Grimwalker said:

I remember the lambda class shuttle kicking my butt in the X Wing VS TIE FIGHTER PC game and now I know why.

Wookieepedia "The Lambda was reasonably well-armed, with three double blaster cannons (one rear-mounted) and two double laser cannons.^[16] The military version built by Cygnus Spaceworks was armed with ten laser cannons. It was also protected by a powerful deflector shield, which was powered by a pair of generators. A Lambda was covered by a heavily reinforced hull capable of deflecting laser fire. The shuttle class was so well armed that it was able to travel across the galaxy without an escort, thus making it suitable for covert operations."

BanthaPoodoo72 said:

Outstanding idea TBH, id have hoped the 2 ships mentioned here were a given, but Gun Turrets and Surface maps are an excellent idea and honestly, if they dish out small ships every wave its not going to be long before we have some really ropey ships out there.  Something that allows different styles of play however would be very good.

Seriously Death star scenery would be a good start, but then there is room for Atmospheric fights aka Bespin cloud city where more manuevers could be classified as Red manuevers representing atmospheric drag etc.  These could be released as Terrain / map sets instead.

My guess, assuming 4 ships as a precedent/tradition.  The B-Wing and Tie Bomber should be a given, as they will bring all of the canon fighters to the table. 

Looking to EU for a source, especially from the PC games, I'm thinking the Z-95 and the Assault Gunboat. 

Will look forward to the Ties Avenger and Defender.  Maybe they can be paired with the E-Wing, and some of the independent fighter ie R-41 Starchaser, or T-Wing, but at my most optimistic guess, these would be a fourth wave at the soonest.

For more big ships, the Lambda could be useful for both sides.  I've had a few fighters lost to the guns of these things.  The PC game transports would be great for all kinds of scenarios.  The Skipray blastboat would make an interesting addition.

The Imperial Missile Boat would be a dream, but way too expensive points wise for the way this game works.

My 2 credits.

I've given this a lot of thought and its hard to come up with too much.  In order for something to be worth FFG's time to produce, it needs to be A) well-known enough and B) actually add something to the game to be worth people buying it.

Given this criteria, the list is pretty short:

-B-wings.  an obvious choice and there are lots of ways they could be implemented

-TIE bombers.  another seemingly obvious choice, though it isn't immediately clear how they would function to make them worth using.  All I can think of is make them cheap (like TIE fighters) and give them some capacity to equip missiles/torpedoes/bombs at a reduced cost or automatically get one free.  Once the missile is fired they will just be a worse TIE with slightly more hull, so they really need to be cheap and make their missiles count.  A Scimitar Assault Bomber would probably make a more worthy addition to the game but it doesnt have the selling power of the much more well-known TIE bomber

-Z-95 headhunter.  A cheap, weak ship giving the rebels a bit of a swarm option. Something like 2 attack, 2 agility, 3(2?) hull, 1 shield seems likely.  Not sure if this ship is really worth it as it would not have the maneuverability of the TIE fighters to compensate for being cheap and weak

-TIE defender.  While not in the films the defender tends to be one of the most popular expanded universe fighters and has made many appearances beyond just the old PC games, including the X-wing novels.  I theorize a high cost (27+ points) and something like 3 attack, 3 agility, 3 hull, 2-3 shields, and an ion cannon.  These stats would make it formiidable but do not stray outside the exisiting limits, as i believe it is very important for balance purposes that no ship exceed 3 base attack or agility. Defenders could give imperial players more options in fielding smaller squadrons, but must be carefully balanced as to to not overpower the rebels' already small squardons.  Also it must be ensured that the defenders do not render the TIE advanced completely obsolete, as they are already of questionable value in many players' estimates

-E-Wing.  Another expanded universe ship but not as popular as the defender.  I really only include it as a possible release alongside the defender as an equivalent "superfighter"

So basically, I see one of two options,  Either way, they will probably release B-wings and TIE bombers, as they are both the last original trilogy fighters and fit a "bomber" theme.  The question then, assuming they do 4 ships again as they have been, is what are the other two ships?

option A: equivalent

Assuming they pick TIE defenders, which is somewhat possible, they then release E-wings alongside them.  Each faction gets one bomber and one advanced starfighter, much like Wave 2 has one fast/maneuverable fighter and one big ship per faction.

option B: asymmetrical

Again assuming TIE defenders are chosen, Z-95s are added to the rebel side.  This adds swarm options to the rebels, and small squadron options to the imperials.  Both sides get something new that they did not have before, and there is precedence for this in wave 1 (the Y-wing and TIE advanced are very different from each other)

Option B seems more likely, as the Z-95 probably has a stronger following than the E-Wing.  Also it seems like a kind of important sub-goal to make sure that the X-wing remains a viable mainstay of rebel squadrons, since the game is named after it and it is pretty much THE iconic rebel ship.  E-wings, depending on how they are implemented, could threaten that.

I agree with Effenhoog on pretty much all points. I'd imagine Wave 3 as follows:

B-Wing 3 attack 1 defense 4 hull 4 shield

abilities: target lock, focus, barrel roll (they can rotate around the cockpit, and it would open up a lot of options for gameplay)

upgrades: torpedo torpedo ion cannon (non turret)

Pilots: Keyan Farlander, Ten Numb, Nova Squadron, Blue Squadron

Z-95 2 attack 2 defense 3 hull 1 shield

abilities: target lock, focus, evade

upgrades: missile

Pilots: Colonel Cracken, Mara Jade (smuggler), Tala squadron, Mercenary pilot (smuggler)

Tie Bomber 2 attack 1 defense 4 hull

abilities: target lock, focus

upgrades: torpedo torpedo missile mine

Pilots: Major Rymer, Captain Jonus, Scimitar Squadron, Beta Squadron

Tie Defender 3 attack 3 defense 3 hull 3 shields

abilities: target lock, focus, evade, barrel roll, boost

upgrades: missile

Pilots: Colonel Jendon, Captain Yorr, Onyx Squadron, Advanced x7 prototype

Then I'd add some more upgrades:

Mag pulse warheads- missile, 1-3 2 attack. If it does at least 1 damage, that fighter may not roll attack dice this turn

Ion pulse Torpedo- torpedo, 2-3, proton torpedo stats but also adds ion counter if at least 1 damage done.

Countermeasures- modification, adds evade to actions

Jamming Beam- modification, if within range 2, may action to reduce one enemy attack dice by 1 this turn

The idea of jamming beacon, would be a cool upgrade

I am guessing we will see a preview for wave 3 by Gen Con.

It's possible thst Disney will not even recognize the EU.  Apparently, they pulled the plug on the upcoming Star Wars 1313 game because it wasn't related to the new trilogy.  The EU fiction quality is kind of a mixed bag and it's not necessarily canon. Sure, the fact that Maarek Steele is a pilot means that some of it has been acknowledged, but I wouldn't be expecting any Ssi-Ruuk or Yuzhaan Vong.  In fact, my preference would be to throw everything post-Endor away.

Clone Wars era stuff is obviously canon, so that is possible.

KevinBakon said:

Except Droid Fighters don't have pilots, there is literally almost zero source material to draw from for Squadrons, pilots, etc. Same with the clones but theres at least a few named pilots not counting Jedi. Also think before you say, throw away "everything post-ROTJ." Don't be blind and just toss away the 10% of the good stories that exist in that era because someone told you all the bad stories. Clone Wars, Dark Times, and Old Republic eras are just as bad as the current state with Post-ROTJ EU. 

KevinBakon said:

Last official news I heard (yesterday) was that 1313 was not cancelled…  http://www.gamespot.com/news/star-wars-1313-on-hold-6404659

Granted they don't want negative press but there was a quote stating that development continues.  

"…the company said. "Star Wars 1313 continues production."

My buddies and I were also speculating the wave three releases and the z-95, bwing, tie bomber and lambda.  But what of wave four I was hoping for the skipray blast boat, missile boat, outrider, talon karrde's ship, and scenario based models and rules for fighting on the death star surface, the Maw installation, Kuat drive yards and stuff like that.n  With that said I have to go and pl;ay my first scenario

Laters

plokoon9619 said:

There's lots of great stories from post-ROTJ EU.  Thrawn, Rogue Squadron, I even like the Black Fleet Crisis.  I read just about all of them up until Chewbacca died and Han got a drinking problem.  I'd just rather the new trilogy not be tied to any of that baggage.  The movies are probably going to focus on the "next generation" because Mark Hamill is now old.  I'm sure they'll design new starfighters among many other things.  They shouldn't be forced to include the (kinda so-so design) E-Wing because it was in a comic 20 years ago.  Start fresh! Surprise us! Give an awesome concept team millions to design some sweet new ships as charismatic and iconic as a B-Wing.  

Good point about the droid pilots, hehe.  I wouldn't be interested in collecting Clone Wars era stuff anyway, but it seems more likely than a Missile Boat.  

KevinBakon said:

That's being unnecessarily polite. The second-worst thing about most of the EU fiction is that LucasFilm's licensing department clearly decided quite a while ago that they could just slap the Star Wars logo on any piece of cringe-worthy fanfiction and turn a profit selling it to thousands of geeky fans.

The very worst thing is that they were right.

I went online and looked at other ships of the line for star wars and seen a few I would like to see. As far as ships that could be played for either side there is a couple of Bounty Hunter ships out there in the size range of the Slave 1 which was 21.5 metres.

IG 2000 - IG88's ship 20 metres

Hounds Tooth - Bossk's ship around 20 metres

Mist Hunter - Zuckuss's ship 21 metres

Some other large ships could be:

Ravens Clan - 26 metres , 1 pilot, 1 co-pilot

Ebon Hawk - 24 metres, 1 pilot, 2 co-pilots, 2 gunners

G-Wing Shuttle- 17.2 metres

YT-1760 Frieghter - 20 metres

Some smaller ships could be:

E-Wing - 11.2 metres, 1 pilot, 1 R7 Droid

K-Wing - 16 metres, 1 pilot, 1 gunner

M12-L Fighter - 16 metres, 1 pilot, 1 Astromech

Tie Phantom - Crew of 2 14.3 metres

Tie Aggressor - 7.8 metres, 1 pilot, 1 gunner

Tie Hunter - 6.6 metres, armament 2 laser cannons, 2 ion cannons, 2 warhead launchers

Some interesting threads and upgrade ideas, also i wonder if they bring out another class of ship or scenarios they could potentialy bring out speed 4 and 5 turns for larger more slugish ships but limiting the slower moves as inertia is more on a larger ship and they seem to fit about 13 moves on the dials.