X-Wing Point Changes and Battle of Yavin

The Battle of Yavin scenario pack dropped not long ago. This marks a new way to play X-Wing with an entirely different mode centered around the icon Battle of Yavin from A New Hope. This pack also sees the introduction of new types of pilots, ones with prebuilt loadouts. Coming along with this release was a small point adjustment.

Point Changes

So what changed with this latest update? Not very much but also quite a bit. By sheer volume, very few things changed. In fact, some factions didn’t see any changes at all. Ignoring new pilots from the scenario pack, only a handful of pilots had any changes. But the impact of these changes could be significant.

First, two point ships are now almost a thing of the past. BB-8 in the transport pod and DFS-081 are the only named pilots at two points. Separatist and Imperials retain their two point generics allowing them to create swarm lists. But gone are Jingoists, Wampa, and Valen from the Imperial kit.

I’d say this is probably a good thing. If not everyone gets a two point named pilot, it is good that essentially no one does now. BB-8 is an exception but that prevents you from taking him as an astromech and he’s not that great. Now, when Imps and Separatists bring filler 2 pointers, they are really bringing filler.

The other major change happened to the Resistance Y-Wings. They are all now at least four points, which is kind of sad. Resistance does not have many 3 point options and there are so many Y-Wing pilots, the only reason you’d ever take many of them was because they were 3 points. Additionally, many of them lost loadout, though the Wartime Loadout upgrade also dropped from 10 to 5 points. This makes it more appealing but the Intuitive Interface ability is so unique its hard to give it up.

As far as upgrades go, there weren’t many. R3 and R4 astromechs went up by a point and several mines got more expensive. Electro-Chaff went up to 9 which puts extra limits on it continuing to be a hard counter to most munitions. Finally, Notorious went up to 5 points, which is fair. Its a very nice card.

Standardized Pilots

The big change to the game is the introduction of a new type of pilot with Battle of Yavin. These pilots have pre-built loadouts which makes them far less flexible. What you see is what you get. However, as a consequence of that loss in flexibility you do get some of them at a discount over their existing versions (if they have one, as we also got many new pilots that don’t have an alternative version). Additionally, many of them have unique upgrades you don’t have access to otherwise. However, not all of the standardized versions feel like a good value.

One interesting affect is you can now field five X-Wings in a list, if you use Gavin and Porkins BoY versions. Will that be good? Maybe, that’s a good amount of firepower and health, but two of them don’t have S-foils. It is definitely a thing you will see at some point. Wedge is also cheaper but comes with the big negative of dropping down to I5. His ability also changes to mostly do the same thing but be far more complicated and be strictly worse than his other two versions.

Luke doesn’t give you any point discount by taking his BoY version. His Loadout also isn’t any better than his regular version. You gain Hope and Attack Speed. Hope is a slightly better version of Hopeful. Attack Speed is interesting. It does help make him a very good objective scorer, as he gets to boost forward for free to have an action to grab an objective. But that doesn’t feel worth it.

Similarly, the Y-Wings also don’t see any kind of point discount. Dutch, for example, has a different ability that is worse. Now he has to spend his lock while attacking in order to give another ship a lock. The new Y-Wings are kind of nice though. Pops, Hol, and Dex all have good abilities and decent loadout.

For the Empire, Vader comes in cheaper, allowing you to get him on the table for only 6 points. Amazingly, you don’t lose much from the lack of flexibility because his loadout is quite strong. The new TIE pilots are also decent. Mauler and Wampa are a good value at the same point cost, gaining much more than they lose, especially Mauler as he gains an extra hull and Afterburners, which is 3x his standard loadout. What’s unclear is why Backstabber comes in at 4 points while Mauler is still 3. They have the same ability and initiative, with Backstabber only gaining Crackshot. Which is nice, don’t get me wrong, but not worth a whole ship point when we’re still just taking about a TIE fighter.

The Interceptors all add some good abilities and are comparably costed with others at 4 points. They do gain a hull though which is nice. Iden will be interesting to see how she fits into the meta. Her new ability works on any TIE, not just Fighters, and can be used every other round, but only prevents one damage. You will pay a premium for it though as she costs as much as Soontir Fel while still being I4. She does have a shield and Fanatic though.

We’ll be getting more standardized pilots with the Battle of Coruscant, and already have the points for those, but not all of the pilots have been revealed yet.

The Scenario

Sadly, I have yet to get a chance to play the scenario due to real life. However, reading through the rules it does bring up a feeling of the movie. You have triggers to bring Vader in part way through the game. You have a trench board, which is a nice feature to add, giving you some visual reference. Allowing Han to swoop in at the last minute feels very thematic but might not actually be the best idea, given that you have a big gun sitting off to the side for much of the game. Luke is definitely your best option to attack the exhaust port but the others could still pull it off.

I look forward to playing it.