The biggest result of the phantom rule change is it opened up the field for Dash. The main reason I didn't play Dash is Whisper could chase Dash quite well and Echo... man she lives in that range 1 bubble. Now that Dash can see where those two ships are starting from Dash has enough information to use that BR and Boost to keep distance from those Phantoms.

The Dashing Menace as I like to call it, destroys non range 3 turreted ships so well large ships continue to do well in the meta. Dash has replaced the Phantom in keeping small ship swarms/miniswarms from doing well (as a whole) which keeps large ship turrets able to deal with just about everything else. At least that's how I see it and more and more people are catching on to the power of Dash.

Yeah, I played against Super Dash and Jan Ors last night with 4 Obsidians, a Patrol Leader, Vader, and Gunner. What happened was I lost a TIE Fighter a turn against 5 attack dice with a TL and focus. I killed the HWK and by then I had lost 2 TIEs and I had 4 health left on my Deci.

There was nothing I could do, that's what I get for flying more than 2 ships. Dumb nuanceless **** where you lose in the list building phase instead of actually getting outflown.

I think next time I have to face Super Dash I'm just going to immediately concede. Would rather not have to pretend to have fun for an hour straight as my maneuvers with sub PS 7 ships are made completely irrelevant because of large ship boost, barrel roll, and broken HLC turret that denies range bonuses with Kyle Katarn so he still gets to modify dice anyways.

In light of the changes to the Phantom, what builds are people having success with? Is the old Whisper + ACD + Gunner combo still the go-to, or are people seeing success with other builds using cards like SPA or Intelligence Agent?

In an epic game I played (it's coming back!) I snuck a generic phantom into my list. I ran with three RGP's and they were supposed to be my Hunter Killer group and take out enemy lynchpins.

Due to some poor flying on my part and some homogeny in my opponents list (7 HLC B-Wings, E'than, and a Transport) I instead took them around the Transport (taking pot shots on it as they got into position) then hit the B-Wings on their flank.

The Phantom's potshots put the Transport into a reactionary state, taking recover or reinforce actions instead of jamming or coordinating. That was pretty valuable in itself, let alone the hurt it put on the B-Wings. I'd probably try to take at least one every epic game...they're dangerous enough to be effective, but still able to fly under the radar when you also have Decimator and TIE Swarm in your list.

Like Eagle... I've done very well with Phantoms pre and post nerf. The nerf was needed for sure, and given my playstyle at least one intelligence agent on my field helps a ton. I think that advanced sensors works better that FCS now. You will have a good idea how things are going, just need to know which way to barrel roll before you move to really make use of its abilities. The lower PS phantoms which are still good, are still just as good!

But its really hard to take Whisper over Soontir now, with Soontir being almost as effective for fewer points.

I flew ECHO and WHISPER at a tournament last weekend and the only list I was afraid of was the one with rebel captive, lucky I didn't have to play him.

fought a BBBB and a BYBY, tabled both of them

phantoms are still deadly as hell, actually I find the rule change allows me to block with my phantom as well as out maneuver the enemy.

The biggest result of the phantom rule change is it opened up the field for Dash. The main reason I didn't play Dash is Whisper could chase Dash quite well and Echo... man she lives in that range 1 bubble. Now that Dash can see where those two ships are starting from Dash has enough information to use that BR and Boost to keep distance from those Phantoms.

The Dashing Menace as I like to call it, destroys non range 3 turreted ships so well large ships continue to do well in the meta. Dash has replaced the Phantom in keeping small ship swarms/miniswarms from doing well (as a whole) which keeps large ship turrets able to deal with just about everything else. At least that's how I see it and more and more people are catching on to the power of Dash.

Yeah, I played against Super Dash and Jan Ors last night with 4 Obsidians, a Patrol Leader, Vader, and Gunner. What happened was I lost a TIE Fighter a turn against 5 attack dice with a TL and focus. I killed the HWK and by then I had lost 2 TIEs and I had 4 health left on my Deci.

There was nothing I could do, that's what I get for flying more than 2 ships. Dumb nuanceless **** where you lose in the list building phase instead of actually getting outflown.

I think next time I have to face Super Dash I'm just going to immediately concede. Would rather not have to pretend to have fun for an hour straight as my maneuvers with sub PS 7 ships are made completely irrelevant because of large ship boost, barrel roll, and broken HLC turret that denies range bonuses with Kyle Katarn so he still gets to modify dice anyways.

I wonder who gets more upset about super dash/fat turret lists, ParaGoomba Slayer or ficklegreendice. There can only be 1 Grand Pooba of Saltiness you know.

The Phantom nerf took it from 15 to 9, while giving it blocking potential and ability to decloak while ionized (which is now irrelevant because it's no longer needed to ionize a Phantom) worth about one point.

It can block a little better now, who cares.

Super Dash with large ship boost and barrel roll and a turret is now the new phantom. It retains a phantom-esque omniscient hypermobility that's multiplied tenfold by its 4 dice turret that wrecks everything not built specifically to counter it, and turrets because they don't give a **** about hypermobility.

The biggest result of the phantom rule change is it opened up the field for Dash. The main reason I didn't play Dash is Whisper could chase Dash quite well and Echo... man she lives in that range 1 bubble. Now that Dash can see where those two ships are starting from Dash has enough information to use that BR and Boost to keep distance from those Phantoms.

The Dashing Menace as I like to call it, destroys non range 3 turreted ships so well large ships continue to do well in the meta. Dash has replaced the Phantom in keeping small ship swarms/miniswarms from doing well (as a whole) which keeps large ship turrets able to deal with just about everything else. At least that's how I see it and more and more people are catching on to the power of Dash.

Yeah, I played against Super Dash and Jan Ors last night with 4 Obsidians, a Patrol Leader, Vader, and Gunner. What happened was I lost a TIE Fighter a turn against 5 attack dice with a TL and focus. I killed the HWK and by then I had lost 2 TIEs and I had 4 health left on my Deci.

There was nothing I could do, that's what I get for flying more than 2 ships. Dumb nuanceless **** where you lose in the list building phase instead of actually getting outflown.

I think next time I have to face Super Dash I'm just going to immediately concede. Would rather not have to pretend to have fun for an hour straight as my maneuvers with sub PS 7 ships are made completely irrelevant because of large ship boost, barrel roll, and broken HLC turret that denies range bonuses with Kyle Katarn so he still gets to modify dice anyways.

I wonder who gets more upset about super dash/fat turret lists, ParaGoomba Slayer or ficklegreendice. There can only be 1 Grand Pooba of Saltiness you know.

well I'm batting 1 out of 2 there (love me some dash )

I would gladly abdicate my claim to the throne

Herm... I'm surprised to see so many people complaining about Dash in this thread. In all honesty, I haven't seen any complaints against him in other threads, and I don't think he's that big of a deal anyways. Heck, in Round 5 (we were both 3-1 entering the round) at the Ohio Regional, my Corran soloed Super Dash + Chewy (Chewy had lost 4 shields). And Corran is far from "built specifically to counter Dash."

Though to be fair, a case could be made for Corran himself being OP. And I have heard complaints along those lines before.

Herm... I'm surprised to see so many people complaining about Dash in this thread. In all honesty, I haven't seen any complaints against him in other threads, and I don't think he's that big of a deal anyways. Heck, in Round 5 (we were both 3-1 entering the round) at the Ohio Regional, my Corran soloed Super Dash + Chewy (Chewy had lost 4 shields). And Corran is far from "built specifically to counter Dash."

Though to be fair, a case could be made for Corran himself being OP. And I have heard complaints along those lines before.

I think it's not many people so much as a few complaining loudly.

I've always found fat dash really fun and actually pretty fair comparatively. Yeah he lays a hurt down, but he still only has 2 evade dice and ps 7 so he burns down pretty quick to a lot of things. Also the donut hole is surprisingly easy to sit in.

same bout as nigel

playing Dash is a mental workout against the vast majority of the typical meta. Not only does Soonts hunt him down well, but so does both flavors of PWT.

There's also the issue of aggressors who, even at optional range, will simply outdice Dash between higher agility and thrusters.

Every game against these lists is a tense cat and mouse as you fight to keep Dash at range 3 to win the unavoidable, inevitable dice-off with otherwise boring PWTs and simply out of arc of aggressors. You live and die entirely on your maneuvers as you try to keep enemies out of your blindspot, and I wouldn't have it any other way (I would have it so PWTs had some kind of similar consideration so I could enjoy them as well ).

In maintaining relevance to the thread, though, there is nothing the comes close to neutering Dash as pre-nerf phantom did with it decloaking after and just dancing around obstacles without much concern. No other ship can so trivially dodge Dash's main defensive mechanism (because it sure as **** ain't green dice); especially not Soontir. Oh, he'll catch you on an open field, but use Dash's ability well and the road to the doughnuthole won't be so clear.

I get pretty prickly when people call it a nerf. Yes you have to have a brain to use them now, but in the hands of a skilled player they're much more powerful now. It used to be with the phantom you got to have your cake and eat it too, now you get a second cake for free to take home. On top of their ridiculous attack strength and very able arc dodgy ness as well as their almost constant top notch defense, now they're also the best blockers in the game and virtually unblockable. Also ion attacks are far less useful against them.

The best tactic for fighting phantoms used to be boxing them in and blocking the decloak, now that's pretty much impossible. The recent change will only bring more turrets and high PS since they're now the only effective counter. Yes there are far fewer phantoms as the less skilled players move to chichi/Fel instead. But the phantom itself has only gotten stronger.

The change hurt the Phantom a lot, but it gained the ability to block low pilot skill ships. I never thought a change was necessary, but it is nice to be able to play Lone Wolf or some other EPT on a Phantom rather than always having to take Veteran instincts. In my experience, nobody plays Phantoms anymore. Considering all of this, I feel that the change was a net loss for the Phantom, with very little benefit to the game itself.

I don't agree with "very little benefit to the game itself". Just looking at the variety of squads being played gives the game a needed refresher. If a ship remains to long at the top the game suffers as people will grow tired of playing the same ship. FFG had a fairly large challenge with fixing something with the need of changing any cards. I personally feel they did a great job of cutting the power of the phantom but not killing it.

Gotta agree with oso. Now that the phantom's strengths aren't so easily abusable, the wave 5 PS war has all but ceased to exist

Sure it's still cheri and a PS 9, but that's just one list. PS 6-8 aggressors are in vogue, ps 7 dash is back, ps 8 corran is riding high, and ps 2 generics have some showing (mostly bs)

Best of all, when I put my newfound love (5 awing madness) I can run vi ptl prockrt Jake instead of vi prltl procket Tycho

Only problem is thrusters are mandatory...

The biggest result of the phantom rule change is it opened up the field for Dash. The main reason I didn't play Dash is Whisper could chase Dash quite well and Echo... man she lives in that range 1 bubble. Now that Dash can see where those two ships are starting from Dash has enough information to use that BR and Boost to keep distance from those Phantoms.

The Dashing Menace as I like to call it, destroys non range 3 turreted ships so well large ships continue to do well in the meta. Dash has replaced the Phantom in keeping small ship swarms/miniswarms from doing well (as a whole) which keeps large ship turrets able to deal with just about everything else. At least that's how I see it and more and more people are catching on to the power of Dash.

Yeah, I played against Super Dash and Jan Ors last night with 4 Obsidians, a Patrol Leader, Vader, and Gunner. What happened was I lost a TIE Fighter a turn against 5 attack dice with a TL and focus. I killed the HWK and by then I had lost 2 TIEs and I had 4 health left on my Deci.

There was nothing I could do, that's what I get for flying more than 2 ships. Dumb nuanceless **** where you lose in the list building phase instead of actually getting outflown.

I think next time I have to face Super Dash I'm just going to immediately concede. Would rather not have to pretend to have fun for an hour straight as my maneuvers with sub PS 7 ships are made completely irrelevant because of large ship boost, barrel roll, and broken HLC turret that denies range bonuses with Kyle Katarn so he still gets to modify dice anyways.

I wonder who gets more upset about super dash/fat turret lists, ParaGoomba Slayer or ficklegreendice. There can only be 1 Grand Pooba of Saltiness you know.

I'm the grand pooba of saltiness. I've tried on numerous occasions to convince FGD that his hatred of turrets should extend to Dash and not just 'pwt's' but he persists in his delusion that the doughnut hole is a weakness unless you specifically bid to PS 7+, and that a ship with PtL, large ship boost and barrel roll, an HLC as a ******* turret, and the ability to completely ignore obstacles is anything but an easy mode ship that's ruining the game.

Yes, it's semi weak to other broken **** like other turrets, dual aggressors, super Corran, and Soontir (I don't consider him OP though). But against normal ships they can't do anything. Often times I'll have a TIE Fighter or two behind it, and realize that no matter what maneuver I pick, there is no possible way to get it in arc because if I go one way, Dash will boost and barrel roll the other way. If I try to peel off and regroup, Dash will just barrel roll backwards after doing his green one bank and still get to shoot me.

Heres the thing.

You needed higher ps to fight phantoms pre-nerf. With lower PS, you almost guaranteed lost unless you piloted brilliantly AND had turrets.

The ACD is a red herring when discussing phantom survivability pre-nerf. ACD was action economy, yes, but it mostly served to cover the phantom if the player messed up or fought a turret. The main reason phantoms were amazing was a 2 speed barrel roll or straight boost before your maneuver. It meant blocking a phantom was extremely difficult and basically required help of a lot of debris or the table edge. And if all that happened, you just remain cloaked.

Now, any lower PS ship with boost can block a post-decloak phantom. If it's done right, the rest of the list will also arc dodge the phantom, making it the world's most expensive z95.

Basically, phantoms have changed from arc dodgers to jousters as long as your opponent has any sort of ability to move or adjust your maneuver dial in the action phase, such as boost, barrel roll, stay on target, imp Boba, etc.

So while hard counters to phantoms wreck them just as well as before and xwings, ywings, and z95s can't take advantage of the change (although yes, the phantom player needs more skill at reading his opponent), all TIEs, B-Wings, A-Wings, and anything with engine upgrade will do FAR better against phantoms now.

Super Dash has made a comeback for two reasons really... 1: debris in tournaments, and 2: teethless phantoms. Phantoms were extremely common in the meta pre-nerf, and Echo or Whisper with VI were a hard counter to Super Dash. With less phantoms, you see more Dash. Yes, Fel is also a hard counter to Super Dash, but Fel is less common than phantoms. But this is why you see so few Super Dash lists actually winning regionals... it beats most tournament list archetypes without much problem, but it has a hugely uphill battle against arguably the single most common list, Fel+Chiraneau.

Super Dash wrecks any normal ship list that isn't built specifically to counter it. It is only matched by other OP things, like super corran or Deci Phantom.

This is the real reason why ships like the X Wing and TIE Defender and Starviper aren't seen very often. They may be overcosted but they're still decent against normal ships. The problem arises when they have to deal with a ship with an HLC turret and large ship boost and barrel roll that can ignore asteroids.

When you stack enough power upgrades on a ship, you end up with one that can reliably solo its point cost in TIE Fighters. Even if a 7 ship swarm only loses 2 TIEs killing the escort, it will not be able to use its 60 points remaining to kill off a ~60 point turret, or if you end up with 4 TIEs against Super Corran, you've lost.

The problem lies in many things, one of which are broken power upgrades like FCS or predator or C-3PO that are on a tier well above all others, like that essentially FCS Astromech or Marksmanship or Expose. Things that were designed with B Wings or X Wings or Black Squadron TIE Fighters or Lambdas break the game when stacked with 10 other power upgrades and gunner shenanigans.

To move away from the whole Dash Dash Dash thing for a minute, how often are people making use of the Phantom K-Turn! ? I really like just doing that sometimes, and sometimes it works out really well, but I always feel like I'm making a terrible mistake and shouldn't be there.

It only hurt reactionary players and not ones that plan ahead. It really isn't a nerf but rather a change of play style. If some one calls it a nerf, they didn't play it right in the first place.

I suppose I disagree with this view and how black/white it is. This is definitely a nerf, just not one that raises its head very often. Even with "proper" play, there are still situations where it would have been better reactionary such that you could get into the best position without any worry. If you consider equal skill play and/or matchups against PS 9 ships that take Init to shoot before decloak, there will likely be at least one situation per match that would've been better being able to decloak after everything has moved. We can play to mitigate this, which is definitely the "proper" play style, but because previously this play style didn't have to be relied on, the Phantom could get into "the best" position much easier.

For that reason, it IS a nerf, just not always one that comes into play.

Also, some rounds it is best to NOT decloak. This is now telegraphed from the get go, meaning the opponent knows it can either shoot up the Phantom with impunity, or take TL actions for future use, or any situation that could be made better by knowing the Phantom isn't going to shoot that round.

We may be able to play to compensate for the change, but not calling it a nerf is incorrect. The ship had less weaknesses before, now it has more.

I faced two Phantoms at the Arizona regional. Shot them both down with PS10 Boba Fett, who went to PS10 to deal with Han, Soontir, and Chiraneau, but gladly took the opportunity to shoot at uncloaked Phantoms.

If I hadn't done that (was brobots before I decided I "needed" PS10), I feel like one or both would have been very hard to deal with, even with the nerf.

I haven't played against a single phantom post Nerf and that kinda bums me out. If they functioned this way from the moment they were released, I bet everyone would still think they're awesome.

All the Nerf did was get them to play the same game as everyone else. Higher PS is helpful when it comes to post-maneuver positioning and firing order, so VI now affects the phantom like it does any other ship. It used to be that decloaking was also affected by PS so VI was mandatory and more beneficial than on any other.

As far as super Dash, I don't get the issue. He's solid, sure, but by doing the whole PtL/Kyle Katarn combo, you're not using one of the best dials in the game, and instead using one of 4 green maneuvers (3 of which can be blocked with a single ship).

If you're chasing Dash, you're going to have a hard time. Spread out your asteroids so they're not in the way, and cast a wide net with your ships and take defensive actions until he commits to a flight path, then get something in to block him and aim everything else his way. He'll still get his focus token but that's not enough to save him. Oh, and almost every single crit in the deck is disastrous for him (except -1 die primary attack). He's tough but manageable.

The nerf helps a bit, but I feel the 4 attack dice with fcs and 4 defensive dice with acd were two much bigger problems with phantoms, or the named ones anyways. I still find an upgraded whisper to be one of the few borderline OP ships in the game.

I played Yorr, Soontir and Echo from store champs through to Nationals. Soontir got some help halfway through and Echo lost some options.

Pre and post 'nerf', Echo was always the primary damage dealer and Soontir the distraction.

The K-Turn options I started using post 'nerf' (with Yorr sucking the stress) were tons of fun.

Games were more 'edge of the seat' and to my mind, more fun. I just love gambling on a de-cloak direction and rolling green dice with high stakes.

It only hurt reactionary players and not ones that plan ahead. It really isn't a nerf but rather a change of play style. If some one calls it a nerf, they didn't play it right in the first place.

Ah yes, the classic "if you disagree with me on this, you suck at the game." Having to decloak before you get to see your opponent's moves is definitely not as good as getting to decloak after seeing everything that your opponent does for the round. Planning ahead is only good if you also change your plans to react to your opponent's actions.

I don't think the nerf made them underpowered, but it certainly had an impact. PS9 Whisper can no longer pull off his same level of untouchability.