21 minutes ago, GreenDragoon said:

I've been talking to @DoubleDown11 about an idea we had, maybe that's a good moment to pitch it.

It is actually some sort of peer review: a googledoc group where somebody writes a piece and people can opt in to comment, clarify and write indepth replies.

The idea stems from the feeling that blogging is really unsatisfactory because it should be a starting point when in effect it is perceived and understood as endpoint. But when I personally write about stuff, I want to have a discussion about it. I have sometimes too many and too strong opinions, I know that. But I enjoy reading thoughtful exchanges, so my motivations is rather to foster that.

Once the piece is rewritten with the new inputs, it would then be published.

The idea is that the group is open for everyone and that the requirements are enough of a filter.

Easy, a 5. Why did you only ask about one squad?!?!

That's perfectly fine. But if my opinion was based on something that's demonstrably wrong, or at least very ambiguous then I personally want to know that.

So a group blog of X authors, where each article has been written, then picked and discussed at by some of the other authors before publication?

That sounds awesome!

11 minutes ago, gennataos said:

Greer is female. Don't assume gender! (@RStan )

It's a weird razor, though. Like, it's not a "one mistake then dead" type list, more of a "oops, fell behind, how in the **** do I claw back"? thing.

I'm pretty much 0 for 42 on guessing pilot gender where I don't actually know it, male or female. My kid insists they are not a boy or girl, but rather just a kid so I'm really glad it's 2020.

And I 100% agree. The dice can often save you too. I think 5A is a very rewarding list to play, but also aware it might not be a rewarding list to play against.

7 minutes ago, GreenDragoon said:

Sorry, I did it again by implication after I said I'd drop it. My point was that if, hypothetically, my opinion was based on something wrong I would like to know. For example, if my opinion was that Extended is better because it allows me to fly RZ2s, then that would be wrong because they are legal in both. If I was saying Extended is better because it has larger diversity, then <I won't comment here without numbers>, that is at least somewhat answerable.

If your issue is with the whole idea that one format is better than another, then that's fair. But I think it's also fair to not only prefer one, but to state reasons for that preference. The jump from stating the reasons to arguing that those reasons make a format the better according to (ofc previously defined) criteria seems also ok? Hm.

No worries friend. None of my comments are meant to be personal towards you, despite the quote. My issue lies in that there seems to be a pervasive idea that diversity = better and then we pick whatever criteria for diversity that matches our format preference. Is # of unique pilots the diversity that is important? Is it playstyle (beef, aces, efficiency, ace and mini swarm, etc)? Is it faction diversity? When trying to balance them, where are the tiebreakers?

It is a wholly selfish topic. Whatever format a person has preference for (totally fine) becomes a launching point to try and convince everyone else to prefer that format because we need opponents (not fine). I've got a friend who moved to a different state, and a lot of his friends from his former residence that he played Magic with don't really talk to him anymore. A theory is that he was a friend because he was a Magic playing NPC in their life, and I don't think it's a bad theory.

This is why free-to-play games are successful: you need people to fill out the ranks so that the people who spend money on videogame cosmetics have people to continue to play the game against, and there are legions of people who will play free games. The format debate feels like a sideways attempt at trying to convince the rest of the population to fill out your tournament format preference.

Again, I want to reiterate this isn't specifically targeted at anyone and I don't think that the people doing this are necessarily doing it consciously (and if you are, you can go straight to the bad place).

45 minutes ago, Brunas said:

We know the truth. Could you tell me your response to the following on this scale?

Thats an old thread joke but it holds up.
What page did that originally show up...

3 minutes ago, Micanthropyre said:

And I 100% agree. The dice can often save you too. I think 5A is a very rewarding list to play, but also aware it might not be a rewarding list to play against.

This seems to hold true. Even if I'm losing, a fair amount of people seem to hate those things.

3 minutes ago, Boom Owl said:

Thats an old thread joke but it holds up.
What page did that originally show up...

Don't

Scroll

Up

Just now, Biophysical said:

So a group blog of X authors, where each article has been written, then picked and discussed at by some of the other authors before publication?

That sounds awesome!

Yes, exactly.

I think it has to be open to anyone who wants to contribute. My initial idea was to make a (heavily moderated) subreddit. But @DoubleDown11 had the idea of googledocs for it, which I agree with that it is better. The discussion can go as long as necessary and initially by as many as wanted*, but ideally someone (the person who started it, or somebody else who burns to do it) should write up a final piece to publish. Whether that would be on a new blog or existing ones is up for debate.

*that might have to change at some point if there are too many active authors. I doubt we'll run in to that problem, but who knows.

6 minutes ago, Micanthropyre said:

No worries friend. None of my comments are meant to be personal towards you, despite the quote.

No problem at all!

6 minutes ago, Micanthropyre said:

My issue lies in that there seems to be a pervasive idea that diversity = better and then we pick whatever criteria for diversity that matches our format preference.

I think the most important part of normative questions is always: better for what? Not just diversity, but formats. Extended is better for what? Hyperspace is better for what?
Some possible answers are more and some less subjective. Hyperspace seems to be tailored to be less frustrating and more beginner friendly. That is a form of "better". Less diversity can mean more boring to play, and that is worse for some - and better for others. I sometimes like to grind out the ever same matchups, so I don't mind less diverse metas as much as others.

10 minutes ago, Micanthropyre said:

Is # of unique pilots the diversity that is important? Is it playstyle (beef, aces, efficiency, ace and mini swarm, etc)? Is it faction diversity? When trying to balance them, where are the tiebreakers?

I think those are great questions! There's an observation that I never understood: it seems "the playerbase (TM)" is fine if all 7 factions have an equally viable list with the same playstyle, but not at all fine if a single faction has many equally viable lists with completely different playstyles. I also don't understand why faction diversity is such a strong focus, but I'm clearly in the minority there.

And finally: I have now 3 extended and 5 hyperspace lists I want to play. I enjoy playing both formats, and we have local tournaments in both formats. I've said the same back in December '18, and it's still true. I just don't get why playing one means you can't play the other. There are different ways to answer the for what, and I have different lists for those answers.

56 minutes ago, GreenDragoon said:

Easy, a 5. Why did you only ask about one squad?!?!

T

R

U

E

3 minutes ago, GreenDragoon said:

And finally: I have now 3 extended and 5 hyperspace lists I want to play. I enjoy playing both formats, and we have local tournaments in both formats. I've said the same back in December '18, and it's still true. I just don't get why playing one means you can't play the other. There are different ways to answer the for what, and I have different lists for those answers.

I appreciate and agree with everything in your post. I don't have answers though. Its funny, because I think that the new Hyperspace is more interesting than the last one with all the targeted removal. Is interesting better? in a way I guess.

My current format preference is Hyperspace because my next big tournament is Adepticon. I like having both formats because it gives me new things to think about in between.

Fs in chat for SW Destiny

1 hour ago, GreenDragoon said:

I've been talking to @DoubleDown11 about an idea we had, maybe that's a good moment to pitch it.

It is actually some sort of peer review: a googledoc group where somebody writes a piece and people can opt in to comment, clarify and write indepth replies.

The idea stems from the feeling that blogging is really unsatisfactory because it should be a starting point when in effect it is perceived and understood as endpoint. But when I personally write about stuff, I want to have a discussion about it. I have sometimes too many and too strong opinions, I know that. But I enjoy reading thoughtful exchanges, so my motivations is rather to foster that.

Once the piece is rewritten with the new inputs, it would then be published.

The idea is that the group is open for everyone and that the requirements are enough of a filter.

Crap. There went any possible productivity I could have had in the coming months...

2 hours ago, GreenDragoon said:

Yes, exactly.

I think it has to be open to anyone who wants to contribute. My initial idea was to make a (heavily moderated) subreddit. But @DoubleDown11 had the idea of googledocs for it, which I agree with that it is better. The discussion can go as long as necessary and initially by as many as wanted*, but ideally someone (the person who started it, or somebody else who burns to do it) should write up a final piece to publish. Whether that would be on a new blog or existing ones is up for debate.

*that might have to change at some point if there are too many active authors. I doubt we'll run in to that problem, but who knows.

No problem at all!

I think the most important part of normative questions is always: better for what? Not just diversity, but formats. Extended is better for what? Hyperspace is better for what?
Some possible answers are more and some less subjective. Hyperspace seems to be tailored to be less frustrating and more beginner friendly. That is a form of "better". Less diversity can mean more boring to play, and that is worse for some - and better for others. I sometimes like to grind out the ever same matchups, so I don't mind less diverse metas as much as others.

I think those are great questions! There's an observation that I never understood: it seems "the playerbase (TM)" is fine if all 7 factions have an equally viable list with the same playstyle, but not at all fine if a single faction has many equally viable lists with completely different playstyles. I also don't understand why faction diversity is such a strong focus, but I'm clearly in the minority there.

And finally: I have now 3 extended and 5 hyperspace lists I want to play. I enjoy playing both formats, and we have local tournaments in both formats. I've said the same back in December '18, and it's still true. I just don't get why playing one means you can't play the other. There are different ways to answer the for what, and I have different lists for those answers.

There's another issue with diversity in that, more options can paradoxically reduce diversity when you get past a certain threshold. People don't think about it, but once you get so many options, the likelihood of one or a handful of demonstrably correct options increases (see the end of 1.0) which basically deletes everything in the game that can't compete with those options (in addition to power creep which has a similar effect).

2 hours ago, gennataos said:

This seems to hold true. Even if I'm losing, a fair amount of people seem to hate those things.

Man i haven't drawn the matchup much but i Really enjoyed our game at gencon.

On 1/13/2020 at 8:29 AM, Bucknife said:

As a "baseline" of sorts, to compare to Poe+3X, here is the new Kylo & Friends:

________

S6

(76) Kylo Ren [TIE/vn Silencer]
Points: 76

(31) "Longshot" [TIE/fo Fighter]
(2) Fanatical
Points: 33

(30) "Null" [TIE/fo Fighter]
Points: 30

(28) Omega Squadron Ace [TIE/fo Fighter]
(2) Fanatical
Points: 30

(28) Omega Squadron Ace [TIE/fo Fighter]
(2) Fanatical
Points: 30

Total points: 199

Won a local tournament with this, this past weekend:

Kylo Ren (76)
Ship total: 76 Half Points: 38 Threshold: 3

"Scorch" (33)
Fanatical (2)
Ship total: 35 Half Points: 18 Threshold: 2

"Longshot" (31)
Fanatical (2)
Ship total: 33 Half Points: 17 Threshold: 2

Omega Squadron Ace (28)
Fanatical (2)
Ship total: 30 Half Points: 15 Threshold: 2

Epsilon Squadron Cadet (25)
Ship total: 25 Half Points: 13 Threshold: 2

Total: 199

View in Yet Another Squad Builder 2.0: https://raithos.github.io/?f=First Order&d=v8ZsZ200Z236XWWWY262X181WWY263X181WWY267X181WWY269XW&sn=Unnamed Squadron&obs=

Even without upgrades Kylo is a beast. And the ties can handle their own pretty well. over three games fanatical didn't trigger once however.

29 minutes ago, catachanninja said:

Man i haven't drawn the matchup much but i Really enjoyed our game at gencon.

That's because you enjoy my company so much.

12 minutes ago, WileECoyote36 said:

Won a local tournament with this, this past weekend:

Kylo Ren (76)
Ship total: 76 Half Points: 38 Threshold: 3

"Scorch" (33)
Fanatical (2)
Ship total: 35 Half Points: 18 Threshold: 2

"Longshot" (31)
Fanatical (2)
Ship total: 33 Half Points: 17 Threshold: 2

Omega Squadron Ace (28)
Fanatical (2)
Ship total: 30 Half Points: 15 Threshold: 2

Epsilon Squadron Cadet (25)
Ship total: 25 Half Points: 13 Threshold: 2

Total: 199

View in Yet Another Squad Builder 2.0: https://raithos.github.io/?f=First Order&d=v8ZsZ200Z236XWWWY262X181WWY263X181WWY267X181WWY269XW&sn=Unnamed Squadron&obs=

Even without upgrades Kylo is a beast. And the ties can handle their own pretty well. over three games fanatical didn't trigger once however.

Very nice! A friend of mine won a local 4 round tourney with a similar list philosophy, but traded some red dice for higher durability and offensive consistency: Kylo + 3 Omega Squad Experts (all with optics). It also allows him a significant bid which came in handy against Blackout, Luke and Thane, and Maul. He's made cuts with Obi + Ric + 2 ARCs as well as with 3 T65 + U beef, so the SF's in the list appeal to his sense of slow roll area denial, double arcs, and the near-inability to one-shot. The SF's can stare some nastiness right down the barrel a la Kylo 2 U at a distant engagement, allowing Kylo to do his classic flank and sneak, but their sudden speed (on a dial with 1-5 options! Who knows what they'll do?) allows them to hold back with a single blocker, all charge to try and block to get to that favorable disengaging shot, or suddenly hard turn to kite with maybe a blocker catching the opponent in butt arcs at range 1 with no shot. I3 on 3 near-2 hit shots can also alpha opposing filler. The absence of crackshot makes their lives easier, and engaging with the rear arc gives pause to Fang Fighters from spending the focus on offense and relying on Concordia (because it doesn't work on the rear!).

I submarined to 2nd with Kylo (instinctive optics torps) Blackout (fanatical optics) and Muse (squad leader). Fanatical triggered twice all day for me, fewer times than Blackout's ability and just as many times as I'll Show You the Dark Side was inflicted. Is Kylo +3 or Kylo + 4 better? I refuse to accept the truth because stupid tricks are what I enjoy on ace platforms.

Granted, given that you actually won your kit tourney over the weekend, the whole thing of "why fix something that works" and what not, but given your statement of fanatical triggering 0 times and noting that Kylo doesn't have optics, might I recommend ditching fanatical from the Omega Squad Ace (not to be confused with Static, whose subtitle is Omega Ace, lol) and using those points to buff the Epsilon Pilot to Rivas? Kylo is probably taking locks anytime that he feels good about it, and locks are red tokens, so that will significantly push the damage output on your handy I1 blocker. If that's not your cup of tea (and if you need help determining that, summon the expert, @clanofwolves) you might want to change the Omega to a unique pilot. Null works as an aggro sink that may or may not make a big play and Muse has a really nice synergy with Scorch. Thanks to the ability, the Muse and Scorch could K-turn to keep guns on target, Muse then destresses Scorch, who then stresses himself to keep his gun 3 dice (which still sometimes carries value with fanatical, given that action-free mods are cool for lowly nobody heroes). Plus, if he's hit with panicked pilot, as enemy Kylo's are wont to do with him, Muse can fix that up a turn early.

4 minutes ago, Hoarder of Garlic Bread said:

Granted, given that you actually won your kit tourney over the weekend, the whole thing of "why fix something that works" and what not, but given your statement of fanatical triggering 0 times and noting that Kylo doesn't have optics, might I recommend ditching fanatical from the Omega Squad Ace (not to be confused with Static, whose subtitle is Omega Ace, lol) and using those points to buff the Epsilon Pilot to Rivas? Kylo is probably taking locks anytime that he feels good about it, and locks are red tokens, so that will significantly push the damage output on your handy I1 blocker. If that's not your cup of tea (and if you need help determining that, summon the expert, @clanofwolves) you might want to change the Omega to a unique pilot. Null works as an aggro sink that may or may not make a big play and Muse has a really nice synergy with Scorch. Thanks to the ability, the Muse and Scorch could K-turn to keep guns on target, Muse then destresses Scorch, who then stresses himself to keep his gun 3 dice (which still sometimes carries value with fanatical, given that action-free mods are cool for lowly nobody heroes). Plus, if he's hit with panicked pilot, as enemy Kylo's are wont to do with him, Muse can fix that up a turn early.

I didn't even catch the rivas/target lock interaction. that's great, thanks.

I went back and forth for a long time trying to figure out which 4 fo's to take. i feel like there's plenty of decent options, that all can work. I had null in there for a while but took him out last minute for the fanatical Omega Ace.

I know it's super early in this hyperspace round, so i'm all for any advice and list optimization.

7 minutes ago, WileECoyote36 said:

I didn't even catch the rivas/target lock interaction. that's great, thanks.

I went back and forth for a long time trying to figure out which 4 fo's to take. i feel like there's plenty of decent options, that all can work. I had null in there for a while but took him out last minute for the fanatical Omega Ace.

I know it's super early in this hyperspace round, so i'm all for any advice and list optimization.

Rivas was solid filler at launch: 2 pts upgrades your I1 blocker to be a Vessery wannabe. The fun part is that every wave he gets cheaper and every wave more sources of locks come by! We have:

Locks, stress, ion, strain, deplete, jam, tractor, and disarm! With an increase in design space around these concepts! And an uptick in their frequency!

1 hour ago, Hoarder of Garlic Bread said:

Very nice! A friend of mine won a local 4 round tourney with a similar list philosophy, but traded some red dice for higher durability and offensive consistency

I heard rebels can do Kylo+4, too...

__________

Season6Rebs

(62) Luke Skywalker [T-65 X-wing]
Points: 62

(40) Blue Squadron Escort [T-65 X-wing]
Points: 40

(40) Blue Squadron Escort [T-65 X-wing]
Points: 40

(29) Phoenix Squadron Pilot [RZ-1 A-wing]
Points: 29

(29) Phoenix Squadron Pilot [RZ-1 A-wing]
Points: 29

Total points: 200

3 hours ago, MasterShake2 said:

There's another issue with diversity in that, more options can paradoxically reduce diversity when you get past a certain threshold. People don't think about it, but once you get so many options, the likelihood of one or a handful of demonstrably correct options increases (see the end of 1.0) which basically deletes everything in the game that can't compete with those options (in addition to power creep which has a similar effect).

This is generally true, and is probably why Extended tends to develop a pretty narrow band of top-tier performers.

That said, I have a somewhat dogmatic belief that "correct" pricing of all items to a single power-level equilibrium can open up diversity in a different sense. The number of potentially abusive things does go up with a larger size, as does the count of things to balance against, meaning that balancing a larger selection of cards is inherently more difficult and takes more iterations to get right.

But what I think is so unique about this last update is that, as someone pointed out above, the devs decided to change the expected equilibrium. Instead of setting the equilibrium at a 23 pt academy pilot, they decided to set it more at a 53-pt Soontir or a 62-pt Anakin. Basing the power level on something with more data points actually makes sense from a certain perspective; after all, there's so little to go on if you're benchmarking from the Academy Pilot: They make up less than 12% of a list and the results are skewed by force-multipliers that have to be priced independently.

From the rock<paper<scissors perspective, this means that paper finally gets a chance to compete and it stops being about the biggest rock. I'll explain what I mean: Due to the limited viability of low-tier generics (Vulture Swarms were the only major 5+ ship threat in the meta for a long time), it tended to be a battle of best aces; I4 didn't matter, I3 didn't matter, I2 didn't matter. Passive mods did matter. Extreme positioning options mattered a lot. Regen, tractor, and Pre-maneuver repositioning became major NPE issues.

This kind of became a problem with the game at nearly a fundamental level. If things like ID Han, Ensnare, AS Guri, and SR Vader were so annoying, how do you make sure they're never good and hence ubiquitous? Either you can ban them like they did with Handbrake Han, or you can price them out of the meta like they did with Supernatural Vader, or you can kind of ignore the more anecdotal success stories like they did with AS Guri. But all of that doesn't really fix the problem; positioning and perfect information will always win in an aces game, and there's not a really viable way for countering higher-initiative, more-maneuverable, more-easily-modded aces. This in combination with slightly undercooked prices is what led to the domination of the Regen Jedi, Inquisitors, and other Imp Aces; they basically did everything you had to in the meta, slightly better than everyone else.

Obviously that's not an acceptable game state. There are two ways you can deal with that: You can continue nerfing the top stuff and hope the bottom stuff catches up, or you can buff the bottom stuff to change the game at a pretty basic level.

Post-points-adjustment, I seriously suspect that there will be a massive reduction of lists that look at Guri/Fenn and say "no I'm not going to play against that." There will be a massive reduction of lists that look at Ensnare Sun Fac and say "this isn't a competition and will not be fun." The paradigm has shifted a little more than we expected, and possibly more than we even realize yet. The whole "More points = More arcs to dodge" dichotomy only actually works if there are affordable arcs that you can get on the board. Looking back, that wasn't really true in the past, and that's why nerfing aces didn't really hurt them. They had to take fewer toys or smaller bids, but it didn't make other kinds of lists any more viable. And perhaps it wouldn't have done that for a very long time, even if the nerfs had continued.

To put it a little bit differently: In a 3-8-ship meta (that I'm supposing may average around 5), is a 100-pt pre-maneuver-repositioning ace actually going to be that big of a problem? And I don't mean in the sense of meta viablity, but will it actually cease to be an NPE?

It will still be NPE against some list, but I would contend every list has NPE potential against another (5x CAZ vs 5x Blue Squadron Escort for example). But if the actual number of lists that consider something NPE goes down substantially, what does that mean?

Edit:

By invoking Rock/Paper/Scissors, I didn't mean to imply that I think a meta should be allowed to exist in that way, but rather that, in the natural course of things, individual pieces act as hard counters to other pieces. Ideally a list should be required to have aspects of all and learn to balance them carefully; going all-in on one archetype ought to be foolish as it suffers badly from hard-counters, but it hasn't been in the past.

3 hours ago, WileECoyote36 said:

I didn't even catch the rivas/target lock interaction. that's great, thanks.

I went back and forth for a long time trying to figure out which 4 fo's to take. i feel like there's plenty of decent options, that all can work. I had null in there for a while but took him out last minute for the fanatical Omega Ace.

I know it's super early in this hyperspace round, so i'm all for any advice and list optimization.

Took something similar to worlds. Latest version runs APT if the swarms must suffer and a bid or pride if the aces must suffer.

1 hour ago, svelok said:

SAME TEAM

1 hour ago, Boom Owl said:

SAME TEAM

I want to be same team, but I’m not sold on Aces.

Current possibilities:

Just Squad Squad

No Ace, No Upgrades, Just Squad

Blair Bunke Tribute Act

Initiative Kill Me Already

Quantity is the New Quality

Any other good options?

10 hours ago, Brunas said:

What do?

Honestly, in a world where people create "realities" that never happened, and shamelessly rely on alternative "facts," you're worried about being perceived as biased because somebody might look at your analysis and not understand it?

That's ... well, honestly, that's adorable. Remind me to pinch your cheeks at LVO.

2 hours ago, AEIllingworth said:

I want to be same team, but I’m not sold on Aces.

Current possibilities:

Just Squad Squad

No Ace, No Upgrades, Just Squad

Blair Bunke Tribute Act

Initiative Kill Me Already

Quantity is the New Quality

Any other good options?

"The Other Guys"

"The B-team"

"No names, no mercy"

"The Expendables"