So you need to react differently to different cards and combos. How is that a bad thing, exactly?

My qualm with the FAQ ruling is that forcing a fighter to spend its action on an evade token in hopes of getting out of dice proof damage is a great value unto itself. Your opponent is buttoning up and forgoing focus and TL in case a crit comes through. That's potential damage given up against your squad. Since evade tokens no longer block the damage, they're worthless to choose against such opponents. You have the possibility of gaining 1-3 damage or a crit and lady dady everybody is going to be choosing focus or putting a TL on you because the name of the game is no longer trying to mitigate the damage, it's to kill you off as rapidly as possible in order to stop it. And the evades that are rolled that don't stop the autohits will certainly stop the crits and hits that don't apply.

Your viewpoint here is completely foreign to me. There are three effects--Autoblaster, Ten Numb, and Autoblaster Turret--that function this way. Two of those restrict the dice you roll and restrict the range at which they can be used, and Ten comes with a huge tax.

And as DR4CO says, what that means is that very occasionally, you have to look at the upgrades your opponent is running and think about how to react to them, rather than adopting your default approach. How is that removing complexity from the game?

FFG slapped a huge band-aid on the issue and took a level of complexity out of the game.

I also don't understand this, but I suspect you haven't been playing long. In the original rulebook, evade tokens added an evade result to the dice. Ten Numb and Autoblaster introduced the completely artificial and very problematic distinction between results that come from dice and results that come from elsewhere.

So the current FAQ ruling isn't a band-aid at all, but rather tearing the band-aid off. It's a signpost that says "Ignore that thing we did a while back, because it was silly."

I played since the original understanding of the evade token was read from the Core Rule Book; 'The player can choose to spend the evade token later during the Combat phase to cancel one damage rolled by the attacker' and the token added to the evade results obtained by the dice, not counted as an extra die itself. When the text on the cards stated specifically that 'defense dice' couldn't cancel the results, the automatic assumption by the entire X-Wing community in my shop was that since dice were specifically mentioned, that evade tokens were the obvious counter to this upgrade.

If somebody chose autoblaster and got into range of a ship with evade action, that ship had to choose to either try to get better range one damage through focus or target lock or to try to avoid the damage through the use of an evade token. The ship with the autocannon was certainly trying to maximize his damage through his actions, so more fragile ships, especially TIE Fighters had to weigh the effectiveness of their 3 attack dice against the uselessness of their 3 evade dice and the possibility of losing their ship in one attack. Many players would take the evade even if they were tailing a ship that was nearly dead because if the autoblaster equipped ship had a higher pilot skill, their TIE might not get the chance to finish off their opponent before their turn came up. If they were already damaged, then it became a matter of luck for the person rolling autoblaster to see if they had enough dice pop up as hits to overcome the evade token and take out the Fighter. It was tense, it was fun, it added complexity.

FAQ 2.2 changed that, but not in a huge way. You couldn't avoid autoblaster fire, but you just had to fly smarter and keep out of the forward arc of the limited number of ships that could carry it. Ten Numb's ability was a bit bothersome, but crits were relatively rare enough that you could stand a good chance of getting out of his firing arc before he could do too much unavoidable damage. Once the Scum faction introduced 'Mangler', all of the sudden you got super Numb who was almost gueranteed an unblockable crit the first time he fired. Saying that you adapt to what an opponent is running doesn't work out too well in a free for all game where your opponents build their squads in secret before revealing 2 super numbs that promptly ignore trying to take each other out and instead go for the Imperial swarm that can take crits on the first hit. Great to have a character like Soontir Fel manage to make it through one Numb firing arc and a second VI numb barrel roll into range, crit, and get a Direct Hit on the first turn.

It's gotten to the point where a lot of new players at my shop don't even unpack their Fighters or Interceptors if a Numb player asks them for a game. That's lowering the complexity of the game for them. More experienced players have to contend with a maneuverable tank where shielded craft are vital if you don't want to risk a significant point loss before you get a similar amount of damage in. Once again, lowering the complexity of the game so you don't expose glaring weaknesses to Numb's enhanced ability.

It's not like Numb is played every game, but at his point cost, he gains advantages that other ships at the same level don't come close to achieving. If you have an unshielded swarm, you can assume that gameplay will revolve around the rest of his team running interferance while he 1 forwards and barrel rolls half that distance back to keep in sniping position. Once again, fewer choices, textbook games, and any Imperial ship whose core defense is based around high manuverability is deprived of one of it's primary advantages as soon as its base nubs cross into Numb's firing arc. For any other B-Wing, it would be a matter of whether the B-Wing could get shots in before the TIE could get out of its firing arc the equal base dice (and don't forget evade tokens!) make it a matter of luck and skill as to who eventually comes out alive.

If Numb rolls a shot at you with 2 asteroids and 3 large ships with tactical jammer installed against your autothrusted TIE Interceptor, take the hit. That's a huge band-aid on the B-Wings primary weakness against those kinds of ships. You're not going to find one other ship in this game that is such a predator to a whole class of ships.

So suspect what you want, I'm not saying that it's an unbeatable juggernaut. I'm saying that to effectively counter it you have to use the same trite methods and that Numb has the ability to disproportionately stack gameplay against certain builds in a way that no other combination can.

I played since the original understanding of the evade token was read from the Core Rule Book; 'The player can choose to spend the evade token later during the Combat phase to cancel one damage rolled by the attacker' and the token added to the evade results obtained by the dice, not counted as an extra die itself. When the text on the cards stated specifically that 'defense dice' couldn't cancel the results, the automatic assumption by the entire X-Wing community in my shop was that since dice were specifically mentioned, that evade tokens were the obvious counter to this upgrade.

If somebody chose autoblaster and got into range of a ship with evade action, that ship had to choose to either try to get better range one damage through focus or target lock or to try to avoid the damage through the use of an evade token. The ship with the autocannon was certainly trying to maximize his damage through his actions, so more fragile ships, especially TIE Fighters had to weigh the effectiveness of their 3 attack dice against the uselessness of their 3 evade dice and the possibility of losing their ship in one attack. Many players would take the evade even if they were tailing a ship that was nearly dead because if the autoblaster equipped ship had a higher pilot skill, their TIE might not get the chance to finish off their opponent before their turn came up. If they were already damaged, then it became a matter of luck for the person rolling autoblaster to see if they had enough dice pop up as hits to overcome the evade token and take out the Fighter. It was tense, it was fun, it added complexity.

FAQ 2.2 changed that, but not in a huge way. You couldn't avoid autoblaster fire, but you just had to fly smarter and keep out of the forward arc of the limited number of ships that could carry it. Ten Numb's ability was a bit bothersome, but crits were relatively rare enough that you could stand a good chance of getting out of his firing arc before he could do too much unavoidable damage. Once the Scum faction introduced 'Mangler', all of the sudden you got super Numb who was almost gueranteed an unblockable crit the first time he fired. Saying that you adapt to what an opponent is running doesn't work out too well in a free for all game where your opponents build their squads in secret before revealing 2 super numbs that promptly ignore trying to take each other out and instead go for the Imperial swarm that can take crits on the first hit. Great to have a character like Soontir Fel manage to make it through one Numb firing arc and a second VI numb barrel roll into range, crit, and get a Direct Hit on the first turn.

It's gotten to the point where a lot of new players at my shop don't even unpack their Fighters or Interceptors if a Numb player asks them for a game. That's lowering the complexity of the game for them. More experienced players have to contend with a maneuverable tank where shielded craft are vital if you don't want to risk a significant point loss before you get a similar amount of damage in. Once again, lowering the complexity of the game so you don't expose glaring weaknesses to Numb's enhanced ability.

It's not like Numb is played every game, but at his point cost, he gains advantages that other ships at the same level don't come close to achieving. If you have an unshielded swarm, you can assume that gameplay will revolve around the rest of his team running interferance while he 1 forwards and barrel rolls half that distance back to keep in sniping position. Once again, fewer choices, textbook games, and any Imperial ship whose core defense is based around high manuverability is deprived of one of it's primary advantages as soon as its base nubs cross into Numb's firing arc. For any other B-Wing, it would be a matter of whether the B-Wing could get shots in before the TIE could get out of its firing arc the equal base dice (and don't forget evade tokens!) make it a matter of luck and skill as to who eventually comes out alive.

If Numb rolls a shot at you with 2 asteroids and 3 large ships with tactical jammer installed against your autothrusted TIE Interceptor, take the hit. That's a huge band-aid on the B-Wings primary weakness against those kinds of ships. You're not going to find one other ship in this game that is such a predator to a whole class of ships.

So suspect what you want, I'm not saying that it's an unbeatable juggernaut. I'm saying that to effectively counter it you have to use the same trite methods and that Numb has the ability to disproportionately stack gameplay against certain builds in a way that no other combination can.

Ten Numb with Mangler Cannon is only getting 1 unblocked {Kaboom} per turn, so it isn't like he can kill your entire squad on his own. The B-wing has 1 agility, it isn't exactly hard to kill. He is also 35 points on his own with just the Mangler Cannon - this is the same as Soontir + PTL + Autothrusters + Stealth Device, or nearly the same as 3 Academy Ties.

Sure in a free-for-all the game is different. With 2 or 3 of him on the board interceptors will feel the hurt. He strips stealth anf does damage. But then this game is not balanced for free for all, but for head to head. Perhaps there is a reason both Numbs attack the Interceptors? Would it be because an Interceptor is able to outmanoeuvre them so they kill the biggest threat to them first?

Also there are other attacks that ignore agility. Does DeciVader appear in your local meta? Or DeciVaderGunner? Can do at least 1 {Kaboom} to any ship at range up to 3 with no ability to defend.

As to the original rules, they said page 12.

So reading this the original ruling was evade token counted as dice results. Since if they didn't, then you could never use them to cancel the attack dice.

I played since the original understanding of the evade token was read from the Core Rule Book; 'The player can choose to spend the evade token later during the Combat phase to cancel one damage rolled by the attacker' and the token added to the evade results obtained by the dice, not counted as an extra die itself. When the text on the cards stated specifically that 'defense dice' couldn't cancel the results, the automatic assumption by the entire X-Wing community in my shop was that since dice were specifically mentioned, that evade tokens were the obvious counter to this upgrade.

That seems to have been FFG's intention, as well. That doesn't change the fact that the rules don't do a good job of supporting the distinction between results that come from dice and results that don't come from dice.

If somebody chose autoblaster and got into range of a ship with evade action, that ship had to choose to either try to get better range one damage through focus or target lock or to try to avoid the damage through the use of an evade token... It was tense, it was fun, it added complexity.

It doesn't add any complexity because it's precisely the same choice you have with literally every single head-to-head engagement at Range 1. A TIE fighter at Range 1 of a B-wing is almost certainly facing 4 modified attack dice. So you have to decide whether you want to reduce your chance of being one-shotted by using the evade action, or take the focus action--which is less certain, but can be used for offense.

...Saying that you adapt to what an opponent is running doesn't work out too well in a free for all game where your opponents build their squads in secret before revealing 2 super numbs that promptly ignore trying to take each other out and instead go for the Imperial swarm that can take crits on the first hit. Great to have a character like Soontir Fel manage to make it through one Numb firing arc and a second VI numb barrel roll into range, crit, and get a Direct Hit on the first turn.

See, this is important information. You have an unusual metagame that's shaped by participation in an unusual (and unsupported) play format.

It's not like Numb is played every game, but at his point cost, he gains advantages that other ships at the same level don't come close to achieving...

I'm sorry, but this isn't true. 35 points is a very high cost, and that's without any upgrades on Ten other than a Mangler Cannon. For those points you can get Soontir Fel + Push the Limit + Autothrusters + Stealth Device, which (although it's hard countered by Ten) is an extraordinarily effective ship. You can get Echo + Veteran Instincts + Advanced Cloaking Device. You can get a Bounty Hunter + Tactician. On the Rebel side you can take Keyan Farlander + Opportunist + Fire Control System. You have an incredible number of options--one might even say there's a fair amount of complexity.

If you have an unshielded swarm, you can assume that gameplay will revolve around the rest of his team running interferance while he 1 forwards and barrel rolls half that distance back to keep in sniping position. Once again, fewer choices, textbook games, and any Imperial ship whose core defense is based around high manuverability is deprived of one of it's primary advantages as soon as its base nubs cross into Numb's firing arc.

Again, Ten is paying a huge premium for that ability, and he's fragile. He can attempt to slow-roll, but if he does his damage is going to be limited to one crit per round--which (again) isn't actually all that efficient unless you need it as a silver bullet against something like Fel + Stealth. Andif he wants to slow-roll you can swarm him with aggressive TIE fighters, which is going to be a problem once they get close and out of arc and are rolling 3 dice each. The B-wing's dial is fairly limited, especially if it wants to keep its action available and doesn't have any system upgrades or Engne Upgrade, and you can use that.

So even in that worst-case scenario of Ten facing agile, fragile ships, you have options you're not considering.

That's a huge band-aid on the B-Wings primary weakness against those kinds of ships. You're not going to find one other ship in this game that is such a predator to a whole class of ships.

Phantoms are many times more effective against a swarm than Ten Numb is--and she's not limited to deployment against TIE swarms or A-wings. Turrets in general preyed viciously on Interceptors and other fragile ships before the introduction of Autothrusters, and a Decimator + Vader + Gunner is still death on wings for an Interceptor. IG-88 is an incredibly dangerous prospect for a low-PS swarm. TIE Bombers are actually nasty competitors against Large ships, unless those ships have the ability to boost out of firing arcs. Anything with an Ion Cannon Turret is a hard counter against Small ships with 1 Agility (like B-wings).

So suspect what you want, I'm not saying that it's an unbeatable juggernaut. I'm saying that to effectively counter it you have to use the same trite methods and that Numb has the ability to disproportionately stack gameplay against certain builds in a way that no other combination can.

It can be countered by more strategies and deployments than you've considered, and the idea that he has an unprecedented ability to counter or shut down enemies is... not really true.

This makes no sense to me. Numb's card says specifically the one critical hit cannot be cancelled by defense dice. An evade token is a TOKEN. If it were the intent to have the ability to apply to tokens AND dice, why would it not say it cannot be cancelled, period. If it were a Focus token, I agree as it is modifying dice.

Example: Numb rolls two hits. One is change to a critical. Defender rolls two evades. First die cancels the regular hit, second does not cancel the Critical hit per the ability. BUT, then the defender spends an evade token. I think it should cancel it.

Perhaps I am missing something.

check the rules on dice results in fantasy flight's x-wing FAQ states that evade tokens count as dice result and gives an example also