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X-Wing or Armada


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Hey everyone,

I am thinking of branching a bit out of my Fantasy (KoW and T9A) shell to incorporate another kind of miniatures system. One of my main goals is to grab a game that someone who is unfamiliar with miniatures war gaming, or is not necessarily a huge strategist, can pick up and have fun playing. I think there are enough star wars fans out there that this game is an easy buy in (meaning they would be interested in hearing more once I say star wars).

My initial feeling was to get Armada, because the scale is more to my tastes and it seemed like a more forgiving game just from the concept of an Armada. To me that would be good for new comers.

I then noticed that Armada is a 2 hour game?! Two hours may be a stretch for some people.

From your perspective what would you think is a better game for people new to the concept? Does the ease of rules for Xwing with the smaller scale and shorter game length make it a superior game, or would Armada, with the larger stakes, and the very powerful capitol ships provide enough reward (killing squadrons) for new players to keep them interested?

What is sort of the minimum size of points you prefer to play with either system? It seems like 1 Xwing vs 2 TIE fighters would get pretty boring pretty fast. But so might 1 SD vs 2 rebel capital ships and a bunch of fighter squads.

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Hey man,

 

I cannot speak to Armada. I enjoyed X-Wing for quiet some time. It can be real tactical or real beer and pretzel depending on how you want to play.

 

100 pts is a standard size game in X-Wing usually netting between 3-6 ships depending on upgrades. The games do last 1-1.5 hours.

 

If you are interested, I know some one with a collection for sale that would get you started! :wink:

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I have nothing but good things to say about X-Wing. Only reason I stopped playing is because the people I picked up minis to play against (friends and family) stopped playing. Rules were simple enough that my wife (a non-gamer) enjoyed the game, but complex and tactical enough to keep things interesting. Definitely a lot of options for list building. I played against some proper "horde" style lists (5+ small ships), but I gravitated to taking 2-ish large ships and loading them to bare, which is also a perfectly viable tactic.

...plus you can play as Scum. Scum!

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I play both and overall Xwing is easier for non-gamers to get into.  Armada has more depth, but that adds to learning curve.  

You really can't go wrong as both are excellent.  

Xwing does have the advantage of the co-op campaign, but that requires a large investment in miniatures.  

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1 hour ago, InfestedKerrigan said:

I think the big thing here is what do you want to see visually? The Battle of Yavin or The Battle of Endor? I prefer Endor, myself. ^_^

Personally, Endor.

But if the complexity detracts from casual folks playing then I am at a loss for playing. It sounds like X-Wing is the gateway drug to Armada.

For both systems should I safely assume that buying two starter packs is enough to play a standard game?

2 hours ago, DisruptiveConduct said:

Hey man,

 

I cannot speak to Armada. I enjoyed X-Wing for quiet some time. It can be real tactical or real beer and pretzel depending on how you want to play.

 

100 pts is a standard size game in X-Wing usually netting between 3-6 ships depending on upgrades. The games do last 1-1.5 hours.

 

If you are interested, I know some one with a collection for sale that would get you started! :wink:

Ummm, yes!

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Has anyone played an opponent that brought something like these?

https://www.target.com/p/star-wars-the-force-awakens-micro-machines-deluxe-vehicle-pack-galactic-showdown/-/A-21436446#lnk=sametab

I remember thinking these little plastic fighters were expensive as a kid. Economies of scale has caught up with everything else in the world, what happened here?

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4 minutes ago, TheBeninator said:

For both systems should I safely assume that buying two starter packs is enough to play a standard game?

Again, just my experience from X-Wing, but if I call correctly, picking up one "starter" is all you need for the core stuff that you will need: measuring sticks, damage deck, tokens, dice, and some ships and upgrades. After that, you are probably better off buying expansion packs, as that will give you more options in the form of additional upgrade cards and ship variety.

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Do the expansion ships come with extra of the other game jazz, such as tokens, dice, damage, ect? Would it be useful to have two sets of maneuver sticks and laser ranges, or is there no pre-measuring in the game?

I guess I am thinking if someone wants to sort of throw some maneuver templates down to get a feel for their options before committing to a maneuver choice. But if that is against the rules, then that simplifies the choice.

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10 minutes ago, TheBeninator said:

Do the expansion ships come with extra of the other game jazz, such as tokens, dice, damage, ect? Would it be useful to have two sets of maneuver sticks and laser ranges, or is there no pre-measuring in the game?

I guess I am thinking if someone wants to sort of throw some maneuver templates down to get a feel for their options before committing to a maneuver choice. But if that is against the rules, then that simplifies the choice.

They may come with some more tokens (not sure though), but I think the sticks / ranges / dice do not come in the expansions. That said, you can find tons of 3rd party makes for maneuver / range sticks out there, and FF does sell the dice as a separate pack.

Pre-measuring is allowed, if I recall correctly.

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2 starters for armada gets you a rebel and imperial core, along with an "imperial tape" and a rebel tape, and dice sets. A couple victory star destroyers, and a handful of rebel ships. Several fighter wings, too. Picking up the rogues expansion gets you the falcon and fett in the game, to add some iconic star fighters. 

I also enjoy playing without fighters when playing non gamer friends. Just moving big ships around throwing dice. 

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X-Wing has two core sets: the standard (red labelled box) and The Force Awakens (blue labelled box). Buying two of either one of them is unnecessary but it is helpful to get one of each. You get different ships and different upgrade cards in each Core. Also the damage decks are slightly different. Otherwise the rest of the content is the same so that's where you can get your second set of dice, range rulers, etc.

Two Armada starters is also kind of unnecessary unless you want the second set of dice, range rulers, etc. It does give you double the ships but the ships that come in the Armada starter are sold individually as well and they come with different upgrade cards than the Core. So it's probably better to get one Core and then, if you want more options, buy the single releases of the ships that come in the Core. You'll probably want an extra set of dice and possibly range rulers but those are all sold separately as well. A second Armada Core would probably only be worth it if you could find it cheap.

My friend and I have played both and enjoy both for different reasons. X-Wing is excellent at representing small fighter dogfighting and Armada is great for large scale capital ship battles. I think X-Wing is easier to learn and a game is usually quicker than Armada, at least from my experience. If you're looking for a game to introduce to non-gamers, I think X-Wing is the safer bet. Another bonus that X-Wing has over Armada is that there are 3 fully fleshed out factions at this point - Rebels, Imperials, and Scum (bounty hunters and other non-Rebel/Imperial organizations like Black Sun) whereas Armada only has the main two. X-Wing was also released before Armada, so there is more available for it and I believe it is usually the more popular game in communities.

The only caveat might be that X-Wing suffers from power creep somewhat. As new ships are released they will sometimes introduce new abilities or maneuvers that are included with the new ships while the old ships are (up to this point anyway) not updated with any of these new abilities. I don't think Armada has this problem yet, or maybe it's not as noticeable.

Also, premeasuring movement during the Planning Phase (this is when each player secretly determines what kind of movement each ship is going to perform for that turn) is not allowed in X-Wing. I believe premeasuring is allowed in Armada at any time, but it's been awhile since I've played.

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I can recommend Armada, but instead of buying two starters I'd suggest getting one starter and then picking a faction and expanding from there into other ships. If you gave some ideas or any questions, let me know. Also, premeasuring of firing range is allowed at any time in Armada, but pre-measuring your movements is only allowed right before you commit to a move. I don't think there are any issues with playing with only a single set of measuring tools, but you probably will want to pick up an extra dice pack.

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