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I'm more of a beer and pretzels player for X-Wing, but I do go tournament for other games... I am pretty surprised that no one is talking about the new TIE/fo Epsilon Leader. 19 points to remove a stress from every friendly ship within 1 seems pretty darn powerful to me. I've used it a few times and I'm impressed by the options that it opens up consistently. Pulling stress off of Fel to open up his dial after PTL, allowing ships to K/S-roll multiple turns in a row, allowing the lambda to pull off a red 0 multiple turns in a row, etc.

Am I missing something here or is this ability "good" but not noteworthy enough to show up in competitive lists?

They call me Griff wrote:
I'm more of a beer and pretzels player for X-Wing, but I do go tournament for other games... I am pretty surprised that no one is talking about the new TIE/fo Epsilon Leader. 19 points to remove a stress from every friendly ship within 1 seems pretty darn powerful to me. I've used it a few times and I'm impressed by the options that it opens up consistently. Pulling stress off of Fel to open up his dial after PTL, allowing ships to K/S-roll multiple turns in a row, allowing the lambda to pull off a red 0 multiple turns in a row, etc.

Am I missing something here or is this ability "good" but not noteworthy enough to show up in competitive lists?

Used it for the first time the other night. It is a great ability. Considering Backstabber took a stress from a crit, and I did 2 S-Loops from both of my TIE/FOs, and then next turn did whatever I wanted, it was awesome. But, you have to keep in mind that the reason why he's not super duper good, at least in my opinion, is because he's a 19 point TIE, and the effect doesn't do anything to get you the action that turn.

So yeah, it's a great ability, but not an auto-include or something to erh mah gerd about.

I tend to put less value in R1 abilities, simply because it takes real skill to maintain the distance once the opening turn or two has played out, and I tend to prefer elite lists over swarms, making it less value.

Undeniably a great ability, but would take real skill to really capitalise.

It's excellent ability, its just something you have to build around, as opposed to say Dark Curse, who you can just throw into almost any list and make him work.

He makes an excellent addition to a Tie swarm. Him, Howlrunner, and 5 Academy Ties slots into a 100pts very nicely and has the extra benefit of drawing fire from howlrunner, as his abilitybuffs a swarm very well. You don't even have to formation fly, just having a few TIEs stick together and K turn at different times, and just have epsilon be sneaky and barrel roll into range 1 of any stressed ships you can. Not to mention he clears the stress off himself, so you could have him pretend to be a defender for a couple turns just to mess with your opponent.

I used it the a week ago and it worked great. My list was
Omega Ace + PTL + Hull Upgrade
Epsilon Leader
Academy Pilot
Academy Pilot
Darh Vader + TIE/x1 + ATC + Calculation

Epsilon Leader was awesome, I could pull the stress off the Omega Ace and got two turns in a row of the 2 auto crits. At the same time it pulled stress off the Acedemy TIE's when they started doing their K turns. Also, it was not a high priority target. My opponenet was mostly concerned with takling out Omega Ace and the Acedemy TIEs (they kept getting in the way of his ships).

The new TIES in conjunction with the old are a great combination.

This will probably get FAQed, as RAW he can do this to himself too, not sure if that's RAI. (A ship is considered at range 1 of itself and the card doesn't stipulate "other" ships)

 Azreal13 wrote:
This will probably get FAQed, as RAW he can do this to himself too, not sure if that's RAI. (A ship is considered at range 1 of itself and the card doesn't stipulate "other" ships)

I doubt it will be FAQ'd (especially considering the new FAQ just came out today) because, like you've said, FFG has maintained that a ship is considered range 1 of itself. If they didn't want it to work that way, it would have wording similar Howlrunner's ability.

Equally, the set doesn't actually go on general sale until later this week does it? The new FAQ only seemed to cover up to Wave VII.

 Azreal13 wrote:
Equally, the set doesn't actually go on general sale until later this week does it? The new FAQ only seemed to cover up to Wave VII.

That's a good point, but the new FAQ makes several references to the old damage deck, so I don't think it completely ignores the existence new core set.

Still, I think the choice of wording is deliberate and similar to other abilities that act the same way.

That's the thing, I'm struggling to think of any, most abilities seem to be "self" or "others." It's unusual enough that it's "all" and not "one."

RAW it is totally clear, in essence he can't be stressed at the start of any turn without something stressing him a second time, so in essence can just sit in the middle K-turning his heart out, but I wouldn't be surprised that the when the next FAQ hits, either in a few weeks or a couple of weeks after Wave VIII hits to see it clarified or errata-ed

 Azreal13 wrote:
That's the thing, I'm struggling to think of any, most abilities seem to be "self" or "others." It's unusual enough that it's "all" and not "one."

RAW it is totally clear, in essence he can't be stressed at the start of any turn without something stressing him a second time, so in essence can just sit in the middle K-turning his heart out, but I wouldn't be surprised that the when the next FAQ hits, either in a few weeks or a couple of weeks after Wave VIII hits to see it clarified or errata-ed

It doesn't need to be clarified because FFG has already clarified that a friendly ship is always within range 1 of itself. It doesn't have the "another" qualifier to say that you cannot use it on yourself.

The ability is nice for sure, but you're removing stress at the beginning of the combat phase. Following your example of repeated K-turns, the stressed ship(s) is still not going to perform any actions during its activation (unless it's using something like Push the Limit or Experimental Interface). More importantly, even with the added one shield, it's still just a TIE fighter and is one good HLC shot away from blown up.

Epsilon Leader is good, but as noted, you need to have a squad where he matters to make him 'great'.

The problems are (a) he doesn't clear stress until the start of the combat phase and (b) he's in a TIE/fo, so if he's too critical to your plans, prepare to see him shot out of the sky on your first pass....

I can see him doing well flying wing for three Saber or Royal Guard Interceptor Pilots, or four Omega Squadron Pilots, with Push The Limit.

locarno24 wrote:

The problems are (a) he doesn't clear stress until the start of the combat phase and (b) he's in a TIE/fo, so if he's too critical to your plans, prepare to see him shot out of the sky on your first pass....

Pretty much this, like Howlrunner or any force multiplier ship it will pretty much die first and although 3 agi helps those 4 hp won't last long