Does any one else have the feeling that in events playing Imperial ties a disadvantage when it comes to mirror matches?

Rebel vs Imperials all is fine as the game ballance is designed for this.

Rebel vs Rebel also works as there are not many ships so turns are quick and combat is deadly because both sides have higher attack than defence and therfore will more than likely wipe eachother out in the 1 hour time limit. This gives one side full 5 points.

Imp vs Imp has in my experiance had on average 14 ships on the table so takes nearly twice as long to move all ships and then combat you rolling less dice in general in attack than defence with the added pain of a evade tokens. So games are a lot slower and I have not seen one that ends in the time limit and in general the differnce is very low so you dont beat the 33 points to get the 5 points. 

So it seems rebels always have a chance of getting 5 points but Imps only get that when they play against a rebel player.

What are other peoples thoughts or experiences?

Your observation is accurate, but I have seen some talented Imperial pilots table other Imperials. It's not common, but it happens. The other thing you have to keep in mind is that you can earn a full 5-point match win if the difference between the total point cost of your remaining ships is 33. So while it's not easy to get a match win, it's not impossible either.

The two things that prevented me from running an Imperial squad at Kessel Run were 1) I didn't have enough ships, and 2) Imp vs. Imp matches can be a little bit boring with "I fire, I miss; you fire, you miss, etc." Oh, and I wanted to wear my Rebel Pilot costume.

With the TIE Interceptor expansion there is a good chance that Imperial mirror matches will not have this problem.

I made a post about this very topic a while back:

http://www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_foros_discusion.asp?efid=254&efcid=6&efidt=745354

I think that with the new wave of ships coming out, the issue will be alleviated a bit.

I think with the new ships it will all change but we are running an event in Jan with only the Tie/in , Tie Advanced, X-wings and Y-wings allowed.

Bar making the first round as near as possible rebel vs imp there is nothing I think I can fairly do other than give moral support to the Imps and hope the force limits the mirror matches.

I like the idea of a tournament where each player brings an Imperial and Rebel list and each game the player and their opponent randomly determine which side they will be.  This way, each match will make sense with good guys vs. bad guys.

Both my games in the Kessel Run event were Imperial vs. Imperial, and the Evade tokens were maddening sometimes.  Both games were won on the final turn after the TO called time when one side finally managed to destroy one ship.

I would concur…..I ran a 5 ship IMP build at KR.  Two of my games were IMP vs. IMP  The first was a draw where I managed to damage everyone of his 6 ships and he had only removed 1 shield, but still a draw.  The second I wone by destroying more than 33 pts difference, but it still ended on time.  We were running 60 munute rounds so that made it even more difficult.

You can counter this by using named pilots that gain extra dice in the shooting phase.

Mauler does a great job of this.  

If the Kessel run was your first big event, you were at a slight disadvantage from those who played at worlds.  Those who played at worlds adjusted their lists as I did to deal with this.

My Worlds list was Vader with swarm tactics and a concussion missile with 5 obsidian pilots.  After having played three games against imps at worlds I knew I needed to change things.

1.) Vader is not worth it.  After the missile is shot he is just a TIE fighter.  So I dropped all TIE Advanced from my list giving me 35 extra points.

2.) I went through the deck of Imps and found pilots that can get more than two attack dice, Mauler and Backstabber.  This was 33 points.

3.) I felt like I needed one more named pilot.  After looking through the deck I knew I wanted Howler Runner.  The reroll would make sure my dice landed more often.  I down graded the obsidian pilots to academy pilots and then changed one to Howler Runner.

My final list was seven ships, no upgrades.

4 Academy pilots

Mauler

Backstabber

Howler Runner

I hope this helps

FCWookiee said:

As Tawnos points out, however, this will be alleviated to some degree by the release of Wave 2. The Empire's ships from the new expansion have more potent attacks (and are more expensive, which will tend to reduce the size of the typical Imperial list); meanwhile the Rebel ships are tougher or more evasive than their existing counterparts, which will lengthen Rebel/Imperial and Rebel/Rebel matches.

I also hope that by the next round of major tournaments, everyone will be a bit more experienced--and therefore faster.

I totally agree with the idea that tournaments need to be a split between Rebels and Imperials.  That way we know who the true champion is -- the one that can handle both sides.  That's why I brought event registration sheets for both sides, but fielded an Imperial squad.

I believe that there were talks at Worlds about implementing this in the future.  We'll just have to wait and see what happens.

I couldn't disagree more that all tournaments, especially  the championship format, should be a classic format, where it will always be the classic Rebel vs. Imperial.  For some more casual events, sure why not?  

What would you do when the Republic and Separatist faction ships come out?  Force everyone to either play one of those factions or bring a squad from every faction?  A good player, with a good squad should be able to acheive a full victory no matter what they are facing.

The only issue with requiring players to bring a Rebel and Imperial list is that it makes the initial buy-in for a new player quite expensive, just to be able to play in a tournament.  Compare to the current model, where, assuming no discounts on pricing and applicable taxes, a new player could bring 3 X-Wings into a match, only having to spend $70 (which in itself is pretty substantial).  You can make some decent competitive lists out of just that and have just as good a chance as any at winning a Kessel Run.

Now compare the Imperial side, where we're seeing 5 ships on the table, as a low number that still functions well competetively.  The cheapest way would be a Core Set at $40, then another $45 on 3 ship packs, totalling to $85.

Combine the two, where a player would need both lists to play, and you wind up spending less money overall than buying separately, but the inital buy-in is still a pretty large barrier for some people.

2 Core Sets at $80 to have 4 TIE Fighters and 2 X-Wings

1 X-Wing or Y-Wing pack (personal taste) to get to 100pts of Rebels is $15

1 TIE Advanced pack (to use Vader or Maarek to fill in the points) is $15

So total, you're looking at $110 to have your bases covered and be able to get in the door if you're required to be prepared to play both sides and have a reasonable chance at success.  Obviously you could technically play with one Core Set and have a really small army list compared to your opponent, but again, the idea is having a a reasonable and fair chance at success at winning.

No, I think this is fine the way it is.  As an Imperial player, you need to appreciate that your 8 Academy Pilot TIE Swarm might have a hard time winning out against a literal mirror match of the same list, because of reasons already discussed in previous posts about 2 Attack Dice vs 3 Agility Dice.

As a Rebel player, you need to be wary of someone like Wedge absolutely wrecking your (modified) Agility 1 X-Wing and your (modified) Agility 0 Y-Wing at Range 1.  You'll be trying to keep their ships out of Range 1 firing solutions so you don't take massive damage from the 2:1 ratio of primary weapon fire.

The mirror matches really cover extreme case; slow matches with low damage output with Imperials, and fast, high damage matches with Rebels.

If you're not attempting to factor this in, then you're missing the point of what makes tournament games more of a challenge than your casual games.  When we play at home, our collection is only big enough to realistically do a Rebel vs Imperial matchup.  I don't have a lot of mirror match experience, except for the one I had at Kessel Run.

What I learned from that has me thinking about the Rebel vs Rebel match a lot more now when I build my list for the Toronto Area Kessel Run Round 2 events coming in January.  Apparently there were shipping delays so they'll be trickling in throughout the month.

Remember this, fellow gamers, when you want to practice a mirror match at home and you don't have all the "official" models to play it; you more than likely have the actual number of ship TOKENS to make it work.  So, if you have 2 Core Sets, you have 2 Luke Skywalker tokens, and 2 Biggs Darklighter tokens, and if you bought 2 X-Wing packs, you now have 2 Wedge tokens, and so on.

Heck, even that notwithstanding, you can ALWAYS go ahead and proxy tokens in at home, just make sure you and your opponent make each other away of what counts as what, and then have at it.  All you really need in the game itself is that little cardboard square and the printed fire arc; the model is just fluff and visuals.  Use Imperial tokens if you need to for subbing in rebel ships, and vice versa, depending on your personal supply.

The cards and abilities are all easy enough to come across in squad builders, and your own collections, so while it may not look as elegant as having the "official" loadout, you are more than able to practice this stuff at home if you get a little creative.

adding to Dave's mirror match proxy sparring practice, using the Maneuver Guide that all ships come with and a piece of lined paper/excel make a good substitute for the dials.  List all the ships in pilot skill from lowest to highest in columns and a new row for each turn.  Simple and effective.  Of course you could put more work into it if you really wanted to.

cleardave said:

For this type of hobby, that is not bad.  Anyway, I see most people ending up collecting both sides simply by accident.

The R5Don4 Star II said:

Hope they keep it a separate game, like Warhammer Fantasy Battle and Warhamemer 40K.

[ADMIN: Edited for language.]

the problem with making them separate will be a stale game and nobody will play with the older models again or rarely so due to bordom

mixing them will give more flavor; though destroying lore in the process.  I say, ****  this is a game and games should be fun and fresh. Don't get me wrong, i'm a huge fan of star wars period, be it original trilogy, episodes 1-3 or Clone wars (which is fantastic by the way and i highly reccommend it if you haven't seen it already) and you shouldn't let your personal vendetta's stand in the way of what could be a very diverse and strategic game just because you like one set of trilogies over another

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=mx_94gWsWBI