Just now, SabineKey said:

Sorry for the delay.

While the data does show Sabine isn't as prevalent as Palp was, there is still the factor of her effect on low health aces to consider.

To be perfectly honest, there are many factors of which Sabine is only one. Kylo Ren is an ace murderer. Guidance chips and ordnance are a huge thing, and the U-Boats wiped out everything. The T-70s have a poor showing and yet are reasonably sturdy. A-Wings no longer have the firepower to deal with most things.

Meanwhile, Fenn Rau is the epitome of a low health ace and he is on a rampage.

1 minute ago, Lampyridae said:

To be perfectly honest, there are many factors of which Sabine is only one. Kylo Ren is an ace murderer. Guidance chips and ordnance are a huge thing, and the U-Boats wiped out everything. The T-70s have a poor showing and yet are reasonably sturdy. A-Wings no longer have the firepower to deal with most things.

Meanwhile, Fenn Rau is the epitome of a low health ace and he is on a rampage.

Because Fenn Rau is a sentient missile. You know he's gonna die, but the chances of him getting off enough damage to pay for himself is high enough to overcome the cost.

I agree Sabine isn't the only one factor. But, she is the one of the ones where green dice mean nothing.

Just now, SabineKey said:

Because Fenn Rau is a sentient missile. You know he's gonna die, but the chances of him getting off enough damage to pay for himself is high enough to overcome the cost.

I agree Sabine isn't the only one factor. But, she is the one of the ones where green dice mean nothing.

Darth Vader, Feedback Array... both reasonably popular at one point or another.

4 minutes ago, Lampyridae said:

Darth Vader, Feedback Array... both reasonably popular at one point or another.

Vader's a decent comparison, but he's A) More expensive and B) Has a HUGE drawback. I'd be ok with Sabine if everytime she dealt damage via a bomb, the ship she was on took 2. Sold!

Just now, Johen Dood said:

Vader's a decent comparison, but he's A) More expensive and B) Has a HUGE drawback. I'd be ok with Sabine if everytime she dealt damage via a bomb, the ship she was on took 2. Sold!

I think Sabine ought to be a point or two more, more in line with Ruthlessness (which can proc more than once in a turn).

43 minutes ago, Lampyridae said:

I think Sabine ought to be a point or two more, more in line with Ruthlessness (which can proc more than once in a turn).

That might work, too.

57 minutes ago, Lampyridae said:

To be perfectly honest, there are many factors of which Sabine is only one. Kylo Ren is an ace murderer. Guidance chips and ordnance are a huge thing, and the U-Boats wiped out everything. The T-70s have a poor showing and yet are reasonably sturdy. A-Wings no longer have the firepower to deal with most things.

Meanwhile, Fenn Rau is the epitome of a low health ace and he is on a rampage.

If K-wing bombers weren't as good as they are now, I can absolutely guarantee you that you would see Imperial aces again. Soontir, Inquisitor, Vader, Jax, Whisper, etc. I agree that there are many factors suppressing these ships in the current meta, but K-wing bombers are by far the most oppressive. I don't care about Kylo or ordnance. I can dodge those. Anytime I think about bringing a low health ace I remind myself that Sabine-assisted Cluster Mines exist and immediately change my mind to a Defender or /sf. And that sucks. Also, Fenn will almost certainly die against any bombing list, luckily the ships he's usually paired with don't care, and those ships are typically Jumpmasters, the best blockers in the game.

I know K-wing bombers are far from unbeatable for an aces player. I've beaten them a number times. But they're just a little too good. Sabine + Advanced SLAM + post-FAQ Cluster Mines are ridiculously good. None of those things are broken by themselves, but together they're simply amazing. As I said previously I don't want to see bombs relegated to the trash bin like they have in the past. They absolutely should exist as a counter to aces. As they are right now with Sabine, Advanced SLAM, and high damage spike Cluster Mines I think they're just a little too good.

2 hours ago, Lampyridae said:

Darth Vader, Feedback Array... both reasonably popular at one point or another.

That is a fair point, but like Johen Dood said, they had more drawbacks. Plus, they do one damage. Sabine does two, which is at least half healthon most traditional aces. While I understand Cluster Mines are proving more popular, The Connor Net's side effects also make it really scary for aces even without Sabine.

As a lowly Rebel player; plz, no.

We only get so many good toys, please don't take our bombs...

4 hours ago, SabineKey said:

I'm not arguing that all auto includes deserve seeing to. I'm arguing that because Sabine is an Autoinclude, she should be.

This confuses me. If you're "not arguing that all auto includes deserve seeing to", then logically that means that you don't think being an auto include in itself is a reason to nerf a card. How then can you argue "because Sabine is an autoinclude, she should be"? You've just said that that is not a reason to nerf a card...?

I think maybe you have lost the point of your argument by trying to simplify it too much.

FWIW, I'm not convinced that Sabine needs a nerf. She makes a previously unviable strategy viable. She's the key to making that strategy work, and is therefore an "autoinclude", but that doesn't make her broken. It just makes her important to that strategy.

56 minutes ago, elfholme said:

This confuses me. If you're "not arguing that all auto includes deserve seeing to", then logically that means that you don't think being an auto include in itself is a reason to nerf a card. How then can you argue "because Sabine is an autoinclude, she should be"? You've just said that that is not a reason to nerf a card...?

I think maybe you have lost the point of your argument by trying to simplify it too much.

FWIW, I'm not convinced that Sabine needs a nerf. She makes a previously unviable strategy viable. She's the key to making that strategy work, and is therefore an "autoinclude", but that doesn't make her broken. It just makes her important to that strategy.

Cause and effect. Sabine is an autoinclude, therefore is on (at least the majority) K-Wing bomber lists. Such lists are the reason that low health aces aren't used much because the cost/benefit ratio is not favorable. While these lists are bad enough on their own for aces, Sabine cranks them up a notch, further pushing them down. If she appeared in say a quarter of Bomber lists, she would be a boogieman (or boogiewoman, in her case) that you hoped you wouldn't face as an Ace pilot rather than an almost certain of multiple match ups against her like has been happening lately.

While I will admit that perhaps it is not Sabine that needs a looking at in that combo, something in the triple K-wing lists should probably be reworked because they are helping suppresse aces from the meta. This happened before when U-Boats suppressed the Rebel's low agility ships. And see how that ended.

11 hours ago, Wiredin said:

Sabine does not need a nerf.

Please...shout this from the rooftops.

What a bunch of whiners around.

ENOUGH ALREADY.

All Threads with "Nerf" in there title should be auto locked. Simple solution to nerf this thread.

I believe that Sabine crew is fine as is but I do have issues with SLAM and Advanced Slam. It's much to easy to Slam around the broad all game with no downside other than not shooting a crappy 2 dice turret. Advanced Slam should give you a stress token when used. That way if you want to Slam every turn your options are going to be FAR more limited. If the K-wing had to start every maneuver with a green to clear stress they would have a much more difficult time landing bombs where they need to go plus it makes other stress mechanics a real pain for K-wings.

As much as I agree that I hate things that automatically cause damage in a game supposed to be about dice and skill, I don't think Sabine is the problem. I feel it is with the SLAM action and Advanced SLAM.

3 hours ago, Tom1132 said:

As a lowly Rebel player; plz, no.

We only get so many good toys, please don't take our bombs...

At a smaller scale Sabine seems to be a rehash of U-boat problem: a single list type (Sabine bombers) is the main factor chasing away an entire archetype (low hp aces) from the game. From this perspective it needs looking at IMO.

14 hours ago, Johen Dood said:

The answer was YES, because she singlehandedly dominates any game where bombs are played by the rebel player, and all at 2 points. It would be one thing if there were bomb lists that didn't utilize Sabine, but her cheapness and brutal effectiveness mean she's auto-include, which means she's OP. Any time you don't have a choice weather to take an upgrade, that's when you know it's out of control power-wise.

*edit* a word

Do other factions have bomb lists that work? I think the real problem is that bombs are bad, not that Sabine is OP.

^ this

Sabine makes bombs viable for one faction. Which is a problem, and why she is so hated.

However - Bombs should be viable for all factions.

FFG, please sally forth and fix bombs so that we can commence our collective bombing runs!

Ye gads. Another nerf thread.

How about raising up the bombing capabilities of the other factions, instead of whining about Sabine?

The hope would be that the Scurrg could improve Scum Bomb, but they are giving that to Sabine too.

Clear FFG bias.

Just my two cents:

If you want her to be based on a die-roll make her able to reroll or something. Or make that a crit can do two damage or target 2 ships if they are within range 1 of each other and of the bomb. Something that has a risk/reward chance.

If you think it should be range restricted - could be range 3 from a friendly bomb. Pointless to limit her only to her own bombs (I must mark them now then?).

Anyway, I have not faced a triple-K bomber list, so my opinion is based solely on the thought "the designers know better", so I think she should be kept as is (I doubt designers change stuff because of countless nerf/buff-threads).

8 hours ago, SabineKey said:

That is a fair point, but like Johen Dood said, they had more drawbacks. Plus, they do one damage. Sabine does two, which is at least half healthon most traditional aces. While I understand Cluster Mines are proving more popular, The Connor Net's side effects also make it really scary for aces even without Sabine.

Vader does critical damage, not regular damage. Feedback arrays can be taken in multiples.

Sabine doesn't do two damage. If you run over a friendly over a Conner Net to proc her (it happens) you've suffered damage and Conner effects to inflict that single point damage. She can also not proc at all if the bomb victim has flown out of range.

Again, I see an argument to making Sabine a point or two more expensive but no more. But at that point she becomes kind of pointless to take on regular ships.

In my opinion Sabine herself is not the problem. She is plenty strong and a pure ace list will lose to any Bombs assisted by her, but that is how it sould be. Aces hardcounter so many other things that something to keep them in check is good for the game.

The problem is Cluster Mines. By themselves they are also okay, but since Sabine potentialy works on every token, they allow her to trigger on a lot more turns. Sabine with 8 Clusters can in the very extreme best case deal 24 damage. A more realistic figure is 14 (that I had not too infrequently). Add to that the dice damage and you have a shot at taking down any list that isn't VCX spam.

Would the 3 K-Wings be forced to run Conner Nets, their total bomb damage would be capped at 16, Sabines contribution being just 8 in the very best case. That is still enough to get rid of any ace and most two ship lists, though a lot slower in dealing out that damage. It isn't able to take on any list with more hitpoints anymore. That would be the ideal situation - pure K-Wing lists wreck aces, but not much else, ace lists wreck anything lower PS without autodamage, but have their hard counters in each faction.

So what is the solution? I'd say to not allow Cluster Mines in lists that also have Sabine Wren. Sabine still allows Rebels to take on aces, Cluster Mines are still an option for Deathfire and other bombers. FFG has never done anything like that, but I think you can do it fine within their usual operating range by adding "if your list contains no Cluster Mines" before her ability, so you can use her to have a bomb slot and put Cluster Mines in there, or you can use other bombs and make them stronger.

14 minutes ago, Admiral Deathrain said:

So what is the solution? I'd say to not allow Cluster Mines in lists that also have Sabine Wren.

You know they are not going to make a rule like that.

9 minutes ago, Pretty Green said:

You know they are not going to make a rule like that.

Pre-wave 6: "They'll never do other factions!"

Pre-Phantom-nerf: "They'll never nerf a ship through FAQ!"

Pre-JM5K-nerfs: "They'll never nerf an upgrade card! - but Tactician - DOESN'T MATTER!"

Pre M3A-changes: "They'll never buff upgrades through FAQ!"

You know, I won't say it is likely FFG does what I propose, I am just some random guy on the internet after all, but I believe this is the best route for the game. Should FFG through some miracle come to the same conclusion, they will make it happen, no matter what happened in the past. My post even included a way to not make the packaging of Cluster Mines in the Ghost expansion pointless, even if it really just does that.