The main issue with Palpatine is people have a bad habit of thinking in a vacuum.

"This ship counters this ship" - Palp's mod stops that

"This ship struggles against this ship" - Palp's mod stops that

Result: "PALP IS SO OP OMG!" despite the fact that every time someone complains about a palp incident, they are actually describing a 2v1 situation.

Even Soontir's defense will fall if you focus/trap him properly. WITH ALL YOUR SHIPS.

The moment you start thinking of the collective list and not 2-3 ships acting independently that happen to be on the same side, you perform way better.

Well we all know OGP w/Palp is very powerful, but what about Palp in a VT-49 decimator? Would Patrol Leader Palp or Oicun Palp or Kenkirk Palp or RAC Palp be jsut as powerful as OGP Palp?

B-Wings. They have also been outclassed by Defenders, but Palp started it. Attack Shuttles that aren't title enablers. K-Things, TIE Bombers often (they can punch through the aces if not unlucky, but thats variance that keeps them from being high tier, if they go for the shuttle they don't have enough steam for both aces usually). I don't mind Palp existing as I prefer playing ships with mines now, but the loss of B-Wings pains me, still.

Why do I feel like if Palp was removed, we would instantly start a new conversation about "liking to play certain ships" which can't punch through whatever the next thing is? Or probably technically the previous thing, since as I've said above, banlisting is regressive.

next thing would immediately be x7 defenders

in fact, already is

The problem is that imperial aces tend to die if they get hit at all. Where as scum and rebels have enough HP to take some damage and still keep ticking the empire has 2 and 3 hull ships and that's it so they must dodge everything to survive. If you take Palpatine away the only answer to the meta that the empire has is X7 defenders because they can actually survive a hit. I like Defenders as much as the next guy but I want to be able to fly other ships like Interceptors, TIE Adv. Prototypes, and Phantoms to top tables and not have them explode in one turn. The next response to this post will probably be along the lines of "X7 needs a nerf along with Palpatine". Congratulations, you've eliminated a whole faction from competitive play.

Just kill the goddamn shuttle, it's not that hard. You can burst it down easily, it won't dodge you. And if you say that if you try to shoot shuttle, the aces will take care of you, you're kind of right, but palp aces don't have THAT much firepower and shooting at the shuttle it's better, than, let's say, trying to get a shoot at stealth device, evade focus ryad, or autothruster focus evade soontir. Really, just kill the goddamn shuttle and work from there.

Can we bring back the all inclusive threads?

Once again...it's not like there aren't ways to beat Palp Defenders. It's just that how many Imperial lists these days don't use Palp? How many lists are viable without Palp in them?

*Eyerolling* It is not about being inable to beat Palpatine, the problem is that some of us would like to play certain ships that just can't have the teeth to punch through Palpatine'd defense (that goes on top of the already highly powercrept ace-defense).

Could you name some examples of ships that are being kept out of the game specifically by Palp-defences?

Wasn't there just a thread last week about how 2 attack die ships can't compete in the tournament environment? Who was knocking them out of the meta? I believe it is Palp Defenders and Dengaroo. Why aren't Tie Formations viable in the game anymore?

Maybe some of the point being made has escaped me. But with the rage these days of the ohh shiney new hot lists such as pal shuttle anything and so on. Have we forgot how to fly ships? as mentioned by heychadwick it would seem a well build and flown swarm could do some real damage to a shuttle. If i am not seeing the big picture please let me know.

Maybe some of the point being made has escaped me. But with the rage these days of the ohh shiney new hot lists such as pal shuttle anything and so on. Have we forgot how to fly ships? as mentioned by heychadwick it would seem a well build and flown swarm could do some real damage to a shuttle. If i am not seeing the big picture please let me know.

I believe the problem with this idea is that there is no range on Palp. So...you hide him across the board. If you want to send your Tie Fighters after the Shuttle, how many will be left by the time you kill it?

I wonder, though, about /x7 facing off vs. Tie Formations without Palpatine? Yes, he makes it even nastier, but do they even need him to win vs. Tie Formation?

Just kill the goddamn shuttle, it's not that hard. You can burst it down easily, it won't dodge you. And if you say that if you try to shoot shuttle, the aces will take care of you, you're kind of right, but palp aces don't have THAT much firepower and shooting at the shuttle it's better, than, let's say, trying to get a shoot at stealth device, evade focus ryad, or autothruster focus evade soontir. Really, just kill the goddamn shuttle and work from there.

With half your list left, since your opponent is free to have rutheless shots at you. The dynamic here just doesn't work out. For the Palp-player the rule is: protect your shuttle, it is not that hard! (it really isn't with two strong ships and asteroids)

B-Wings. They have also been outclassed by Defenders, but Palp started it. Attack Shuttles that aren't title enablers. K-Things, TIE Bombers often (they can punch through the aces if not unlucky, but thats variance that keeps them from being high tier, if they go for the shuttle they don't have enough steam for both aces usually). I don't mind Palp existing as I prefer playing ships with mines now, but the loss of B-Wings pains me, still.

B-Wings: Died off around the time TLT's first arrived owing to their crippling weakness to them, but since the TLT's faded the B-Wings havn't really returned. I'd argue this is far more likely a result of the general firepower increase rather than anything to do with Palpatine.

Attack Shuttles: That one I'll give you as a ship you don't really see, but it's again nothing to do with Palpatine, more that it's just not a very good ship on it's own merits. That said, try Ezra with PTL, TLT, Chewbacca, and a Hull Upgrade. 36pts of pure frustration for your opponent.

K-Wings: I hope this one was a joke. Between Miranda (one of the best pilots Rebels have right now) and bombing shenanigans (which ignore Palp entirely), the K-Wing is one of the last ships I'd put on a 'gated by Palpatine' list.

TIE Bomber: Ok, at this point it's become hard to take you seriously. Bombers currently are used for two main purposes - carrying crew to support other ships, in which case their gun is largely immaterial anyway, or munitions carriers, which means they can threaten a much higher dice volume than their basic gun, and even if they arnt dropping that on the Aces (especially if it's Homing Missiles), it's a big threat to the Palp shuttle itself. The fact that LRS allows you to create 'no-fly' zones for the two aces, or to play mind games with your opponent as to where you plan to use said munitions, is icing on the cake.

Thus far I remain unconvinced by your suggestions. Do you have any more?

Just kill the goddamn shuttle, it's not that hard. You can burst it down easily, it won't dodge you. And if you say that if you try to shoot shuttle, the aces will take care of you, you're kind of right, but palp aces don't have THAT much firepower and shooting at the shuttle it's better, than, let's say, trying to get a shoot at stealth device, evade focus ryad, or autothruster focus evade soontir. Really, just kill the goddamn shuttle and work from there.

With half your list left, since your opponent is free to have rutheless shots at you. The dynamic here just doesn't work out. For the Palp-player the rule is: protect your shuttle, it is not that hard! (it really isn't with two strong ships and asteroids)

I wouldn't say he's free. Assuming you're not playing like an idiot trying to just get to shuttle as fast as possible, you just pick it as priority target. How is it better to try shooting at opponent's aces, which have tons of mods and green dice, wasting your whole squad attack power probably for not a great result? You can burst shuttle a lot faster and make killing aces easier.

Maybe some of the point being made has escaped me. But with the rage these days of the ohh shiney new hot lists such as pal shuttle anything and so on. Have we forgot how to fly ships? as mentioned by heychadwick it would seem a well build and flown swarm could do some real damage to a shuttle. If i am not seeing the big picture please let me know.

I believe the problem with this idea is that there is no range on Palp. So...you hide him across the board. If you want to send your Tie Fighters after the Shuttle, how many will be left by the time you kill it?

I wonder, though, about /x7 facing off vs. Tie Formations without Palpatine? Yes, he makes it even nastier, but do they even need him to win vs. Tie Formation?

True enough, but i think with some proper flying and good red dice you potentially can take down a defender in 1-2 rounds from 3-5 ties, especially with juke or crack shot.

B-Wings. They have also been outclassed by Defenders, but Palp started it. Attack Shuttles that aren't title enablers. K-Things, TIE Bombers often (they can punch through the aces if not unlucky, but thats variance that keeps them from being high tier, if they go for the shuttle they don't have enough steam for both aces usually). I don't mind Palp existing as I prefer playing ships with mines now, but the loss of B-Wings pains me, still.

B-Wings: Died off around the time TLT's first arrived owing to their crippling weakness to them, but since the TLT's faded the B-Wings havn't really returned. I'd argue this is far more likely a result of the general firepower increase rather than anything to do with Palpatine.

Attack Shuttles: That one I'll give you as a ship you don't really see, but it's again nothing to do with Palpatine, more that it's just not a very good ship on it's own merits. That said, try Ezra with PTL, TLT, Chewbacca, and a Hull Upgrade. 36pts of pure frustration for your opponent.

K-Wings: I hope this one was a joke. Between Miranda (one of the best pilots Rebels have right now) and bombing shenanigans (which ignore Palp entirely), the K-Wing is one of the last ships I'd put on a 'gated by Palpatine' list.

TIE Bomber: Ok, at this point it's become hard to take you seriously. Bombers currently are used for two main purposes - carrying crew to support other ships, in which case their gun is largely immaterial anyway, or munitions carriers, which means they can threaten a much higher dice volume than their basic gun, and even if they arnt dropping that on the Aces (especially if it's Homing Missiles), it's a big threat to the Palp shuttle itself. The fact that LRS allows you to create 'no-fly' zones for the two aces, or to play mind games with your opponent as to where you plan to use said munitions, is icing on the cake.

Thus far I remain unconvinced by your suggestions. Do you have any more?

Notice I said K-Things as I sure as hell won't spell those out. also note "I don't mind Palp existing as I prefer playing ships with mines now". What do you think those ships are?

Saying B.Wings are weak to TLTs is not really true, they tend to beat them (at least I do) with more hullpoints than TLTs can chew through reliably and better firepower to take down one agi ships. It is a fallacy that TLTs prey on low agi ships in general.

Believe me that I have played lots of TIE Bombers. Yes, they can beat Palpaces by punching through the aces well, but they can't do it reliably since often they just glance off a lucky green dice wall. I stopped taking them into serious competition because of this, it is too frustrating to lose so hard on variance. And lose hard they do, they can't recover well from those blowouts.

I don't think this dance of viability is the way to go. So, you drop palp, and then nobody has much stock to run Lambda (they'll just Run Upsilon instead, which with some of those pilots and upgrades is going to start happening anyway), people will probably not feel good about a lot of the more fragile imperial ace type ships, so it'll go back to defenders. Which for the longest time were not viable in of themselves. Do we (or rather, does FFG) need to keep doing this dance so specific lists are viable? Ships makes sense for players and them. They want people to use what they buy and if they aren't then that's a perfect opportunity for additional product to help move ships up. There's a very strong argument that Palp himself allowed the viability of Shuttle+Two Aces to become real. You pay a shitload of points for his swiss-army-ness, whereas other upgrades cost you less to get similar dice mod elements in more specified conditions.

I know a lot of the palp haters and viability talkers hate "complexity" and want to just slash-n-burn the whole game for some new edition where we'd have this problem all over again, but honestly, I think this is a thing where more expansion of the game will help. Time and variety is needed, The way to help imperial viability and variety is not to kill palpatine directly, but to present them with more options and strategies which are also viable (again, like cards like Stridan or Hux will probably be doing). If there are less choices, the winning strategies to pick will also get smaller. You need to make the game contain more choices, more combinations to prevent equilibrium and present more intransitivity. Only when you end up not introducing variety because a strategy is very clearly dominant and not intransitive should hard nerfs be applied (I/E, U-Boats strategy is so simple and beats so much more than beats it, it reduces variance)

I'll start this post with the idea that I don't really care one way or the other, but I like to articulate the discussion so that it's actually clear what both sides are saying.

I don't think this dance of viability is the way to go. So, you drop palp, and then nobody has much stock to run Lambda (they'll just Run Upsilon instead, which with some of those pilots and upgrades is going to start happening anyway), people will probably not feel good about a lot of the more fragile imperial ace type ships, so it'll go back to defenders. Which for the longest time were not viable in of themselves. Do we (or rather, does FFG) need to keep doing this dance so specific lists are viable? Ships makes sense for players and them. They want people to use what they buy and if they aren't then that's a perfect opportunity for additional product to help move ships up. There's a very strong argument that Palp himself allowed the viability of Shuttle+Two Aces to become real. You pay a shitload of points for his swiss-army-ness, whereas other upgrades cost you less to get similar dice mod elements in more specified conditions.

I know a lot of the palp haters and viability talkers hate "complexity" and want to just slash-n-burn the whole game for some new edition where we'd have this problem all over again, but honestly, I think this is a thing where more expansion of the game will help. Time and variety is needed, The way to help imperial viability and variety is not to kill palpatine directly, but to present them with more options and strategies which are also viable (again, like cards like Stridan or Hux will probably be doing). If there are less choices, the winning strategies to pick will also get smaller. You need to make the game contain more choices, more combinations to prevent equilibrium and present more intransitivity. Only when you end up not introducing variety because a strategy is very clearly dominant and not intransitive should hard nerfs be applied (I/E, U-Boats strategy is so simple and beats so much more than beats it, it reduces variance)

So, you think bring out the Upsilon Shuttle will balance things or have Imperials actually create lists without Palp in them as a real alternative? I don't believe that letting the Upsilon Shuttle into the game is really going to change what people bring to tournaments by too much. Maybe I'm wrong, but we shall just have to see.

Or do you mean that we have to wait until the next wave after 10 to start to see some variety? If that's the case then that's a long time.

I too doubt the UPS will change much

Requires too much forethought to fly properly next to more forgiving lists like dengaroo defenders and parawhatever

Will be a big hit in the local scene, though. Its got the dice amd tricks for it

I too doubt the UPS will change much

Requires too much forethought to fly properly next to more forgiving lists like dengaroo defenders and parawhatever

Will be a big hit in the local scene, though. Its got the dice amd tricks for it

Interesting thread.....currently Palp isn't all that he was pre-power creep. Dengaroo is very solid, but his wife and the shenanigins that Scum have make him great. I'd say, cause I love to add to discussions some crazy-talk, these two are the real powers in the Meta due to their cheapness (first) and the crazy mind control (second):

I think many of you are glossing over what Palpatine really is.

I keep reading he's 29 points of your list. No, he's 8 points and the other 21 points is invested in an incredibly efficient ship. The ONLY weakness the Lambda has is it's dial (and it is a big weakness). It's not like that 29 points is providing nothing other than Palpatine's ability. It's providing 3 attack offense, 10HP that has to be chewed through, and a big base that can do some excellent board control. I would suggest going to watch some of Dom Cairo's vassal games from a year and a half ago to see how excellent the shuttle can be if flown well.

I also keep hearing that he's only a single die modification. That's not even half the story. Most benefits in the game have to be assigned or used before you know if it's the correct decision. You have to take a TL on a ship even if you aren't sure that's the ship you will be able to shoot at. You have to take an evade action on a ship even if you aren't sure that's the ship your opponent will be shooting at. You have to spend your focus on offense before you know if your opponent will be able to evade your shot. The list goes on and on. The game is basically built around the idea that you have to spend resources without complete knowledge of an outcome. Defensively, Palpatine just gets around all this. He's the Ultimate SuperEvade. A normal evade token has to be assigned to a ship before any combat. Palpatine doesn't. You can hold him in your back pocket and wait until you need that evade. Hell, even the FAQ now states that you can't spend 2 evade tokens on the same defensive roll, but Palpatine gets right past that. He's an evade token that you get to put in your pocket and spend anytime you need to, even if you have already spent an evade token on that defense roll. That's crazy good. It's not simply a single die modification. If you were forced to use Palpatine without full knowledge of the outcome, like you do most everything else, he'd become reasonable. Oh, and lets not forget, if you don't or won't need that SuperEvade this round, he becomes a Critical Hit on an attack roll. Saying he's just a single dice modification is an oversimplification.

Let's not forget some of the basic design of the game. Look at the Tie Fighter and the Bwing. The Bwing has 1 agi and 8 HP. The Bwing will last for basically a set number of shots at it. 4 3 attack shots will almost always kill it. Sometimes it will die in 3 shots, and sometimes it will last through 6 shots, but that's basically it's floor and ceiling for survival. The Tie Fighter is much different. You have a ship that will die in 1 shot, or survive through 8 shots. It's 3 agility allows for some big variance in it's overall survivability. On average a Tie will likely die in 3 shots, but occasionally it will die faster or slower. The point is that the Bwing sacrifices a high ceiling on survival for a high floor, but the Tie Fighter gains a high ceiling at the expense of a much lower floor. High agility ships all should behave this way. It's what keeps them balanced with the ships that don't have high agility, and cannot create 3-4 evades with their tokens and dice results. High agility ships should absolutely be at the mercy of a blanked green die roll, because for that risk, they also have the benefit of potentially rolling 3 evades (both of which have the same chance of happening). Palpatine just upsets all this. High agility ships backed by Palpatine have raised their survival floor much high that it should ever be. Soontir Fel shouldn't be able to create 3 evades from 4 blank green dice (token, AT, Palp). It strains the game rules. It's part of the reason we don't see T65s any longer. Their survival graph is terrible in comparison when they are facing 3 agi ships backed by the SuperEvade.

At the very least, Palpatine's SuperEvade should fall in line with the FAQ. If you have spent an evade token on a defense roll, you shouldn't also be able to use Palpatine to create an evade. Variance has to be allowed to hurt high agility ships that are dancing with the variance devil.

Manaroo is a problem, but she's just passing focus tokens and TLs. There are tons of ways to create focus tokens for ships. The issue with Dengaroo is not Manaroo, but the total lack of stress penalty. They should simply implement a game rule that says you cannot spend tokens or reroll dice if you have more than 3 stress tokens. That solves the problem, and it maintains a penalty for stress.

Let's just stop and do a quick analysis of Imperial ships. This will be thinking of their attack and defensive values without Palp.

TIE Adv. Prototype: Has poor attack native, much like the Awing. Needs ordnance or to be Inq. to push any damage through. Defensively though, it can take AT, have access to an incredible title, and most can take PTL to have F, E, and AT. Because it is SO squishy, I would say it wants Palp, but doesn't need him.

TIE Adv.: Only Vader has proven to be the competitive option and even then, only a bit. Poor defense when having to get the TL for ATC to proc, and after that gets F and E with no stress. Due to lack of AT, Vader suffers against Turrets. Going to have to say that he needs Palp.

TIE Bomber: Attack with ordnance is pretty great. However, they are very fragile for their point cost when you start loading them out. Defensively only a F, which you will probably use to punch as hard as possible. Don't put Palp with a Bomber...

TIE Defender: TIE/x7 have consistent F and E for defense. Couple that with 6 HP, and this thing is a tough nut to crack defensively. Offensively, they can be pretty average unless you are running stuff to help that. They are great with Palp because of the boost to an already great defense, and he can help their offense out as well. Wants, but doesn't need, Palp. TIE/D's have very strong offense, but poor defense. Palp can't do much to boost their survivability, and they are too expensive to put in a list with him. Doesn't want to be with Palp, probably better options.

TIE Fighter: Unless you are flying a specific *cough* Wampa *cough* one, they just have poor offense and defense in today's meta. Run them in a swarm, or generally not at all. No palp.

TIE Interceptor: Here we go. This is probably the king of green dice mods. Fel with AT, F, and E has always been the king of "good luck hitting me with your standard lasers puny mortals!" Palp just makes him even more invincible. Damage output is pretty average though. Unless you slap TC on him, just a F for offense. This is why Palp is so great with Fel. Makes him unkillable with most red dice, and helps his offense. There are just so many hard counters to Interceptors now, that he's not seen even with Palp! However, I don't think you have to have Palp to fly and Interceptor. With so many innate defensive mods, I would say wants, but doesn't need, Palp.

TIE Phantom: One of the offensive power houses of Imperial small based ships. However, this thing is SO STINKING FRAGILE. One bad green dice roll, and you're done. You might be able to get by without him, but for that fragility, I'm going to say a Phantom really needs Palp.

TIE Punisher: Nope...

TIE Striker: More nope...

TIE/FO: Probably best if run to support a swarm. Generics have subpar defense and offense in today's meta. OL is great defensively IF he has you TL'd. Even then, it's often naked dice v naked dice. His damage output can be wildly inconsistent without Palp. I'm going to say, because of that inconsistency, OL needs Palp.

TIE/SF: Pretty fragile for defense. Only two greens with a F puts it the same defensively as a Bomber (not good). LWF and Sensor Clusters can help, but then you're sinking some major points into something that is already getting into the mid 30's. Offensively, the named pilots are great. BD and QD give great offense in their own ways. Because they already have good offense, and their defense isn't great enough for Palp to help much, no Palp needed.

This is just my analysis of Imp small based ships. There are some ships that don't need Palp, but most of those are just not used because they are too low on the power curve of today's meta. There are several ships that would be unplayable competitively without Palp. Some don't need him, but some of those ships (such as Interceptors) are already out of the meta because they have such HARD counters in the game. If Palp were nerfed, you would see x7's, SF's, maybe Bombers, and Deci's but mainly x7's. That's a really limited ship choice for Empire, and most would probably just fly a different and more interesting faction with more options.

sorry guys, i read all the threat and i don't understand this build: Dengar/Bossk, how is set? and what are the difference with Ketsu/Bossk? thank you

Well, we already know what all is in Wave 10, so yeah, barring something being a breakout people haven't yet proced (which can happen) further variety will probably come AFTER this season of tournaments. I do, however, feel like the Upsilon is the start of a push for more variety. You could just cram palp in it, but this plays with your point options, people may not like how the numbers shake out, so people will try different strategies they've already eyeballed using the pilots/upgrades in the pack. I don't think it'll actually grow to be a meta-defining imperial list though, unless somebody makes that magic happen and connects some Dengaroo-style dots. And yeah, it's slow, but this is what you get playing a game where they make the merch overseas and ship it here on a boat. The lead time on development also means that direct addressing of stuff happening right now will always be 6-12 months away from now. Yeah, it's slow, but we need to be careful about immediate "fixes" right now, because while for us it seems simple, FFG is playing this game a few releases ahead of us, we cannot make logical conclusions on what is yet to come in the game.

Given that Phantoms and U-Boats have been hard fixed, I reckon if such situations persist beyond FFG's ability to adjust in the game itself, then you will get hard and fast rule alterations. Palp would probably get range fixed. Manaroo is probably working as intended. Zuck is likely to get some kind of errata in line with Epic when the C-ROC comes out as those literally ignore stress (And since "if you are stressed" does nothing about Epic, hope for a "once per round" stipulation). Biggs already has a range limit and is locked into what many consider a sub-par chassis, not sure what more to do there. Allow a prevalence of splash effects to persist? More Baze Malbus?

Upsilon should shake the meta up a bit, finally giving imperials another viable large based ship finally.

I think flying mostly Imperials have plagued my large base play. I recently got into scum and i find it insanely hard to avoid large ships so im forced to figure them out.

Imperials have 0 viable large base ships. palpmobile doesnt count since it literally doesnt have to do anything other than not fly off the board. Usually i only see it fire once, maybe twice. Decimator works in specific situations but i had sickeningly bad luck with that thing so i tend to avoid it lol (lost Oicuun in 1.5 rounds and im not joking...)