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Thejulz
Posts: 13Member, Tester
Hi all,
Firstly thank you very much to the guys that took the time to put this all together. I've been searching all over the interwebs for a system to combine ground and aerial troops together in X-wing and am very glad to have stumbled across this site.
I downloaded the rules and components and persuaded a mate to give it a go last night. Although it took us about 5 hours to stumble through a game, we still thoroughly enjoyed it. The reason it took so long is mostly our fault, we decided to jump in the deep end and bypass the introductory scenarios and put together a +/- 100 pt army each (ground troops only) and may have been drinking a lot of beer.
As one would expect when trying any new game that neither player is familiar with, it was a lot of constant rule checking and clarifying.
I scribbled down some notes every time we came across something we couldn’t clarify in the rules or between ourselves. Again I will remind you that we had been drinking a lot of beer and some of these situations may obviously be answered in the rules or online already, so please “beer” with me.
Most of the notes are generally about infantry, we found the vehicles and turrets play pretty much just like ships do in a normal X-wing game.
Firstly thank you very much to the guys that took the time to put this all together. I've been searching all over the interwebs for a system to combine ground and aerial troops together in X-wing and am very glad to have stumbled across this site.
I downloaded the rules and components and persuaded a mate to give it a go last night. Although it took us about 5 hours to stumble through a game, we still thoroughly enjoyed it. The reason it took so long is mostly our fault, we decided to jump in the deep end and bypass the introductory scenarios and put together a +/- 100 pt army each (ground troops only) and may have been drinking a lot of beer.
As one would expect when trying any new game that neither player is familiar with, it was a lot of constant rule checking and clarifying.
I scribbled down some notes every time we came across something we couldn’t clarify in the rules or between ourselves. Again I will remind you that we had been drinking a lot of beer and some of these situations may obviously be answered in the rules or online already, so please “beer” with me.
Most of the notes are generally about infantry, we found the vehicles and turrets play pretty much just like ships do in a normal X-wing game.
Comments
- We took the terms “infantry unit” and “platoon” to mean the same thing.
- When planning my list I threw in 2 platoons of “normal” skill 2 snow troopers, I fitted them with a Heavy repeating blaster upgrade each. I represented this on the board by swapping one of the snow trooper team templates provided in the download, with the heavy repeating blaster team template.
- I figured that is all pretty straight forward however when it came to playing the game, the Heavy repeating blaster requires the platoon to have a focus before it can be used. So my first question is, If a an infantry unit has advanced, or for some reason does not have a focus, can the team represented by a Heavy repeating blaster, still fire as a “normal” team. (I.e combine attack dice with other teams for a total of 4)?
- Some examples; I advanced an infantry platoon (Probably foolishly) towards a neat line of rebel defense. One of my snow trooper teams was ahead of the other 3 and ended up being within range of the rebels attack and copped an absolute flogging. The snow trooper team in front attracted a lot of focus dice and the platoon became extremely stressed out, so much so that it was unable to rally and retreated off the board. I suppose it makes sense that the rest of the platoon just saw the amount of firepower directed at one of their teams and thought “F*&K this”, but it fealt a bit harsh that “one quarter portion” of the platoon can get it thrown off the board? Maybe I’m just a bit sour about it but it got me thinking about other situations, We started using the infantry manoeuvre template as a measure and said that all teams within a platoon must be at least the measure distance from another team of the same platoon at all times (except when forced to move by AT AT etc). We did this because, in theory, without it you could have one team on one side of the board and the other 3 on the other. The single team gets stressed to the eyeballs and causes the whole platoon to be removed, even though 3 of them weren’t even involved. So another question; is there a Zone of control for the platoon? I.e do teams in the same platoon need to be within a certain distance of the other teams to be able to relay orders, co-ordinate attacks etc?
- Another situation we came across; Infantry who have performed the take cover order, I.e gone to ground and get a free evade. Can that evade be used to negate a focus (suppression) hit? The rules state that defense dice cannot negate suppression hits, what about free evade tokens from taking cover?
- The rebel scum also upgraded their troopers with a repeating blaster (medium). I particularly wanted to get rid of it so I pointed my AT AT at them. Now, when I attack a platoon of infantry and all 4 are within range and I get 1 hit after all modifications, can I designate which of the infantry teams gets killed (I.e can I specifically take out the repeating blaster team) or can the opponent chose which team is removed? It makes sense that the attacker chooses which team gets removed as they are the team in their sights, but it also makes sense that the troopers using the repeating blaster are killed but it could easily be picked up by another nearby team as it’s a valuable weapon? So long story short, When a team is killed within a platoon, who decides which team is removed?
So in summary, pretty damn good fun with a snot load of potential. I can see a platoon of Jawa's for a scum faction with sand crawlers as vehicels. You can do so much with it once the basics are down pat. Well done all involved.
If the platoon uses an Advance order then the Heavy repeater team will be treated as a normal infantry team (Attack 1). When they perform an Overwatch order (focus token) then it is assumed that they have time to set up their heavy blaster and gain the benefit of Attack: 3. Infantry do add a certain level of complexity as they are a completely new type of unit. The rules try to make them play in a somewhat realistic manner as they may not do what you want them to do once they come under fire! So your example of a unit breaking is certainly possible in the chaos of a firefight. So that unit must have taken more focus (suppression hits) than remaining teams AND failed their rally attempt in the END PHASE before they broke, harsh but "c'est la guerre!"
Your suggestion of keeping teams within 1 move template is great. Although not specified in the rules it works much better to keep troops together in a group so units can be easily identified and not mixed up.
Evade results can not negate suppression hits, troops gone to ground and taking fire are just going to keep their heads down. We have thought about some ideas for trenches and other fortifications that may negate suppression as an option later on.
Regarding casualty removal the defender has priority of which team was hit from those that are in range. If a heavy weapon team was killed then other troops would try to take over as you suggest. If only one team is in range or fire arc of an attack then that team must be chosen.
It sounds like you did a good job on understanding the basics even by "jumping in the deep end" so we really appreciate your comments, thanks. Your ideas on obstacles are good too, basically using the standard X-Wing rules but having blocked fire lanes is a good way to break up terrain. Huge units may be able to shoot across these features but the target could get an extra defense die for example. As long as you and your opponent agree on a system that is fine.
Secondary weapons can be very effective against ground targets which is exactly as intended. Armor is good against energy attacks from blasters (primary attacks) but not good vs explosive ordnance (missiles/torpedoes). This makes shields the best defense against all attack types as it is a more advanced form of defense and does not require the massive weight of armor to be effective. Ground units therefore need effective anti-air defenses, which are most likely their own aerial units.
Vehicles and Turrets use actions just like ships as you say which makes them very straightforward to use. The rules do focus more on infantry as they really are the most different in how they use their "actions" as orders and always use focus results for attack and defense but treat as suppression hits.