Perhaps you are right and if you are and FFG did want this ship to be more aggressive/powerful then I'm sure we'll see a change. Not impossible at all.

Nevertheless I am not disappointed in not seeing a squad of cargo ships each with 3atk turrets.

Again I must agree with KineticOperator from another thread. http://community.fantasyflightgames.com/index.php?/topic/86876-confusing-faq-answers/page-4#entry823088

But seeing we are at an impasse both here and on another thread and...

Also that I've state to the best of my ability my thoughts and...

I haven't, yet, heard a persuasive opinion, well at least not enough to persuade me, haha.

I think I'll just play it out and see if FFG likes it and changes it.

Hmm if we change the rules 4 HWK-290 squad each with a 3 atk I wonder if someone might complain that this squad is under priced, over balanced and too powerful.

just wondering...

My two cents, be at peace. But make war 'games'.

I didn't have enough time yesterday to add to my post but not only does the 4 HWK squad get screwed, think about the HWK in your squad in general.

If the imperial player fields Dark Curse, all he would have to do is eliminate all other ships, leaving the HWK 290 ('s) for the end, and then the rebel player would have to concede due to an auto lose scenario. This forces the HWK 290 to do teamwork more to benefit the rebel squad as opposed to the shuttle which has no such restriction.

Rebel players will have to sacrifice firepower for teamwork. You get the opposite effect of Biggs. "Don't target the Hwk, its will become useless once all other ships are gone". Imperial players will start taking range 2-3 shots on x-wings over range 1 on a Hwk because they know they have to take out everything but the HWK's to win.

The Imperials have no such drawback.

Dark curse with Stealth would become the must have ship for all imperial squads cause it can shut down the offence of the HWK 290 automatically.

I don't mind if FFG wants to develop the game in a rock-pappers-scissors fashion whereby some ships are immune to other types of ships, but at this point it has created a gameplay imbalance for this new ship that tips the balance in favour of the Imperials IMHO. They don't get a ship that gets its attack automatically stopped.

I understand that they wanted the HWK 290 and the Lambda to be "support" ships. The Lambda shuttle has no such restrictions on it and is comparable to Slave for survivability so why the support ship disparity.

If they wanted to restrict the HWK 290's turret they could have done it way better than this.

So the result of this is that the rebels have to kill Dark Curse early, instead of just ignoring him till the end? Or the HWK takes an Ion turret instead? Why are people soooo worried that 1 single upgrade can't attack 1 single ship? Is Dark Curse Really used that much in tournaments??

"Rebel players will have to sacrifice firepower for teamwork."

Really? Teamwork increases firepower, doesn't sacrifice one for the other. And really, all you have to do as rebels is all target Dark Curse first, then move on to others.

I'm sorry for my sarcasm, but i just don't see the huge issue that people have been arguing about for page after page after page. It's 1 upgrade, and 1 ship. You don't like it? Don't run 4 HWK's all with Blaster Turrets. Maybe run 2 with Ion Cannons instead? It really doesn't seem extraordinarily hard to counter.

Quoting is doing some weird things with the colours/fonts so my replies will be in green.

So the result of this is that the rebels have to kill Dark Curse early, instead of just ignoring him till the end? Or the HWK takes an Ion turret instead? Why are people soooo worried that 1 single upgrade can't attack 1 single ship? Is Dark Curse Really used that much in tournaments??

And since any tournament playing imperial player would know this (just like they know that Biggs is the first to be wiped from the board when you can) they would camp DC in the back and make it a gauntlet run, of course shooting at everything that didn't have a blaster turret. A strategy becomes THE strategy. Every imperial player takes on the same tactic against this weapon system if it shows up and they have DC in their squad. Keep DC alive, destroy all but the ships with blaster turrets.

Instead of trying to kill everything in your opponents squad, you just have to kill everything in your opponents squad that doesn't have a blaster turret.

"Rebel players will have to sacrifice firepower for teamwork."

Really? Teamwork increases firepower, doesn't sacrifice one for the other. And really, all you have to do as rebels is all target Dark Curse first, then move on to others.

What I was trying to get to here was that HWK 290 players will have to build around the focus passing and other squad building benefits. But that 1 Attack will mean that they will be all but useless for offence. And if DC dying is what is needed to win you can bet your squad that the imperial player will guard DC with everything they've got.

I'm sorry for my sarcasm, but i just don't see the huge issue that people have been arguing about for page after page after page. It's 1 upgrade, and 1 ship. You don't like it? Don't run 4 HWK's all with Blaster Turrets. Maybe run 2 with Ion Cannons instead? It really doesn't seem extraordinarily hard to counter.

I get the sarcasm and I have seen pages of this argument already and that's why I peeled off to present the gameplay side of it to show how it won't be a pretty picture. A ridiculum ad absurum if you will. The reaction, at least from me, was the anticipation of using this new ship and finding out via the FAQ that a ship will be immune to its marquee weapon system and the other side has no such restriction. It breaks the 4th wall for me for believability as a rule. Having a turret should allow you to fire at everything in a 360 arc. I would have been fine with a limitation on damage or range, high use cost, lengthy chain of actions, but not able to even fire it?

I think they feared the 4 HWK 290 blaster turrets would do what the YT did to the interceptor in wave 2 (best maneuvering ship meets 360 turret making maneuvering useless) and thus wanted to limit turreted systems on ships. I also believe that's why they costed missiles the way they did so players would have to go to guns more than missiles, a more dogfight arena than exchange of playloads.

I would have made the blaster turret function like this " Attack (Lock): discard your target lock on the ship you are attacking to use the blaster turret. You must have a focus token to use the blaster turret." Still desireable and usable but would need synergy with other pilot abilties to get a shot off every turn. They could have also made the blaster turret do 2 attack instead of 3 and have no activation costs.

What I can see happening from this ruling is Y-wings will now carry blaster turrets and HWK's will carry the ION turrets. The Y's can shoot at all the ties they want and can go after DC with 2 attack dice while the HWK will focus on synergy with the ION setting up teammates shots for the next round, while passing focus tokens or extra attack dice. It just took me awhile to see that the Y-wing and the HWK were essentially switching weapon roles. It just takes a bit to wrap your head around that idea.

I dont get why everyone is up in arms over one tie fighter its not like its a firespray or something. seriously. The wording makes sense and this game isnt that serious, even with tourniemnts, that i doubt one tie fighter will make a differance. and it makes sense since how many ships empire side can take this weapon vs the rebels? its all about ballance which im guessing we agre faction vs faction this game is pretty balanced.

I dont get why everyone is up in arms over one tie fighter its not like its a firespray or something. seriously. The wording makes sense and this game isnt that serious, even with tourniemnts, that i doubt one tie fighter will make a differance. and it makes sense since how many ships empire side can take this weapon vs the rebels? its all about ballance which im guessing we agre faction vs faction this game is pretty balanced.

What seems to be upsetting everyone is the fact that you can't fire a weapon system because the FAQ says you can't, and not anything else to support it.

If DC was like a stealth craft and you could never get a target lock on him then having a missile not being able to fire on him would make sense and everyone could accept that. You would then have to use your guns.

But a gun just needs you to aim and pull the trigger. So this ruling means you can't aim so you can't pull the trigger and that illogical reasoning is making people upset.

The net effect is that the imperial will have a ship that is immune to a weapon system. I don't mind that, its just that its the first time we've seen a ruling grant such an ability. It's the way in which it is being done that isn't sitting well with everyone.

Every ship can fire and damage every other ship, up until this. And what I don't want to have happen is future rulings/ new rules that expand on this. You can't fire a missile at this guy, he has missile defence, you can't bomb this guy he eats bombs for breakfast. It would add a complexity level to the game that would make strategizing frustrating as hell, and this game wins with players by how easy and simple it was to pick up and play.

This game is great for balancing out both sides but this is where it looks like its starting to unravel.

I admit it that on the surface it seems unfair. However read Dark Curse's card. It says focus tokens may not be used to attack him. Not that focus tokens may not be used to modify dice.

I admit it that on the surface it seems unfair. However read Dark Curse's card. It says focus tokens may not be used to attack him. Not that focus tokens may not be used to modify dice.

Reread the card. That's not what it says,

Here's both cards:

It's so close an issue that FFG could rule either way - it IS their game. I just wish that in the name of sportspersonship and in-universe realism that their would allow "Dark Curse" to be targeted and it would be easily to justify by just saying that the Focus spent to fire the Blaster Turret is allowed because at that point DK is not defending and that the Blaster Turret only targets AFTER it pays the Focus to fire.

I don't want to argue like a rules lawyer - I argue merely on the basis of sportspersonship and in-universe realism.

I just think they are doing this is because the blaster gives ships (y-wing and the new one) the ability to kill ships endlessly and wanted at least one ship to have slightly more survivability. sure you could give them same ships other weapons. But, those weapons are one time uses. Sure maybe FF should have better reasoning.

sure u may say a y with the 4 extra points is more expensive than the standard x but really its different, not to mention 360 firing arc is pretty huge.

Maybe they will just update his text to just say no focus can be used to attack DC

I won't continue the rules/timing argument, I have stated my opinion elsewhere. I can see both sides of the argument, but I believe the case for simultaneous weapon/target selection is correct for the simple reason that it is the only way the FFG ruling makes sense. Which is exactly why people who don't want to accept the simultaneous method are upset, because the sequential selection method does NOT work with the FFG ruling, for DK or anyone else.

As far as a hard counter, DK is far from unkillable even by Hawks with Blaster Turrets. At range 1 they will throw 2 dice vs. DKs 3 evade, something we see in TIE vs. TIE games repeatedly and I can assure you that it is far from impossible to generate hits. I have seen plenty of TIEs killed by other TIEs at range 2. Even with 3 evade dice, or 4, there have been many, many times I have rolled or watched others roll 0 evades. It certainly won't be ideal, but it is not impossible like people want to claim.

Add Jan Ors' ability to add an attack die, and it becomes entirely possible to bring DK down with focused fire from Hawks. Of course the situation is hardly ideal, and DK will have an enormous advantage, but that does not make it impossible any more than it is impossible to hit a stealthed Soontir Fel when he is double focused with an evade token. Just shoot at him repeatedly and sooner or later he runs out of tokens, fails an evade, and loses his stealth device.

As for the "4th Wall of Believability" where it is hard to accept that the Blaster turret cannot fire at DK at all? On that one, I have to agree. It is hard to imagine a turret that cannot even shoot at someone. I try to picture DK being so evasive that the slow tracking Blaster turret (it is slow, which is why it takes so much more focus than other easier to aim weapons. You have to lead targets much more) cannot get a bead on him. I imagine focus as a representation of the pilot successfully predicting his opponent's actions, and DK's ability means that he is completely unpredictable. Not perfect, but while it strains my suspension of disbelief it doesn't quite break it.

Five reasons I don't think this is a problem.

1. Half or more of games I play/see are Imperial v. Imperial -- this won't affect them at all.

2. Right now, if a player is using DC, it is usually the last ship standing in the squad -- this will make it so Rebel players with the HWK must change this up a bit (which may not be a bad thing).

At a minimum, they will have to do their best to remove stealth devices when present before they are just left with HWKs, and by then DC will only have a max of 2 hull left which does not seem insurmountable (and if the hit was a crit it could be even worse).

It will be especially important for a Rebel ship with 3 attack to get into range 1of DC before too late in the game to get a 4 on 4 attack. This should hit regularly enough even with DC focus/evade to get rid of stealth and one hull.

3. HWK will get 2 attack dice at range 1. In my experience two attack dice v. 3 defense dice will hit at least 25% of the time even without a reroll.

4. Obviously this would be lower if DC had an evade or focus, but these only works once per round. So, as long as you have at least two ships left you’d still have chance to hit, especially at range 1. One HWK vs. DC might be an auto loss (or close to it), but that’s how it should be anyway.

5. DC only has two attack dice and the HWK has 2 defense dice. HWK can use his focus for defense. DC can focus on offense, but not reroll (no target lock). And, if he’s smart he’ll be using evade when there is or might be a shot on him so he won’t even be able to focus at least some of the time.

Sure, this ruling could be bad sometimes, but I don’t think it will be very often (and usually only when a player using an HWK plays poorly or gets very unlucky).

Note, this does not address the issue re: whether or not the ruling makes sense. I just don’t think it is the end of the world (especially since we haven’t seen everything in Wave 3 yet).

As far as a hard counter, DK is far from unkillable

Actually, Marksmanship allows you to modify rolls against "Dark Curse" because it neither uses Focus tokens nor rereolls. We'll be seeing a lot more of Marksmanship when Ten Numb comes out as it gives him an almost guarenteed uncancellable crit. "So long, Dark Curse - it was fun while it lasted!"

I admit it that on the surface it seems unfair. However read Dark Curse's card. It says focus tokens may not be used to attack him. Not that focus tokens may not be used to modify dice.

Reread the card. That's not what it says,

My synopsis was not verbatim but accurate.

I can live with FFGs ruling on this just as I can their ripping on backstabber vs slave 1. I don't agree 100% but it's their hassle and I can live with it.

Or we can argue some more until someone wins teh internetz.

I admit it that on the surface it seems unfair. However read Dark Curse's card. It says focus tokens may not be used to attack him. Not that focus tokens may not be used to modify dice.

Reread the card. That's not what it says,

My synopsis was not verbatim but accurate.

No, it wasn't. If it were accurate, there probably wouldn't be any issue with the ruling. But you can't just ignore the parts of his ability that you find inconvenient.

That is not true. You have a problem with the ruling, not him, which is what leads you to reject his synopsis. That is not the same thing.

His synopsis was an accurate reading of the card in light of the FAQ ruling.

If you want to say that's what he can do, fine. If you want to say it's an accurate description of his ability, fine.

But no, it is not an accurate reading of the text.

It is plain English. The card image was even posted, read it with your own eyes. That you don't like what the English words say, that I cannot help.

IMHO no unit should be immune to any attack. I'm just going by what is written.

I have no interest in arguing with immature attitudes.

I admit it that on the surface it seems unfair. However read Dark Curse's card. It says focus tokens may not be used to attack him. Not that focus tokens may not be used to modify dice.

Are you seriously suggesting that during an attack that targets Dark Curse, the attacker can spend a focus token to modify dice results?

No, ziggy. That is not what I said at all.

DoubleNot7, here's what Dark Curse prevents you from using when he's the defender:

1-Using a focus to attack him while triggering a secondary weapon, perhaps in conjunction with deadeye(forbidden!)

2-Using a focus to transform eyes into hits

3-Using a target lock to reroll dice once the attack has been rolled

4-Using a buddy ship's "aura" to reroll dice (like say, howlrunner) or your own ship's ability (like Han)

All 4 of those consequences trigger because the pilot card text says the condition for them to occur is: Dark Curse defends an attack.

Your post seemed to indicate (forgive me if I read that incorrectly) that your reading of Dark Curse only included #1. You think #2 isn't included, but it's right there on the card text. As for #3 and #4, I have every reason to believe you're aware of them, but the discussion wasn't oriented towards those so they didn't come up.

"ships attacking may not spend focus tokens or re-roll attack dice" That is all I have stuck by, anything else is incorrect expression on my part or incorrect comprhension by others.

DC = Put your focus tokens away and leave the dice rolls alone, that's it.

How do you post an image?

I'm good with it either way. I don't even feel we need to clarify what is made clear by the FAQ.

Part of this is that some don't like the rule and are insisting FFG change it. Some don't agree with the logic and are demanding FFG change it. But forever there will be the rules lawyer and someone to disagree. All of us are welcome to create house rules, new rules or even our own games. But for Star Wars X-Wings that 's in tourneys or for my play, etc. that is there purview and they play by the rules.