A question is: Is the Phantom underpowered without ACD? I think its possible.

No, not even close to underpowered. Compare a (hypothetical) generic PS 2 phantom with hull upgrade to a rookie pilot. The phantom pays 6 points for a permanent +1 attack, (arguably) a better maneuver dial, and three extra actions in its action bar (barrel roll, cloak, evade). This is a pretty nice deal considering the fact that a HLC is 7 points to add +1 attack at range 2-3.

The power creep of removing the low and mid PS ships (like the generic Xs) is incredibly saddening.

This isn't power creep, it's just a metagame trend that favors high-PS ships. Power creep involves new stuff making old stuff obsolete, not Wedge and rookie pilots trading places in popularity. In fact, some people like the fact that the metagame is favoring named characters instead of a horde of math-efficient generics because a lot of those characters are fun to use and it's frustrating to never get the chance because generics have better math.

It feels like C3PO will give about 3 evades per game, assuming the opponent focus fires the Falcon within 2 or 3 turns as they should. This for 3 points.

Your feeling is off. C-3P0, assuming ideal conditions (no bonus defense dice), adds 5/8 of a HP every turn that your Falcon takes fire. To get 3 evades per game you'd have to take fire for an average of 5 turns, not 2-3 turns. If focused fire is killing the Falcon within 3 turns you're only getting 2 HP from C-3P0, which is worse than Chewbacca.

Chewbacca gives ~2.5 "evades", by restoring 1 shield, and removing a damage card, which is sometimes a direct hit or an important crit. Other times, its a facedown card or a non-relevant crit. This for 4 points.

It's more than 2.5, really, because you're either using Chewbacca when you lose your last HP or saving him for a double-damage crit (or something equally nasty). So unless your Falcon never takes a meaningful crit before dying you should always be getting the full 3 HP (or equivalent in serious crit canceling).

I stand corrected by Maths.

However: If Chewbacca is better or about the same, why then is it only C3PO nowadays? I'm guessing that single point makes a big difference then? Which means... C3PO is better?

There's a little bit of a incongruity here. It seems like we are trying to equate C3PO to worse or at least equal to Chewbacca. However if that's the case, then we should see more Chewbacca than C3PO in lists, and that isn't so.

However: If Chewbacca is better or about the same, why then is it only C3PO nowadays?

Two reasons:

1) You can take C-3P0 on Chewbacca (ship), which finally gives him a defensive crew option.

2) The metagame right now favors low-numbers elite lists with small numbers of high-PS and ultra-maneuverable attack dice, which means it takes more turns of shooting to get through the Falcon's HP and you're more likely to reach the break-even point and gain more HP from C-3P0. In a metagame without ACD phantoms you'd likely see swarms/XXBB/etc become a bigger presence in the metagame and those lists tend to kill Falcons very quickly and make C-3P0 less effective.

Which means... C3PO is better?

In the current metagame? Yes. But the question is how much better. By the numbers C-3P0's advantage is fairly small, so it's hard to believe that C-3P0 is the reason Falcons went from being a fairly small part of the metagame to one of two dominant lists. And if this is true fixing the ACD problem is likely to return Falcons to their wave-3 status regardless of which defensive crew choice they have.

Nothing here we don't know...

I think ACD is strong, as a positional tool. It also eats the modification slot. The 4 green dice being tough, but not insane. Averaging 1.5 evades w/o focus and 2.5 with. HLC is a good tool to crack the 4 evade, and the 4 hp is fairly low.

It's the repositioning that is strongest, as arc dodging makes it hard to hit, and that is keyed into the p.s. Bid, where phantoms are wisely capped. The phantom is really predictable in general, as it is generally going after a ship. If we know the intended target, we have a good idea where it will want to be and which way it will Decloak. We also know it has to Decloak, so it can't be where it is. Turrets are a good method for attacking if you can't predict where it will end up. So are wide spread arc coverage, done at range or with multiple ships. Even Intel agent can be quite useful, as then you only need predict Decloak direction. Knowing where it will be is a good tool even if you can't reposition, as it helps inform our action choice.

Also, that not having a shot will kill the action economy of ACD. It can't Decloak if it's ioned. Stress prior to ACD also shuts it down. Rebel captive helps do that. Point being there are several methods and tools available to shut it down, from building anti phantom, to flight options, with pilot skill, turrets, repositioning and stress all available to both factions (decimator included).

The cheapest ACD phantom is easiest to outfly at 29points, and likely to get stomped with its 3 p.s. at 2 agility. The most expensive builds topping out at 46 points. Any ship running nearly half our list should be fairly monstrous. Most of the scenarios I see being troublesome are towards endgame, where you've run out of your lists tricks and are fighting with a portion of your list.

In wave 1, wedge was one of the monsters, and kill him first was a common response to the powerhouse he represented. R7-t1, expert handling, experimental interface and jake Farrell with vi and wingman allow for a monstrous wedge. Coming in at half your list, and able to annihilate phantoms. The above leads me to believe that the phantom, and even ACD is balanced, if on the strong side of the curve (ptl vs marksmanship, far lander vs ten numb).

I think power creep is still mostly curtailed, but present - specifically in the unique pilot power level, as pointed out above, the designers have shifted, and we're seeing a push in unique pilot power. Ibti was ok, but ten a little behind the curve, arvel and fel's wrath duds, but great fluff. Kanos and cowell were on the lower side, but testing the waters... It's as if wedge/fell/echo/farlander are the hero's with actual power.

- This is the most fundamental shift we've seen recently. A shift from spamming generics to building with and around unique pilots.

However: If Chewbacca is better or about the same, why then is it only C3PO nowadays?

First, it isn't "only C3PO nowadays". There are a lot of Han builds around that don't run Threepio or Chewbacca.

Second, if you're reaching for a defensive benefit, and you have the option to pay 3 points instead of 4, most people will do that. Particularly when...

Third, everyone's been on about how broken Threepio is for months now. This is the second time someone's suggested adding it to a banlist, as if that's going to fix the problem (to reiterate, half the Falcon lists that made Top 8 at Nationals events had neither Threepio nor Chewie). And as Lagomorphia has said multiple times here and elsewhere, calling something overpowered is a neon sign saying "use this if you want to be powerful!)

@Duraham: you're wrong about Threepio, for reasons I've explained at length and so have others, and you're wrong about ACD. And the fact that you're calling for a ban on an upgrade that isn't even released yet is absurd.

I think this thread is great. Ever since it appeared it accumulated all the balance talk on the forums, saving us from having 20 Fat Han threads, ACD OP, card banning and so on.

Keep going, guys!

Now lets look at the conditional effectiveness for just the generic pilots for some of the ships in wave 3 vs wave 4. (weighted final placement divided by occurrence at top tables)

X-wing: 87.98% to 52.06%

Y-wing: 113.6% to 104.7%

B-wing: 90.32% to 101.5%

A-wing: 54.97% to 54.4%

Z-95: N/A to 125.2%

E-wing: N/A to 44.45%

TIE Fighter: 131.8% to 104.9%

TIE Interceptor: 148.2% to 38.62% (commentary: wow)

Firespray: 83.91% to 61.26%

TIE Defender: N/A to 46.72%

And lastly, 3/1/8/5 Falcons and all Phantoms:

Named YT-1300: 85.66% to 104.9%

All Phantoms: N/A to 107.0%

Looking at the above data, do you still think that it is hard to come to the conclusion about generic E-wings? If you do, then I genuinely don't understand why not.

A couple of possible confounds here:

The e-wing suffered a lot of flak for being an expensive ship, much like the defender, and so was very unpopular at first. People have started warming up to the named pilots.

How much e-wing data is actually there? Taking a look at GenCon for instance out of all the squads I see one Blackmoon, which did fairly well but didn't make it into the final 8. Even with a few more of these "e-wing sitings", what would we really be able to draw from that?

I did a quick search from the regionals and nationals data and found:

Out of all of the data presented in regionals I found 1 instance of a knave or blackmoon.

Out of all of the data presented in nationals I found 2 instances of a knave or blackmoon.

So my conclusion is there isn't enough information to draw any conclusions from that data.

Basically, people just need to start using the superfighters a little more so we can really understand them.

Slight tangent but relevant to 3PO discussion since it's a hot topic of conversation.

There's a lot of discussion about how 3PO is worth 5/8 of an evade per round and I get where that is coming from, but I don't think it's quite right. He's pretty obviously more than that, though I'm not sure how much, but I think it's more significant than some think. Also disclaimer: I don't think he's all that big of a deal.

3PO can net you an extra evade if you guess one, but I think that chance is effectively a net zero with the times you'll actually be wrong. There are situations, though, where he gives a ship the ability to survive when it normally wouldn't because of being able to guess one. I'm not sure that changes the percentages.

However, with a focus token, you have the chance of getting an extra evade from 3PO by guessing zero. With one die that's a 25% chance and better than that with two. So, while some seem to have a pretty strict adherence to the notion of 5/8, it's not quite accurate. If we assume a regular focus and only one die, that's still .25 evades per turn, which puts the number at 7/8, but this is a bit variable because it's conditional (need for the focus and sometimes it will be two dice), but I think 5/8 is too low as a consistent measure.

I'm also curious why people go right to the ban list instead of the restricted list. I guess it's unfamiliarity with FFG's handling of their tournament games.

I assure you, as unbalancing as things may be (which is definitely up for debate), nothing FFG has released for this game comes anywhere CLOSE to point where they would ban it. Maybe, maybe introduce a restricted list.

Slight tangent but relevant to 3PO discussion since it's a hot topic of conversation.

There's a lot of discussion about how 3PO is worth 5/8 of an evade per round and I get where that is coming from, but I don't think it's quite right.

It's right.

3PO can net you an extra evade if you guess one, but I think that chance is effectively a net zero with the times you'll actually be wrong. There are situations, though, where he gives a ship the ability to survive when it normally wouldn't because of being able to guess one. I'm not sure that changes the percentages.

It does change things: if you guess one evade result on one die, Threepio generates 3/8 of an evade rather than 5/8. The distribution of evade results looks like this:

Evades | p

--------------------------

0 0.625

1 0

2 0.375

The expected value for that attack, then, is 0.75. If you don't have C-3PO, the EV is 0.375; if you do have C-3P0 and guess 0, the EV is 1. Basically, the only time it's useful to guess 1 is if you must have 2 evades to survive the attack, but typically (that is, on the average) you'll avoid more damage by guessing 0.

However, with a focus token, you have the chance of getting an extra evade from 3PO by guessing zero. With one die that's a 25% chance and better than that with two. So, while some seem to have a pretty strict adherence to the notion of 5/8, it's not quite accurate. If we assume a regular focus and only one die, that's still .25 evades per turn, which puts the number at 7/8, but this is a bit variable because it's conditional (need for the focus and sometimes it will be two dice), but I think 5/8 is too low as a consistent measure.

Focus doesn't affect Threepio at all; he still generates exactly 5/8 of an evade. The distribution with one die, Threepio with a zero guess, and a focus token looks like this:

Evades | p

--------------------------

0 0

1 0.75

2 0.25

That makes the expected value 1.25, compared to an EV of 0.625 for a single die with focus. 1.25-0.625 = 0.625, or 5/8.

***

TL;DR: Threepio can generate some unusual distributions, which have applications given a particular number of hits you have to dodge--but as long as you're only rolling one die, he can't generate anything other than 3/8 of an evade or 5/8 of an evade.

I've advocated for it in other threads with much resistance, but I'll say it here also:

I think the game should "officially" move to a higher point level, say 125.

A lot of the issues that people bring up get dialed down as point levels get higher. It also starts to make things like ordnance become more worth the points.

C3PO math works as follows:

No focus no C3PO: 3/8 chances of evade , 5/8 nothing

/w focus no C3PO: 5/8 evade, 3/8 nothing

No focus /w C3PO: 100% evade

/w focus /w C3PO: 6/8 evade, 2/8 2 evades (if you spend focus)

The 25% chance of you getting to 2 evades when you have focus is included into the 5/8. No matter what, you still have the chance of 3/8 of him doing exactly nothing.

What C3PO does that is not included in the 5/8 average that people use as shorthand is strongly increase the lower threshold of green dice for one attack. While the attacker still has non-zero chance of getting 0 hits, you have 100% chance of getting at least one evade. From a quick scribble, I'm getting the following chances and average hits for 2 dice vs. 1 green:

2 vs. 1(no focus):

no C3PO: 56% chances of hitting, 0.72 avg damage

/w C3PO: 25% chances of hitting, 0.25 avg damage

Additionally, we can see C3PO actively reducing damage in 46.88% of cases

3 vs. 1:

no C3PO: 73% chances of hitting, 1.17 avg damage

/w C3PO: 50% chances of hitting, 0.63 avg damage

Here, C3PO reduces damage 54.6% of the time

What I'm trying to say is that, yes, C3PO is 5/8 of an evade, but this has an unintuitive effect on actual damage reduction when factored in with what it's defending *against*.

Bear in mind that these are hand scribbles, there might be mistakes I also think it's still not *unbalanced*, but the guarantee of 1 evade is nice.

Ninja'ed by Vorpal

I'm also curious why people go right to the ban list instead of the restricted list.

Kneejerk-"nuke it from orbit" reaction, because if something is seen as OP'ed that's the best answer... Kill it with fire, so you know it's dead.

Honestly the fix for Goldenrod is pretty simple IMO, assuming a fix is actually needed. Errata the card so that zero isn't a valid guess. You have to guess 1 or more, to get the extra evade. Although I'm not sure how much use he would get then...

That all said I too don't think he needs to be fixed or banned, because for 3 points he's not really OP'ed. The real problem IMO with Fat Han is just how many upgrades you can put on the YT, which is actually pretty fluffy, but also creates more options for builds on the upper end of the food chain.

If you up the point level to 125, other problems will arise, like 10 ship builds where the size of the table is too small, or builds we don't think off because we can't complete them right now. If i had to guess, most of the ships are playtested at 100 points, so you would need to change a lot.

I don't think escalation is a solution.

@Vorpal and Chilligan,

Ok, that makes sense and thanks for pointing it out.

I don't think escalation is a solution.

I agree, because more points just means a even Fatter Han, and more named Phantoms.

At 125 I can build the following, not sure if Ruthlessness is the best answer, but if the falcon is the only thing left it would increase his offense. Plus between Han and Luke odds of getting a hit is good.

Han Solo, Ruthlessness, Luke Skywalker, C-3PO, Millennium Falcon, Engine Upgrade

Blue Squadron Pilot, Advanced Sensors, Heavy Laser Cannon

Biggs Darklighter, R2-D2

Or you can fit both Whisper and Echo with VI and ACD into a list for 72 points still leaving you 53 points for other ships. Like say a Decimator...

Except for the fact that Ruthlessness is Imperial only...

If you up the point level to 125, other problems will arise, like 10 ship builds where the size of the table is too small, or builds we don't think off because we can't complete them right now. If i had to guess, most of the ships are playtested at 100 points, so you would need to change a lot.

I don't think escalation is a solution.

125 plays perfectly fine on a 3x3. 150 should probably use a 3x4, but also plays fine on a 3x3. Swarms actually become less effective as you increase their size (past 6-8) due to spacing and more susceptible to aoe. Can you think of any other possible issues?

Except for the fact that Ruthlessness is Imperial only...

There you go, once again destroying perfectly good theory with ugly fact...

Voidstate needs to fix that then, it worked on his site, and I didn't even consider if it was allowed or not. But there's still plenty of good 3 point EPT's out there.

I don't think escalation is a solution.

I agree, because more points just means a even Fatter Han, and more named Phantoms.

At 125 I can build the following, not sure if Ruthlessness is the best answer, but if the falcon is the only thing left it would increase his offense. Plus between Han and Luke odds of getting a hit is good.

Han Solo, Ruthlessness, Luke Skywalker, C-3PO, Millennium Falcon, Engine Upgrade

Blue Squadron Pilot, Advanced Sensors, Heavy Laser Cannon

Biggs Darklighter, R2-D2

Or you can fit both Whisper and Echo with VI and ACD into a list for 72 points still leaving you 53 points for other ships. Like say a Decimator...

Larger point values dial down these hard countering ships. You have more bodies and more arcs on the table, so things like Han Solo and C3P0 become less effective. Phantoms also become less effective since there are more firing arcs to try and avoid, and there's more breathing room to bring a counter that will take up less of a list.

To both of the lists above, a simple middle of the road list of just b-wings could really challenge both a lot better than at 100 pts.

I think the game used to be better balanced at 100, but as of Wave 4 and on, actually plays better at 125.

The only turrets they have will be Y-wing and HWK, and the highest PS is 7 and 8.

The Scumhawks are debuffers, and I'm pretty sure based on the interview that one has the equivalent of jamming.

And we all know how much PTL ships and Phantoms loooooooove the Jam action...

Hmm, no they don't Gather. The more ships the better. The only problem are Assault missiles, but you can get away with getting 1 ship damage by the missile and another by the side effect. The problem is that at that moment, the swarm will have complete space control, denying actions and movements very easilly.

Honestly the fix for Goldenrod is pretty simple IMO, assuming a fix is actually needed. Errata the card so that zero isn't a valid guess. You have to guess 1 or more, to get the extra evade. Although I'm not sure how much use he would get then...

I think it would actually make him less valuable than a Shield Upgrade: much in the same way you currently have to survive at least four rounds' worth of attacks for Threepio to be consistently better than Chewie, you'd have to survive at least three rounds for him to be better than a simple +1 hp.

But although he wouldn't be that good anymore, I'm not actually sure the change would dial back the amount of frustration. Quoting myself:

...if you guess one evade result on one die, Threepio generates 3/8 of an evade rather than 5/8. The distribution of evade results looks like this:

Evades | p

--------------------------

0 0.625

1 0

2 0.375

That's less effective on average than the current version, but it makes Threepio a sort of double-or-nothing gambit. That odd 0 in the middle of the distribution is prone to all sorts of cognitive biases: look, now when Threepio triggers he cancels two damage--and in combination with the Falcon title, he can cancel up to three damage!

And it's "worse" with a focus token:

Evades | p

--------------------------

0 0.375

1 0.25

2 0.375

Threepio is still only generating 3/8 of an evade here, but the expected value is 1 and "2" is tied for the most likely result. Intuition currently says that Threepio represents a guaranteed evade (which is true but misleading), and intuition with the "nerfed" Threepio would be that sometimes he gives you nothing but sometimes he gives you 2, and confirmation bias is going to emphasize the latter effect.

Now I don't know how that will mix with the general knowledge that Threepio was nerfed (in this scenario)--since problems with him are mostly just perception now, maybe the perception that the problem was fixed would satisfy.

Hmm, no they don't Gather. The more ships the better. The only problem are Assault missiles, but you can get away with getting 1 ship damage by the missile and another by the side effect. The problem is that at that moment, the swarm will have complete space control, denying actions and movements very easilly.

Really, have you played a lot of this? Honestly try a 150 pt game, where you have 12 tie fighters vs 6-7 b-wings or x-wings. It becomes harder for those tie fighters to focus fire and become effective, while the b-wings can still narrow in and take out a tie-fighter or 2 a turn.

There comes a point, roughly past 6 ships where swarming starts becoming less efficient due to space, range, and obstacles.