I had the good fortune to be able to sit down with Max Brooke , X-Wing Developer from Fantasy Flight Games, and discuss X-Wing’s new expansions, Wave 7, 7.1, and Wave 8! We also discussed some of the new things that were recently changed during the most recent points update, as well as some changes that are coming in the fall!
For those unable to watch at the moment, here is a brief summary –
– Overview and comments on each ship, from Wave 7 to Wave 8.
– Some clarification on Side-Sloop – Max explains the angles and that you cannot slide backward.
– Some talk about the new points update and changes to the format, including the Extended column – turns out there are no current plans to remove ships from extended.
– New Keywords! Such as Light Side and Dark Side – In the next point supdate they talk about how these will be hooks that other cards and list-building stuff will reference. They won’t have innate abilities however. Some new KeyWords are related to ship types, others are related to pilots. Some examples are “TIE”, “X-Wing”, “A-Wing”, “Droid” etc.
– New Keywords allow them to adjust certain things – like for example if Mandalorian Seas 2 shows a main character to secretly have been a Droid all along, they can go back and give him/her the “Droid” keyword retroactively. Which also strongly suggests Mandalorian content coming (Although not directly confirmed).
There is a whole lot more in the video! I encourage you to watch!
Wave 3 has been announced and it’s the moment we’ve all been waiting for! The Clone Wars have officially begun!
This is officially being dubbed as Wave 3, and it’s exciting for so many reasons! First off, it’s not JUST new factions! We are getting a Scum Z-95 and an Imperial TIE Striker! There seems to be nothing for the Rebels yet, but I’m sure there’s a good reason for that. It’s probably going to be tricky to fit 7 factions worth of expansions into each wave that’s coming, so we’ll probably see some alternating releases for awhile!
It’s also worth noting that the Z-95 and TIE Striker don’t come with any new cards that aren’t already found in their respective conversion kits, so if you were hoping for new pilots for these ships you are likely out of luck for the foreseeable future. The good news however, is that if you’ve already got your kits, you probably can skip these purchases altogether!
Additionally, we are getting Squadron Packs!
These new squadron packs will act much like a miniature faction starter! Coming with 3 ships each they’ll remind you of the structure of the original core set, but these don’t come with dice, damage decks, or templates – so you’ll still need the core game’s box to play if you are just now diving into X-Wing.
Darth Maul’s Scimitar looks awesome and will have the ability to cloak!
The Vulture Droid expansion will sport a different pain job than the squadron pack, so if you want extras this is an additional option.
The ARC-170 looks even more beautiful than the rebels’ version, and looks to come with Chancellor Palpatine!
The Delta 7 has a new paint job, and through this preview we notice some new pink/purple actions, that likely interact with the force somehow!
This Year’s Gen Con was my first ever Gen Con! Easily the busiest convention I’ve ever been to, it’s easy to get lost among the activity! I took a bunch of pictures though so lets go through my time!
First up – I had to wait in a line that was nearly a mile long for Will Call to get my tickets to the In Flight Report. I didn’t even have time to check into my hotel – went straight to the convention center!
But I made it! Front row seat! I was crazy nervous that I wasn’t going to make it in time but luckily I managed!
And was surprised with 2 KeyForge decks for attending! I’ve got to say I’m pretty impressed with this game. The concept of completely unique decks in every box is really ambitious! And it plays quickly and is a bit of fun as well!
But THIS thing was the star of the show! The Super Star Destroyer for Armada really stole my heart! Finally being able to see it was amazing! After the report I grabbed some dinner and made my way back to the hotel, to prepare to teach some Legion and Armada the next morning!
The next morning – right before they opened the doors and let everyone in!
Everyone wanted to get pictures of the incoming rush!
There was alot of cosplay! X-Wing and Legion were the two biggest attractions right in front of the main door, and they almost didn’t have any Armada tables, but luckily I found a core set on a table and was able to get it set up!
We had a core set, Wave 7, and the Rogues and Villains pack for Armada! Nobody was scheduled to demo it, but I jumped all over it and made alot of new Armada fans from Thursday through Saturday.
Andrew Cox, Fellow Orlando Gamer, took home the championship for Destiny! Way to represent Orlando! Now we just need to him playing Legion and Armada as well!
Got to check out some other games as well – Project Elite is being relaunched by CMON, and the new miniatures look awesome!
Finally got to see this giant Cthulhu miniature from CMON’s new Cthulhu : Death May Die kickstarter. It’s amazing, but it’s just so big it reminded me of the fact that I wouldn’t have had the room to actually put it anywhere!
Got a nice demo from Ares Games on their new title Battlestar Galactica: Starship Battles. This looks gorgeous!
And got some more pictures of new FFG releases!
Sunday I was judging for a Legion Team Battle! 2v2 Tournament!
There was also an X-Wing Epic Tournament going on!
And the Armada Finals! Congrats to JJsJuggernaut on an extremely close finish! Not exactly sure why they had Destiny promos for the Armada winners….
When all was said and done, I had a TON of stuff to bring home and just my carry-on – so I had to break everything down!
I managed to get it all to fit! Yup I put the falcon in a sock for safekeeping!
All in all, it was exhausting. Working for FFG, demoing games nonstop, over loud crowds can really drain you. Next time I need to go as a fan instead of an exhibitor. I’d love to play in the tournaments and have more time to actually shop and participate in the con a bit more!
I also managed to capture a bunch of video as well! Here’s just some of what I caught!
In preparation for Gen Con 2018, FFG has published all of the points and upgrade slots for all of the ships and everything launching in the first wave of 2.0! These are published in 4 separate files, and I’ve consolidated them all into one single PDF for printing ease and consolidation.
This is certainly subject to change, and I’ve already noticed some changes from the cards released for Second Edition in the TIE Reaper expansion Pack, namely Swarm Tactics is printed as Imperial Only, yet according to FFG it is a generic upgrade that all can use. This is just one more reason we’ll all have to stay up to speed on the latest from FFG regarding X-Wing 2.0!
Do you think X-Wing Second Edition can recapture the magic?
Here’s my breakdown of these files, from last week.
X-Wing 2.0 is getting closer and the time has never been better to have a giveaway! You can win one of three X-Wing Second Edition Conversion Kits right here!
The conversion kits are absolutely essential to anyone playing the origina X-Wing Miniatures Game, who wants to dive in to Second Edition without having to buy all the new ships. If you don’t get one, you will be stuck waiting for new Second Edition ships to come out, and will also end up paying an arm and a leg. For about $50 MSRP, (cheaper if you shop around), you can get a conversion kit for either Rebels, Imperials, or Scum, which will upgrade multiples of each of your ships to second edition format.
First Order and Resistance conversion kits aren’t yet fully announced, so we don’t know how much they will cost or what exactly they’ll contain. We do know that they will be cheaper, so you can expect to pay less for those.
How do I Enter The Giveaway?
Simple – All you have to do is to become a subscriber on Crabbok’s Channel, and leave a comment on one of his videos and you’ll be automatically entered to win! Here is a link to the announcement video!
When will the Winners be Announced?
The winners will be announced during the last week of July. This means you will know if you’ve won, before they go on early pre-sale at GenCon, and long before they go on sale at local retail stores, later in September. Winners are typically announced at the end of a video, so stay subscribed and watch all the way to the end!
How will I Get my Winnings?
If your name is revealed as a winner, you’ll have 30 days to contact Crabbok, either on Youtube, Facebook, Twitter, or the email address, found on Crabbok’s Channel. You’ll be e-mailed a digital gift card for the amount of $42.49, the cost of a conversion kit on coolstuffinc.com.
What if I don’t play X-Wing?
Honestly, at this point you can do whatever you like with the giftcard. You can put it towards some other game. It’s up to you!
Want to learn more about X-Wing 2.0? X-Wing Wave 14 just came out with some new ships that have 2.0 cards in them! Here are some unboxing videos!
It’s not a joke this time. In an attempt to fix this aging system, and future proof the game, X-Wing is getting a second edition.
It’ll follow in a similar design to previous Core Sets. A T-65 X-Wing and two TIE Fighters. This time around however, the T-65 will have folding S-Foils! It’ll use the same dice and many of the mechanics will be the same, but there will be several key differences. For starters, It’ll have a new damage deck, so picking up a new core set to play Second Edition will be required. It’ll also have some positive changes to the game.
The Good:
New Force Powers
The Force is going to play a significant role in Second Edition. It’ll be a stat on certain pilot cards. Force tokens will be able to modify a single eyeball result to either a hit or evade, as well as triggering additional conditions when required. This allows a contrast between ace pilots, and force-sensitive pilots, in more meaningful ways that don’t always boil down to simply manipulating focus results. New upgrades can interact with force abilities, and new crew members can also lend force tokens to the ships they are on. It may now finally be possible to have a meaningful Obi Wan or Yoda on board the Millennium Falcon.
Turrets
Turrets are getting a makeover. The Mobile Firing Arc from the Shadowcaster expansion was so popular that they have applied that similar aspect to Second Edition. Turrets will no longer be able to shoot in every direction at the same time, and will now be limited to certain 90 degree arcs, depending on their current position. This will be more thematic and more balanced, and will likely increase the reward for skilled flying.
The App
Card will no longer have point cost printed on them. Instead an app will control those things, allowing errata to take place in real time and give FFG an easy ability to adjust point costs based on real world interactions of cards and the developing meta. This might be problematic for players who don’t have a smart phone, but since the majority of players do have access to the required technology, the negative impact of this should be minimal. The positive side here is that this will allow for a more dynamic meta game that will adjust and balance itself accordingly. It should also prevent the need for constant card errata. If a card seems to be too strong it’s point cost can simply be adjusted.
Ship Base Size
In addition to so many subtle changes come the welcome change of the medium base size. We’ve seen time and time again, that some ships were “in between” the small base and large base size, resulting in some bizarre situations like the K-Wing on a small base, and the IG-2000 and U-Wing on large bases. The Medium Base is a new base size that will bridge the gap between the two size in standard X-Wing and the Slave-1 will be the first ship in this new category.
The Bad
Cost
First off, you’ll need to buy a $40 new core set, and that’s just to get started. If you want to use all of your old stuff, you’ll need to purchase a conversion kit, which will set you back about $50 for each faction. Considering that there are three faction conversion kits launching right away, you can spend almost $200 to BEGIN playing second edition, and that means using all the miniatures that you ALREADY HAVE! That’s alot of money to begin playing a game using your old stuff. Naturally, players on a budget will probably want to stick to a single faction when beginning 2.0, but many of us have amassed larger collections over the years and we won’t simply want to throw out all of our old ships.
Cardboard
One of the biggest problems in the original X-Wing was the fact that there was a separate Ship Card and Cardboard Chit for each pilot. This lead to a mountain of cardboard inserts that absolutely must be saved, sorted, and accessible for future builds. Other games have handled this better by having pilots as upgrade cards rather than being printed on the cardboard tokens – and this WOULD have been a perfect opportunity to fix this, however they left this flawed old system intact. This is a huge missed opportunity for storage efficiency.
Here’s my video reaction to 2.0!
There’s a whole lot more to Second Edition, and it’s sure to have some fans of the game angry, while others will rejoice for the fixes. It’s currently set to be available for an early purchase at Gencon 2018, and then a wider release in September! Will you be getting a copy?
Wave 14 is finally announced and it’s going to have the long awaited T-65 fix!!! So much goodness here!
It’s an entire Rogue One theme! TIE Reapers, Saw Guererra, Partisans! Oh, and by the way NO SCUM! WHAT?!?! Maybe some scum will come soon.
A 2-Pack for the rebels includes yet another place to pick up X-Wings and they actually seem to have movable wings! Numerous upgrades in here and several of them say “S-Foil” so we are almost certainly getting that long awaited X-Wing fix! And also apparently some love for U-Wings as well.
And the TIE Reaper looks amazing! Look at this thing OMG! It is so big for a ship that’s riding on a small base! And you can put Palpatine here as well!
It’s turning out to be a great month to be a Star Wars fan! Also an expensive month! We finally get the long awaited Gunboat! New mechanics with the Kimogila’s bullseye firing arc, and the Phantom 2’s amazing new crew, whom I can’t wait to run with a B-Wing, Maul. Also some new Last Jedi ships for Wave 13 are sure to shake things up with their huge impact and huge table presence…. seriously these ships are huge!
Videos
Hope you enjoy! Discuss these over on the forums on Discord!
It’s been a great contest with over 60 submissions! I’d like to thank everyone who entered! Submissions are now closed, but you are still more than welcome to add some more paint jobs to the forums if you simply want to share!
I’ll be announcing the winner of the Legion Core Set, as well as the winner of the door prize in the next day or 2, so make sure and check back often!
I’ll be narrowing down the paint jobs soon, but here are some of the finalists:
Here are some thumbnails of the submissions we got over on the forums!
I’ve had so many entries that I’ve decided to include a door prize! This one is open to all of my youtube subscribers and as a bonus, everyone who enters the painting contest also gets a bonus chance to win the door prize! It’s a $20 gift card to Miniature Market that you can use for an expansion of your choice!
I announce it in the video below.
The video itself is about all games in general. If units had no printed point cost, do you think that would help the need to errata cards all the time?
