So for a while now there has been countless post about problems with Xwing, fill in blank ship need a fix, such and such ship needs a nurf.

Aside from some of the ships needing a rework , which FFG have done a great job in breathing new life into less used ships and the great work on FAQ to help keep things fresh along with new ships.

I have started to think that in a competitive environment that VI has no place.

I know hold on this is a big statement but here me out.

I believe that just this change could see the return of the mid pilot skill ships. Now ships like garvin would have a chance against say ships like echo, an initiative bid would need to come into play to determine who would shot first.

Another thing , ps 9 is for all intents and purposes kinda supposed to represent the very top level of pilot skill. Vi kinda says no Vader your just good . Without vi those top skill pilots would not be get usurped which I believe is thematically the way it should be.

So when we get done to the nuts and bolts of things who really is going to be mostly effected by this . Well the named phantoms really, they get the very most benefit from vi, and I know the phantoms just got the supposed nurf, but that kinda just ment they had to start playing the same game as everyone else. Most other uses I have seen for vi would have very subtle effects on list and have realy just been used for the phantom counter ever since that ship dropped.

So people's thoughts?

Another thing , ps 9 is for all intents and purposes kinda supposed to represent the very top level of pilot skill. Vi kinda says no Vader your just good . Without vi those top skill pilots would not be get usurped which I believe is thematically the way it should be.

VI thematically is what it says on the tin, instincts, reactions. A pilot with VI's elite talent is reaction time. They're still a PS8 pilot, but their special skill is super-quick reactions and they sacrifice other elite talents for that. PS9's still more skilled, but if it puts its elite talent to more aggressive use than the PS8 with VI the PS8 will have higher effective pilot skill. Don't think of a PS8 with VI as a PS10 with no EPT, think of it as a PS8 with an EPT in reaction speed.

The reason to kill VI would be if it were so vital that it was choking the other EPTs out of the game, if the EPT slot was basically +1 cost +1 pilot skill. With the phantom repaired and Scum living in mid PS it should straighten out in time.

And if it doesn't FFG will do something about it.

Mountains and molehills.

Part of me wishes you could double up on VI to make a ps12 Tycho.

Eh. The only problem is that VI is very bland. It doesn't allow re-rolls or grant a unique action - it just is.

That said, initiative bidding is part of the game and, with the insane popularity of engine upgrade, can have a huge impact on the game. VI means that initiative isn't guaranteed even for a PS 9 pilot.

Another thing , ps 9 is for all intents and purposes kinda supposed to represent the very top level of pilot skill. Vi kinda says no Vader your just good . Without vi those top skill pilots would not be get usurped which I believe is thematically the way it should be.

VI thematically is what it says on the tin, instincts, reactions. A pilot with VI's elite talent is reaction time. They're still a PS8 pilot, but their special skill is super-quick reactions and they sacrifice other elite talents for that. PS9's still more skilled, but if it puts its elite talent to more aggressive use than the PS8 with VI the PS8 will have higher effective pilot skill. Don't think of a PS8 with VI as a PS10 with no EPT, think of it as a PS8 with an EPT in reaction speed.

The reason to kill VI would be if it were so vital that it was choking the other EPTs out of the game, if the EPT slot was basically +1 cost +1 pilot skill. With the phantom repaired and Scum living in mid PS it should straighten out in time.

And if it doesn't FFG will do something about it.

Yep. VI is great for an initiative bid, but VI against BBBBZ, Panic Attack or Thug Lyfe is going to be a waste of points compared to something like Calculation or Determination. It's also a double-edged sword that makes you more succeptible to blocking.

I wonder if VI was errata'd to be just +1PS, would it see so much use. Now putting VI on Corran puts him at PS9, which ties the folks he was trying to go past (Han and Fel). Furthermore, it still means that a non-VI PS9 pilot will NOT be over-PS'd by anyone else (except a PS9 VI, in which case it was already a 9 and it's okay). I feel like it would end up being more of a "herm, do I want a 1pt init bid, or do I just spend that 1pt on VI" type of a thing rather than "MUST. HAVE. VI!!" as it currently is. Plus, it would make a non-VI Whisper/Echo a viable option.

V.I is not a problem, ACD was a problem

now that the errata has hit (and really, everyone outside of an official ffg event should be playing with the revisions) VI matters that much less. You still have innate 9s like soontir and vader trolling around, but since they can actually be blocked for tangible benefit PS makes less of a difference against them, too

Now ACD still exists and the four dice + focus defenses ala whisper mean VI remains auto-include on her, but now any list can draw more arcs on her now that she's lost her ability to be an indecisive spoiled princess and still 2" barrel-roll in the direction of her choosing after everyone has moved

I actually don't see anymore use for VI in my squadrons, now. Only the Stress Wing (VI, R3-A2, Eu) really needs it because X-wings have garbage maneuverability (no barrel-roll) you need to go after Soontir so you can peg him with the double stress.

If I used Thurr, he'd be a fan too. The named tie advance have yet to be spoiled, so maybe there's a candidate there?

anyway, VI exercises far less undue influence with the phantom errata.

Part of me wishes you could double up on VI to make a ps12 Tycho.

Roark. And done.

VI also doesn't hurt mid PS (PS5, PS6) much because they can either take VI themselves or they're going to be beaten by ships that could take VI anyway.

Part of me wishes you could double up on VI to make a ps12 Tycho.

Roark. And done.

Yeah, except it leaves almost all the benefits of a PS12 Tycho on chop floor since it only activates in the combat phase. Roark is a nice counter to ACD. He is not a maneuverability solution, which is so often the more important piece.

Yeah, VI is not a problem. The phantom pilots having an EPT slot is.

The problem with VI is that it pushed Whisper up, making him much harder to deal with than at PS7 (so much so that people deem Whisper unplayable at that PS). That made only a few ships able to reliably deal with him thereby really limiting the competitive design space for lists: you had to be able to deal with a PS9 Phantom, you had to be able to deal with Fat Han.

Moving the decloak to before movement allows for good players to have a swarm dodge around the possible spaces where a Phantom might end up. Swarms deal with Fat Han. The balance is restored, the circle is complete.

Phantoms eat Swarms eat Falcons eat Phantoms

Is the problem with xwing VI

No.

Is there a problem with xwing

No.

FTFY

We are in/exiting a pilot skill cold war. It is likely the catalyst was the Phantom but ACD would not have been an issue if VI wasn't around.

I'm not suggesting we remove VI, I think the change to decloaking and introduction of scum is resolving the issue for the most part. Also the suggestion that Phantoms shouldn't have elite pilot talent slots is absurd.

In my area, phantoms were not as popular as 360s - super dash and fat han are STILL common place (more the latter than the former).

I shake my head at the continuing notion that Phantoms were such a problem. Deci/Whisper was as or less common than Super Dash/Corran in my area. Either way - playing x-wing has been straight up boring when 75% of my matches are against one of those two lists (more the latter than the former).

I feel like I'm playing the same **** match over and over and over, regardless of which ships I bring. It is as fascinating as playing the fight vs. Garland in Final Fantasy again and again without ever progressing to another story.

VI is just underpriced for my taste. Upgrades should never give a cheaper means to increasing an ability than the base cost formulas normally would. PS, with very few exceptions, costs 1 point per level; VI just cheapenend it extraordinarily.

I think VI will still be needed against people like Soontir Fel. Yes, it's not as important, but I think we will still see a bit of it.

For a house rule, it would be interesting to not allow VI on anyone unique. If you are a generic (with an EPT), take it all day long. If you are a named pilot, you can't.

I have been running Furball pairs out of my FLGS from time to time. 40 points, small base only, no VI.

When VI is off the table, players make imaginative and varied combinations. There are still Phantoms on the table. Vader being PS 9 means more.

Part of me wishes you could double up on VI to make a ps12 Tycho.

Roark. And done.

It just isn't the same

I have no issue with VI. The only ship on which it has been anywhere near an auto-include is the phantom, which the developers have stated they left capped at PS7 specifically because VI was already in the game. It has low cost, but a significant opportunity cost (the EPT slot), and can even be used deliberately for more than just raising your PS just for PS bidding (see Wes Janson + VI to strip tokens for Wedge followup attacks). It's also a pretty basic potential counter for the phantom: Wedge or Corran with VI can counter the (old?) phantom repositioning antics, and are effective against Soontir and VI-less Vader for the same reasons.

Wes Jenson! Must have with VI its great to shoot first and remove tokens from the defender

I think the OP is onto something. I think if you look at the overall EPTs taken in the last year, VI probably trumps every other card. Why? because the PS bid has gotten out of hand. How many 7 and 8 skill pilots do you look at and basically say to yourself "Well, I guess I'll have to take VI"? I can name several off the top of my head, many of which have already been mentioned in this thread.

Take the recent Phantom Nerf. Do you think anyone would have complained about Whisper and the Phantom if she was capped at 7PS (barring some crazy combo otherwise)? I don't think so at all. In fact, even with the old Decloak, we'd likely be asking for buffs to the Phantom at this point, instead of discussing nerfs.

As it is, I think if you have more than 2 PS, you need to be at least a 7 or have an ability that largely doesn't care about your PS (like Biggs) to be playable. This means if you are in the 3-6 range you are either largely unplayable or need VI to boost you into the 7+ range.

While I am not necessarily saying VI needs to be removed/changed, what I am saying is that it does seem to me to distort the game a bit. If they decided to do something about VI, I would actually welcome that at this point. The PS bidding stuff is fine (I guess) but think of how much more valuable the mid range pilots would be if you couldn't artificially boost your PS. The meta would, in my opinion, shift back to the wave 1 type of arguments. Obsidians or Academies in Swarm was an argument I felt was really interesting at that time frame. It really does feel like right now the argument is more "haves and have-nots" and each time a 5 PS pilot is previewed they are generally not given much, if any thought. Which is a shame, it would be nice if the mid-range PS guys were more attractive.

That all being said, I do still think the PS Cold War is still on regardless of the Phantom changes. There are far too many good pilots now that have PS7+ for that to change. But removing VI would help widen the gap in my opinion.

The only thing that was close to borken in this game was just elegantly modified. The end result of that change could see a reduction in turreted ships (another polarizing vessel in the game). We don't even know where the meta is going to wind up yet following the introduction of Scum and the mod to decloaking.

I'm very surprised this topic is rearing it's head following the decloak rule change. I thought the biggest gripe with it was the interaction with Whisper where people felt she was OP.

I personally think VI is a really fun upgrade and is flat out good for the game. It's clearly not an autoinclude because to use it a ship is forced to give up their all important EPT slot.

Yes it is cheap. Yes it's a 2PS bump. No, it's not overpowered and if anything it adds a fair amount of variety to lists.

Putting the cart before the horse there, Hida

ACD started the PS war, vi just enabled it