from a different perspective: Think about when you're fighting against Y-Wings. They are really easy to shoot down, it just takes a while to get through all the shields and armor.

Hmm… I think I'll load up Alliance and see how many Top Ace Y-Wings I can take down with a standard TIE

>A pure bomber (not a fighter bomber) would not have any agility.

Persoanlly I think and agility of 0 is more like a capital ship that cannot move at all.


>They are not as good at dogfighting as the other fighters, but there aren't supposed to be.

Agreed, and I've blown stuff up with Y-wings as well. I've tried to run all Y-wing lists (i own 3 of them) and it is very difficult to be competitive. The 2 attack dice limit their effectiveness as it is in a dogfight. The 1 agility ***** them.


>Remember an x-wing has an agility of 2. There is no way that a y-wing is as easy to hit as an x-wing

I thought about this too, and I agree that the x-wing should be a more nimble craft. That is why I figured on nerfing the y-wings maneuverability dial even more. In a straight up fight the x-wing would still have 3 attack dice vs 2 y-wing defence, while the y-wing hits back at 2 dice vs 2 dice. The x-wing has more moves it can pull off and so should win the dogfight.

Or does the 2 agility make the y-wing too close to the x-wing? Maybe nerfing the y-wings lasers, saying that they can only inflict 1 damage max limits the effectiveness in a dog fight even more? I dunno. Currently I just don't like the y-wing as it plays.

Or how about 2 agility but the y-wing cannot take focus actions, only target locks? That limits it's ability quite a lot.

NewTroski said:

True enough, they were easier to take down than other ships. I just remember working miracles with them in the game, but then again I was a pretty good player. See how the top aces do. I haven't played Alliance in a while, that was such a fun game! There is a skin mod floating around that redoes all the skins with more resolution. If you google it, you'll find it.

My thinking for the y-wing was to limit their movement as opposed to agility and the more I think about it, the more I like the idea of removing the focus action from their action bar to limit their combat effectiveness. Maybe only named pilots should have the focus ability.

I took a look at shadowjack's old, and pretty awesome, post about reverse engineering the points for ships. Here's the link if anyone is interested.

http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_foros_discusion.asp?efid=254&efcid=6&efidt=734236&efpag=0

It seems like 2 weapons, 2 agility, and 3 hull are a sort of basic starting stat for ships.

At 2 weapons, 2 agility, 3 hull and 3 shield a 2 pilot skill ship costs 17.5 points, or rounded up is 18 pts, just like the current y-wing.

Here is the math

An FFG Gold Y-Wing (2 pilot skill):

‘Squad Points’ = 2 + 2 + (2 – 2) x 8 + (1 – 2) x 8 + (5 – 3) x 4.25 + 3 x 4.5
‘Squad Points’ = 18

----

Edited Y-Wing (pilot skill 2)

‘Squad Points’ = 2 + 2 + (2 – 2) x 8 + (2 – 2) x 8 + (3 – 3) x 4.25 + 3 x 4.5
‘Squad Points’ = 2 + 2 + 0 + 0 + 0 + 13.5
‘Squad Points’ = 17.5

---

Maybe nefring the movement or taking away focus isn't necessary for balance after all. It might be interesting to have cheaper y-wings with no ability to focus, like tie fighter spam for the empire? However, Shadowjack couldn't find a direct correlation between points values for ships and their abilities on the action bar and movement dial.

Anyway here is a pic to show a comparison with the current y-wing, including nerfed movement (no points subtracted for nerfed movement, although one could argue to round the y-wing down to 17 points with nerfed movement)

What do you guys think, does this feel more like a y-wing to you or did FFG get it right with the 5 hull 1 agility?

They cost the same amount of points, which would you rather have?

Very easy and game-legal way to give Y-Wings 2 Agility - put the new Stealth upgrade on them!

Problem solved! You're welcome!

Stormtrooper721 said:

Spoken like a true Imperial! lol

Stormtrooper721 said:

or use R2F2. actually, WHY NOT BOTH?

crimzonteerz said:

A 2/2/3/3 fighter is not very different from the 3/2/3/2 X-wing. A 2/1/5/3 fighter, on the other hand, is a completely different beast altogether: almost twice as tough, but with a much harder time evading shots. If I'm designing the game, I go for the second option--the one that is immediately and obviously different, even before you put it on the table.

Also note that, after Wave 3, we'll have one fighter each with agility 1, 2, and 3. I doubt that's a coincidence, nor is it a coincidence that the YT-1300 has the agility of a Y-wing rather than an X-wing.

And where the Y-wing's hull rating is concerned, there are two ways to look at it: the Y-wing is heavily armored, for a fighter, and it's also an older, simpler model with a lot of redundancy. If a hole does get punched in it, there are so few truly vital components that your opponent is unlikely to hit anything that can't be repaired, rerouted, or in a pinch simply done without.

As a comparison and additional justification, look at the A-wing. It's lightly armored out of a desire to keep its mass low, but it's also compact and full of state-of-the-art tech. If you get through its armor, you're almost guaranteed to hit something mission-critical (I mean, look what happened to poor Arvel Skynyrd).

I really prefer the Y-wing's current stats.

I think the Vorpal Sword's point are great. (snicker-snack!)

I just don't understand what you meant by this: "Also note that, after Wave 3, we'll have one fighter each with agility 1, 2, and 3. I doubt that's a coincidence, nor is it a coincidence that the YT-1300 has the agility of a Y-wing rather than an X-wing."

I guess you mean on the Rebel side only, and mean "fighter" to not include the YT freighter.

But I love that the ships are different. And I think the game balance is great.

Just like I kept representing in that other thread about the TIE Defender, you can't get too caught up in having the stats in exact mathematical proportion to the stats for these fighters in some other game or medium. If a novel or the old PC games uses some numeric rating for either pseudo-technical flavor, or for the balance of play in THAT game, then that may not translate into this totally different type of game.

The stats are great because they use small whole numbers, and need no "calculations" to use, but they represent a great variety of ship types even with the simplicity of the structure.

I don't think that the Y-Wing should have 2 agility, as the 1 agility is rather fitting from a background perspective. However, I do think that the Y-Wing should be a point or two cheaper. 18 points for 2 attack and 1 agility is simply not a good deal, even with 8HP; those hit points just melt away in the face of close-range volleys of 3 or 4 attack dice.

Y-Wings with Ion Cannons are great, but Y-Wings without Ion Cannons seem rather underpowered to me. Has anyone found success in employing normal Y-Wings? The dilemma of needing to be at Range 1 to be effective yet getting ripped apart by enemies at Range 1 is frustrating. I'd take an extra agility dice over that 3HP any day. Maybe if more of it was concentrated in the shields, I guess? 4HP/4 shields would be much better for avoiding the crippling critical damage that Y-Wings soak up so easily.

if you are flying without ion cannons, they can easily do range 1 exchanges with other ships without any problem, mainly due to their high hp. the problem with them is getting into range 1

As someone who plays against a friend who uses 2 ywings regularly they really dont need the extra agility. The amount of shooting i have to put into one to take it down is ridiculous. The amount of damage ywings with upgrades can dish out is equally ridiculous. They aren't meant to be maneuverable. Look at them. Its a box with engines.

I think 2 agility would make them very unbalanced, they are almost a no brainer selection for a rebel fleet as it is (i have yet to play a rebel fleet without at least 1)

deviant-dj said:

I ran a 4-ship x-wing build at my Kessel run, and got 3rd out of 10. I was the highest placed rebel squad, and could have gotten 2nd if I hadn't been so bad at crashing into asteroids. Y-wings just don't have the bite you need against a swarm.

Duraham said:

3 attack dice and a target lock against 3 agility just doesn't cut it when you are eating 3 or even 4 attack dice against 1 agility in return, especially when your opponent is fielding a swarm. That extra 3HP just vanishes. God help you if you're fighting Wedge.

I just don't think that the naked Y-Wing with 2 pilot skill is worth 18 points; they can't throw enough dice to deal damage reliably to TIEs, especially Evading ones, and the Y-Wing still blows apart very quickly under concentrated fire thanks to its appallingly low defense. Ironically, the Y-Wing appears to be much more effective against Rebel lists, as the lower evasion of Rebel ships and the smaller squadron size means that Y-Wings can hit more reliably and can easily lock down a significant portion of the enemy squadron with their ion cannons.

edit: nevermind