Wow, nice preview today.  I did not expect to get two in a row.  

Showed off both unique pilots, and Darth Vader is a monster.  Also showed all 5 upgrade cards.  Really like the missiles.

As predicted the numbers in this set were 18 and 19.

Thanks,

Duncan

i think i have an idea what they are. the pilot cards or pilots may be numbered somehow, and these might be random pilot picking tokens like the tokens in space hulk death angel. although not likely its also not an impossible use.

Well, the strange thing is that there are 3 tokens each with the same number on them.

X-Wing has: 10 (x3) & 11 (x3)

Tie/In has: 12 (x3), 13 (x3), 14 (x3), 15 (x3)

Y-Wing has: 16 (x3), 17 (x3)

Tie/Adv has: 18 (x3), 19 (x3)

Your suggestion is interesting, but I don't see why they would need three copies of each number. 

It seems like they might be used to keep track of something … and there are three places to do so. Seems a bit redundant, but possible.

Perhaps they are used to keep track of ships in a 'squadron', and are assuming 3 ships per squadron?

They also might be some sort of objective markers for scenarios.

 What?! I thought they said that Expert Handling was only in the X-Wing pack. I must have misread that. Oh well. That's a good thing to be wrong about. It means I'll end up with two copies from the get-go.

Budgernaut said:

You didn't miss read that at all.

 I was surprised to see that TIE Advanced pilots include a pilot with a skill rank of 2.  I always thought that the TIE Advanced was reserved for Aces.

I also noticed that they were very careful to cover up the point cost of Darth Vader.  It is like they are trying to force those of us who are going to be in the tournament to have build out squadrons with as little pre-understanging as possible.

 Vader's cost is 29.  If you click on his name you get the complete stat card.

I didn't think that TIE Advanced would cost more than Y-Wings. Makes sense though, since they're rather advanced and expensive prototype-only kind of ships…

 TIE Advanced fighters are really on par with X-wings and should cost about as much. It's about what I expected.

dvang said:

With the rules up, the number tokens are explained. They are used to identify/match ships with the same pilot. Whether using the generic pilots, or a mirror-match between two forces using the same side.  I hadn't previously noticed that there are two slots on the ship stand, which are used to hold (front and back) two of the tokens, while the third is placed on the card itself.

 After reading the rules and understaning what all those icons mean, and what actions are, I have to say that Darth Vader is just about the coolest thing ever.  Which is really cool, becasue I have wanted him to be the center of my fleet ever since I started thinking about what I wanted to field.  

Of course that doesn't meant that I won't buy al the fighters (probably 2 vcoppies of everything) but I will probab ly buy extra TIE Advanced.