5 minutes ago, gennataos said:

Well, that's totally valid because it's not like I've been putting up screen caps of game states or "first 3 rounds of engagement" bat reps as reference. I've just been saying, "trust me".

My low init stuff against the republic stuff? If that's what you're talking about, miles better. I can block them and make it count. Their force can bail them out sometimes, but the blocking is as much, often more, about removing their shot from a hurt ship and positional advantage than it is about action denial.

Hmmm. I always found that the Jedi player sacrifices a ship for positioning with the rest so I don't really get the chance to block.

1 hour ago, Tlfj200 said:

I unironically have no idea what that means, but I really haven't been checking this except every few weeks.

Somehow a discussion on whether the Nantex is a legitimate problem morphed into a Zapruder-film-level of dissection of one turn of one game. Meanwhile the larger point about just what percentage of the sky is currently falling is largely ignored.

Edit: Which is honestly fine. Semi-productive discussion of tactics > More screaming from entrenched positions.

4 minutes ago, jagsba said:

Hmmm. I always found that the Jedi player sacrifices a ship for positioning with the rest so I don't really get the chance to block.

We're just talking about "feels" of nantex or jedi/broadside vs. low init though, right? Like,...I'm cautious here because I'm not sure what you're driving at, feels like a trap or something.

1 hour ago, Tlfj200 said:

**So, I want to caveat this with something I suspect people will either not read, ignore, or dismiss, but this has nothing to do with nantexes, but rather aces players. A second caveat will be that I do believe spamtexes are undercosted, but the size and severity of the reaction to them has been... interesting.

I have seen a narrative from ace players over the years that when they lose games, they go back and throw up their hands and say there was nothing they could do, and almost doubly so against swarms (literally, insert vulture swarms, and even TIE swarms).

Here, the narrative is a bit of "they came in from three angles [good!], and the swarm found one and killed it! What else could they have done?!" Answer: not much, but basically, that's the game, and it's not just nantexes. Droids would have done this, as well as a TIE swarm. So far, nantexes, here, aren't yet special.

Coming in from 3 angles just means the swarm has to "pick one" - but given they brought 6+ ships, they should be able to find that one. If you could bring 3 ships, and always hide all three from 6+ other ships, then something is wrong with the game. The nantexes went after the medium base, which ensured higher likelihoods of bullseyes (3 die shots + their toys). That's just smart. They have 3 agility, reducing the likelihood they get alpha -ed, and make a good trade on the exchange (literally swarm tactics 101).

So, going back... This is pretty classic ace vs swarm, and just because someone did the correct "split up" maneuver doesn't mean they deserve to win, it just shifts the odds away from 99/01. Shifts it to what new distribution of odds? I have no idea. But the point being that being mad they still lost, or extrapolating that because the aces lost, the swarm is inherently too good because it beat an ace list that didn't just straight-joust has some really deep assumptions in there.

The mistake wasn't that turn, but the following one where the ace player pretty much suicided a ship and gave up manouvering options just to kill another one. But that's just a nitpick.

On the nantex "issue" I think you are seeing heated reactions because it is pretty much clear they are under costed, yet some people are denying it for reasons that come from straight up trolling to not having a clue about this game passing through not having neither played nor watched nantex in action. That seemed to trigger a few people.

It's also very true that online gaming is different, if anything mere ships availability would make spamtex rarer

But hey, that's far from being the first time we had debates on undefendable position in this thread, heck I was here when 52 points wedge was bad or lolwut those dumb Europeans losing to leebo 😂

Nice to have you and Brunas back thought

11 minutes ago, gennataos said:

We're just talking about "feels" of nantex or jedi/broadside vs. low init though, right? Like,...I'm cautious here because I'm not sure what you're driving at, feels like a trap or something.

Lol. I was trying to get an opinion without biasing it.

To qualify, I haven't tried the matchup, but in my experience massed small ace ships (4jedi+1, strikers that move second, etc) are a worse matchup than aces for a couple of reasons.

1) the player tends to be better than the average ace player (personal experience), so make better flanks, more willing to make trades, etc.

2) it's just more aces to deal with.

So the question i wanted to ask was what makes nantexans worse than just another mass of generic aces. (besides the unblockability that you mentioned)

To be clear. Not denying the value of unblockable ship. Just acknowledging it's been mentioned already.

1 minute ago, Sunitsa said:

Nice to have you and Brunas back thought

This.

Regarding the point balance of whether there should be room for 6 or only 5 Nantex. I think it is worth considering some similar competitors:

6 i1 Blue Squadron Recruits all with Heroic, which compared to 6 i3 Stalgasin/i4 Petranaki can rotate their arc without taking an agility penalty, but instead a stress token which they can largely clear the next round due to a hyper-dial, and rinse-repeat. At i1 they can run a good blocking game, and always get their mods, and it is possible to block in a Nantex so it has nowhere to tractor it self. With the full-range of boosts the RZ-2 awing can navigate tight asteroid fields more advantageously and heroic is a life-saver when the 3 greens fail. The nantex player here has to rely on the 3 dice, bulls-eye or arc-dodgery to ensure those important side-shoots without return fire to win. If there is only room for 5 i3 Stalgasin/i4 Petranaki , a skilled Resistance player should be able to take this to a win.

Likewise, 5 Named RZ-2 awings (i5 Lulo, i5 Zizi, i5 Tali, i4 Greer, i3 Zari) all with Heroic flown well should be superior to 5 i3 Stalgasin/i4 Petranaki even with upgrades due to their higher (for 4/3 of them) pilot skill.

I think the 6 i3 Stalgasin are fine where there are, there are alot of other i3 lists which can threaten them. Considering the advantage of the 6 i4 Petranaki are either bull-eye specific including the upgrades top-players equip them with, or from good arc-dodgery with carefull ahead-thinking of where to place your 2 dice mobile-arc, both which requires top-flying, I am not so worried for the next 6 months, where they depending on how the meta and pilot respond could go up in price from 30 to 32/33, as I think 6 i4 naked Petranakis are no longer a power house.

17 minutes ago, jagsba said:

So the question i wanted to ask was what makes nantexans worse than just another mass of generic aces. (besides the unblockability that you mentioned)

The combo of the unblockability and the turret. Sure, they want the focus token, but with enough red dice, not all of them need it. Self-bumping for position, arc-dodging and guaranteed shot. It's also way less about the initial engagement, more about the second and third. Where something like jedi+broadside can't guarantee all, or even most, arcs on a single lower init target, the nantex can. On top of that, the nantex can often guarantee that all of them shoot at something, even if the primary target is init killed before nantex #whatever shoots.

Well, crap, you said besides the unblockability, but I don't think one can talk about them without including that, because it's pretty key in the scrum. Like, playing as them, I can plan for something, but adjust to changing board state and it's still often "fine". Like, move #3 first now, even though I planned him to go last, but now he was self-block someone to save damage/get shot, etc.

To be fair to the bugs, the word "swarm" has never felt more apropos in X-Wing. It's like when you walk into a swarm of aggressive gnats and they just won't stop trying to get into every orifice in your head.

1 hour ago, jagsba said:

I agree. But id also say a well executed flank this was not.

I'd say the bait was poorly executed, but the flank was fine. Despite where Whisper is in that image, both she and Grand Inq get a Lock + Force shot in the engagement that Red dies. The Imps all got max hits (8 hits, 2 crits) and only killed the 1 Texan.

1 hour ago, Chumbalaya said:

Thank you for the picture. This is now something to go on. This is pretty much just a joust because Redline has committed to a lane for at least 1 round and can't get out of it. Jousting isn't just lining up across each other, diagonal jousting is more common where players line up in opposite corners just to turn in to each other in the middle.

This is pretty much core ace "gameplay" where they start in a corner and use their giant brains to move and last and reposition to "jockey for position" by waiting for their opponent to commit first. The difference here is that Redline is going to get mega punished by all those bullseyes he opted into a turn ago. No knock on the player, I've done this more times than I can count. Normally aces get bailed out because they just normally out joust everything, but this isn't the case.

If you run this type of deployment but have Redline go down the less congested lane to give him outs you'll have more success. Also, the other aces need to be a lot more aggressive to properly punish the Nantexans for box jousting.

Also also, aces are scared of Nantexans because Nantexans will force trades and ace players aren't used to trading ships. Endgames are similarly harder because 1 ace vs 3 Nantexans is not the slam dunk that 1 ace vs 3 normal ships usually is. It's winnable, possibly even favored if you can get to a 2v4 or 1v2, but you have to actually play the game which is rare for trip aces.

Chumby, this I appreciate. I don't know how to say it without sounding condescending, but your remarks before felt more pithy, but this is well thought out and expressed. It's actually what I normally expect from you. Sorry, if that sounds patronizing, but I wanted to say I liked this better.

54 minutes ago, gennataos said:

I read all of it! To be fair (to me), I'm actually WAY more bummed about my low init ships which is a MUCH worse game against nantex than the aces. It's gross.

This so many times. IDGAF about Nantex beating aces. I care about the fact that Nantex shred "regular" stuff. This was also the case back in the Ensnare days.

1 hour ago, 5050Saint said:

The one list I did see set up to joust was Sloane Aggressors. To which, the Nantex rightly declined the joust and decided to be 6 Aces instead.

Seems like often enough they'll win through this.

I keep wondering how much of a difference simply being forced to Init 3 would be. Init 4 really allows Nantex to be a "swarm of aces," and if they were forced down to Init 3s, they'd still be pretty much the same against aces lists, but against stuff like beef or generics, that's within striking range. Folks could decide to cut upgrades to get higher-Init generics, and at least draw initiative, and that could go a long way.

54 minutes ago, jagsba said:

Can we take a moment to appreciate that they at least aren't tractoring the opponents ships? No matter what you feel about these nantex they gotta be better than ensnare.

To be sure. Mostly, I just mean that it's not surprising that Nantex have been ****ed in every points update.

• They almost surely jacked up in playtesting, where they were almost surely a lot cheaper than release and with one or two mod slots. 3 threat for a Sun Fac build that was nearly 100 points with release prices shows they kinda messed up, and hit the streets pre-nerfed.
• They were utter BS at release, with Ensnare.
• Post Ensnare nerf, they were ****ed in the other way, and essentially trash, since they were just really overpriced. Maybe that was a bit wrong, since folks never gave them much of a shot.
• This brings us to live, where they're kinda ridiculously under-priced. I mean, regardless of table performance, the on-paper value of this dial, these guns, and this ship ability is just a LOT higher than anything else. They're probably the most under-priced ships in X-Wing by a wide margin.

With as odd as these enby buggy baes are, it's not surprising the balance has been so hard. That's what's great about online points--they can be adjusted.

The other thing: for as complicated as these look, they're really a lot easier to fly than they look like they'd be.

48 minutes ago, Timathius said:

Hey I am not going to read anything in this thread

Wise.

10 minutes ago, gennataos said:

Well, crap, you said besides the unblockability, but I don't think one can talk about them without including that, because it's pretty key in the scrum. Like, playing as them, I can plan for something, but adjust to changing board state and it's still often "fine". Like, move #3 first now, even though I planned him to go last, but now he was self-block someone to save damage/get shot, etc.

Lol. It's fine you can mention it again. Just wanted the comprehensive take.

The turret allowing shots post killbox is a very good point no one's mentioned yet.

4 minutes ago, jagsba said:

Lol. It's fine you can mention it again. Just wanted the comprehensive take.

The turret allowing shots post killbox is a very good point no one's mentioned yet.

Dad definitely mentioned it earlier when he talked about having almost perfect uptime during attempt 1 with the list

2 minutes ago, catachanninja said:

Dad definitely mentioned it earlier when he talked about having almost perfect uptime during attempt 1 with the list

*A good point that my dummy thicc brain hadn't read/remembered reading before

I've found a silver bullet that's more decent than most silver bullets when put against the rest of the field (the Nantex's true strength is spammability. Their game-breaking strengths can be leveraged into weaknesses). Will take it to a 4 round Extended Store Champ this Saturday.

If I:

-Win against Nantex, I will ***** about the game being Rock Paper Scissors and all I did was find the Paper

-Lose against Nantex, I will complain about being so wrong in testing

-Win with no Nantex around, I will wonder what the point of this all was

-Lose out with no Nantex around, I will be very sad and take another 2 months off from the game

All the same, it will be good to push plastic ships again!

31 minutes ago, Sunitsa said:

Nice to have you and Brunas back thought

30 minutes ago, gennataos said:

This.

2 hours ago, jagsba said:

With recruits I'd be more worried about avoiding side turret shots

With Recruits, I just hold up my hands and let them all blow up fast so I can get a long lunch break 😅

1 hour ago, Timathius said:

Hey I am not going to read anything in this thread but I just wanted to say something to people who thought extended would balance itself because of a large card pool.

Example A.

1 hour ago, Brunas said:

the rare dab and dash

I don't think anyone is going to argue that Nantexans aren't currently underpriced, but I don't think it's by much. 1-2 points maybe. What appears to be getting lost in the shuffle is Crack Shot, which is similarly underpriced by 1-2 points. What makes Nantexans so effective at collecting jousts is having 6 3 dice crack shots available. That's what people should be mad about, but I'm mostly seeing complaints about things that don't seem nearly as important.

They're unblockable, kinda. They're losing agility and losing an action. Big orange doesn't really care, small orange probably just needs to not box joust. Even then, small orange is either largely nonexistent or getting dunked on by aces anyway so it feels like a red herring.

They're getting shots, sure. 2 dice turret shots aren't exactly inspiring a lot of dread.

Side note, I feel like people should be more upset that bad ace flanking wins so often that the times they actually get punished for it are rare enough to be noteworthy and evidence of the thing punishing a poor approach as a problem.

The Nantexans feel like a weird combo of RZ-2s and Sear Swarm. It's a block of bullseye shots collecting taxes from naive jousts with a side of squirrelly 3 agility turrets. The crack shot aspect is more concerning, 3 agility turrets are just annoying to play against. That said I would much rather play against Nantexans than 5A simply because Nantexans "play X-Wing" more due to the bullseyes.

From my experience, Nantex don't need a lot of bullseye to win. The more they bullseye, the harder they win. Those 2-die turrets are more often really 3-die turrets because they're in your hip pocket. The bulleye acts as more of an area denial.

Experiences vary. /shrug

19 minutes ago, Chumbalaya said:

They're getting shots, sure. 2 dice turret shots aren't exactly inspiring a lot of dread.

Two die shots normally aren't great. Massed 2 die shots, however, have worth, as 5A shows. I suppose the TIE Aggressor list has also proven that this weekend, as well, even though those turrets don't go out to range 3. I truly think that detractors from this list are really undervaluing the worth of those turrets. It's akin to having 6 TIE fighters that have near 100% time on target.

As @gennataos has said, bullseye and Crack Shot is just the icing on the cake. There are suitable replacement talents that can replace Crack Shot and Predator that still fit. Treacherous and Intimidation come to mind. Certainly not better than Crack Shot, but good enough to not count out the bugs from Hyperspace.

29 minutes ago, Chumbalaya said:

The Nantexans feel like a weird combo of RZ-2s and Sear Swarm.

This is a great summation. Slightly better time on target than the A's with less reliable hits with comparable dice cancelling that Sear provides.

38 minutes ago, Chumbalaya said:

What appears to be getting lost in the shuffle is Crack Shot, which is similarly underpriced by 1-2 points. What makes Nantexans so effective at collecting jousts is having 6 3 dice crack shots available.

I definitely agree that this is a big problem. Incidentally, I mostly think this is why the Rebel list in World's finals was at World's finals (no disrespect whatsoever intended towards the player, I'm not arguing his play wouldn't also have been strong to get there). Especially at 1pt, Crack Shot has propped up a fair number of otherwise suspect lists.

I'm less on board with them being only 1-2 points undercosted but I suspect the new few rounds of points adjustments will answer that. Naked Nantexes are significant less scary but it's still a really high volume of red dice at i4. I can't think of anything else quite comparable. 6x TIE/in's is 216 points. 6x i3 RZ-2's is 204 (and not i4 nor capable of 3-die primary shots). Scum can put together 6x Tansari Point Veterans with Autoblasters with points to spare, but this also feels significantly more exploitable than Nantex. I think if the Nantex was 34 minimum, at least the 6x i4 block is no longer viable.

I think they're problematic because of a combination of factors (some resilience to bumping, one-sided relationships with obstacles, etc) but mostly it's a pricing problem and at the right price, those problems become the sort of fair challenges I personally like trying to solve in an X-Wing game.

18 minutes ago, gennataos said:

From my experience, Nantex don't need a lot of bullseye to win. The more they bullseye, the harder they win. Those 2-die turrets are more often really 3-die turrets because they're in your hip pocket. The bulleye acts as more of an area denial.

Experiences vary. /shrug

I'm genuinely struggling to think of how this is happening. Pictures or even rough sketches would make this much easier.

I’ve played a fair amount of Nantex, and they really need the bullseye in some matchups.

The turn after redline from all the screenshots, Grand Inquisitor gets blocked into two bullseyes and gets one rounded. That’s the turn that is the most significant from that game I think. Two dice turrets are not going to finish off GI in one round, and they will have trouble with whisper.

edit: weirdly, the matchups where they least need bullseye are the ones where it is easiest to get it, i. e. Decimators.