X-Wing Rules Differences between Mk 1 and 2

Now that X-Wing Mark 2 has released, people are going to be wondering what's changed from the first to second editions. Overall, the game appears to be fairly similar to the first edition, with a few things streamlined, some additions and a new approach to building lists.

A great step in line with other wargaming companies is that all the rules for X-Wing are available on Fantasy Flight's website if you scroll down to the Support section. Start with Quickstart if you're totally new, the Rulebook for detailed play and the Rules Reference for a great alphabetical index of all the rules. (I'll probably print a copy of this to keep in my P.A.C.K.) They've also released a Squad Builder on both their Website and as an Android app.

Oh, and if you want to see more details on my own greyscale Core Couriers fleet including a little background story, take a look.

Now, lets get into the nitty gritty...


First off, before getting into the specifics, your fleet is going to look very different. You're going to want to use the ship builders linked above. I wasn't able to make anything close to my existing fleet. Turrets also have to be pointed now, they can't just shoot anywhere, some ships only have their turret. Honestly, I think as you look through all the little details to follow, the biggest thing to change is the composition of your fleet. Oh yeah, and Han can now be found piloting Lando's Falcon for Scum. More ships come with moving parts now, which is kind of neat.

What are your impressions? Have I missed anything? Will you be jumping in and upgrading or continuing to play Mark 1?
Leave a comment!

Ships

• ID Tokens
• It's encouraged to place a numbered token on each of your ships to track some in-game effects like Target Lock.
• Medium Sized Bases
• Some Ships have increased in size and now there are also Medium bases.
• The upgrade boxes have "Medium" sized bases included and conversion pegs so you can place some of your old small Ships on these new medium sized bases.
• Pilot Skill
• Seems to be in a range of 1-6 now.

Phases

1. Planning (Choose Maneuvers)
2. System (Special Abilities)
3. Activation (Movement and Actions)
4. Engagement (Attacking)
5. End (Remove Tokens, Recover Some Charges)

Movement

• Difficulty
• Green arrows on movement dials have been replaced by Blue arrows.
• Some effects may increase or decrease the difficulty of movement. There's no bonus for extra hard or extra easy.
• Movement Templates
• Now have a line down the center.
• This is used to align things like barrel rolls or to ensure ships are centered.
• Old movement templates without this line are no longer compatible with X-Wing Mk2.
• Obstacles
• Asteroids
• Passing through or touching (Range 0): Roll a damage die and take any damage shown. No actions performed.
• Touching (Range 0): Cannot attack.
• Debris Fields
• Passing through or touching (Range 0): Roll a damage die and take critical damage shown. Gain a Stress Token.
• Reserve
  
  • Ships can now be placed in Reserve.
  • They're off the table for all intents and purposes and abilities only function if they specifically reference Reserve.
• Reverse (Dash-Line-Square)
• Some ships can now move in reverse.
• Stationary (SQUARE)
• Doesn't move, but counts as executing a maneuver.
• Talon Roll
• When placing the ship after moving, it can only be placed in 1 of 3 positions:
• Center to Center, aligning the dashes on the ship and the movement template.
• All the way forward
• All the way backward

Actions

• Barrel Roll
• Still using the short edge of the straight 1 movement template.
• Align the center dash of the movement template with the center dash of either side of the ship.
• Move the ship to the other side of the movement template. Same as the Talon Roll, instead of placing it anywhere along the side, it can only be placed in 1 of 3 positions:
• Center to Center
• All the way forward
• All the way backward
• Boost
• Ships can't boost if they would overlap a ship or pass through an obstacle.
• Coordinate
• Allows a ship within Range 1-2 to take an action. Fails if no ship in range.
• Dock
  
  • A ship may dock or deploy during the System Phase on it's initiative, though not both in the same phase.
  • May start the game docked.
  • Deploy
  • During the system phase, use any non-reverse, non-stationary maneuver to move from the front or rear of the carrier. May them perform an action.
  • Dock
  • During the system phase, a ship at range 0 of its carrier may dock.
  • Emergency Deploy
  • If the carrier is destroyed, a docked ship receives one critical damage and deploys without an action. It's destroyed if it can't be placed.
  • It can still take a combat action during the engagement phase if it hasn't missed it's initiative.
• Fail
• There isn't pre-measuring to see if you can perform an action. Choose what you want to do, then check.
• If an action fails, players don't get to choose a different one.
• If something triggers after an action takes place, a Failed action won't trigger these additional things.
• Cannot link from a failed action.
• Jam
• Jam action happens at Range 1. Weapons or abilities may also Jam.
• Attacker gets to remove a green token or a Target Lock, then removes the Jam token.
• If a ship is jammed and doesn't have any green tokens or locks, the jam token remains. A Jammed ship given a green token or a lock doesn't receive it, then remove the Jam token.
• Jams don't cause actions to fail.
• Performing Actions
• Some actions are now coloured Red
• These cause stress.
• Some actions are now "Linked". (Action > Action)
• In these cases, one action will have an arrow pointing to the right at another action.
• You can perform the second one after the first if you want to.
• For example, Green Focus > Stressful Barrel Roll
• Reload
• If a torpedo, missile or bomb has less Energy Tokens than its max, gain another and the ship gets a Disabled token.
• Rotate
• Ships with turrets now have turret markers that go on their base and display the direction the turret is pointed and can shoot.
• Rotate the ship's turret marker to another quadrant.
• Target Lock
• Target Lock tokens are now numbered.
• When you place a target lock token next to an enemy ship, use the token with the same number on it as the ID token of the ship making the target lock.

Attacking

• Arcs
• An icon representing the arc(s) that a ship can fire in will be printed on the ship's card with the corresponding number of attack dice.
• All ships have a Bullseye Arc in the center of their attack arc. Some rules may reference this. This arc is a straight line the width of the firing range finder.
• Flanking
• Rules may reference the placement of a ship compared to another.
• Infront = fully in the forward half of the ship.
• Behind = fully in the rear half of the ship's base.
• Flanking = along the line in the middle of the ship's base.
• Simultaneous Fire
• Ships aren't removed from play until after all ships firing on the same initiative have fired.
• Steps
• Attacker rolls dice, defender modifies them, attacker modifies them.
  Defender rolls dice, attacker modified them, defender modified them.

Upgrades and Abilities

• Special Weapons
• Display the arc it can be fired in now.
• Range bonuses can be applied now.
  (+1 Attack at Range 1 and +1 Defense at Range 3)
• Range Bonus Indicator
• If there's a red missile icon present with the weapon stats, DO NOT apply range bonuses.
• Requirements
• May display "Attack (SYMBOL)" in which case, the SYMBOL must be available to fire the weapon. Example, "Attack (Target Lock)".
• Charges (Yellow Lightning Bolt Symbol)
• These are abilities, ammo, equipment, etc.. that have a limited number of uses.
• Ships start at maximum charge.
• Spend charges according to what the card says. (Flip the charge token over to the red inactive side.)
• Recover charges in the end phase if the maximum charge number has an arrow next to it.
• Force (Purple Blobby Flower Symbol)
• Same rules as Charges.
• Can also spend any number of Force Tokens to convert Focus symbols on attack and defense dice to Hits and Dodges.

Tokens

• Colouring
• They've change the colour and shape of some tokens to streamline what's removed when.
• Green Circles
• Positive, removed during end phase.
• Orange Circles
• Negative, removed during end phase.
• Blue Squares
• Positive, removed as per token's rules.
• Red Squares
• Negative, removed as per token's rules.
• Calculate
• Can spend these to turn Focus results on dice to either Hits or Dodges.
• Condition (Shady looking alien)
• Certain cards may place a condition in effect on a ship.
• Place a Condition Token next to affected ships as a reminder.
• Devices
• Are Dropped from the rear or Launched from the front.
• Disabled
• Orange token that prevents shooting.
• Ion
• A ship is ionized if it has enough ion tokens to equal or exceed its size.
• 1 = Small
• 2 = Medium
• 3 = Large
• Ships affected perform the Ion Maneuver on it's initiative, which is a Blue 1 forward and doesn't count as revealing movement.
• It can only perform the Focus action.
• All Ion Tokens are removed after it's activation.