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.

KnuckleWolf wrote:
But that is to my mind an almost irrelevant, players will buy new ships if only because of how they look or to just have the newest thing. Let there be multiple ships filling the same role! Give them different style abilities, make one tough, and another shooty, done!

But making one tough and another shooty isn't multiple ships in the same role, it's two different roles. The problem with X-Wing's design space is that there just aren't that many combinations of the basic attributes available, especially if you want to have the two factions be clearly different from each other. And if you start releasing ships that actually have the same role then people are going to quickly lose interest in new releases. Sure, the dedicated fanboys will buy a dozen copies of every obscure EU ship, but if the rules for it are pretty much "it's a Y-Wing with a different model" then most people won't be very excited about it and will just keep playing with their existing Y-Wings.

If you want to distinguish between them assign them different 'Eras' of play. Say that B-wings cant be taken starting late Galactic Civil War and through early New Republic and be done with it.

This is a terrible idea because it introduces divisions in the community. One of X-Wing's greatest strengths is the fact that you can just show up on game night and say "hey, let's play a 100 point game". If you start breaking the game up into arbitrary eras then people are going to prefer different eras and you have to negotiate which things are going to be allowed before you can ever play a game. It's just not worth it to add a bunch of obscure EU ships that few people care about, or stuff from the movies that most people would prefer to pretend never happened.

Lastly I strongly disagree with the Empire getting a generalist (aka Superiority Role) starfighter like an X-wing. Especially since they already have one in the form of the TIE Advanced, similar price and options, +1 agility/-1 firepower. Or a heavy fighter like the B-wing. They never had anything really similar to that at all canonically but the Lambda comes closest to fulfilling the same role in game.

But that's exactly what the assault gunboat was in the X-Wing video games: an imperial version of the X-wing/Y-wing. Obviously it shouldn't be exactly the same as either of them, but it should fill the same general role of "generalist fighter that can act independently". And that should be possible without making a rebel ship with a different paint scheme, as FFG demonstrated when they made the Z-95 a rebel "academy pilot" that is still clearly a rebel ship.

And no, the TIE advanced doesn't fill that role at all. No ship with two attack dice can ever do that job. The advanced is much closer to being an imperial A-wing, a ship that values staying alive above all else.

(Preface: Hoo-ray for the interwebs! lol)

Point 1: If I'm understanding you, your statement says that Luke and Wedge are two different roles? I would state that they are the same role but function distinctly. Making one tough and another shooty in fact does allow two ships to fill the same 'role' while being distinct as Luke and Wedge demonstrate handily. For instance to do Clone Wars era Y-Wing bombers you could say that the two basic pilot cards are both 1 pilot skill lower and appropriate points cheaper because they are still new to most pilots and the flight controls still need ironing out. Alternatively to do a Separatist Droid Starfighter you could take the base stats of a TIE and change its maneuver dial, take away Barrel Roll and give it Boost. Want to make a Naboo Starfighter? Take a X-Wing, drop a Firepower, tack on a shield. In each case you get the same role, but with different functionality. Now make them feel different within each ship type. One Droid starfighter may Koigran without stress, another may re-roll one of his attack die every attack, another may receive a free Evade token after being Target Locked. Same ship, same roles, distinct functions, but new things to play with.

Point 2: Proclaiming that such division in the community is foregone conclusion is like saying 'Apocalypse will kill 40k!' No, it's not a terrible idea. It gives players options without dictating to them, which can never be bad. The suggestion of 'Era Format' does not preclude the option to smash my Ebon Hawk in a list to play against your (heaven forbid) Yuhzan Vong. Notably Flames of War has lasted more or less a decade with distinct 'Eras' dividing it. The point of the game is still to have fun, no one suggested taking that away.

Point 3: Ironically the TIE Advanced was a multi-role starfighter that could act independently. I never said it was good at it though in game. The game really does not support 2 Firepower ships very well as far as I care, unless of course you can get a few of 'em together with like a Howlrunner buff going in which case heck yeah. However getting a TIE/Adv into your opponents rear and close range makes it work in that role quite well I'm afraid, if you can manage it, but then again when doesn't it? An A-Wing it is not, that comparison is better reserved for the TIE/In, which foregoes shields to pick up firepower but other than that uses its mobility to duck and weave enemy fire. All this of course in each our own humble opinion. But that's how the Empire rolls: More but weaker guns, more maneuverable but weaker hulls with out shields. To change this up so that the Imps have a ship as equal as you want it to be to X's or Y's would nix the whole feel. I'm sorry if you don't care for the Advanced but that's your X-Wing, and the TIE Bomber is your Y-wing.

KnuckleWolf wrote:
Point 1: If I'm understanding you, your statement says that Luke and Wedge are two different roles?

Not really. They're two slight variants of the X-Wing's role as a generalist fighter. If they were two separate $15 ships you'd be pretty disappointed and one wouldn't be very interesting if you already have the other. For ships to be interesting they need to have clearly different roles. For example the X-Wing is the generalist ship that all rebel fighters are measured against, the Y-wing is a turret boat, the B-wing is the close-range knife fighter, the A-wing is the fast ship, the E-wing is the expensive super-ship, and the Z-95 is the cheap meatshield. There are probably more broad categories like that to explore, but they are certainly not infinite and I doubt there are enough of them to cover every random obscure EU ship.

For instance to do Clone Wars era Y-Wing bombers you could say that the two basic pilot cards are both 1 pilot skill lower and appropriate points cheaper because they are still new to most pilots and the flight controls still need ironing out.

But that's not really going to make that ship play differently compared to a standard Y-wing. It's going to feel like another set of character cards (like Imperial Aces or the X-wing that comes with the transport), not a unique ship. That might work fine where the new ship is literally just a variant of an existing one, but if it's supposed to represent a different ship then it's going to be disappointing.

Alternatively to do a Separatist Droid Starfighter you could take the base stats of a TIE and change its maneuver dial, take away Barrel Roll and give it Boost. Want to make a Naboo Starfighter? Take a X-Wing, drop a Firepower, tack on a shield. In each case you get the same role, but with different functionality. Now make them feel different within each ship type. One Droid starfighter may Koigran without stress, another may re-roll one of his attack die every attack, another may receive a free Evade token after being Target Locked. Same ship, same roles, distinct functions, but new things to play with.

The problem is that this kind of thing adds complexity without adding much depth. It generates lots of options, but since the options are all very similar it all blends together into a dull mess. For example, when you have a choice between boost or barrel roll on your cheap "academy pilot" it's hard to tell which one you'd prefer, or even feel like they're two truly different choices. It's much better to have a smaller number of options, but have all of them be different enough to be interesting. For example, TIE fighter vs. TIE interceptor is a very interesting choice that most players have a strong opinion about.

Point 2: Proclaiming that such division in the community is foregone conclusion is like saying 'Apocalypse will kill 40k!' No, it's not a terrible idea. It gives players options without dictating to them, which can never be bad. The suggestion of 'Era Format' does not preclude the option to smash my Ebon Hawk in a list to play against your (heaven forbid) Yuhzan Vong. Notably Flames of War has lasted more or less a decade with distinct 'Eras' dividing it. The point of the game is still to have fun, no one suggested taking that away.

This isn't just hypothetical, it's what's happening right now with 40k. The community is divided about what should be legal (FW/Escalation/allies/etc), how competitively you should play, what rules need to be changed, etc. If I show up with a Baneblade I can expect to have to negotiate about whether my opponent will play against it, and have to give up on playing if they don't like it and I don't want to change my army. The only way to avoid it is to make everything balanced and compatible, but then you have "eras" that exist in name only.

The game really does not support 2 Firepower ships very well as far as I care, unless of course you can get a few of 'em together with like a Howlrunner buff going in which case heck yeah.

The game supports them just fine in general, FFG just made a mistake with the point costs of the TIE advanced and A-wing. They're both a little too expensive for what they do, especially with low-skill pilots that can't make good use of all of their actions.

An A-Wing it is not, that comparison is better reserved for the TIE/In, which foregoes shields to pick up firepower but other than that uses its mobility to duck and weave enemy fire.

The interceptor also costs more points (compared to what the advanced should cost) and has the critical three attack dice. In actual games the interceptor plays like a faster X-wing or B-wing with the three attack dice to kill you quickly and the speed to get into an ideal firing position to do it, while the A-wing and TIE advanced are both "turtle" ships that stack defensive actions, maneuver out of arcs, and focus on surviving as long as possible while slowly wearing down their opponents.

But that's how the Empire rolls: More but weaker guns, more maneuverable but weaker hulls with out shields. To change this up so that the Imps have a ship as equal as you want it to be to X's or Y's would nix the whole feel. I'm sorry if you don't care for the Advanced but that's your X-Wing, and the TIE Bomber is your Y-wing.

That's why the gunboat shouldn't be a literal X-wing, just like the Z-95 functions as a rebel "academy pilot" while still clearly being a rebel ship. Make the gunboat a middle ground between the B-wing and X-wing with two evade dice, a dial somewhere between the two rebel ships, barrel roll, no droid, and missiles instead of torps.

I think there are still loads of options for wave 5, without going down the road of too much eu stuff. All the Nubian stuff from episodes 1-3. I'm not sure why folk get worked up that they are 'old republic'. So was the falcon under a different name, and slave 1. The whole 6 film saga takes place over a generation or two. Surely there would still be plenty of ships knocking about from the earlier era.

Other possibilities I'd like to see - the scimitar assault bomber, skipray blastboat, Jedi starfighter, with maybe the Lady Luck as a large base rebel ship. Also, I'd like to see variant ships, like the black x wings.

One could argue that if the N-1 was able to reliably stand up to TIEs then the Rebels would have used them more commonly. But one could counter by suggesting that perhaps the N-1 really is a cracker jack starfighter, even by GCW-era standards, but is simply too expensive/high maintenance for the rag tag Alliance.

To me, it seems unlikely that a largely ceremonial ship designed by an inexperienced, vestigal military in a long era of peace would be on par with GCW-era fighters. It stands to reason that the N-1 was outclassed by early, Clone Wars-era variants of the Y-Wing and Z-95 decades before the Battle of Yavin. Considering the late variants of those fighters are among the "weaker" ships available in the game, where would that leave the N-1?

The same analysis applies to other prequels-era or earlier ships. While the YT-1300, Firespray, Y-Wing, and Z-95 are all technically prequels-era ships, the ones available in the game are "updated" for the GCW-era, as supported by the movies; either late variants at the end of their operational history or souped-up hot rods like the Millennium Falcon.

Furthermore, there is the question of branding. The brand of this game is not "Star Wars" (as with WotC products) but rather "X-Wing." The GCW is clearly the heart of the brand. I'd say this is another strong argument for not developing a fringer faction. In this era, everything is defined by the conflict between Rebels and Imperials. (Jabba is the only clear exception in the movies.)

With all that in mind, I think the future of X-Wing lies in mid-size ships with lots of customizability, fighters defined by entirely new mechanics (such as Wave 4's TIE Phantom but also the A-Wing from before), repaints with new cards, and playstyle-changing/expanding large-size ships.

The N-1 was still in use during the GCW (as was the ARC-170 and other Clone Wars era designs).

chaos0xomega wrote:
The N-1 was still in use during the GCW

 Manchu wrote:
if the N-1 was able to reliably stand up to TIEs then the Rebels would have used them more commonly

If they aren't great, price them cheap at let us take a squadron.

 Eggs wrote:
aren't great, price them cheap

If only game design was that simple so we could all be game designers.

As mentioned above, my idea for a future release is the Rogue Shadow.



In addition to whatever stats the ship itself brings (at the very least, a game-changing mid-size cloaking ship), it could come with two versions of the Starkiller upgrade card: one that makes it a Rebel ship and another than makes it an Imperial ship. It could also be packaged with faction-specific cards for each faction. For example, there could be a Rebs-only Rahm Kota upgrade and a Imps-only PROXY-as-Vader, or similar. Basically, whether you only play Rebs or Imps, you could still incorporate the ship into your list.

 Manchu wrote:

chaos0xomega wrote:
The N-1 was still in use during the GCW

 Manchu wrote:
if the N-1 was able to reliably stand up to TIEs then the Rebels would have used them more commonly

Or, it might just be that by that point the N-1 fighters were out of production and not easily available. Correlation does not equal causation.

Personally, one of the things that always bothered me about Star Wars was the apparent inconsistency in technological progression. Evidently, during the entire 10,000 or so year history of the Republic (up to the point of the Clone Wars), the size of starships and the capabilities of weapon systems remained relatively static... then the Clone Wars come along, and the size of the vessels remains roughly the same as it has been (though you start to see a general increase), but the systems capabilities (if not the quantity of the weapon systems themselves) seems to suddenly spike up making capital ships much more capable combatants...

AND THEN the Galactic Civil War era sets in, and you evidently see not only a great increase in size (Ex. Imperial Star Destroyers are almost twice the size of some of the vessels they replaced, and about 25% larger than some of the larger vessels they replaced... despite the fact that they (the ISD's) were considered 'medium size' at the time of their introduction...) but also a great increase in capability (you hear things like the weapons on an x-wing had a faster recharge time and were more powerful than those on z-95s, and older capital ships lacking the firepower to damage newer capital ships, even en masse, etc.).

I dunno, just never seemed like technology progressed over that 10,000 year or so period like you would expect it to.

chaos0xomega wrote:
it might just be that by that point the N-1 fighters were out of production and not easily available

 Manchu wrote:
But one could counter by suggesting that perhaps the N-1 really is a cracker jack starfighter, even by GCW-era standards, but is simply too expensive/high maintenance for the rag tag Alliance.

I suppose we could do this all day but I wish you'd just give my post a read.

chaos0xomega wrote:
just never seemed like technology progressed over that 10,000 year or so period like you would expect it to

This is the result of SW being a fantasy franchise rather than a sci fi one, despite appearances.

chaos0xomega wrote:

 Manchu wrote:

chaos0xomega wrote:
The N-1 was still in use during the GCW

 Manchu wrote:
if the N-1 was able to reliably stand up to TIEs then the Rebels would have used them more commonly

Or, it might just be that by that point the N-1 fighters were out of production and not easily available. Correlation does not equal causation.

Personally, one of the things that always bothered me about Star Wars was the apparent inconsistency in technological progression. Evidently, during the entire 10,000 or so year history of the Republic (up to the point of the Clone Wars), the size of starships and the capabilities of weapon systems remained relatively static... then the Clone Wars come along, and the size of the vessels remains roughly the same as it has been (though you start to see a general increase), but the systems capabilities (if not the quantity of the weapon systems themselves) seems to suddenly spike up making capital ships much more capable combatants...

AND THEN the Galactic Civil War era sets in, and you evidently see not only a great increase in size (Ex. Imperial Star Destroyers are almost twice the size of some of the vessels they replaced, and about 25% larger than some of the larger vessels they replaced... despite the fact that they (the ISD's) were considered 'medium size' at the time of their introduction...) but also a great increase in capability (you hear things like the weapons on an x-wing had a faster recharge time and were more powerful than those on z-95s, and older capital ships lacking the firepower to damage newer capital ships, even en masse, etc.).

I dunno, just never seemed like technology progressed over that 10,000 year or so period like you would expect it to.

I see it as this:

10 000 years of relative peace, leading to little in the way of technological development for Warfare. Then, along comes a Massive war, triggering an arms race and leading to a massive technological revolution. This re-starts the development of Military Technology, which is maintained by a period of continuous Warfare from the Clone Wars on. From Around the Battle of Naboo through to the Vong Wars, Tech progresses at a level comparable to today.

That's the fluff justification. A more realistic explanation is that the people describing the old republic stuff got lazy and just used pretty much the same tech as main-series Star Wars. they are therefore forced to maintain stasis for 10 000 years. From the Clone Wars on, however, the tech is allowed to advance at a rate which is fairly reasonable for a 50-year period of near-constant war.

 Crazy_Carnifex wrote:
10 000 years of relative peace

Not true. Star Wars lives up to its name in all eras except perhaps the 1000 years immediately preceding Attack of the Clones.

 Crazy_Carnifex wrote:
A more realistic explanation is that the people describing the old republic stuff got lazy

I think it's less about laziness and more about wanting to connect the games to moves through visual thematics. I think it's just hard to convey what an older futuristic vessel looks like (this is sometimes a problem in Star Trek, too, but that's sci fi unlike SW so they can rely on technological differences to drive the point). Lucas came up with a genius method for distinguishing between the "past" and "present" in the prequels; namely, the design of the past is primarily aesthetic whereas the present is primarily utilitarian. Tales of the Jedi also does a great job of coming up with an extremely archaic SW aesthetic but BioWare chose to do something completely different in KotOR.

 Manchu wrote:

 Eggs wrote:
aren't great, price them cheap

If only game design was that simple so we could all be game designers.

Isn't this what they are doing with the z95 then?

I did read your post, issue is that your premise is incorrect. I mean, it might have been a 'ceremonial' fighter design during a long era of peace by a vestigial inexperienced (note that many of the pilots actually came from mercenary/pirate backgrounds and were actually veteran pilots, as the Naboo Royal Space Fighter Corps was a volunteer organization) military, etc. but it was considered a very successful and highly effective starfighter design according to (expanded) in-universe sources, and they were considered to be 'battleship killers'.

While we do know that it was considered outdated by the time of the GCW, the fact that they were used at all means there was some worthwhile value to them.

Beyond that, I would argue that the basic tie fighter design was individually inferior to all of its contemporaries, and more on-par with Clone Wars era designs than GCW designs.

There is also the updated N-1T from Star Wars Galactic Battlegrounds which was considered the successor model. Its from a video game... but so is the Tie Phantom.

In fact is that not how all wargames work?

 Eggs wrote:

 Manchu wrote:

 Eggs wrote:
aren't great, price them cheap

If only game design was that simple so we could all be game designers.

Isn't this what they are doing with the z95 then?

I don't know if that's all they're doing. I do know that the "not as good and cheaper" formula is what I always advocated for the Z-95 but then again I'm no game designer. Bandit Squad ships cost as much as Academy Pilots but the comparison sort of stops there. You know, this is actually something I'd like to hear Peregrine weigh in on.

@Peregrine: Is the Z-95 just a cheaper generalist ... as in, are we just talking about replacing 3 X-Wings with 5-6 Z-95s?

I would think not. I've been thinking about them as missile delivery systems. I think there will need to be a A-Wing aces pack to "edit" as it were the A-Wing after the Z-95 release.

chaos0xomega wrote:
they were considered to be 'battleship killers'

LOL I can read Wookiepedia, too. The only time we've seen a N-1 kill a capital ship was when Anakin did it by accident.I actually own the Essential Guide to Warfare and will try to remember to look this up later.

chaos0xomega wrote:
the fact that they were used at all means there was some worthwhile value to them

Kinda sorta but not really. If someone breaks into my house in the middle of the night and all I have is a hammer then I guess I'll use the hammer. But if I have some time to prepare ... Point being, the Alliance clearly did not avail itself of the N-1 starfighter. As I already said, maybe that means it was outdated -- and maybe that means it was too expensive. But it's more likely that it was simply outdated by the time of the GCW, as even Wookiepedia says.

chaos0xomega wrote:
I would argue that the basic tie fighter design was individually inferior to all of its contemporaries

I doubt anyone would disagree at that superficial level. But of course the TIE is designed to be used in swarms.

So, if a TIE is inferior to its contemporaries but intended to be used in swarms, on the tabletop this is represented with a lower points cost and a weaker set of status... logically then designs like the N-1, ARC-170, V-wing, and other such fighters could be represented with slightly better statlines and slightly increased points costs... no?

Okay, this is going to get a bit theoretical and the disclaimer is that I'm not a games designer.

I think there is a common misconception about points costs being in a separate category from stats. The thinking seems to go, stats have a certain value that is represented by points cost.

I see a lot of players trying to figure out the "conversion rate." How much is one more point of defense worth? Is it different as between 1 and 2 as opposed to as between 2 and 3? Does having a 2 rather than a 3, or vice versa, in attack effect that calculation? And what about shields, hull points, maneuvers, upgrade slots, etc?

I think the conversion rate is an illusion. To me, points cost is not a product of stats but rather just another stat.

What does that have to do with making low cost prequels ships?

One important function of design in X-Wing is to simulate what players generally think about both the individual ships and the factions. TIE Fighters don't cost less than X-Wings primarily because they have a few lower stats. Their lower points cost is itself a stat meant to simulate (1) TIE Fighters and (2) Imperial military doctrine.

So let's take a look at the X-Wing and its predecessor the ARC-170. First off, they are very different ships in a lot of ways but they seem to serve similar roles albeit in different eras. The state of warfare had changed so much between the Clone Wars and the early days of the GCW that X-Wings had completely replaced ARC-170s in the Alliance military. Let's also keep in mind that X-Wing is set during the GCW (as opposed to the timeless abstraction of WotC's SW miniatures game).

Given that, how do we simulate an ARC-170 in the X-Wing game? Your proposal seems to be, give it lower stats that translate into a lower cost. Well, if the X-Wing is our benchmark, we know the ARC-170 has to have lower stats simply because the X-Wing is supposed to outperform it in our simulation. The notion that these lower stats then imply a lower points cost is problematic, however. The ARC-170s was not a swarm-attack fighter in any era, after all. But if we don't lower the points cost then there is less or no mechanical incentive to play the ship.

In this way, we see that era is important to game design.

This should be apparent to anyone with some experience in historical war games. War game rules are meant to simulate conflict given certain parameters, importantly including place and time. It does not make design sense, for example, to shoehorn WW1-era tanks into a game about Kursk. If the game is about Kursk, then its rules should be allowed to focus on simulating Kursk. The Germans should not be able to take a 5-10 Oberschlesiens from 1918 for every one T-34/85 the Russians take.

Similarly, the X-Wing miniatures game is in fact a historical war game even if the history in question happens to be fictional. The game is not designed to simulate warfare during the ancient Old Republic, the Clone Wars, or the Yuuzhan Vong invasion. This is a game explicitly about the GCW.

I suppose you will say again, well, ARC-170s were used in the GCW. No, they weren't really. I mean, maybe in some one-off adventure but not in the war at large nor did such one-off adventures play any meaningful role in the GCW. The rediscovery of a cache of ARC-170s or N-1s would not have significantly affected the Rebellion's chances, as opposed to the successful development and deployment of experimental TIEs like the Phantom.

Treating points costs as derivative of other stats strikes me as the flaw essential to this ahistorical approach to game design. But think where it ultimately leads. Looking back into the far past, all ships must have zeroes in every stat and cost nothing, i.e., have no effect on the game whatsoever. And looking into the future, you would hypothetically have single fighters that cost more than the point allowance for a whole fleet, to the same practical result.

Now the ARC-170 is a much less extreme example of course. It's the immediate predecessor to the X-Wing, after all, just as the Y-Wing was initially a Clone Wars-era bomber and predecessor to the B-Wing. But there is a difference inasmuch as that "historically" the late variant Y-Wings were useful and were used even after the declaration of the New Republic whereas the ARC-170 is totally outmoded by the Battle of Yavin.

In other words, low stats and low cost do not accurately simulate the ARC-170s place in the GCW. Not being in the game accurately simulates the ARC-170s place in the GCW.

 Manchu wrote:
@Peregrine: Is the Z-95 just a cheaper generalist ... as in, are we just talking about replacing 3 X-Wings with 5-6 Z-95s?

That's exactly what we're talking about. Z-95s will be used in two situations: as a swarm list with 6-8 Z-95s, and as a "filler" unit to add cheap numbers to a list (much like the prototype pilot now). For example, a list with Wedge/HLC B-wings/etc might add 2-3 Z-95s instead of a single X-wing, just so the ship count doesn't drop too low. Or a list that's in the 80-90 point range where you can't add a "real" ship without cutting something important will take a single Z-95 instead of throwing 10 points into marginal upgrades. But in either case I expect it to play a lot like the academy pilot: a generalist "just another ship" that tanks damage and makes attacks, without any fancy tricks or specialization.

IMO the missile role is going to end up like the "torpedo role" that X-wings have. Yeah, you have the upgrade slot available, but you aren't going to use it all that often. I don't think missiles are appealing enough in general for dedicated missile Z-95s to become popular.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Manchu wrote:
TIE Fighters don't cost less than X-Wings primarily because they have a few lower stats. Their lower points cost is itself a stat meant to simulate (1) TIE Fighters and (2) Imperial military doctrine.

I think you've got that kind of backwards. The point cost is a direct product of the stats, and the stats were designed with the intent of producing a ship that would be balanced at a cheap point cost. I imagine the way it worked in FFG's design and playtesting was that they realized early on that the TIE fighter stat line would work well as a cheap ship, and then fine-tuned the point cost once the stats were set. After all, if TIE fighters had cost 11 points or 13 points it would have had very little impact on the "fluff" concept (it's still a cheap swarm ship), but it would have had a massive impact on balance.

 Peregrine wrote:
I don't think missiles are appealing enough in general for dedicated missile Z-95s to become popular.

IMO missiles are a bit expensive on any rebel fighter. But you won't find a cheaper way to use them than Bandit Squadron. The ion pulse missile is also cheap and wants some follow up punch that can't be provided from one other Z-95. Then again, you're more likely to have two post-ion shots lined up flying with a swarm of Z-95s than one shot lined up flying with a heavier hitter.

I'm still wary of the supposed Rebel swarm. Butu I am really looking forward to seeing the Z-95 dial.

 Peregrine wrote:
After all, if TIE fighters had cost 11 points or 13 points it would have had very little impact on the "fluff" concept (it's still a cheap swarm ship), but it would have had a massive impact on balance.

I'm not discounting balance. I'm saying that points cost is a stat that can be balanced against other stats rather than a representation of net value of stats.

To be more clear:

Their lower points cost is itself a stat meant to simulate for the purposes of the X-Wing game (1) TIE Fighters and (2) Imperial military doctrine.

Under the misconception about cost that I'm talking about, it's the conversion rate (which is assumed to be constant against some standard, probably the X-Wing in this case) that does the balancing.

That's a slightly different aspect, however, than what I was addressing; namely, how chasing the illusionary conversion rate leads to the belief that ships outside the GCW era can/should be added to the game.

I think there is room for prequel ships though. Just because the majority of the GCW took place with X wings, Y wings et al, doesn't mean that you can't have the occasional antique knocking about. The conflict was galaxy wide, so there were bound to be all sorts of ships pressed into service here and there. An old, outdated star fighter is better than no star fighter.

I'm not fussed wither way. I can see why they'd want to keep the background 'pure', but I'm a fan of all the movies, the animated series, and I've read a good chunk of the books too. If they want to throw prequel stuff out there, I'll buy it. Pew pew pew.

 Eggs wrote:
I can see why they'd want to keep the background 'pure', but I'm a fan of all the movies, the animated series, and I've read a good chunk of the books too.

It's not really a matter of "pureness," or even a matter of disliking the prequels. Rather, it is a matter of design as I explained at great length above.

 Eggs wrote:
An old, outdated star fighter is better than no star fighter.

Of course, this is not a choice presented to players in the X-Wing game so I'd have to say it's irrelevant.

 Eggs wrote:
I think there is room for prequel ships though. Just because the majority of the GCW took place with X wings, Y wings et al, doesn't mean that you can't have the occasional antique knocking about. The conflict was galaxy wide, so there were bound to be all sorts of ships pressed into service here and there. An old, outdated star fighter is better than no star fighter.

But that's just bad design. You could theoretically make a prequel ship with 1/1/1/0 stats at 5 points each and it would accurately represent its usefulness in the setting of X-Wing (obsolete garbage) and likely tactics (swarm with enough of them to compensate for its inferiority), but is anyone going to be very happy to see their favorite ship, which was pretty cool in the prequel era, reduced to being obsolete garbage that even academy pilots laugh at? You'd have to break the game into "eras" so that the older ships can be satisfying without being un-fluffy.

Also it would just be boring to redo X-Wing for the Clone Wars era because so much of the design space has been explored in the GCW era's idiom. It would amount to a reskin. If there was to be a CW-era game, I'd like to see a design progression from what FFG has done with Flight Path in X-Wing. The first thing I would do is reduce the scale to better accommodate huge formations and capital ships.

Given the nature of the Rebellion and its military doctrine, fighter-focused combat makes good sense for a game simulating the GCW era. That is less true of the Clones Wars.

Well, I had commentary. lol

But it is becoming apparent that for a forum thread, oppinions otherwise to those of certain posters are unwelcome or at the least unrespected and intently shredded on contact with the board. So have a good time, I withdraw. Interesting thoughts though. Never heard some one compare a point cost to a stat that way. At least they got that it's not a static conversion from other values. Good job whoever that was.

I'm not sure why you think prequel ships are obsolete garbage. They still use the same astromechs, weapons systems etc. the start of the first civil war to the end is only what? 20 years? The tech has developed for ten thousand years up to that point, encompassing many wars. Did things really move on so much in 20 years that all existing ships became obsolete garbage? Yet they didn't bother upgrading their astromechs or weapons?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I have a fifteen year old car. It'll still eat about 80% of brand new cars for breakfast, progress be damned.

 Eggs wrote:
I'm not sure why you think prequel ships are obsolete garbage.

Because that's what the fluff says. The Z-95, despite upgrades over time, is a barely-adequate fighter that sees little use outside of pirates and rebel units that can't get better ships. And by the end of the rebellion era it has pretty much lost that role, with only the most desperate groups even attempting to use them. And all of the other ships are gone. Does it makes sense in a setting with 10,000 years of relative stability in technology? Not really, but that's what the fluff says.

chaos0xomega wrote:

 Manchu wrote:

chaos0xomega wrote:
The N-1 was still in use during the GCW

 Manchu wrote:
if the N-1 was able to reliably stand up to TIEs then the Rebels would have used them more commonly

Or, it might just be that by that point the N-1 fighters were out of production and not easily available. Correlation does not equal causation.

Personally, one of the things that always bothered me about Star Wars was the apparent inconsistency in technological progression. Evidently, during the entire 10,000 or so year history of the Republic (up to the point of the Clone Wars), the size of starships and the capabilities of weapon systems remained relatively static... then the Clone Wars come along, and the size of the vessels remains roughly the same as it has been (though you start to see a general increase), but the systems capabilities (if not the quantity of the weapon systems themselves) seems to suddenly spike up making capital ships much more capable combatants...

AND THEN the Galactic Civil War era sets in, and you evidently see not only a great increase in size (Ex. Imperial Star Destroyers are almost twice the size of some of the vessels they replaced, and about 25% larger than some of the larger vessels they replaced... despite the fact that they (the ISD's) were considered 'medium size' at the time of their introduction...) but also a great increase in capability (you hear things like the weapons on an x-wing had a faster recharge time and were more powerful than those on z-95s, and older capital ships lacking the firepower to damage newer capital ships, even en masse, etc.).

I dunno, just never seemed like technology progressed over that 10,000 year or so period like you would expect it to.

I believe this is due to Palpatine having a need to prove that size does matter.

I agree that they are drying up a pool of roles that need filled for each faction. That is why I vote they delve into the capital ship classes in a second system next!!