A week or so ago, I put up a post about the 2 dice attack and the Tank meta .There was a lot of good discusion there, and I decided to see what I could come up with as a way to make 2 dice ships more viable. Here's version 1 of my card:



Image from: http://www.dragoart.com/tuts/15624/1/1/how-to-draw-a-tie-fighter,-tie-fighter,-star-wars.htm


Guided primary V1.0 Notes: This upgrade is an attempt at solving a problem I've seen with 2 dice attacks- they just don't seem to be able to do much.

This card is a straight up buff to ships that have a 2 primary attack, which is why I'm pricing it at 0 points- I want to get as many of them as possible on the board. Putting the card at 1 point would make it impossible to field an 8 TIE Swarm.

This card is a modification, because that seems like the best slot for it. Making it an EPT would limit the ships that could carry it to some of the higher PS ships that are already crowing out ships like the Academy Pilot. Having it be a title would eliminate the TIE Advanced or TIE Adv. Prototype from being able to take it.

The ability to equip a second modification is there to allow for Mark 2 engines- or for any of the low/no cost ordnance mods. TIE Bombers with this equipped would be able to expend their ordnance, but still contribute to the fight afterwards. You might even see a few Concussion Missile TIE Adv. Prototypes!

I am strongly considering bumping the additional modification allowance from 1 point to 2 points, to allow some ships to take this upgrade as well as Autothrusters or Lightweight frames, but then the Inquisitor becomes a tiny bit of a question.

Speaking of the Inquisitor: there are a host of ships like him that are technically 2 dice primaries, but in actuality are tossing 3 dice. Darth Vader + Advanced Targeting Computer. Any TIE S/F + Special Ops Training title. I am concerned that this upgrade would buff them more than it would buff the standard TIE Fighter. I don't think it would make any of these ships overpowered, but I do think there's a possibility that it won't have the desired effect.

So: thoughts? (I kinda hate the name, myself)

Why is it "TIE Only" if you want to buff 2 dice primary attacks? Certainly the A-Wing and Z-95 plus any number of other 2 attack ships should benefit from a random buff aimed at boosting 2 die primaries.

For what you have there you should just say your want to boost TIE FIGHTERS instead of saying a blanket upgrade for 2 dice primary weapons.

TIE only prevents arcs from getting this sweetie, but TIE/SF will still love it ;-)

Why is it "TIE Only" if you want to buff 2 dice primary attacks? Certainly the A-Wing and Z-95 plus any number of other 2 attack ships should benefit from a random buff aimed at boosting 2 die primaries.

For what you have there you should just say your want to boost TIE FIGHTERS instead of saying a blanket upgrade for 2 dice primary weapons.

This was my exact thought. Just take the Tie only bit off the card. Also I agree, the name sucks, but I have nothing better, so I guess it works fine.

If you are afraid that it may be too powerful on ships like Inquisitor, Tie/sf etc. you can perhaps change the conditions from attack value to number of dice rolled so that only 2 dice rolled at range 2 or 3 dice at range 1 would activiate the effect. Haven't thought this through, so it may have some undesirable effects.

As someone who routinely gets my butt kicked by my friend's well-flown TIE swarm, I'm very, very glad this card doesn't exist.

I think that is a bid to ...conditional?

I think the solution is less elegant but simple. Errata:

--Zuckuss props once per round.

--X7 evade is a free ACRION.

Then FAQ:

--primary turrets roll one fewer attack die out of arc

-- turret secondary weapons are subject to defensive range bonuses.

IMHO this will stop the red-eye escallation, and narrow the margin between the uncompetitive ships and the competitive ones. It also pushes value back into movement and positioning without completely dumping the range control that turrets provide.

Just my 2 cents.

I would also give the Hawks a second red die, but I think everyone knows that.

Why is it "TIE Only" if you want to buff 2 dice primary attacks? Certainly the A-Wing and Z-95 plus any number of other 2 attack ships should benefit from a random buff aimed at boosting 2 die primaries.

For what you have there you should just say your want to boost TIE FIGHTERS instead of saying a blanket upgrade for 2 dice primary weapons.

That's an excellent question, and one I thought about a bit.

It's TIE only, because it addresses a significant number of ships, without doing _so much_ that it creates more potential for negative unintended consequences. I have a general sense that each faction should have it's own issues addressed individually.

Just for instance: should this mod be available for the JumpMaster 5000? What about the K-Wing or YT-2400? I haven't yet given sufficient thought to all these interactions, and so I wanted to put out an Imperial version.

If you are afraid that it may be too powerful on ships like Inquisitor, Tie/sf etc. you can perhaps change the conditions from attack value to number of dice rolled so that only 2 dice rolled at range 2 or 3 dice at range 1 would activiate the effect. Haven't thought this through, so it may have some undesirable effects.

I thought about something like that, but Mauler Mithel needs love!

This card can be designed better so as to not help ships like Inquisitor that are technically 2-attack, but are rolling 3 dice. I don't like that the effect is a form of gunner. Giving TIE fighters a gunner effect would make the dice rolling in the attack phase take longer than necessary.

I would word the effect exactly like 'Lightweight Frame' except for attack dice from 2-attack ships. If the defender has more green dice than you, simply roll an additional red die. Inquisitor would only get help from the mod when shooting at cloaked phantoms and ships with Stealth Device.

Hopefully some card like this comes out to help 2-attack ships. The meta is not really 'balanced' or 'diverse' until this happens.

Giving TIE fighters a gunner effect would make the dice rolling in the attack phase take longer than necessary.

This is definitely something I thought about. The flip side is that I don't think the mod will pop as often as you might think it would. There are a _lot_ of triggers on it. It's mostly designed to help 2 die attacks burn token stacks- it deliberately doesn't do much if the defender simply gets lucky, or if they are rolling a few green dice.

The Gunner thing is by design, tbh. It forces certain decisions about "do I spend a token to avoid all damage, or accept 1 damage and not be forced to defend again?" It's also basically always going to trigger against Poe or ships protected by Palp.

I would word the effect exactly like 'Lightweight Frame' except for attack dice from 2-attack ships. If the defender has more green dice than you, simply roll an additional red die. Inquisitor would only get help from the mod when shooting at cloaked phantoms and ships with Stealth Device.

This is something I wrestled with. Ultimately, I don't think a good solution to "2 red dice aren't good enough" is "MOAR RED DICE!". That represents an escalation of the problem, and I very much would like to deescalate the red dice/green dice race. If Whisper has 4 green dice, adding a red die to the attacker skews that balance quite a bit. Adding red die is a 7 point upgrade for Rear Admiral Chiraneau, 6 points (arguably 8 points) for a Scyk, or 12 points for a JM5k. An Academy Pilot simply shouldn't be able to do so without some significant cost- which should push them into a price range that you wouldn't want to take them anyway.

Those were my reasons for not creating an effect that let you add a red die. If they do, it would tend to contribute to dice inflation, which is the opposite of what I want.

Yes, I thought hard about it. Your solution was one I came up with and ultimately discarded. It's definitely not a bad idea!

Telling you guys, its very simple

Take eathn abbats, or however the hell you spell it, ability

Make "another friendly"

Instead of hit --> crit, assign Fanatical Devotion

Done

Beats green dice and encourages good flying

I thought of a buff for TIE fighters a while ago but never tested it . It goes something like this. TIE only. When attacking if there is another friendly Tie fighter at range 1 ,that has the defender in arc and has not attacked, you may assign that ship a weapons disabled token to add it's base attack value to your attack value. You may not use this ability if the other friendly ship already has a weapons disabled token.

Basically combine two TIE fighters attacks into one 4 or 5 dice attack. I would make it a title but never came up with a name or point cost.

Edit: I forgot to mention that now that swarm leader exists that this would probably be broken when put together. Oh and OL is a HUGE problem.

Or just change it to: when attacking at range 1-2, if you rolled less than 3 red dice...

Don't forget about Zs! I love flying Z swarms, but it's been too long.

I thought of another way to approach the problem that eliminates adding dice or having gunner effects.

Use Wampa's ability just tweaked slightly so as to not bypass shields. I would even go so far as to possibly include it as a rules change.

-- On any in arc primary weapon attack, if you have a crit result, at the compare results step you may cancel all results and the defender suffers one damage.

-- 2-attack dice have a 23.4% of a crit

-- 2-attack dice with 1 reroll (howlrunner) 31.3%

X-wing is less fun when there are full rounds of shooting and no one takes damage. If you get an in arc shot, you should always be given a decent chance to do at least one damage. Calculation is the only EPT you would have to tweak.

I thought of another way to approach the problem that eliminates adding dice or having gunner effects.

Use Wampa's ability just tweaked slightly so as to not bypass shields. I would even go so far as to possibly include it as a rules change.

-- On any in arc primary weapon attack, if you have a crit result, at the compare results step you may cancel all results and the defender suffers one damage.

-- 2-attack dice have a 23.4% of a crit

-- 2-attack dice with 1 reroll (howlrunner) 31.3%

X-wing is less fun when there are full rounds of shooting and no one takes damage. If you get an in arc shot, you should always be given a decent chance to do at least one damage. Calculation is the only EPT you would have to tweak.

I really like this idea. They probably wouldn't do it because it either invalidates or buffs to many pilot abilities. Ten Numb would be worthless because everyone has his ability but E'than Abath would be SUPER powerful. Great idea though.

My question is how do you buff 1 primary?

"There's a problem with low attack dice ships"

--Zuckuss props once per round.

Clearly, nefing Zuckuss is the answer.

The things is...2-attack ships are already cheaper to begin with so you can spam them/use them as blockers/etc.

If you really want them to hit hard like their more expensive kin, pretty much all the but tie fighter can take some kind of secondary weapon to boost their offense for at least one round if not more.

And the tie fighter is dirt cheap so no need to bump it's offense any more. Plus you have howlrunner.

My question is how do you buff 1 primary?

Why don't we just have a rule that states "average all stats of all ships before they are deployed"

Then you can play with every ship being identical. Solve all your problems.

If you are trying to fly a z-95 like an x-wing then it's really your playstyle that has the issue not the game.

2 attack dice ships are much cheaper for a reason...

Then you can play with every ship being identical. Solve all your problems.

If you are trying to fly a z-95 like an x-wing then it's really your playstyle that has the issue not the game.

2 attack dice ships are much cheaper for a reason...

Except that they are no longer cheaper enough.

The Academy TIE Fighter used to be the 100% benchmark for efficiency. At wave 4, the Bandit Z-95 set the new benchmark by being a hair over that (bumping the AP down to 99.3%, IIRC). So far so good, as far as 2 dice primaries being "average".

Then we get the Delta X7 Defender. It has an efficiency of 102%. On a point for point basis, you are better off with a PS1 Defender than 2 PS1 TIE Fighters.

This is not a complaint about the X7 title. I _like_ it. But it absolutely does create problems for 2 dice attacks.

By making the most efficient ship in the game a 3 die attack, you're causing the Academy Pilot to effectively pay points for the privilege of making a less effective attack. Given that literally the only thing an Academy TIE has is raw efficiency, you begin to see the problem.

Then there's another problem: now that a 3 die attack is the baseline, ships that can't survive that much fire simply don't exist in a competitive environment. And any ship that can survive in a 3 attack environment can shrug off 2 die attacks fairly easily. Even lots of 2 dice attacks.

That's why it's important to raise the efficiency of 2 dice attacks to being the baseline again. That's why the answer shouldn't be "more red dice". If we can raise the efficiency of 2 red dice without cutting the defensive value of ships that rely on green dice, we'll be in a good spot to introduce lots of ships back into the meta without scaring anything off.

I thought of another way to approach the problem that eliminates adding dice or having gunner effects.

Use Wampa's ability just tweaked slightly so as to not bypass shields. I would even go so far as to possibly include it as a rules change.

-- On any in arc primary weapon attack, if you have a crit result, at the compare results step you may cancel all results and the defender suffers one damage.

-- 2-attack dice have a 23.4% of a crit

-- 2-attack dice with 1 reroll (howlrunner) 31.3%

X-wing is less fun when there are full rounds of shooting and no one takes damage. If you get an in arc shot, you should always be given a decent chance to do at least one damage. Calculation is the only EPT you would have to tweak.

I'm thinking about this, and I like the idea quite a bit. Maybe something like:

"Crackshot (limited)

Modification. TIE Only.

When making a primary weapon attack, in arc, for every (crit) or pair of (hit) results the defender must roll one fewer die (to a minimum of 2).

May not equip if you have a primary weapon value of 3 or greater, except "Fel's Wrath".

{Plus previous words about other mods being OK}"

Calling it "crackshot" prevents it from stacking with Crackshot, which would let a TIE punch far above its weight class. But paying 3 points (1 for the card, 2 for the EPT slot) for calculation seems OK to me.

I included the thing about 2 (hit) results in order to give a buff to Accuracy Corrector Tempest Squadron- I haven't done the math, but I think it's actually harder for most 2 die ships to get a pair of (hit)s than a crit.

Fun part: Darth Vader and Backdraft could basically lower defense dice by 2-3 every time. Seems unlikely, tho.

I also like this because it gives gameplay options to the defending ships. It doesn't cancel their results, or remove their pre-combat decisions. Soontir Fel will still have his token stack of doom. He can still use his actions on taking evade tokens and focus tokens. He will simply have fewer green dice he will be able to modify- if the Attacker plays well. That seems fair to me.

Also- this won't do much to make it easier to hit ships that already have 1 or 2 agility. That's on purpose- those ships seem fairly well balanced against 2 die attacks.

I'll put all this onto a card later- I'm at work right now. :/

Then you can play with every ship being identical. Solve all your problems.

If you are trying to fly a z-95 like an x-wing then it's really your playstyle that has the issue not the game.

2 attack dice ships are much cheaper for a reason...

Except that they are no longer cheaper enough.

The Academy TIE Fighter used to be the 100% benchmark for efficiency. At wave 4, the Bandit Z-95 set the new benchmark by being a hair over that (bumping the AP down to 99.3%, IIRC). So far so good, as far as 2 dice primaries being "average".

Then we get the Delta X7 Defender. It has an efficiency of 102%. On a point for point basis, you are better off with a PS1 Defender than 2 PS1 TIE Fighters.

This is not a complaint about the X7 title. I _like_ it. But it absolutely does create problems for 2 dice attacks.

By making the most efficient ship in the game a 3 die attack, you're causing the Academy Pilot to effectively pay points for the privilege of making a less effective attack. Given that literally the only thing an Academy TIE has is raw efficiency, you begin to see the problem.

Then there's another problem: now that a 3 die attack is the baseline, ships that can't survive that much fire simply don't exist in a competitive environment. And any ship that can survive in a 3 attack environment can shrug off 2 die attacks fairly easily. Even lots of 2 dice attacks.

That's why it's important to raise the efficiency of 2 dice attacks to being the baseline again. That's why the answer shouldn't be "more red dice". If we can raise the efficiency of 2 red dice without cutting the defensive value of ships that rely on green dice, we'll be in a good spot to introduce lots of ships back into the meta without scaring anything off.

This is why I dont like major juggler. Sad really.