Paul Heaver has won championships on consecutive years with the old deck. We've all played a million games and at the worst, a hand full of those have ever truly been decided on a crit.

The odds of the deck ruining your meteoric rise to X-wing stardom are so low that it's essentially a non-issue. Crits are still bad, because damage is bad.

Stop drop and roll guys. It's not that serious.

well, don't roll

you might get a crit

DAT... and when you stay at home and with your friends It REALLY DOES NOT Matters...

But crit effects have been increasing of late, meaning that crits are more likely these days than they were in years past. After all, we haven't had a world championship where "Manglers," Bossk, and Calculation were on the field. As the game moves on, crits may start to play a bigger role.

And I love "Mangler" Scyks, so crits are a big deal to me.

well, don't roll

you might get a crit

I like your thinking AC on everything!

But crit effects have been increasing of late, meaning that crits are more likely these days than they were in years past. After all, we haven't had a world championship where "Manglers," Bossk, and Calculation were on the field. As the game moves on, crits may start to play a bigger role.

And I love "Mangler" Scyks, so crits are a big deal to me.

... Mean-ass...

One deck is much more fair than the other.

It is consistently brutal, but the other can be either worthless or neuter your plan entirely

Did anyone else notice the "for the for seeable future" this will be the option. That SEEMED to read to me, that maybe in a year or so, they will just say you have to go with the new deck.

But, to the OP, I agree: probably not going to be THAT big of a deal. Did not the Wings of War/Wings of Glory game have like 4+ different damage decks?

Crits are ever increasing in this game and they have a large impact on some of the lists I fly. If people are allowed to use the old decks, then there are some lists that are able to flat out ignore many of the crits that happen. That's pretty unfair. The whole point of them making a new deck is due to the fact that the old deck is bad. Why change course?

Did anyone else notice the "for the for seeable future" this will be the option. That SEEMED to read to me, that maybe in a year or so, they will just say you have to go with the new deck.

But, to the OP, I agree: probably not going to be THAT big of a deal. Did not the Wings of War/Wings of Glory game have like 4+ different damage decks?

I don't agree with that move on FFG's part. If that's their intention, they should just come out and say they want to wait another year before it's completely legal. Or at least be more transparent that they plan for it to happen eventually, they just don't know when.

To leave it open like that means some people may sell their TFA stuff and then complain when it becomes mandatory again.

It matters in the slightest. Not much more than that, though.

Everyone using the new rebalanced deck is probably the best option in terms of over-the-table play. And one deck or the other is probably somewhat better for most lists. Not THAT much better, though.

You're right that a lot of this response is a knee-jerk reaction to the waffling. At the end of the day, it won't seem like many game outcomes will actually be determined by damage deck choice.

But the effect is far from neglible.

Quick stats would suggest that for someone running a swarm, running the old deck means 12% (4/33) of your crit cards will have no effect and might as well be treated as hits (2 Munitions Failure, 2 Injured Pilot).

It matters quite a lot. I want my criticals to hurt people. I want them to hurt me.

You're right that a lot of this response is a knee-jerk reaction to the waffling. At the end of the day, it won't seem like many game outcomes will actually be determined by damage deck choice.

But the effect is far from neglible.

Quick stats would suggest that for someone running a swarm, running the old deck means 12% (4/33) of your crit cards will have no effect and might as well be treated as hits (2 Munitions Failure, 2 Injured Pilot).

It matters in the slightest. Not much more than that, though.

Everyone using the new rebalanced deck is probably the best option in terms of over-the-table play. And one deck or the other is probably somewhat better for most lists. Not THAT much better, though.

I disagree. I can tell you that my Tie Bomber list really suffers from crits. There are a lot of crits out there these days. Just last night I faced a list with 3 Mangler cannons in it. There are a lot of crits. The critical hit that kills off secondary weapons is brutal to my list. It often happens to my list.

As someone who lost the final game of his first tournament on losing the turret of my HWK I can say yes, it matters more than slightly. The problem with the old deck is how crazy the variance is. Some crits might as well not be there, while others push you into a loss. Crits should all hurt, but none of them should be able to win the game on their own.

One deck is much more fair than the other.

It is consistently brutal, but the other can be either worthless or neuter your plan entirely

Yep. That's why, as a Maarek player, if I could make my opponent use the old deck, I would.

At the very least, they should release an Errata that when you get a crit card that targets an upgrade or ability that your ship doesn't even have, it counts as a Direct Hit instead.

Well ships can be destroyed without a single critical effect. That happens to a lot of ships with >50% shield coverage. A B-wing and a Y-wing both get taken down after 8 hits.

However what critical effects do is allow for spontaneous events to occur. Soontir Fell may be doing fine then one crit later and he is space dust.

Did anyone else notice the "for the for seeable future" this will be the option. That SEEMED to read to me, that maybe in a year or so, they will just say you have to go with the new deck.

But, to the OP, I agree: probably not going to be THAT big of a deal. Did not the Wings of War/Wings of Glory game have like 4+ different damage decks?

I wonder if sales of the new core were less than they expected and are hoping that number goes up once the films out.

If a lot of the player base had bought the new core there would be no real need for this change.

Did anyone else notice the "for the for seeable future" this will be the option. That SEEMED to read to me, that maybe in a year or so, they will just say you have to go with the new deck.

But, to the OP, I agree: probably not going to be THAT big of a deal. Did not the Wings of War/Wings of Glory game have like 4+ different damage decks?

I wonder if sales of the new core were less than they expected and are hoping that number goes up once the films out.

If a lot of the player base had bought the new core there would be no real need for this change.

That could be, or they are having stock shortages in some areas and aren't able to get a reprint on the shelves before January.

Paul Heaver has won championships on consecutive years with the old deck. We've all played a million games and at the worst, a hand full of those have ever truly been decided on a crit.

The odds of the deck ruining your meteoric rise to X-wing stardom are so low that it's essentially a non-issue. Crits are still bad, because damage is bad.

Stop drop and roll guys. It's not that serious.

...and generic T-65s are good because ships are good.

I mean, come on. We're talking about design issues. There's nothing wrong with that and no need to paint the discussion simply as a bunch of unduly ambitious people crying over spilled milk.

You're right that a lot of this response is a knee-jerk reaction to the waffling. At the end of the day, it won't seem like many game outcomes will actually be determined by damage deck choice.

But the effect is far from neglible.

Quick stats would suggest that for someone running a swarm, running the old deck means 12% (4/33) of your crit cards will have no effect and might as well be treated as hits (2 Munitions Failure, 2 Injured Pilot).

So likely about one crit a game? I mean yeah, I wouldn't call that "negligible". But it can see negligible on a clear day.

Hmmm... probably less. To see 1 nullified crit per game, you'd have to be taking ~8 crits a game. There certainly are matchups where that number is passed, but if I had to guess I probably flip around 5 crits a game. So maybe 1 nullified crit per 2 games?

It's not some insurmountable advantage since a damage is a damage; but having 12% of your crits turn into hits is a significant buff IMO.

You're right that a lot of this response is a knee-jerk reaction to the waffling. At the end of the day, it won't seem like many game outcomes will actually be determined by damage deck choice.

But the effect is far from neglible.

Quick stats would suggest that for someone running a swarm, running the old deck means 12% (4/33) of your crit cards will have no effect and might as well be treated as hits (2 Munitions Failure, 2 Injured Pilot).

So likely about one crit a game? I mean yeah, I wouldn't call that "negligible". But it can see negligible on a clear day.

Hmmm... probably less. To see 1 nullified crit per game, you'd have to be taking ~8 crits a game. There certainly are matchups where that number is passed, but if I had to guess I probably flip around 5 crits a game. So maybe 1 nullified crit per 2 games?

It's not some insurmountable advantage since a damage is a damage; but having 12% of your crits turn into hits is a significant buff IMO.

So it's like having Determination, but a little less likely to trigger, and it doesn't actually discard the card...hang on.

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Old Damage Deck

Title. Non-unique pilots only. May not be equipped if a secondary weapon is equipped.

When you are dealt a faceup Damage card, roll 1 attack die. On a [Crit] result, immediately flip that card facedown (without resolving its ability).

0 pts.

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...Sorry.

Stop drop and roll guys. It's not that serious.

Respectfully disagree.

I'll grant you that it's not highest on the list of importance for winning individual games.

But,

Note the squads that won with the old damage deck.

Note the number of effects used that provide critical hits.

The old damage deck was occasionally very harsh with critical effects to the point of affecting list building. The new deck, doesn't really affect list building. Previously, munitions failure made turret carrying Y's and especially Hwks, a bit of a liability. It also lightly affected cannon carrying ships (the scyk however was dead on a crit most of the time anyway). Injured pilot also spanked some ships harder than others - but cut epts out, and pilot abilities- shutting down your lists trick early would be really bad. At worlds, a loss or two, attributable to either of those crits is possible - and enough to not make the cut. The solution was not to build that weakness into your squad. Or buffer your squad against them. Pauls worlds squads didn't need to worry about those crits. (Han being super damage resistant even if he were injured)

Marksmanship was the crit effect in the early game, with some limited use of the merc copilot. Now there are several powerful and prominent crit effects, ATC, Mangler at the top. These ramp the likely hood of seeing those meta altering critical effects. And this means those squads are even more likely to get the crippling crit.

So, I'll argue that the new damage deck opens up squad building options that were a bit more iffy before... Want to run 3 Hwks and a bwing? it may not be the biggest difference, but I think it's fairly important.

Did not the Wings of War/Wings of Glory game have like 4+ different damage decks?

Wings of Glory does indeed have 4 damage decks, but they do not replace one another.

Rather they are used depending on the number of guns and/or damage being represented: aircraft with a single machinegun (i.e. Sopwith Triplane) use the B deck, aircraft with two machine guns (i.e. Sopwith Camel, Fokker Dr.1) use the A deck. C decks are for anti-aircraft guns (and optionally for collisions, if those rules are used). D decks are for rockets (used against balloons).