I am really intrigued... and kinda scared...

I really hope this "Epic" version doesn't replace the standard rules for stuff...

I also can see a severe abuse of the "Tie fighter crashing into ship" thing.

Imagine transports VS Tie swarm where the rebel wins simply by cutting off all Tie Fighters...

Doesn't seem too fun to me.

If the Tie flyer can't see that coming with this huge ship, its his own fault.

Yes, they have altered the images. I recognize the Firespray images from LCG art, only with the proper Slave I coloring.

And from the images from the magazine last month, we know there isn't a new generic pilot.

I'm really excited that they stuck to the movies and don't have this thing bristling with weapons. Hopefully this means we'll finally be playing some fun escort scenarios and not just 100 pt. dogfights. Also time to get a second playmat to really take advantage of this stuff.

Are there any spoilers on Porkins or what looks like another named X-wing?

I really hope this "Epic" version doesn't replace the standard rules for stuff...

I'd be surprised if that happens. But we also don't know what the epic and cinematic rules will bring to the Imperials.

FFG does love it's alternative play formats. Epic is just a secondary tournament format.

Does anyone have the link to that article released awhile back? it had a higher resolution image of the layout and cards....

If the Tie flyer can't see that coming with this huge ship, its his own fault.

I guess that's true... I panicked, and forgot that

Epic = More points = more space.

I was imagining 8x tie fighters, VS 3x Transports on a 3x3 space... Herp derp me.

FFG does love it's alternative play formats. Epic is just a secondary tournament format.

This, I can certainly be excited about.

Hopefully this means we'll finally be playing some fun escort scenarios and not just 100 pt. dogfights.

Yes. A thousand times, yes.

Speaking as a Rebel mostly player... My biggest issue with the Transport is that it seems to be a Rebel only ship. I know the Empire was never seen using one, and likely didn't have a huge need for such a thing when they have ISD's.

But for the game, and without seeing the rules... It seems like this gives the Reb's a huge number of new toys and nothing for the Empire.

The ship is pretty cool. Vanor the GE did use at least one Transport as a Slave ship.

My only ultra major mionr issue with the lore they posted about the ship is that it is unscanable. Thats a half truth ships can still do close range scans on these transports. Like I said almost nonexistant issue.

I wonder if any of the new abilites on the 75 will make its way onto wave 4 + fighters.

Well, a TIE swarm should be PS1 and as such move before the transport. So unless you're attacking the thing head on, you shouldn't have a problem clearing it. As for running multiple ones, it doesn't look like they'll be able to do much damage on their own. If you run 2 of them, and you put a slicer on at least one (so you can do damage), you're left with 33 points for other ships (assuming epic still uses 100 point lists, which i doubt, but seeing as that's what we're all familiar with for now, I'll use that as a starting point). But lets go and give them both slicers. So you're left with 26 points for other ships.

This means the rebels can take 1 other ship, and it's not going to be that loaded - you can't even make a dagger + AdvS for that. So if there are 7 TIEs against a B wing + 2 transports, they should be able to take the B out in one turn, only losing 1 ship max. That means 6 TIEs against these things. You should be able to fly along side / behind them and with 6 ships, you should be able to slowly kill them. In the mean time, they can put 4 stress tokens on your ships. Which means they can maintain 2 ships are stressed. And then they can both do 1 damage to each of those ships. So they'll be doing 8 damage per turn. So that won't actually take too long to kill your swarm off, considering it has 18 health total. But if they're doing that, they don't get to regen their shields. So if you focus, you're averaging 1.5 damage / ship, times 6 ships, puts you at 9 damage after 1 round. Then the second round, 2 ships die, and two more are at 1 health. The 4 remaining ships do 6 damage, 3 of which kills the first transport. The remaining 3 goes on the second transport. Now he stresses another ship and damages it 1 and kills both that have 1 hull, and you're down to 2 ships. You do 3 damage to him. He stresses your other ship and now your two ties are down to 1 and 2 hull respectively. They do another 3 damage to him. Next turn he kills one off, and puts the other at 1 hull. You do another 1.5 damage, and he has 1.5 hull remaining. And then he kills you. Note, at any point after he brought you down under 4 TIEs, he could just regen shields every turn and you couldn't punch through those. But now if you got to R1, you'd be doing 2.25 damage per TIE instead of 1.5. Also, I didn't take into account the fact that you get two stress tokens so you can't take an action the turn after he stresses you, so you can't take that focus.

So, TIE swarm vs. double transport = advantage Transport. Though if you stay at R3, he can do nothing. The worst place for the swarm to be is R2.

I'm not imagining ways to play scenarios with this. What about an Imp attack on a rebel transport. The Transport moves each turn and you don't actually move it but the board. Anyone too far from it dies! BWHAHAHA

Does anyone have the link to that article released awhile back? it had a higher resolution image of the layout and cards....

You mean this one?

http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_news.asp?eidn=4312

Vanor the GE did use at least one Transport as a Slave ship.

I meant in the movies. Most people associate the GT-75 with the RA, and most of the lore seems to follow this.

I guess my real issue here is, that the Empire gets the Imperial Aces, which are cool. But don't do nearly as much to change the game as this Transport does, but Imperial players don't really get much out of it.

Yeah, not a lot for the Imps in terms of ships, but I'm going to hope that the changes in the game this introduces will add a lot. I could see playing against this transport opening up new use for bombers and shuttles too. Although I like the Imperials the best, don't most people play both sides? I'd love to see new cool Imp stuff, but I'm not sure that symmetry is a necessity.

Does anyone have the link to that article released awhile back? it had a higher resolution image of the layout and cards....

You mean this one?

http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_news.asp?eidn=4312

Nah, but I did find what I was looking for back on like page 7, or 8

Speaking as a Rebel mostly player... My biggest issue with the Transport is that it seems to be a Rebel only ship. I know the Empire was never seen using one, and likely didn't have a huge need for such a thing when they have ISD's.

But for the game, and without seeing the rules... It seems like this gives the Reb's a huge number of new toys and nothing for the Empire.

Empire will get something to match it. they have imperial aces on its way and look for something else mid-yr imo.

Well, a TIE swarm should be PS1 and as such move before the transport. So unless you're attacking the thing head on, you shouldn't have a problem clearing it. As for running multiple ones, it doesn't look like they'll be able to do much damage on their own. If you run 2 of them, and you put a slicer on at least one (so you can do damage), you're left with 33 points for other ships (assuming epic still uses 100 point lists, which i doubt, but seeing as that's what we're all familiar with for now, I'll use that as a starting point). But lets go and give them both slicers. So you're left with 26 points for other ships.

This means the rebels can take 1 other ship, and it's not going to be that loaded - you can't even make a dagger + AdvS for that. So if there are 7 TIEs against a B wing + 2 transports, they should be able to take the B out in one turn, only losing 1 ship max. That means 6 TIEs against these things. You should be able to fly along side / behind them and with 6 ships, you should be able to slowly kill them. In the mean time, they can put 4 stress tokens on your ships. Which means they can maintain 2 ships are stressed. And then they can both do 1 damage to each of those ships. So they'll be doing 8 damage per turn. So that won't actually take too long to kill your swarm off, considering it has 18 health total. But if they're doing that, they don't get to regen their shields. So if you focus, you're averaging 1.5 damage / ship, times 6 ships, puts you at 9 damage after 1 round. Then the second round, 2 ships die, and two more are at 1 health. The 4 remaining ships do 6 damage, 3 of which kills the first transport. The remaining 3 goes on the second transport. Now he stresses another ship and damages it 1 and kills both that have 1 hull, and you're down to 2 ships. You do 3 damage to him. He stresses your other ship and now your two ties are down to 1 and 2 hull respectively. They do another 3 damage to him. Next turn he kills one off, and puts the other at 1 hull. You do another 1.5 damage, and he has 1.5 hull remaining. And then he kills you. Note, at any point after he brought you down under 4 TIEs, he could just regen shields every turn and you couldn't punch through those. But now if you got to R1, you'd be doing 2.25 damage per TIE instead of 1.5. Also, I didn't take into account the fact that you get two stress tokens so you can't take an action the turn after he stresses you, so you can't take that focus.

So, TIE swarm vs. double transport = advantage Transport. Though if you stay at R3, he can do nothing. The worst place for the swarm to be is R2.

epic will be more points - at least 150 per side. they will give u some options about how big u wanna go and leave it up to u. scenarios will set these points at specific levels but there will likely be rules for u to go nuts and have higher points if u have the ships imo.

Although I like the Imperials the best, don't most people play both sides?

That was true, and perhaps is still true, I think most people collect both sides, but seems more and more you're getting people who are a bit more devoted to one faction.

Even if someone does play both sides, so they have a good reason to buy a transport, it still seems like they're giving the Reb's a really cool new toy with lots of stuff it can do, without the same level of game changing stuff for the Imperial side...

But again I also don't know what the new rule sets will include so there maybe some cool stuff in there for the Imp's.

I think there will be the typical 'reinforcement' rules for the imps in scenarios at least.

I imagine that FFG likely has larger ships for the Imperial side coming, just that this and the Tantive IV are the first. In the interim, they may either draw upon bounty hunters for additional evil side support (though a third pirate faction would be better for them) or introduce a heavy Imperial themed Wave 4 (everyone seems to want the defender and avenger).

I'm intrigued by the mention of energy and how it will work - is energy a finite resource over the entire game or does it get refreshed with every turn?

I'm intrigued by the mention of energy and how it will work - is energy a finite resource over the entire game or does it get refreshed with every turn?

Here's a bit from the page about that...

The GR-75‘s maximum energy capacity is indicated by the purple number above its agility value, and new rules allow your transport to both gain energy and spend it to power a brand-new action and activate a host of new upgrades.

So it isn't a finite resource for the whole game. My guess would be something like a focus action. Use your action for that turn to gain 4 energy.

Hey, look, they updated the Upcoming page finally to include the Rebel Transport and Tantive IV.

http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_upcoming.asp

Both are listed as in development and neither has an expected release date yet.

[edit] And they took the Starfield Tile Kit off completely, haha.

Both are listed as in development and neither has an expected release date yet.

Cool thanks

I know a number of people have pre-ordered these already. But I'm kinda glad I haven't, not until they get closer to release anyway.

I am so eager for this.

Several people have mentioned how this really doesn't help the Imperials. I'm not sure this is true, though it certainly helps the rebels more. We have no idea if any of the upgrade cards (specifically crew cards) are generic or even unique and non-faction bound. We might see cards that can benefit any ship with a crew slot.

Of course, the only ships with crew slots are the HWK-290, YT-1300, the Slave 1 and... and... The Lambda. *cries a tear of joy*

Off topic - I thought I'd share with you Sable that I finally got to fly against a competent buzzsaw shuttle. It put out the hurt for sure, and I made sure to make it my primary target. Though I may reconsider that in the future. In two turns I got it down to 1 hull, but by then, I had maneuvered behind it, and it started its long arduous journey to turn around to rejoin the battle. And I proceeded to ignore it for those turns even though it just had 1 hull.

Have you experienced this at all with all of your flying?

Off topic - I thought I'd share with you Sable that I finally got to fly against a competent buzzsaw shuttle. It put out the hurt for sure, and I made sure to make it my primary target. Though I may reconsider that in the future. In two turns I got it down to 1 hull, but by then, I had maneuvered behind it, and it started its long arduous journey to turn around to rejoin the battle. And I proceeded to ignore it for those turns even though it just had 1 hull.

Have you experienced this at all with all of your flying?

Yes. Indeed, i generally want them to pound on the lambda until it's time to break off and sweep away. It might take a couple turns to return, but when it does, it usually pounces on something unsuspecting. If you don't think you can survive that long with your other ships, break them off too. Force your opponent to chase one ship while the rest of your herd regroups.