Why are you crying about Mindlink?

By haritos, in X-Wing

I tried guys, I tried to believe in the latest propaganda. I failed.

Can someone explain to me why the mindlink tears wont stop flowing?

I get it, its good. Its really good. That's why you see it all over the place. Why is that bad? You also (used to?) see PTL all over the place. Because it's good. No, it's actually great. So are other upgrades and ships.

You mostly see mindlink on lists with 3 ships. Which means that basically mindlink is a card that for 3 points and 3 EPT slots total gives your list +2 focus (maybe more with manaroo), and the versatility of getting those focuses in some scenarios where you otherwise wouldn't be able to (eg. after bumping).

So that's what broke x wing? +2 focus tokens for the price of 3 points and 3 EPTs? I repeat, I'm not saying its not strong, I am saying strong doesn't mean broken.

And lets not forget what people conveniently understate: The stress. Stress is stress. You can't say it does nothing just because you only need to make 1 green maneuver with 1 ship to focus all of them.

Wow. Amazeballs.

You got 3 focuses for 3 ships.

But you couldn't do that red maneuver you wanted.

Or that barrel roll.

Or that target lock.

Because you got your ships stressed. Because mindlink. So that stress mechanic ruined all that efficiency for you.

You did however, get to focus up that ship of yours that bumped. Thats great! Thats a plus. I thought that's what upgrades are for: they do nice stuff for a price.

And people seem to ignore the fact that mindlink takes 3 EPTs. 3 EPTs! I don't need to explain what you can do with 3 EPTs. And you give that all up for +2 focuses per round.

Somebody please, help me understand the propaganda. I wanna cry with you, I feel left out :(

TL/DR: Mindlink costs 3 epts, 3 points (for 3 ship lists), and extra stress for the benefit of +2 focus tokens. Sounds ok. Why are you crying?

Edited by haritos

[ADMIN: Edited for content.]

IMO most of the people crying about Mindlink are actually crying about Jumpmasters, Fenn, Assaj, and Ketsu, they're just misattributing the problem to Mindlink because that's the obvious part of the build. Take away Mindlink and you can still fit a ridiculous amount of goodness onto those few ships particularly - good Dengar Assaj builds don't even use mindlink, and Rauboats could fit PTL Fenn and drop to Crack Shot or 0 point EPTs on the Scouts, etc etc.

I've never seen anyone crying about Mindlink on G1As, zs, StarVipers, K-Fighters, Firesprays, Scyks, etc etc etc. It's the ships that are overpowered/underpriced, not the EPT. Take it away from them and they carry on being overpowered with the next best EPT.

Tl;dr? Mindlink is the symptom, not the disease.

Spaceinvader is on to something. Those are my thoughts exactly.

It goes without saying that replies like the first one will get reported.

17 minutes ago, thespaceinvader said:

IMO most of the people crying about Mindlink are actually crying about Jumpmasters, Fenn, Assaj, and Ketsu, they're just misattributing the problem to Mindlink because that's the obvious part of the build. Take away Mindlink and you can still fit a ridiculous amount of goodness onto those few ships particularly - good Dengar Assaj builds don't even use mindlink, and Rauboats could fit PTL Fenn and drop to Crack Shot or 0 point EPTs on the Scouts, etc etc.

I've never seen anyone crying about Mindlink on G1As, zs, StarVipers, K-Fighters, Firesprays, Scyks, etc etc etc. It's the ships that are overpowered/underpriced, not the EPT. Take it away from them and they carry on being overpowered with the next best EPT.

Tl;dr? Mindlink is the symptom, not the disease.

I've been saying this for a while now. It wasn't reigning king until those ships were available. I used to run Guri/Palob/Kavil mindlink builds at local tournies and no one else was running mindlink. Ever. Then we had the rise of paratanni and suddenly mindlink is OP.

5 minutes ago, haritos said:

It goes without saying that replies like the first one will get reported.

Ah, yes. He can be a bit abrasive. Quite an intelligent chap at times but does tend to rub people up the wrong way.

The power creep from under costed hyper efficient ships is the real problem, mindlink is the scapegoat.

I mean, to take Dengar/Assaj as an example, the core of that build is Denger/Expertise/K4/Unhinged/Punishing One, Assaj/PTL/Latts. That's 95 points and it's perfectly run-able at that point value, filling out those extra 5 points is just gravy. Dengaroo was the same, its bare minimum core clocked in at 88 points ! (Dengar/Lone Wolf/Countermeasures/Stim/Title/Zuckuss, Manaroo/PTL/EM/Plasma, though it still needed a bunch of extra upgrades to get to full potential, it could run as low as 95 or 96). Parattani is ONLY possible because of those ships all being as cheap as they are; any one of them being even a point more would have left it in a much worse place, it clocks in with 3 of the most efficient ships in the game at exactly 100, and it's still good even after a major nerf to one of its best tricks. Rauboats clocks in at 94 points without crew on the U Boats (mindlink, EM, Plasma on the JMs, standard mindlink Fenn); K4s definitely make it better, but you could afford to drop the JMs down to Trick Shot, bump Fenn up to PTL, and STILL buy the K4s in 100 points.

As regards Ketsu/Assaj, just look at Boba and Kath for comparison. A point more PS on each of them, broadly similarly good abilities (Both Ketsu and Boba get outstanding damage improvement but only at R1, and Assaj vs Kath isn't quite as good a comparison, but they both like pointing their weirds arcs at people. But the Lancers get a VASTLY better dial, mobile arc, extra illicit slot, and much more useful title, at the cost only of the Missile slot and the Bomb slot, which is pretty much a wash for me. And Boba and Kath cost a point more each than Ketsu and Assaj, despite being at least two points each worse.

Jumps are radically undercosted and over-slotted, Fenn, Assaj and Ketsu are at least a point undercosted each.

Edited by thespaceinvader
Correcting to include Manaroo's proper price and add Zuckuss, how did I forget that
17 minutes ago, haritos said:

It goes without saying that replies like the first one will get reported.

Ok, I take it back. I don't think you're very stupid. I just think you're being deliberately controversial to stir up aggro because you've nothing else going on in your life that's rewarding.

If on the other hand you ARE just stupid, here is an educational tool.

t1zrhRp.png

1 minute ago, Stay On The Leader said:

Ok, I take it back. I don't think you're very stupid. I just think you're being deliberately controversial to stir up aggro because you've nothing else going on in your life that's rewarding.

If on the other hand you ARE just stupid, here is an educational tool.

t1zrhRp.png

Now do the same with Jumpmasters, Fenn, Assaj, and Ketsu.

Giving large base ships green hards was probably a mistake.

Just now, asters89 said:

Giving large base ships green hards was probably a mistake.

This is one of my big takeaways from the Jumpmaster and Lancer (and to a lesser extent, Kanan crew).

29 minutes ago, thespaceinvader said:

Tl;dr? Mindlink is the symptom, not the disease.

...this. It's the low cost and incredible versatility of the JM5K (and, to a lesser extent, the Shadow Caster) that is the true problem. Attanni is getting the bad press, but it's the ships that are taking it which are to blame.

The Contracted Scout is just four points more expensive than a Rookie Pilot.

Let's repeat that: FOUR POINTS.

For those four points it gains 2 shields, 2 hull, barrel roll, an elite talent slot, an extra torpedo slot, a crew slot, an illicit slot, a much better dial and an extra point of pilot skill. OK, so it loses a red dice, but it also gains a primary weapon turret.

For FOUR POINTS.

Add three exceptional pilots in Dengar, Tel Trevura and Manaroo, and you've got a ship which unsurprisingly almost single-handedly dominates the meta.

Just now, FTS Gecko said:

...this. It's the low cost and incredible versatility of the JM5K (and, to a lesser extent, the Shadow Caster) that is the true problem. Attanni is getting the bad press, but it's the ships that are taking it which are to blame.

The Contracted Scout is just four points more expensive than a Rookie Pilot.

Let's repeat that: FOUR POINTS.

For those four points it gains 2 shields, 2 hull, barrel roll, an elite talent slot, an extra torpedo slot, a crew slot, an illicit slot, a much better dial and an extra point of pilot skill. OK, so it loses a red dice, but it also gains a primary weapon turret.

For FOUR POINTS.

Add three exceptional pilots in Dengar, Tel Trevura and Manaroo, and you've got a ship which unsurprisingly almost single-handedly dominates the meta.

I mean, Tel would be outstanding on his own (PS7 3-PWT with massive durability and excellent slots for 42 points (or two 4-die torpedoes and a 2-PWT for 35!), compared to, say, Oicunn for 42, and Oicunn was in the Worlds top 16...). It's hugely telling to me that it's taken more than a year for Tel to feature in top tier lists, because there's so much that's just better available.

Jesus, I'm not getting sucked into this again, it's like groundhog day in this forum. Change the ******* channel.

9 minutes ago, Stay On The Leader said:

Ok, I take it back. I don't think you're very stupid. I just think you're being deliberately controversial to stir up aggro because you've nothing else going on in your life that's rewarding.

If on the other hand you ARE just stupid, here is an educational tool.

t1zrhRp.png

Like I said; does tend to rub people up the wrong way. Most of the time I think you have some very intelligent input @Stay On The Leader but you could always try and not talk down to people. It may make it a little easier to swallow what your selling...

15 minutes ago, Stay On The Leader said:

Ok, I take it back. I don't think you're very stupid. I just think you're being deliberately controversial to stir up aggro because you've nothing else going on in your life that's rewarding.

If on the other hand you ARE just stupid, here is an educational tool.

t1zrhRp.png

13 minutes ago, thespaceinvader said:

Now do the same with Jumpmasters, Fenn, Assaj, and Ketsu.

I did the same for him but with the focus action. Nerf focus action. ( Although is there actually a ship without a focus action? :P )

t1zrhRp.png

Edited by haritos
8 minutes ago, FTS Gecko said:

...this. It's the low cost and incredible versatility of the JM5K (and, to a lesser extent, the Shadow Caster) that is the true problem. Attanni is getting the bad press, but it's the ships that are taking it which are to blame.

The Contracted Scout is just four points more expensive than a Rookie Pilot.

Let's repeat that: FOUR POINTS.

For those four points it gains 2 shields, 2 hull, barrel roll, an elite talent slot, an extra torpedo slot, a crew slot, an illicit slot, a much better dial and an extra point of pilot skill. OK, so it loses a red dice, but it also gains a primary weapon turret.

For FOUR POINTS.

Add three exceptional pilots in Dengar, Tel Trevura and Manaroo, and you've got a ship which unsurprisingly almost single-handedly dominates the meta.

Now I completely understand why people feel Jumpmasters are too good, but how about, when you make this kind of comparisons, you compare it to something that's actually good, instead of stuff nobody fielded competitively long before J umpmasters because they're THAT bad?

4 minutes ago, haritos said:

Nerf focus action.

This would solve the problem with mindlink.

19 minutes ago, thespaceinvader said:

Now do the same with Jumpmasters, Fenn, Assaj, and Ketsu.

Since I'm assuming SotL won't... The first image generously assumes that Teroch isn't underpriced, the second includes Teroch as well. And it's worth noting that Ketsu doesn't even get a look-in despite being outstanding value. Data taken from the worlds top 16 lists, just counting the actual ships used, Fenn, Assaj, and all jumps in the first chart versus all other ships, Fenn Teroch, Assaj and all jumps in the second.

Screen Shot 2017-05-25 at 11.11.52.png

Screen Shot 2017-05-25 at 11.11.42.png

Edited by thespaceinvader
7 minutes ago, LordBlades said:

Now I completely understand why people feel Jumpmasters are too good, but how about, when you make this kind of comparisons, you compare it to something that's actually good, instead of stuff nobody fielded competitively long before J umpmasters because they're THAT bad?

OK.

The Contracted Scout vs Biggs Darklighter.

Same price, but the Contracted Scout gains 2 shields, 2 hull, barrel roll, an elite talent slot, an extra torpedo slot, a crew slot, an illicit slot and a much better dial OK, so it loses 2 points of pilot skill and a red dice, but it also gains a primary weapon turret.

Edited by FTS Gecko

4 minutes ago, Smutpedler said:

This would solve the problem with mindlink.

Lol no it won't. The problem undercosted ships would just have a new flavor of the week.

8 minutes ago, FTS Gecko said:

OK.

The Contracted Scout vs Biggs Darklighter.

Same price, but the Contracts Scout gains 2 shields, 2 hull, barrel roll, an elite talent slot, an extra torpedo slot, a crew slot, an illicit slot and a much better dial OK, so it loses 2 points of pilot skill and a red dice, but it also gains a primary weapon turret.

Contracted Scout with title versus Oicunn: Scout is 37 points. Oicunn is 42. Those extra 5 points buy you 1 PS and a good ability, and cost you significant durability and a WAY worse dial. Dengar versus RAC: Dengar is 45 points with title, RAC is 46, RAC loses a point of PS and has a WAY worse dial and a worse ability; Han (either version) is also 46, and gets a worse ability and dial. E: oh, and none of them get repositioning actions where the JMs do!

Edited by thespaceinvader
Just now, sim1killa said:

Lol no it won't. The problem undercosted ships would just have a new flavor of the week.

I know. I'm being facetious.

21 minutes ago, Smutpedler said:

Like I said; does tend to rub people up the wrong way. Most of the time I think you have some very intelligent input @Stay On The Leader but you could always try and not talk down to people. It may make it a little easier to swallow what your selling...

In response to an OP full of ****-stirring "why are you you noobs crying just git gud" and I'm the one talking down to people?

Whatever.

8 minutes ago, Stay On The Leader said:

In response to an OP full of ****-stirring "why are you you noobs crying just git gud" and I'm the one talking down to people?

Whatever.

Yes.

Just now, Smutpedler said:

Yes.

Like I said: whatever. The day I start caring about what people think about me is the day I stop leaving the house.