"Wave 4 Announced" Topic

E-wing, Z-95 Headhunter, TIE defender, and TIE phantom.

link

I like the E-wing and the Z95 is a much needed cheap filler ship. It's going in my falcon list if I can cram it in. Plus the Ion Pulse torp is nasty. I have to review the rules but I'm hopping it will pin a smaller ship in place for 2 turns and stop a large ship for one turn. The good news is we are now officially in the EU only stuff so I suspect we will start getting dual releases with repaints then new ships and rinse and repeat.

Jumping the shark?

WOO-HOO! The TIE Defender! And the TIE Phantom!

And they actually make the E-wing look halfway decent.

I refuse to calculate how much this is gonna set my wallet back. (At least I'll have time to prepare…)

Nope, no shark jumping here. For folks who only want original trilogy fighters, you knew you were pretty well complete after Wave 3. Here on out is EU until the next movie arrives.

Actually, I prefer these to the stuff from Episodes 1-3. I don't know if I will pick up any though, as I like just having original trilogy ships on both sides '.

The Ties just look a tad silly to me.

CorSec, no the rules already specify that all Ion tokens are removed at once and only affect the next move. The torp is nice for nailing big ships in a single shot, or hitting any ship at Range 3. Also, that's the second missile now that doesn't require the Target Lock to be spent when firing, so it will be a super-hitter when backed with Focus too.

Here's a blog that's posting a running tally of what's been deciphered so far: link

For folks who only want original trilogy fighters, you knew you were pretty well complete after Wave 3

Yeah, I can get a transport and the corvette, these ships are not real to me.

Kids might like them tho.

@miniMo I thought I remembered something about all Ions being removed. It's really a big ship neutralizer.

I really want another batch of large ships. Pulsar Skate, Wild Karrde, Lady Luck, and even the Love Commander. Plus some descent Imp ships like the gun ship version of the Lambda.

I'd love to see a smuggler/bounty hunter faction to mix up stuff a lot.

Those hoping for the prequel ships are probably going to have a long wait. I don't think they have plans to go backwards. I'd even bet that they don't hit the new movie stuff for a while. I guess Disney could make them do it but I hope not.

This game just feels pure to me. Unlike Attack Wing that is just an IP hog. They dump ships out like crazy for that game. I want a steady balanced growth to X-wing not a blast of ships but something that respects the original material and yes the EU is part of that. Of course I kinda don't like the movies and would prefer to live in the EU. Cooler characters and grander adventures.

Here's a blog

Thanks for that link. Interesting. The blogger missed one clue on the TIE Defender; if you zoom in on the image, you can see that the maneuver dial is set to a 5 green maneuver, like the A-wing. Not that big of surprise, I guess, but it gives an idea as to how the thing's maneuverability is going to be.

I note the blogger expressed hope that the Defender would not have ST:AW's "reverse" maneuver. I don't play AW, so I'm curious as to how that maneuver differs from a K-turn, and what might be "unfortunate" about it?

I an foreseeing some significant damage to my wallet…

The reverse is unfortunate because I'll have to figure out how to add it to my dials :) It's different from a K-turn because it's really a backup. You keep facing but move backwards.

Hmm. That wouldn't make sense with X-Wing. So I suspect that's probably out.

I'll predict either the missing 1-K turn, or a new, very tight turn that comes with a new maneuver template of some sort. Maybe a twist on a barrel roll?

I really want another batch of large ships. Pulsar Skate, Wild Karrde, Lady Luck, and even the Love Commander.

Pulsar Skate:

Wild Karrde:
Lady Luck:
Love Commander: My Google-fu failed on this one, even though I was sure to combine the name with "spaceship" and "star wars". I wasn't gonna search for it without those!!!

Oh, and my assessment: Yuck, Meh, and Yuck. I'd much rather have prequel designs than those things.

Well like I said it's all about the characters for me. Mara Jade drives the Wild Karrde. Corran Horns wife drives the skate. Lando flies the Lady Luck and the Love Commander. The Love Commander is just silly. Typical Lando with a nice fancy yacht that he wins in a card game but it gets funny when he loans it to Han and Leia. There are several funny scenes. The reason Han is flying it is sad. His crazy kid donuts the Falcon with a cruiser or something. They rebuild it but it's in dry dock for a long time.

link

They might not look amazing but they will have some cool in game effects and cards to go with them. Plus a pile of cool pilots.

However, It's not for me to criticize if you want to fly boring droid transforming ships and shiny fighters :)

Lady Luck (Sorosuub 3000) is available on Shapeways:
link
I might order one of these soon — I've been holding off on another Shapeways order until Wave 4 was announced.

Love Commander (Sorsuub 2400), even Wookieepedia doesn't have an image.

I don't recall that anyone's done the Pulsar Skate yet.

The 125m long Wild Karrde would be verry expensive in 1/270 scale!

12.5" wooden Wild Karrde available: auction

It's a boxy enough design to be a reasonable scratch-build project out of sheet styrene & bits.

Whoops, missed this: Gosric has a Pulsar Skate
link

I'm not a huge fan of the prequels (nor am I of the EU for that matter) but there *are* some nice prequel designs. I heard FFG's licence agreement does not cover the prequels… is that true?

Superb! We now have the main fighter before the TIE, and still (at least it should be) the most used out of the main factions, the Z95 (SW roleplayers will welcome it in memory of admiral Talon). And then we have what are possibly the coolest TIE ship, the Defender, which is coherent with TIE designs all the way (SW videogame players will welcome it for sure).

The other ships, only I can say, they look great and choherent with others. The incoming big ships look great too. Maybe in the future we'll see some specialized ones like the Scout version of the Y Wing, or the scout big Tie…

I have heard that FFG only has license for the Original Trilogy and the EU.

Crud, I really wanted a TIE Avenger. Oh well…this wave is going to do some serious damage to my bank account, I can't wait!

I would say FFG knows their core audience and is hedging bets to stay out of the prequel mine field. They seem to have a deep respect for the material and want to avoid the ship dumping that WizKids is doing. Their core audience is older and will be more attached to the originals. There is also a high chance they hate the prequels.

Also no one knows anything about that license except a few lawyers, Disney, Lucas, and the top brass at FFG. So we have no idea about the restrictions they are under.

Totally agree w/ CorSecEng.

It's why I'm not holding my breath waiting for an AT-AT or AT-ST from them. It's POSSIBLE but we have no idea what they're licensed for.

Tie Defender!!!

Yes!!!!!

The rebellion will be crushed for sure, this time………

Hmm, very interesting; we're seeing FFG take the game's implied timeline forward (E-Wing didn't see service until after Endor) and backwards (Z-95 was used by the Rebellion mostly before the X-wing entered service).

The Z-95 will fulfill a much-needed 'low cost ship' in the Rebellion line up, but I'm not sure how effective it will be; without Agility 3 and Evade it's not nearly as survivable as the TIE Fighter, and relying on a missile for punch means it's not quite as cheap as it seems….

The E-wing looks like a beast though; it's got evade, barrel roll and an A-wing like movement dial per the description, plus a very nice upgrade bar. But then it's 32 points!

I admit the TIE Defender stats seems fairly tame to me (3/3/3/3) but I guess it's for balance. Unfortunately that leaves no room for the TIE Avenger in between the TIE Advanced and the TIE Defender.

The TIE Phantom really surprises me, as it was always fairly obscure. Can't make out the rules so I'll reserve judgement.

Anyway, I like this wave overall, and I know I'll be picking some up!

-Will

Well, Hasbro just announced the new D&D minis will be made by WizKids in the booster boxes like before to kick off the new D&D. (The figs are not clix but collectable.) I wonder if Hasbro will give new Star Wars figures to WizKids for the new SW RPG? Seems like a no-brainer to me.

Why would Hasbro have anything to do with it? If it's a rights issue then why not go directly to FFG. I for one don't want WizKids to get it. They still haven't figured out what a wash is.

Great additions to the game. Roll on further releases.

Impressive. Most impressive.

The TIEs will definitely fit into my collection

Why would Hasbro have anything to do with it?

It's probably a different license for the SW RPG. FFG has the license for their spaceship miniatures combat game and their SW card game, which wouldn't cover RPG figs.

But I'll agree with you in hoping against any WizKid connection with X-Wing. While I acknowledge they have a better supply and distribution system for ST:AW, their miniature quality simply sucks. Out of scale, bad sculpting, and horrible paint jobs. No thanks. Give me quality over quantity any day of the week. I'll deal with the distribution problems with FFG (which aren't that bad, all things considered).

Yah but FFG is publishing the RPG. We are talking about Hasbro kicking the license to someone else so other then having an existing relationship with WizKids why not give those rights to FFG? That is if Hasbro is even involved at all.

Thinking of scratchbuilding a Wild Karrde, I just grabbed a cheap WizKids Starship Battles figure off EBay. It's too small for X-Wing, but will be a super study piece for making a larger one!

FFG has already included prequel material in their Edge of Empire game. So they may well have rights to it for X-Wing too. But I'd guess that mining the EU first is a safer bet for miniatures. I'd certainly bet that there's a large pool of gamers who enjoyed the video games and want those ships for tabletop play now.

The WizKids dump for Star Trek makes sense for them. They already have all the molds. The reason they licensed FFG's game mechanic was so that they could sell all the ships they'd already invested in and no one was buying because their own game wasn't very good. Holding back on releasing them for Attack Wing would only result in that they'd still not be selling them.

Over on The Metal Bikini there's some info about the stats, pilots, upgrades for the Z-95 Headhunter and E-Wing

the z-95 screams pirates to me.

It'd be cool if they had a Black Sun Squadron pilot for the Z-95, eh Combat Wombat?

drool. I did just buy some TIE Defenders and some assault boats from shapeways.

Glad to see more ships being released. On my list to get.

Thanks for The Metal Bikini link. Great to read about this stuff. These ships are gonna be fun.

Wish they would come sooner, but then, I've barely scratched the surface of scenarios for Wave 2 and Wave 3!

One of these days, I'm gonna come up with a scenario for every ship my buddies and I have… but we're gonna need to find a bigger gaming group to have enough pilots to pull the thing off! (And that's even with people running four and five-ship flights!)

You're welcome, Parzival.

Here's the next Wave 4 report on The Metal Bikini.

Oh, wow— I forgot about the Tractor Beam in TIE Fighter. Can you imagine one on the tabletop? That would be nasty…
Alas (or not), there doesn't seem to be a mention of it among the upgrade cards.

The only thing I do regret about this wave is that they seem to be skipping over the TIE Avenger. Maybe they expect the TIE Advanced to fulfill that role, but it'd have been nice to at least have the licensed sculpts.

There's a little bit of scepticism in my neck of the woods. Apologies in advance for the cold water I'm about to pour on this. I understand people want things to grow and not stagnate as that kills interest and I do think it's a really good game too. But…..

Firstly please Wayland Games don't ask me to pre order when you've had my money for Heaven knows how long and STILL haven't come up with my 2 boxes of TIE Imperial Guard Interceptors. Not your fault I know but the cash is better in my pocket than yours. This time when a retailer has them in stock I will make my purchase, not before.

Secondly I have no interest in the Expanded Universe. If it's not in the films I don't have any knowledge of it as I don't play computer games or read Star Wars books. Star Wars for me begins and ends with the six films.

Thirdly if FFG's previous performance is anything to go by we will still be waiting for these ships this time next year. I can't get excited about something that's possibly a year or more away.

Lastly aren't we in danger of entering a Games Workshop 40K type arms race where to be competitive you just have to have the latest ship?

For myself, my FLGS doesn't require pre-payment for pre-orders, but I can see how that would be discouraging.

I'm just recently learning about the EU stuff and enjoying it, but certainly each to their own tastes.

I don't mind the wait. Actually, the wait works to my own advantage! I was waiting for the announcement of theWave 4 releases before placing another order on Shapeways for custom ships. Now I know what won't be duplicated in the coming year. And because of the known delay, a good sized Shapeways order should fit into the budget next month ^,^

While there is a risk of pulling a GW at some point, so far FFG has nicely avoided that. This game works quite competitively with older releases against new. I suspect that trend will continue. The 'ooh new shiny' lists will always gain a lot of attention. But in this game more variety means, well, more variety. No squad that used to be good has become obsolete. The larger variety of viable lists ensures a greater variety of lists that will be used in any given tournament. I'll happily fly a Wave 1 and/or 2 Imperial or Rebel list in a competitive tournament against Wave 3 or 4.

Not all ships and upgrades are quite worth their points cost. Some have always been clunkers. But nothing that has started out good has lost any competitive play value.

Since I don't take the "I must build a fleet that will defeat yours" approach, or play with those who do, I don't have an issue with whether any of these are too powerful. But even then, they're not that powerful if you consider the points cost. Wingmen make a difference, and a lone big baddy is also a fire magnet.
In any case the solution is scenario play, with objectives other than "kill them all."
And while I started as an original trilogy guy, I have a fondness for the flight sim ships, at least.
But as with anything, buy what you want, play with what you want, and don't worry about what anyone else enjoys. As it is, the film ships are pretty much done (or at least on the way), so EU is the only route for FFG to expand the line.
I concur on some of the supply issues, although honestly I've been able to get the ships I wanted in a timely way, once they were available. I've just learned to go with multiple sources.

But as with anything, buy what you want, play with what you want, and don't worry about what anyone else enjoys.

Amen.

Some people might not like the EU ships, but some of us don't like all of the ships from Episodes IV, V, or VI.

I feel it's a big enough "galaxy" for everyone's ship preferences.

some of us don't like all of the ships from Episodes IV, V, or VI.

Hey, I think the B-wing is one of the silliest ship designs ever— a rotating, offset cockpit? Why in the name of Kenobi would you design such a thing? It makes no logical sense— but at the same time, I love being able to play a game with it. Ditto the TIE (horrible pilot sight lines), the Falcon (again with the offset cockpit— at least it doesn't rotate), the A-Wing (streamlining? Fins? Why?), and so forth. But I still love the looks of the things, as well as the "character" of how they perform in both films and the game.

I also initially spoke against the E-wing before it was announced, because I thought it was ugly. I also resisted the Slave 1 for the same reasons, until I played a game with it and decided it was too tactically interesting to ignore.
Now I'm starting to think "the more, the merrier!"

Looking forward to these.

Glad the TIE/D is not the Munchkin Mary-Jane wannabe ship that some were demanding… one person was seriously arguing it should have 4 agility and 8 Shields.

Straight 3s seem reasonable.

A little curious why the E-Wing only got 2 Hull, but I guess the shields are rechargeable with certain combos, so that might be a gain over the X-Wing.

Phantom looks to be a glass cannon… but cloaking could add some new options.

Z-95 looks like a filler ship for the Rebels.

Like all the previous ships, it will all come down to the pilot options: Flying in a TIE/D won't save Mook #41.

As if to illustrate my point I just got an e mail from Wayland Games saying the release date for the Imperial Aces has been put back again, this time to the 28th of February. There's nothing they can do about that of course so I'm not blaming them but my money has been in their account rather than mine now for 5 months and I still have no ships. Why on earth would I preorder X Wing ships again? Not just from Wayland Games but from anybody. Also why would I get remotely excited about the Wave 4 stuff? On current form I might just see it in 2015 but I'm not holding my breath.

Aha! In the midst right now of finally catching up on repainting my 2nd and 3rd TIE squadrons, I figured out how to incorporate these and future TIE variants…

According to the [mostly] all-knowing Wookieepedia, the standard fighter complement of a Star Destroyer is 4 Squadrons of TIEs (the 4th is usually a training squadron, i.e. the Academy Pilots), 1 of Interceptors, and 1 of Bombers. 1 of the TIE squadrons can be replaced with a 2nd Interceptor Squadron.

Rather than a 2nd squad of squints, my SD will have a Testing & Advanced Training Squadron! A pair of each new prototype goes to this squadron. If I discover I really like a new ship, then more can be requisitioned =^,^=

And for bonus points, this solution will help fend off my urge to get a 4th TIE squadron ~,~