No. It does not.

@LordBlades

Hmm no, sorry if that's what you got from my post, i guess it's my poor english. I don't mean you should limit yourself in any way, i am not attempting to say that the good lists are the best lists that require more practice or something along those lines. What i am saying is that you (and by you i mean we) won't ever know what truly is the best because we have a tendency to isolate what's performing the best, and this is something that top players do aswell, not only your average player.. I would argue that we do accept the current best performing list as the best because it streamlines discussion and the listbuilding proccess for the majority who can't really define what's best by themselves.

For example Fenn Rau, he is most of the time used with Attani mindlink, but plenty of people seem to be missing on why, and just accept it as "the best choice" (the truth) regardless that a Fenn Rau can't maneuver and lacks the flexibility and endgame potential of a PtL Fenn Rau for the most part. Is mindlink better or PtL ? Depends on the list, but since we are shoehorning ourselves to play Fenn Rau with mindlink, we are also narrowing the list building process down to lists which can work with such Fenn Rau only.

10 minutes ago, DreadStar said:

...

For example Fenn Rau, he is most of the time used with Attani mindlink, but plenty of people seem to be missing on why, and just accept it as "the best choice" (the truth) regardless that a Fenn Rau can't maneuver and lacks the flexibility and endgame potential of a PtL Fenn Rau for the most part. Is mindlink better or PtL ? Depends on the list, but since we are shoehorning ourselves to play Fenn Rau with mindlink, we are also narrowing the list building process down to lists which can work with such Fenn Rau only.

This. I was the only local player to play mindlink Fenn when he dropped. Everyone else built him with ptl. It was only after worlds 2016 that the mindlink fenn became the norm. So many people laughed at my choice because of a "stress meta". They were wrong. Mindlink is better for dealing with stress dealers but it has its downsides. Just like ptl.

I think R3A2, Tactician, Rebel Captive, Thermal Detonators, Flechette cannon/torps, Mara Jade, 4-LOM pilot and Asajj like Attanni just the way it is when they face it on the battlefield. I think anything you do to it to make it more costly will basically remove it from the game because the downside to receiving stress across your whole squad is so huge.

Nerf Off you Nerf Hearder!

What are you gonna do, I'll Nerf your list up!

5 hours ago, IG88E said:

It does not need a nerf, it is not so powerful.

But one sad thing is that nowadays you only see scum lists in combination with mindlink. It seems that variation has dramatically decreased in this fraction

This is a stunning disconnect.

4 hours ago, markcsoul said:

The other thing I hate with anything meta in general is how everyone jumps on what's best and won't try anything else since it might be a bit inferior.

This might blow some minds but I'm currently running a 3 ship scum list that all have EPTs and none of them have mindlink.

But isn't this kind of the point? Most people don't like to handicap themselves if they don't have to. If you have the choice between a list that can take mindlink but chooses not to do so, then the current state of the game indicates you are accepting that you are not running the list as optimally as possible.

For most players, the competitive nature of the game is enough for them to always want to run the best option possible, meaning mindlink is almost always going to be on the top tables for scum until a) it sees some form of errata, b) by some miracle a true hard counter is found, or c) some list building genius finds a way to manipulate another card in a way that makes it even stronger than mindlink.

Unless you are doing options b or c, which seems incredibly difficult if not impossible, you are almost certainly handicapping yourself by not taking mindlink.

But, as someone who really dislikes a stale meta, I say fly whatever anyways.

I have a hypothetical question about Mindlink. If Attanni Mindlink was not Scum only would it see much play for the other factions? We were debating this at my local store the other day and I wanted to get some more opinions.

I believe Scum is really the only faction that can utilize it to its fullest potential but Empire could also make decent use of it. Rebels just don't have good enough dials to handle the stress sharing so I don't think they could effectively use it other than maybe an A-wing swarm(Jake would be great tho).

I'm not sure. I think we saw plenty of scum competitive lists before mindlink. I think with manaroo and zuckuss nerfed, mindlink has become far more prevalent because dengaroo and party busses have been discouraged somewhat. But I've seen wall-to-wall mindlink lists recently with scum.

I don't think mindlink needs a nerf particularly, but it's definitely up there as one of the tallest nails for the nerf hammer right now.

1 hour ago, MenaceNsobriety said:

I have a hypothetical question about Mindlink. If Attanni Mindlink was not Scum only would it see much play for the other factions? We were debating this at my local store the other day and I wanted to get some more opinions.

I believe Scum is really the only faction that can utilize it to its fullest potential but Empire could also make decent use of it. Rebels just don't have good enough dials to handle the stress sharing so I don't think they could effectively use it other than maybe an A-wing swarm(Jake would be great tho).

I agree with your conclusions. When I started writing this, I thought the Empire could use it just as effectively, but it doesn't have as many beefy ships with enough greens like Scum has. The closest is Countess Ryad with mk II engine, but that's one pilot rather than a whole ship. An engine upgraded Decimator might work, but that's expensive.

Slight tangent, but would Mindlink be a good investment for Advanceds with ATC? It could help with their action economy a good bit, though they don't have great greens.

A Mindlinked A-Wing swarm would be fun.

1 hour ago, MenaceNsobriety said:

I have a hypothetical question about Mindlink. If Attanni Mindlink was not Scum only would it see much play for the other factions? We were debating this at my local store the other day and I wanted to get some more opinions.

I believe Scum is really the only faction that can utilize it to its fullest potential but Empire could also make decent use of it. Rebels just don't have good enough dials to handle the stress sharing so I don't think they could effectively use it other than maybe an A-wing swarm(Jake would be great tho).

Rebels lack of green hard turners would mean they would likely see the least use from it (outside of A-wing shenanigans, which would probably be absurd enough on its own anyways), but some popular imperial ships would go bonkers with it. Mindlink Ryad, inquisitor, and Carnor all sound insanely good. Soontir may even drop PTL for it, as the moment you stress anyone in the list his ability triggers. Omega Ace in an odd twist becomes way better, as does Zeta ace. Tetran Cowell isn't awful with the capability to still get a focus after using his ability.

I think scum probably takes advantage of it best, but I think it would still be a major force in the other factions too, especially imperials.

Corran with R2-D2, FCS, Mindlink and 3 Green squadrons with mindlink and another EPT to taste sounds like a really good list to me.

Oh I forgot to add that Rey crew would be spectacular with Mindlink. So Rebels would have that going for them if they had access to Attanni.

10 minutes ago, MenaceNsobriety said:

Oh I forgot to add that Rey crew would be spectacular with Mindlink. So Rebels would have that going for them if they had access to Attanni.

Ha. Ya, that is as close as you are going to get to a broken combo in this game as possible I think. You could have every one of your ships double stressed, blocked, and still get 3 actions for the turn.

7 hours ago, DreadStar said:

@LordBlades

Hmm no, sorry if that's what you got from my post, i guess it's my poor english. I don't mean you should limit yourself in any way, i am not attempting to say that the good lists are the best lists that require more practice or something along those lines. What i am saying is that you (and by you i mean we) won't ever know what truly is the best because we have a tendency to isolate what's performing the best, and this is something that top players do aswell, not only your average player.. I would argue that we do accept the current best performing list as the best because it streamlines discussion and the listbuilding proccess for the majority who can't really define what's best by themselves.

For example Fenn Rau, he is most of the time used with Attani mindlink, but plenty of people seem to be missing on why, and just accept it as "the best choice" (the truth) regardless that a Fenn Rau can't maneuver and lacks the flexibility and endgame potential of a PtL Fenn Rau for the most part. Is mindlink better or PtL ? Depends on the list, but since we are shoehorning ourselves to play Fenn Rau with mindlink, we are also narrowing the list building process down to lists which can work with such Fenn Rau only.

I agree. It's never a guarantee that the best possible list of a given meta will be found (look at Dengaroo or Parattani, they appeared months after all their pieces were already in game), but most top tier lists are still quite good.

What I'm trying to say is that Average Joe #234 is not going to find the next Parattani that everyone else missed. Likely, he'll have better results with a good list a top player has designed than with his own design (even if he doesn't exactly understand why).

Top player might get good results if they experiment with list building, most of us will not, as we don't really have the skill and experience these guys have.

5 hours ago, MenaceNsobriety said:

I believe Scum is really the only faction that can utilize it to its fullest potential but Empire could also make decent use of it. Rebels just don't have good enough dials to handle the stress sharing so I don't think they could effectively use it other than maybe an A-wing swarm(Jake would be great tho).

Decent? Empire with AM will be litterally broken! Way more than the triple U!!

How about changing the word "assign" the focus token to "perform a free focus action". That's a more elegant wording fix that would make Mindlink more susceptible to stress effects. Afterall, a stressed ship cannot perform free actions. It also would not let you double up on focus actions since you cannot perform the same action twice in a round.

Thoughts?

There is zero reason for a mindlink nerf. The costs are baked into it already: shared stress and the ooprtunity cost of locking in your EPTs across multiple ships.

If it was SO good, then why aren't the top 8's filled with ML kath, scyk swarms, and the like?

Take parattani: 3 ships. 3 points. 3 focus/action (manaroo notwithstanding, faq addressed that). 3 possible stress. 0 ept flexibility.

tomax shuttle W/ fleet officer + 2 aces: 3 ships. 3 points. 2 focus/action and 1 stress. 3 open EPTs. (Oh, look. Cool hand. +1 evade)

Broken? Hardly.

4 minutes ago, Isophane said:

How about changing the word "assign" the focus token to "perform a free focus action". That's a more elegant wording fix that would make Mindlink more susceptible to stress effects. Afterall, a stressed ship cannot perform free actions. It also would not let you double up on focus actions since you cannot perform the same action twice in a round.

Thoughts?

This i can get behind. It helps futureproof, brings it in line with the risk/reward FFG is leaning on with the last faq, and makes me cry less in the corner with my 4pt Issard that can't pop a <~~ when she's (!).

15 hours ago, BlodVargarna said:

Can i Turbo-Like something? I just want to like this post more than just once...

FFG can you please un-nerf the like button?

53 minutes ago, thebrettski said:

There is zero reason for a mindlink nerf. The costs are baked into it already: shared stress and the ooprtunity cost of locking in your EPTs across multiple ships.

If it was SO good, then why aren't the top 8's filled with ML kath, scyk swarms, and the like?

Because the fire spray still isn't good. And sycks are getting better, but still not generally to the level of the more commonly used scum ships. Mindlink is good, but it's not going to cause you to take weaker ships when there's better choices that can ALSO take it.

53 minutes ago, thebrettski said:

Take parattani: 3 ships. 3 points. 3 focus/action (manaroo notwithstanding, faq addressed that). 3 possible stress. 0 ept flexibility.

tomax shuttle W/ fleet officer + 2 aces: 3 ships. 3 points. 2 focus/action and 1 stress. 3 open EPTs. (Oh, look. Cool hand. +1 evade)

Broken? Hardly.

Mindlink - 3 focus for one action
Fleet officer - 2 focus for one action

Mindlink - Unlimited range
Fleet Officer - range 1-2

Mindlink - Works if any of the ships take a focus action. This means if one (or more) ship is stressed or bumps, a different ship can provide the tokens for it
Fleet Officer - Only works from the one ship. If that ship is stressed or bumps, it can't trigger.

Mindlink - Shares around stress tokens if you take stress, but only shares 1, and is generally taken with ships that have good greens so at least one can clear it again
Fleet Officer - stresses you in the act of getting the tokens. means you're limited to the bombers vastly inferior greens every round, and if you need to k-turn you can't use FO the round before, and if you do a white the round after using it, you can't use it again

29 minutes ago, thebrettski said:

There is zero reason for a mindlink nerf. The costs are baked into it already: shared stress and the ooprtunity cost of locking in your EPTs across multiple ships.

If it was SO good, then why aren't the top 8's filled with ML kath, scyk swarms, and the like?

Take parattani: 3 ships. 3 points. 3 focus/action (manaroo notwithstanding, faq addressed that). 3 possible stress. 0 ept flexibility.

tomax shuttle W/ fleet officer + 2 aces: 3 ships. 3 points. 2 focus/action and 1 stress. 3 open EPTs. (Oh, look. Cool hand. +1 evade)

Broken? Hardly.

You don't see ML Kath, scyk swarms, and the like, because there are better mindlink options than that. Heck, there are better options even if Mindlink isn't available. I'm not sure how much clearer to explain this. If a card makes something that's bad/mediocre good, it also makes good things better. And Fenn Rau and Jumpmasters are better.

side note- Mindlink scyk swarms aren't awful though, and I think a light scyk mindlink token passer who just skirts around the board passing off focus is something that will be seen every now and then when the CROC drops.

Stress is not the counter to Mindlink like many seem to believe. In fact, Mindlink squads are often more resilient to stress than other squads. With non-mindlink squads, if you have a ship that is double stressed, it's pretty much ruined next round no matter what. In a mindlink squad? All you need is one of your other ships to do a green, and like magic, that ship has a focus. But they are all predictable now that they are all stressed, right, so you can stop this from happening? Go ahead and let me know how easy it is to block 2 ships in a round (when they have no need to stay within close proximity to each other, mind you) even when you know they are trying to do greens, and then let me know how many shots you have that are doing anything for you that round in that case. The times you get a double block and are able to make your opponent pay for it are few and far between and take exceptional flying on your part and (usually) pretty poor flying on your opponents.

And the comparisons between an action passing Tie Shuttle and Mindlink begin and end with the word action. The shuttle needs those ships within a range band to give them actions, it stresses itself while using the action, leaving itself without its own action (outside of the coolhand focus or evade), and without green turn options on a bomber or any carrier for this card, it becomes painfully predictable. Mindlink does none of those things, which makes it clear that Mindlink is better in almost every case.

That bomber also melts in one to three rounds of combat, whereas the best mindlink squads have extremely sturdy or dodgy ships, allowing the mindlink synergy to last many rounds longer than it reasonably should. And if Mindlink was giving up something special by taking up the elite slot, why don't we ever see any other elites used in scum squads on top tables that have 3+ elite ships? The value of an elite that can give 2 of my ships free focus tokens no matter where they are on the board as long as I have 3 ships alive (or 1 of my ships a free focus as long as 2 ships are alive) and at least one of those ships isn't stressed or blocked, for 1 point, is unmatched.

6 minutes ago, VanderLegion said:

Because the fire spray still isn't good. And sycks are getting better, but still not generally to the level of the more commonly used scum ships. Mindlink is good, but it's not going to cause you to take weaker ships when there's better choices that can ALSO take it.

Mindlink - 3 focus for one action
Fleet officer - 2 focus for one action

Mindlink - Unlimited range
Fleet Officer - range 1-2

Mindlink - Works if any of the ships take a focus action. This means if one (or more) ship is stressed or bumps, a different ship can provide the tokens for it
Fleet Officer - Only works from the one ship. If that ship is stressed or bumps, it can't trigger.

Mindlink - Shares around stress tokens if you take stress, but only shares 1, and is generally taken with ships that have good greens so at least one can clear it again
Fleet Officer - stresses you in the act of getting the tokens. means you're limited to the bombers vastly inferior greens every round, and if you need to k-turn you can't use FO the round before, and if you do a white the round after using it, you can't use it again

Always beating me to the punch in a much more concise and clear statement, Vander.

7 hours ago, MenaceNsobriety said:

I have a hypothetical question about Mindlink. If Attanni Mindlink was not Scum only would it see much play for the other factions? We were debating this at my local store the other day and I wanted to get some more opinions.

I believe Scum is really the only faction that can utilize it to its fullest potential but Empire could also make decent use of it. Rebels just don't have good enough dials to handle the stress sharing so I don't think they could effectively use it other than maybe an A-wing swarm(Jake would be great tho).

Loads. Empire would love it, it makes some of their best aces better, and all of their cheap pocket aces get stupid except OL. I'm envisioning Sabacc, Duchess, Inq and Carnor, for instance. Or just an entire TIE Swarm all with Mindlink.

A Wings too.

My gut feel is that it probably wants toning down a bit, but not a lot. The real culprit of it being stupid-good is the Jumpmaster being undercosted.

The obvious answer would be to make it Small Ship Only, but that's treating the symptom, not curing the ill. If the Scout lost its EPT and was a point more expensive and Manaroo was a point more expensive, a lot of the problem would go away, and MIndlink would still be there as a boon for 3- or 4-ship Scum lists to play with to make ships like the Scyk better.

(WHen I've run a Fleet Officer bomber I've never had problems with its greens. TIE Mk2 gives it more than enough to cope.)

20 minutes ago, Kdubb said:

Always beating me to the punch in a much more concise and clear statement, Vander.

I do what I can