MARAUDERS.

7 hours ago, CRCL said:

Yeah I've been thinking of running a casual tournament with this restriction. I'd throw in the striker and U-wing too, as they're both fun well balanced ships that are technically from that timeline.

Also I'd say no Palpatine and limit a ship to 50pts max, just to stamp out Palp-Aces and Fat Han. Biggs might also get a skill-change for the event too.

We've had these in our area and while they are fun, TLT pretty much dominates if someone spams them.

There's a restricted ship list game night being held near me on Thursday, which has the basic ships mentioned plus an 'experimental' category where you have to roll for damage each turn after the first. Currently there are 3 things in that: B-Wings, Defenders, and anything with a TLT.

Attani is keeping PTL out of play. They do almost the exact same thing, but Attani is more powerful in the early game AND cheaper.

1 minute ago, Rakaydos said:

Attani is keeping PTL out of play. They do almost the exact same thing, but Attani is more powerful in the early game AND cheaper.

Scum PtL was never good. Fenn Rau was a bad ship until Attanni caught on.

Attanni isn't keeping PtL out of play, PtL being bad on Scum ships is keeping PtL out of play.

On the Imperial side, the TIE/sf is just more efficient than any PtL Ace you can put out now that Palpatine is gone, but Inquisitor, Jax and Fel still see marginal play in the right lists.

On the Rebel side, PtL Norra comes up from time to time, and PtL Jake has always basically been middling to fine and will continue to see marginal play even with his gimpy 2-dice attacks.

16 hours ago, Rakaydos said:

Sure, Wave 1 with Integrated Astromech, Tie advance x1, and BTLa4.

Nope, wave one only. otherwise you bring in TLT wings.

1 minute ago, Marinealver said:

Nope, wave one only. otherwise you bring in TLT wings.

Pretty sure tie swarm is TLT wing's natural predator. Especially without Unhinged, which isnt available until Most Wanted adds scum Ys.

Just now, Rakaydos said:

Pretty sure tie swarm is TLT wing's natural predator. Especially without Unhinged, which isnt available until Most Wanted adds scum Ys.

swarm was strong against Fat Han because it they could overwhelm them with attack dice. Fat han took up half the list and only had one 3 firepower attack. Also even with a reliable 2 evades and only 1 agility the 7-8 2 dice attack can overwhelm the defense. Which is why you didn't see that many Falcons in Wave 2 when it first came out. It wasn't until the TIE Phantom (the point where many said the meta start to go downhill) that Han became a thing.

For TLTs each have 2 attacks. So a 4 Y-wing with TLT will out gun TIE swarms every day not only with the same number of attacks but also with more dice. Sure it takes 2 Y-wings with TLTs to take out a TIE Fighter but that is rather consistent. So you got 2 TIE Fighter dead each round of shooting. A swarm will (reduced by 2) will not be able to take out a Y-wing as easily.

There is and will always be some dominant meta that people will complain about.

Such is the nature of a competitive game... maybe just learn to deal with it?

39 minutes ago, Marinealver said:

For TLTs each have 2 attacks. So a 4 Y-wing with TLT will out gun TIE swarms every day not only with the same number of attacks but also with more dice. Sure it takes 2 Y-wings with TLTs to take out a TIE Fighter but that is rather consistent. So you got 2 TIE Fighter dead each round of shooting. A swarm will (reduced by 2) will not be able to take out a Y-wing as easily.

Unless the TIE's get into the Range One bubble, that is. Or block. Or have higher PS. Or all three.

9 minutes ago, FTS Gecko said:

Unless the TIE's get into the Range One bubble, that is. Or block. Or have higher PS. Or all three.

Which was my point about not having Unhinged Astromech.

PTL aces can come back if Jumps are nerfed by either not having a b roll, or else 5pts more expensive. There has always been WSF with intel that can block aces, but was too expensive to field in non ace matchups. Bumpmaster is dirt cheap, so might as well have it in your list.

One asajj in a list wouldnt keep me from bringing Soontir etc. But when half the field is jumpmasters with those hard 1s and barrel rolls, we got a problem.

On 03/07/2017 at 5:50 PM, Herowannabe said:

X-Wing Miniatures Game.

This.

6 hours ago, Rakaydos said:

Attani is keeping PTL out of play. They do almost the exact same thing, but Attani is more powerful in the early game AND cheaper.

Oh that's cute... your PTL costs 4 more on 2 ships and stress to get you the same as any attani list.

That's right folks, PTL is 4-6 pts overcosted in this meta. Think about that for a minute. The former be all end all of epts is overcosted by 4-6pts in a list right now.

and you can get it on the chassis that is 2-5pts undercosted. On a large base. That can turn around on a white maneuver bit doesn't need to with a 360 arc, an torp and droid slots...On. A. Large. Base. Ship. Costing less than Fenn or Soontir.

45 minutes ago, Rakky Wistol said:

Oh that's cute... your PTL costs 4 more on 2 ships and stress to get you the same as any attani list.

That's right folks, PTL is 4-6 pts overcosted in this meta. Think about that for a minute. The former be all end all of epts is overcosted by 4-6pts in a list right now.

and you can get it on the chassis that is 2-5pts undercosted. On a large base. That can turn around on a white maneuver bit doesn't need to with a 360 arc, an torp and droid slots...On. A. Large. Base. Ship. Costing less than Fenn or Soontir.

Or...mindlink is just undercosted/OP on those ships?

and sure, that torp boat is costs less than soontir (usually comes in at more points than fenn actually), but if you're comparing single ship to single ship, I'll bet on fenn or soontir beating the torp scout every time assuming there's no big play skill imbalance

That's kinda the issue... at a point more than Fenn x2 or x3 you lose. It's never a point more than Fenn or Soontir because you can do it twice, or three times!

You can never take 2x Fenn or Soontir or 3x Fenn or Soontir. The closest you can get is Fenn/Teroch or Soontir/Canor which are arguably better than 2x torp scouts if all play skill is equal. Throw in a third and 3 toilet seats pretty much wipe out 3 proctorates or 3 interceptors any day of the week.

You can manage giving up 2-4pts a game when all else is equal but when you hit that 6-9pts a game IN THE EPT SLOT and another handful of points on the chassis it's almost impossible to compete across 8 games.

"play moar betterer" doesn't fly when you fly 9-15pts down a game at the competitive level "assuming there's no big play skill imbalance". That's a whole other ship!

8 hours ago, Icelom said:

There is and will always be some dominant meta that people will complain about.

Such is the nature of a competitive game... maybe just learn to deal with it?

There is a difference between learning to deal with players that are better than you, and learning to deal with options within the game that are better than the rest.

Both are things you should be attempting to do to enjoy the competitive level of the game, but the second point is a frustration based on the fact that there are only a handful of top tier options available in a game with hundreds of them, and this is static. You cannot change the jumpmaster's value, no matter how much you wish you could.

However, if a player is better than you, you can adjust that by continued practice and dedication to the game. This relationship is not static.

Now consider if that relationship WAS static. Why would you ever play the game? It would be silly to do so, as you would be playing a game you lost before it even started. Many players who prefer not to netlist are actually participating in a relationship similar to this, which is what brings about this frustration.

Now while things like player skill and the ever existing possibility of yet to be discovered "counters" to meta staples exists, it is entirely fair for a player to feel upset by the fact that, in a game with hundreds and hundreds of options, one or two options are overwhelmingly considered a far better value than the hundreds of others.

In essence, this means you might as well not play the game to win (similar to the scenario in which the opposing player is always better than you), unless

a) you are running those few options yourself- a poor option for players who would prefer and hope to promote a diverse game

b) you are far and away the best player at an event and know you can handicap yourself without worry

c) you are one of a handful of squad building geniuses who can find something that does work that is not a meta staple or top tier. Most players that are successful at this often still utilize a card or two that are top tier value (Dengaroo still using jumpmasters, "danger zone" triple Ks still using tlt, etc.).

If you don't fall under one of those categories though, you are probably out of luck of truly enjoying competitive xwing until FFG steps in and makes changes which return those options that are above the power curve, back to it. Now the easy response is, "well that's simply not possible. The best will always float to the top and people will complain about it." While there will ALWAYS be something that is better value, there is no doubt in my mind that within this game, that gap can be much, much tighter. I believe the diversity we see in competitive imperial builds currently indicates to me just how this game could look across all factions if FFG is willing to make a few more changes to problem cards within those factions. After that is done, then maybe they could more fully focus on the next great step- buffing all those cards that are bad. What a beautiful day that would be.

In the weeks before the jumpmaster, TAP, and such came out, I went to my first store championship. The meta was Palp aces, Palp budget aces +wampa, Miranda Stresshog, Brobots... that meta. Remember that meta?

I brought a hotshot blaster Khirazx, 2 z95s, and a torpedo-and-ion armed Ywing, and made the cut at my first store champ. Lost first round of the cut because my PS1 bandit botched a range 1 shot on a 1 health miranda. I had good luck to make it through to the cut (2 low margin losses, 2 100/0 wins, and a pair more of high margin wins, and another player had 3 modified wins- remember those? and a loss, putting me ahead as the top 2 loss MOV) but playing a list nobody expected gave me an advantage the list itself didnt. it was an amazing first championship experience.

Could you imagine the same experience in the Jumpmaster era?

Edit: Dug out my battle report:

I would consider Dengar/Tel a gate-keeper at the moment. When building a new list Dengar/Tel is for me the list that I most often cannot possibly see a way to win against with whatever I wanted to try out. But that might just be my experience..

It's amusing to look back and think how perspectives have changed in the last couple of years.

Back in the early days of Wave 1-5, ordnance was widely regarded as unusable, and in need of "fixing". Deadeye came out (and was ignored), Munitions Failsafe came out (and was ignored), and the cries for missile and torpedo buffs continued until Wave 7, when Extra Munitions and Guidance Chimps made their debut. It still wasn't widely used until the Punishing One expansion arrived in Wave 8.

Now burst damage rules the meta, and there is a wailing and a gnashing of teeth.

The same with Bombs. They arrived on the scene in wave 2, and for the most part were ignored until Wave 7, when SLAM and Extra Munitions became a thing. Even then, there were cries that bombs still weren't good enough; that Cluster Mines especially needed a buff. Then once again we have Wave 8, and the arrival of Sabine Wren.

Now Miranda runs wild and free, and her unerring bombing accuracy has helped to all but kill off the Empire's stock low health / high agility aces.

Basically, FFG have given us what we asked for*, and now we've realised we don't actually want it.

*except Gunboat

20 hours ago, Rakaydos said:

Attani is keeping PTL out of play. They do almost the exact same thing, but Attani is more powerful in the early game AND cheaper.

I don't think it's attani - Asajj and other stressors like bmst or r3a2 are keeping ptl out of play.

14 hours ago, Rakky Wistol said:

Oh that's cute... your PTL costs 4 more on 2 ships and stress to get you the same as any attani list.

Wow - so your version of Attanni lets you Boost & Barrel Roll? Or Target Lock and Evade? Or perform pretty much any two actions in pretty much any combination?

Amazing! Mine just gives my ships a Focus token! Where do I get your magnificent version?!

23 hours ago, FTS Gecko said:

MARAUDERS.

THIS. Can't wait for the "free" upgrades on the list.

5 hours ago, FTS Gecko said:

Wow - so your version of Attanni lets you Boost & Barrel Roll? Or Target Lock and Evade? Or perform pretty much any two actions in pretty much any combination?

Amazing! Mine just gives my ships a Focus token! Where do I get your magnificent version?!

Not just mine, everyone's! Attani does let me do those things and then another ship with Attani focuses and all my Attani ships get focus.

So either you're arguing just to argue or don't understand how it works.

The three points you spend on three ships with Attani cost the same as PTL on one other ship and allow you to token stack just like PTL or take another action. You can't Boost and BR the same turn but it has to have some "drawback". But then again you get the free focus regardless of your other statuses as long as you're alive and another ship with it is alive.

16 minutes ago, Rakky Wistol said:

You can't Boost and BR the same turn...

OK, so Attanni doesn't do what Push the Limit does then,. does it? So your earlier post was hyperbole, wasn't it? Got it. Thanks!