Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_news.asp?eidn=4682


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Looks like it could be fun.

 Manchu wrote:
http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_news.asp?eidn=4682

Great, now I need to buy the transport box. I am not sure how much use I am going to get out of the transport, but the new X-wing pilots are very nice.

 guardpiper wrote:
Great, now I need to buy the transport box. I am not sure how much use I am going to get out of the transport, but the new X-wing pilots are very nice.

Because quoting is easier than typing that myself.

Also, R2-A3 and Hobbie look fun: Targtet opponent, both players get stressed, Hobbie spends target lock, discards stress.

And finally, Y-wings with Elite Pilot Talents!

Wes scares me.

Put VI on him and pretty much point at one enemy ship and say "Hope you didn't plan on losing that Focus/Evade/Target Lock so soon"

IMO:

Wes Janson: solid. Taking off a token, even if you don't cause any damage with your attack, is an awesome support ability that sets up an easy kill for the rest of your squadron and limits the return fire you'll be taking. The only real downside here is that you're paying Wedge-level points for a pilot that isn't Wedge. I'd have a hard time taking him over Wedge (who is more likely to just kill a ship instead of screwing around with crippling it), and taking both of them puts some pretty severe limits on your list options.

Hobbie: decent, but kind of overrated IMO. Yeah, easily clearing stress is pretty nice, but unless you're carrying an unused target lock into a k-turn then it isn't going to come up all that often without EPTs. And the EPT options are kind of limited. Sure, you can spend +4 points and your droid slot for PTL, but with only two actions available you aren't getting much out of it. Add engine upgrade for a third action and you're spending way too many points. Opportunist brings your point cost up to a HLC B-wing that gets 4 dice all the time instead of only sometimes. Expert handling is nice, but then you don't have target locks to clear your stress. I think this is one where it's easy to imagine cool tricks, but none of them are really all that competitive.

Tarn Mison: awesome. That's a really powerful ability, and he's cheap. It's going to be very easy to just throw him into a list as an upgrade to a random generic X-wing. And he's an interesting torpedo carrier, take focus as your action and then if anyone in your arc attacks you at PS 4+ you get to return fire with a focused torpedo shot. I'd even give serious thought to putting advanced torps on him, since he's the cheapest possible APT carrier that can get the focused shot without support from a second ship.

Porkins: solid. Another X-wing with an EPT is always nice to see, and his point cost relative to PS is excellent (PS 7 for only +1 point over the PS 5 pilots). And the ability is actually pretty good. Don't believe the hype about using "endless" stress-producing EPTs/k-turns/etc, that's just a good way to throw away a ship. But when you absolutely need to get maximum performance at a critical moment you've got it.

R3-A2: awesome. Cheap stress is nice. Sure, you'll be limited to a very small range of maneuvers, but so will most of your targets. I wouldn't waste a high-skill pilot on this when there are better skill-enhancing droids available, but it's an easy addition that instantly turns a cheap rookie pilot into a major threat. Just note two important things: you immediately assign the stress before you even roll dice, so Hobbie's ability can clear it right away and it inflicts the stress on the defender no matter what the outcome of the attack is, and it only works if the target is inside your arc, so turrets don't help. Though a Y-wing with an ion turret firing in its primary arc can keep a target pretty well locked down as long as you can keep rolling well enough.

R2-D6: overrated. The best EPTs require you to take stress to use them, and you really want the basic R2 to give you more stress-clearing greens. So you're left with the lower-tier EPTs that aren't really cost-effective when you're paying an additional point and giving up your droid slot to get them. And that price is even higher when we just got two powerful new unique droids (auto-stress and boost + TL) that you could take instead. I'm sure it will see some use, but it's a lot more situational than the initial hype would suggest.

Flechette torps: awesome. Yeah, it's not the best damaging attack ever, but automatic stress is incredibly powerful. And it's cheap, at only two points per shot it's easy to throw a couple in your list with spare points. Just be careful when you use them. Shoot too early and you're wasting them without much impact. But if you put stress on a target at the right time (when they need a k-turn to get back into the fight, when they already have stress, etc) you can completely cripple them.

 Crazy_Carnifex wrote:
And finally, Y-wings with Elite Pilot Talents!

Sadly not. The awesomeness of EPT Y-wings depended on having the droid slot available to give them some decent greens. Without it there isn't really anything interesting to do with them.

I was excited to get Garven Dreis the new elite droid for Veteran Instincts. Much improves my typical casual list. I'm already calling the next era of game play the Stress Wars haha lol

I was wondering how practical tarn mison would be with r5-k6 as his droid co-pilot.

In his turn he moves and takes the focus token, most enemies aren't going to one shot him since he can use the focus to evade, so he picks up a target lock on one of the attackers. He can spend the target lock to return fire(with a torpedo upgrade ) and possibly nabs another target lock in the process.

Any thoughts? Too expensive?

 Theophony wrote:
I was wondering how practical tarn mison would be with r5-k6 as his droid co-pilot.

In his turn he moves and takes the focus token, most enemies aren't going to one shot him since he can use the focus to evade, so he picks up a target lock on one of the attackers. He can spend the target lock to return fire(with a torpedo upgrade ) and possibly nabs another target lock in the process.

Any thoughts? Too expensive?

I personally expect that Tarn will be most often seen fairly naked, just replacing a generic X-wing, although (as Peregrin mentioned), running him with advanced Torps could be a good Mortons Fork- Move into Range 1 and focus. Opponent now must either ignore you (in which case, 4 attack dice and a focus), or try to kill you (and if they fail, Advanced torps to the face).

I see Porkins and R5-D8 becoming best friends. Slap PTL on Jek for even more fun.

 Theophony wrote:
I was wondering how practical tarn mison would be with r5-k6 as his droid co-pilot.

Decent maybe, but I'll probably just take a generic R2 like usual. You'll probably be using target locks more frequently than most pilots (since focus is the default first action) so you've obviously getting more out of the droid, but you're also talking about a pilot whose main advantage is being incredibly cheap. And since it's so easy for him to get a free target lock on something you're going to end up in a lot of situations where the droid gives you back the target lock you just spent, and then when you get shot at you gain another free target lock that replaces your droid bonus before you get to spend it.

 Zathras wrote:
I see Porkins and R5-D8 becoming best friends. Slap PTL on Jek for even more fun.

Not really a fan of either idea. The droid sounds good on paper, but if you're frequently spending your action to attempt to repair damage then you're negating most of the advantage of removing the stress in the first place. Then if you add PTL you're getting the marginal advantage of stacking focus + TL and nothing else (using PTL to repair the damage you just took by using PTL is completely absurd) in exchange for killing yourself, so you'd probably better add an engine upgrade to justify it. Now you're paying Wedge-level points for an X-wing that isn't Wedge. And that's a tough call to make.

IMO the way to make him work is going to be treating him as a standard X-wing that can occasionally ignore stress (mostly k-turn stress) at a critical moment. For an EPT I'd probably go with either something cheap and boring (swarm tactics, VI, etc) or expert handling. Barrel rolls on an X-wing are always good, and since you won't use it every turn and can sometimes recover with a basic green you aren't going to kill yourself trying to keep stress-free.

 Iur_tae_mont wrote:
Wes scares me.

Put VI on him and pretty much point at one enemy ship and say "Hope you didn't plan on losing that Focus/Evade/Target Lock so soon"

I saw a friend do that and put him in a list with Luke w/VI, R2D2 & Shield Upgrade and Wedge w/PTL & R2. 100 points and very nasty....no need to stay in formation for abilities to work.