Hey uhhh, TTA died. It got hugged really hard. I've got to take it down and rework a few things to get it to a more stable place so this can't happen again. All the data is safe, don't worry.
Sorry for the bad timing. I know everyone looks forward to playing with the new points. Hopefully after this, the site will be faster overall. Just gotta do some leg work. I foresee it taking me 4 or 5 hours of work, which I will be up tonight doing. If all goes well, I'll have it switched over before I have to sleep.
 
Thanks for the support and for killing my site. It's cool that it's come to that point. But also it sucks. Coffee time.

I think I am getting rid of it all this time. I just own 4 Star Wars infantry games and I'm thinking maybe 2 or 3 is enough. If I really want to play again I'll use my opponents dice & rulers and proxy one oe my many other model Star Wars armies in "close enough" scale. I've got to offload:
2 x Tauntauns 1 x Atgar 2x Vets with MKII blaster 1x Pathfinders 1x Wookies 1x Snowspeeder Luke Chewbacca Rebel Operatives Imperial Operatives Darth Vader Veers Boba Fett 3x Snowtroopers 3x Stormtroopers 1x AT-ST 1x E-Web 1x Speeder Bikes I've also got some unpainted stuff. Jyn Erso, Bossk, a core set or two's worth of rebels, and (Primed) Tauntauns.
If I sell Imperial Assault too, you guys will be the first to know. That Rancor's gonna be tough to part with though!

If I am a CIS player, yes

If I am a CIS player, yes

If I am a CIS player, yes

Is it power creep though?

If vehicles were way underpowered before, and they wanted the new ones to be good when released, it's hard to call that power creep vs. just getting it right this time.
If anything this game is guilty of "complexity creep", as in they keep adding new keywords ability, which is fun, but sucks for older units and heroes that don't have that printed on their stupid physical cards that can't be updated easily.

I do not disagree that R2 needs a nerf.
But in the movies they are rarely really together. They meet briefly in E1 and are apart a decade after. R2 is always in the middle of space battles where 3PO hangs back. Even in E2 during the fight on Kamino they are separated most of the time. E5: R2 with Luke, 3PO with the others almost the entire movie. I cannot even recall a moment of them together in E3 ...
Thematically I'd argue that 3PO should be playable alone as well. But he usually does little to nothing on his own and needs rescuing most of the time ...

So much truth here.
Imperials are pretty similar too. You constantly see:
Iden/Veers/Shores/Snipers/Bossk
Anything else is pretty much just flavor, but not necessarily better. So Imps could use some points changes to help balance this out.

As a rebel player, it is a profoundly depressing situation. Competitive listbuilding goes as follows:
Step 1: Decide which flavor of over-powered unit or combination of over-powered units to bring. Choose from Luke, Leia, Sabine, Tauns, Snipers, and Cassian, and hope playing them over and over doesn't get old (it does).
Step 2: Choose few mediocre to potentially solid options. Sadly, some of the interesting options in this slot such as turrets or AT-RTs must compete with tauns and are auto-exclude.
Step 3: Finish of the list by padding it with utter trash-tier corps units. Naked rebel troopers usually enter in here, and add zero fun to the game.
On the whole, you are forced to use the same few units over and over if you want to be competitive. I usually play for fun in friendly games, so I generally run off-meta lists, but every time I field fleets, wookiees, speeders of either variety, Han, or kitted out rebel troopers I am amazed by just how bad they are compared to the crutch pieces listed above. They are fun to put on the table, and it would be nice if you could have said fun and remain competitive, On a positive note, I do find Jyn and pathfidners to be much better now that Cassian has arrived. Probably not super competitive still, but much better. That said, competing with snipers is bad for pathfinders, so even if they are suddenly pretty good they will get left behind for pretty great. 
TL, DR: I am a rebel player, and wish the rebels didn't have to rely on a few broken releases to carry the rest of their underperforming list. I usually run off-meta, themed builds in friendly games, and these lists are laughably bad by comparison to the top tier lists.

As a rebel player, it is a profoundly depressing situation. Competitive listbuilding goes as follows:
Step 1: Decide which flavor of over-powered unit or combination of over-powered units to bring. Choose from Luke, Leia, Sabine, Tauns, Snipers, and Cassian, and hope playing them over and over doesn't get old (it does).
Step 2: Choose few mediocre to potentially solid options. Sadly, some of the interesting options in this slot such as turrets or AT-RTs must compete with tauns and are auto-exclude.
Step 3: Finish of the list by padding it with utter trash-tier corps units. Naked rebel troopers usually enter in here, and add zero fun to the game.
On the whole, you are forced to use the same few units over and over if you want to be competitive. I usually play for fun in friendly games, so I generally run off-meta lists, but every time I field fleets, wookiees, speeders of either variety, Han, or kitted out rebel troopers I am amazed by just how bad they are compared to the crutch pieces listed above. They are fun to put on the table, and it would be nice if you could have said fun and remain competitive, On a positive note, I do find Jyn and pathfidners to be much better now that Cassian has arrived. Probably not super competitive still, but much better. That said, competing with snipers is bad for pathfinders, so even if they are suddenly pretty good they will get left behind for pretty great. 
TL, DR: I am a rebel player, and wish the rebels didn't have to rely on a few broken releases to carry the rest of their underperforming list. I usually run off-meta, themed builds in friendly games, and these lists are laughably bad by comparison to the top tier lists.

As a rebel player, it is a profoundly depressing situation. Competitive listbuilding goes as follows:
Step 1: Decide which flavor of over-powered unit or combination of over-powered units to bring. Choose from Luke, Leia, Sabine, Tauns, Snipers, and Cassian, and hope playing them over and over doesn't get old (it does).
Step 2: Choose few mediocre to potentially solid options. Sadly, some of the interesting options in this slot such as turrets or AT-RTs must compete with tauns and are auto-exclude.
Step 3: Finish of the list by padding it with utter trash-tier corps units. Naked rebel troopers usually enter in here, and add zero fun to the game.
On the whole, you are forced to use the same few units over and over if you want to be competitive. I usually play for fun in friendly games, so I generally run off-meta lists, but every time I field fleets, wookiees, speeders of either variety, Han, or kitted out rebel troopers I am amazed by just how bad they are compared to the crutch pieces listed above. They are fun to put on the table, and it would be nice if you could have said fun and remain competitive, On a positive note, I do find Jyn and pathfidners to be much better now that Cassian has arrived. Probably not super competitive still, but much better. That said, competing with snipers is bad for pathfinders, so even if they are suddenly pretty good they will get left behind for pretty great. 
TL, DR: I am a rebel player, and wish the rebels didn't have to rely on a few broken releases to carry the rest of their underperforming list. I usually run off-meta, themed builds in friendly games, and these lists are laughably bad by comparison to the top tier lists.

As has been explained several times in this thread, it's a red die that doesn't natively surge and can't benefit from surge tokens.
Is it needed? No.  But it's not the same thing.  However, the same effect could be achieved with keywords instead of dice.

The Empire was always a faction that did a lot with suppression and aims, while the Rebels get more usage out of dodge tokens, and rely quite heavily on their big pieces, mostly Commanders/Operatives, though recently their support slot as well.
They have faction identities they just aren't as mechanically powerful as what the droids and clones have. The problem is, not only are their base mechanics weaker, but as the game has progressed those mechanics have been overshadowed by new things that have come out. For example on the Rebel side, they're having to add in a new upgrade just so that dodge can be brought up in power again, as it has become a lot easier over time to get around people's dodge tokens. As for the big hero pieces for the Rebels, well now every faction has something that can compete with and even surpass their Heroes, especially the earlier ones. Then their is suppression, great against the Rebels or even other Imperials, but the droids are hardly effected by it, and the clones have built in fire support to get around it if it stacks up to high. Then there is aims, sure rolling more dice with aims is nice, but when you compare that to the amount and quality of dice the clones can throw out there, it just doesn't help that much to be able to re-roll 3 white dice over 2.
It all comes from a place of being very conservative when the game came out, as they were trying to find their feet, and see what worked and what didn't. Now they've had the time and experience with the player base the Devs know what will work and what won't, and can design really well made units, it is just unfortunate that the early releases had to be the canary in the coal mine, for us to get to this point, and so the two starting factions have been hurt the most.

Yeah, I really want them to release all of the Jedi options possible, including some generic, unnamed Jedi squads.  Maybe something like a two-man strike team, master and apprentice style. The padawan can be a generic, and the heavy options could be different Jedi archetypes: Jedi Guardian, Jedi Consular, etc.
Unfortunately, if they are released they will likely not be taken, as they will not fit in with clone spam.
On the other hand, perhaps there will be some Jedi synergy or buffs coming in the future, who knows?  One can always hope, I heard somewhere that rebellions are built on the stuff...😉

currently imagining an army of nothing but Jedi, maybe 6/7 Jedi in a single list, that would be nuts

A new keyword could be introduced, a defensive version of Marksman: spend Dodge tokens to change dice results, from blank to surge, from surge to block. Could be too much OP? 
Just thinking aloud. 

The dice are fine as are. That said, here’s a hot take: 
 
having both the attack and defense mechanics use dice to determine results is super abstract and negatively effects the stability of the game overall. Dice inherently work on averages over samples taken. Having multiple points in the attack system that require extremely high numbers to average out creates imbalance at the individual rolls. They should abandon defense dice, develop defense tokens similar to other games they’ve developed.

 
Inb4 the collective crowd shout I’m going to take from the “the game is fine” crowd.
 
It’s my opinion, you won’t change my mind. 
 
 
 

I would say the fear of ARCs may be misplaced, but at the same time with only one points change a year I rather be on the side of caution. Sure we only got two tournaments to go by, but man they really look so different.
GenCon top 8 https://thefifthtrooper.com/gencon-online-top-8/ has a few of every faction and somewhat different list. 3 Rebels, 2 GAR, 2 CIS, and an Empire.
Compare that to Invaders League https://www.invaderleague.com/league/season-5/season-5-single-elimination. Top 8 now has 5 GAR, 2 CIS, and a Rebel list. And most of the GAR list are copies of each other lol https://www.invaderleague.com/league/season-5/season-5-single-elimination-lists
But I'll take that standby change and call it a win.
I am not sure what part I hate more. That X-wing is right there doing a pretty good balance of cards and online, or the feeling that FFG dpends on the community to build their game own apps to run everything.

You don't have to go full digital. Have cards with cool art and QR codes to look up their stats! 😄

It's done! Mostly! Pilot, hatch and base to do, but AAT is fin...
















[Model was kept in sections to aid spraying the zenithal highlight for the main base of the tank]

- I don't have an airbrush, so my one (and only) plan was to achieve as much of the shading as possible, using spray paints as the main base coat.
- Pieces were attached via pin vice drill heads stuck into pieces balsa wood etc, the main body I managed to just wedge a piece of shaved balsa into as a handle). For the tank bottom, I drilled 2 large drill bits into the section at the back which would be covered by the main body (and not visible when put together).
- - - - - - - - - - -

Main base [primer]: Humbrol Dark Brown Matt

- - - Brown back section of bottom base was then covered with tamiya curve tape and pieces of masking tape (de-stuck a few times on table to prevent paint pulling) - - -

Zenthial Highlight: Humbrol Desert Tan (sprayed in separate pieces - see above)

Light Drybrush [Highlight]: Screaming Skull

Brown Highlight: Light drybrush of Steel legion drab mixed with Humbrol Desert Tan.

Pin Wash: Agrax Earthshade with long haired (15mm) brush.

Shade/Blend: Tamiya Weathering powder, applied with old size 0 paintbrush and foam make-up applicators.

Metal Areas: Ammo MIG Gunmeta, shaded with nuln oil. Drybrushed with Ammo MIG Steel.

Metal Chipping: Ammo MIG Steel, applied with torn dish sponge,  light drybrushing, and light scrapes with brush.
 

 
 

Bly finished!


 

Been meaning to paint an Alt Rex mini as Commander Bly for a while. A spare helmet in the Phase 2 pack, finally helped that be possible...


 

Applied a bit of freehand to the Z6's backpack...


 

Saber is still in progress, but thought `I'd paint up one of my clone commandos from darkfire designs to help shake the painting cobwebs off a bit!