9 minutes ago, Chumbalaya said:

So we have precious few pictures to look at when analyzing Nantexans matchups, but I'll take what I can get.

We have this instant classic. Nantexans in an inexplicable honorable box joust and and Redline opting in to death ~2 turns in advance. Note that it's less important where he ends up (we've seen that picture) than how he ends up there. Look at the obstacle placement and see how many potential outs Redline has to avoid the corner joust into a billion bullseyes and inevitable death. He's pot committed and there's no way to avoid it. This isn't a Nantex problem. On top of Redline's positioning, Whisper and Quiz are nowhere near good positions to punish the Nantexans taking the Redline bait. They will have time to clean up Redline and turn in to the other two without much issue. Having bullseyes and tractor tokens and turrets isn't the issue. Crack Shot and the Nantexans are underpriced, but it's only really apparent because they can actually punish this fairly typical lazy ace play.

In a similar vein, we see inexplicable box jousting Nantex taking on some really poorly positioned ships trusting in their passive mods to see them through this most honorable joust. Note again the position of the aces relative to obstacles. Holo is mostly fine. That rock at Kylo's 1 o'clock cuts off your standard 2 forward roll right boost left non-committal ace maneuver that is basically never wrong. Kylo's only options are now overshoot and punt for a turn, turn in (which is probably fine tbh given he'll likely bump one and with Holo can PS-kill another), or basically concede the game by running away leaving Holo to solo 6 and probably die pointlessly, then coming back to 1v5 and blaming his dice when it doesn't work. The highly maneuverable aces should really be using these asteroids to block Nantex moves or entice them to self damage. If Kylo was just a little further back and to his right he could easily 2 bank left in front of the asteroid and get his big brain reposition perfectly based on complete information. Tavson being in the middle of the table also makes no sense given Nantexans can go 7 forward and shoot out of their sides after seeing his final position. He's basically not participating in the game.

Now these are only two examples, but both of them have very similar elements. We have players making mistakes and getting punished for them. There really isn't anything wrong with that, in fact I'm more upset that stuff like this works more often than not. Nantexans are undercosted, sure, but the only crime they've committed here is punishing play mistakes that normally go unpunished.

sure but you're not telling us how to deal with them

That's all fine and well, but what are my options to counter 4% of the field in list building?

19 minutes ago, Chumbalaya said:

So we have precious few pictures to look at when analyzing Nantexans matchups, but I'll take what I can get.

Another spotting down in south america.

Dozens of players running and screaming in the streets.

Key community leaders have gone missing or silent in mysterious accidents on TTS over the last week.

This could be the end...

Me when FFG tells me I can't joust nantexans and expect to win:

56 minutes ago, mschobes said:

That's all fine and well, but what are my options to counter 4% of the field in list building?

WEDGE

1 hour ago, FlyingAnchors said:

WEDGE

wedge is always the answer. Followed by thane.

2 hours ago, mschobes said:

That's all fine and well, but what are my options to counter 4% of the field in list building?

git gud

or fly bugs

or the ghost, because you can't crack shot 0 agility

or maybe some unholy miranda+y's degenerate bomb/turret saturation that has silly space control and a large number of warm bodies

Miranda Doni (40)
Sabine Wren (3)
Seismic Charges (3)
Proton Bombs (5)

Ship total: 51 Half Points: 26 Threshold: 5

Gray Squadron Bomber (30)
Dorsal Turret (2)
Proton Bombs (5)

Ship total: 37 Half Points: 19 Threshold: 4

Gray Squadron Bomber (30)
Dorsal Turret (2)
Proton Bombs (5)

Ship total: 37 Half Points: 19 Threshold: 4

Gray Squadron Bomber (30)
Dorsal Turret (2)
Proton Bombs (5)

Ship total: 37 Half Points: 19 Threshold: 4

Gray Squadron Bomber (30)
Dorsal Turret (2)
Proton Bombs (5)

Ship total: 37 Half Points: 19 Threshold: 4


Total: 199

View in Yet Another Squad Builder 2.0: https://raithos.github.io/?f=Rebel Alliance&d=v8ZsZ200Z17XWWWW57W71W69WY30X137WWWW69WY30X137WWWW69WY30X137WWWW69WY30X137WWWW69W&sn=New Squadron&obs=

1 hour ago, jagsba said:

wedge is always the answer. Followed by thane.

I am 100% confident that an I-6 with outmaneuver baked in and an I-5 that wishes he was Mareek Steele can counter 4% of the field.

Idk about the other 96% though.

I know I'm not great at the game. Autopsy all you want, @Chumbalaya, as there's a smorgasbord. But don't use my mediocre play as a straw man for the actual good ace players that are losing en masse in the cut. That's more disingenuous than claiming that Nanteces are only slightly undercosted. Go ahead and find a match using my list and show the world how you table Nantex.

I suppose if I start taking screencaps with RAC + Whisper, a silver bullet that literally removes a Nantex per turn of combat more often than it doesn't (Vader + Hotshot guarantee either early strip or early dmg + strip, leaving Juke Whisper full mods an easy shot), we'll find out that ALL ace players are trash that need silver bullets or nukes in the case of munition + pre-maneuver Guri/Kylo.

(Absolute worse case of DPS with RAC + Drift Queen v. a bug: http://xwing.gateofstorms.net/2/multi/?d=AwAAAAAAAAAA&a1=MwECAAABAAAA&a2=MQAQAAgIAAAA. But there are so many such that finding one with a tractor and/or no token should be trivial.)

9 minutes ago, Hoarder of Garlic Bread said:

But don't use my mediocre play as a straw man for the actual good ace players that are losing en masse in the cut.

seemed pretty on par

9 minutes ago, Hoarder of Garlic Bread said:

we'll find out that ALL ace players are trash

5 hours ago, mschobes said:

That's all fine and well, but what are my options to counter 4% of the field in list building?

Joined on Tuesday just to stirr up **** again. Not suspicious at all

e: and just to be clear: the real idiots in my eyes are those cheering on that bs.

Actively making a place worse and then complaining that it's bad is really low.

6 hours ago, Chumbalaya said:

Nantexans are underpriced, but it's only really apparent because they can actually punish this fairly typical lazy ace play.

Your bias is showing.

I feel like it became apparent that they were underpriced when FFG dropped them by 8pt.

I have another multiple choice question. Is there anything else that can punish aces who make sub optimal plays?

A) Yes.

B) No.

On a completely unrelated note, I'm enjoying 2x Bounty Hunter with PerCo and CC again. The 56pt spare is a sweet number, currently being filled by 2x Autoblaster Spacers.

I don't fancy the Nantex match up though.

11 hours ago, mschobes said:

That's all fine and well, but what are my options to counter 4% of the field in list building?

You mean 50% of the field. A list is either Nantex or it isn't.

11 hours ago, mschobes said:

Me when FFG tells me I can't joust nantexans and expect to win:

Sooo...were you on Fly Better and exhausted your rhetoric there, or is this your 2nd, 3rd, whatever account here?

6 hours ago, Cuz05 said:

Your bias is showing.

I feel like it became apparent that they were underpriced when FFG dropped them by 8pt.

I have another multiple choice question. Is there anything else that can punish aces who make sub optimal plays?

A) Yes.

B) No.

Yeah. Nantex do it better is all

How about we shift things?

@jagsba and I have both brought it up...how does lower init survive the bugs? Blocking is neutered and most things trade really poorly. That’s the big bummer here, IMO.

6 hours ago, Cuz05 said:

Your bias is showing.

I feel like it became apparent that they were underpriced when FFG dropped them by 8pt.

Did whisper become overpriced when she went up by 8pts?

Is jamming beam underpriced because it dropped by 100%

If there's more games to see I'm happy to analyze them. Nothing I've seen is inherently a problem with Nantexans, just general efficiency swarm stuff.

Aces aren't entitled to wins just because they diagonal joust directly at things. Nantexans punishing this is a feature, not a bug.

8 minutes ago, Chumbalaya said:

If there's more games to see I'm happy to analyze them. Nothing I've seen is inherently a problem with Nantexans, just general efficiency swarm stuff.

Aces aren't entitled to wins just because they diagonal joust directly at things. Nantexans punishing this is a feature, not a bug.

Have you tried?

2 minutes ago, gennataos said:

How about we shift things?

@jagsba and I have both brought it up...how does lower init survive the bugs? Blocking is neutered and most things trade really poorly. That’s the big bummer here, IMO.

I have noted this too, id take 5 bugs over 5x, but the bugs actually can fit 6? This just comes back to, the bugs are pretty under costed. If I didn't know better, i'd assume the forces that do points adjustments are humans and occasionally fallible. I do super get the people upset on that end.

Normally with swarms, if your opponent has chosen to play the game with you (another matter entirely) If jousting is your strategy you can try to pick an engagement point where 100% of your ships shoot and not 100% of thiers to and maybe your k turns are easier/can go an extra turn without k turning, and kill a few ships before they shoot to make up for your lack of numbers. Against the nantex, they move after and shoot before most other jousters while also having a salvo advantage and have a semi free reposition, that for me, is alarmingly close to "nothing i can do" territory.

So the end result is we probably live in a world where you take high initiative front loaded damage or bombs or your own nantex until the next points adjust and that's sub optimal but probably fine.

Just now, jagsba said:

Did whisper become overpriced when she went up by 8pts?

Is jamming beam underpriced because it dropped by 100%

Did Whisper cost 38pt?

Was Jamming Beam good?

13 minutes ago, gennataos said:

How about we shift things?

@jagsba and I have both brought it up...how does lower init survive the bugs? Blocking is neutered and most things trade really poorly. That’s the big bummer here, IMO.

Yes this. It is the entirety of my concern.

Unfortunately, I keep coming up short on the headsim. If there were only 5 of them, or 4 with something else, or even all I3, it plays out with a serving of hope. That 6th ship reaches a critical mass, almost regardless of the extra efficiency of the massed talents.

I'd be willing to let 6 I4 slide without the talents, just to see if the variance can make a difference. Sure, they can roll hot and be an ****, but that's true of everything. If, however, a little more variance was to come in on their red dice, and it would with those numbers, then the damage race may possibly move closer to even.

This is ignoring the fact that it has about the best dial in the game, so counter manoeuvre options for your own massed generics are pretty limited.

I appreciate that this is just more of the same and not any kind of answer to the actual question. But there it is.

11 minutes ago, Chumbalaya said:

feature, not a bug

I came here merely to say that I enjoyed this pun far too much! Thank you.

I'll leave you all to your discussion now.

10 minutes ago, Chumbalaya said:

If there's more games to see I'm happy to analyze them. Nothing I've seen is inherently a problem with Nantexans, just general efficiency swarm stuff.

Aces aren't entitled to wins just because they diagonal joust directly at things. Nantexans punishing this is a feature, not a bug.

Can you just stop with the whole, they're pretty fine and people only don't like them because lazy aces?

I mean, you have kinda covered that, I'm not cutting you off mid flow or anything.

1 hour ago, gennataos said:

Sooo...were you on Fly Better and exhausted your rhetoric there, or is this your 2nd, 3rd, whatever account here?

You'll have to stay tuned for my next thread...

7 hours ago, GreenDragoon said:

Joined on Tuesday just to stirr up **** again. Not suspicious at all

e: and just to be clear: the real idiots in my eyes are those cheering on that bs.

Actively making a place worse and then complaining that it's bad is really low.

To be fair, I was trying to stir **** up during the argument, but it took a few days for my account to be approved.