IG-58 said:

Don't forget the dice you can't use for anything else are included. :)

When it was speculated that there were 3 TIEs and 6 X-wings, that was great for a starter I thought.  I'll even take 2 / 4.  It makes it a bit harder to get too excited, but then I remind myself it is cheaper than a case of minis.  Certainly not as many pieces, but still a full game.  The expansions could be a different story and might not allow the game to continue for very long if the price point is as high as being speculated.

I'm excited for the game, but to start squirreling away some cash now I think.

Squid89 said:

That's my concern, as well. If these projections are correct, I can see myself buying only one of each ship type they release. If that's the norm among buyers... can FFG keep it rolling?

Thanks for the vid, Squid89. I, too, noticed that broken laser cannon, but it's likely that the actual miniatures will be higher quality...at least I hope so.

Man, I'm becoming increasingly excited about this game. I refrained from the Wizards of the Coast Star Wars Miniatures, but couldn't keep myself from jumping into their Starship Battles with both feet. This game looks to have me hooked just as much.

But what really got me excited was the firing arcs! Seems like you'll really have to line up your shot (I've never played Wings of War, so this is unilke anything I've played). And to have no gridlines on top of that -- it feels so free, like the good ol' X-wing and TIE Fighter games.

The low ship count in the starter is a little sad, but this is a dogfighting game, not a game of whole-fleet engagements. It looks to me like playing with just a few fighters will take plenty of time. I mean, the estimated time on the starter box is 20+ minutes, right?

 So,

 One of the things ive seen, in like Dust tactics. And YES..i under stand the 'hows and whys' of why its done. but they start off as small 'dog fight' games. then start scaling up fast.

 I know most of my old squardron would 'want' if not NEED to play biger battles..and fast. i know im one f them.. i want sqaudrons and wings..not just to get blasted by some goodie two shoes pilot in a custume X wang.

 Nice, thanks for the link.  Can't wait for this game!

Squid89 said:

Nice thanks for the link!  Can't wait for this game! 

 Some of you guys may have seen this, but here's another YouTube vid I found. It was posted Sept 18 and as of now, only has 16 views. It's part 1 of a 3 part set of videos of a full game of X-wing. I'm not done watching it, but it looks way more exciting than I anticipated. I'm getting so stoked for these new Star Wars games!

[Edit] The best part is that he said to expect the Millennium Falcon and the Slave I! Yay bounty hunters! [end Edit]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vLJXuhd9dus

I'm glad you posted those.  They are long, but informative.  I'm glad to hear that they will be doing the Millenium Falcon and Slave I as well as other fighters.  I'm curious as to how much the prototype rules will change to the final product.

 This is very helpful - thank you for posting! Here we all were crying for more information in the other thread, and now this. 

It's interesting to note that they haven't yet finalized what'll be in the box; he talked about 1 XW 2 TIEs, 1 XW 1TIE, and even 2 XW 4 TIEs! Also, he very plainly says that they are effectively playtesting the game live at the Con, which was very nice/brave of them to do, when you think about it. If WotC had done that with Starship Battles, we mighta had something! 

I'm only halfway through Part 1, so I might edit this post with more pointless ramblings...

EDIT #1: you can shoot through friendlies OR enemies. Cool. A quick, easy approximation of 3D space.

EDIT #2: Collisions seem a little clunky.

EDIT #3: That Immerman (sp?) is a crazy and surprising move!

EDIT #4,351: If you're precious about your fighter models, you could really play the game just using the base, and not worry about wings and laser cannons being broken off.

That video really made my mouth water. I love all the choices you can make, but it still doesn't slow down the game! More ship types and more pilots will only make it more awesome. Aside from the X-Wing series of video games, this is the best and most dramatic approximation of Star Wars starfighter combat I've ever seen. Can't wait to take four TIEs against the Falcon! 

I. J. Thompson said:

That's what I thought, too. And another good approximation of 3D space is that collisions only seem to occur when you end your movement on top of another ship; there's no problem flying through other ships because you're in essence going over or under them. But like they said, collision rules still need work. Personally, I think it's really hard for a pilot to predict what will happen when he collides, so there really needs to be a random element to collision. I don't think the rules should be so straightforward that a pilot can plan to collide in order to line up a shot. Once you crash, you can't guarantee you'll be in the position you want. Maybe they could have a random spinner or something that tells you which direction you point after a collision. Of course, that's only one of the problems. They would still need some adjustments on rules determining where you end up.

Budgernaut said:

That's what happened to Vader, after all! 

Too true. And I remember all too well playing the TIE Fighter video game and, upon colliding, fighting with my joystick trying to regain control. A random element to collisions would be nice.

Thanks for posting the link to those vids, Budgernaut. Just a warning to everybody who watches them: very shaky cameraman. By the end of the third installment I was nauseated to the point where I just closed my eyes and listened.

I still find it interesting that rolling a crit with the defense dice is equivalent to rolling a blank (I know this has been talked about elsewhere, but I don't know where). As a defender I would feel cheated. But when you think about it, giving the defender a lower chance of avoiding hits will really help to speed the game along and fill it with more action. I think it's a good choice, but a little bit non-intuitive.

EDIT #1: And speaking of critical hits, I like the way critical hits are handled, doing no extra damage, but causing another effect. The video really helped me understand how that works, and I like it!

I don't know how far into this game I'll go but I'm beginning to think I will definitely at least get the starter set. 

 I was watching the video again and was reminded of something I thought of last time but didn't mention. Because there are no grid-lines, it seems that it would be extra important not to nudge your fighters around. Despite that, there are multiple items to be placed on and removed from the miniature bases. There is a real potential for moving ships around that way. Does that concern anyone? Is there perhaps a better way to indicate your desired action and to assign target locks to enemies?

Budgernaut said:

First off, I think you just need to be a little forgiving. Judging from the video, the amount that they nudged the fighters didn't appear that it would make a big difference (although there could be some close calls with collisions as a result).

My two thoughts are to either place the tokens next to the ship (which gets confusing if too many ships are in a furball), or to put the counters on the card. I think the second option could work because players look at their cards for stats and remaining health, but it's not as intuitive when your looking around the playing field.

Does that seem reasonable? I've never played games without gridlines so I don't know how much of a problem this may be.