Its the overall response thats interesting to me. Seems to be a consensus even without game context that all of those aces can deal with a minimum of 2 t65s. Im not sure what conclusions to draw from that other than maybe some of those Aces should be a bit more expensive. Probably not realistic or a good idea to price generics substantially lower.

Genuinely not trying to contrive a preferred or specific conclusion here either. It just looks bad that a 50-60 pt Aces is thought of as comfortable dealing with 80 pts worth of chunky 3 dice generics. Does not seem crazy to wonder if FFG should push more Aces closer to 60+.

The stuff thats already in a 70-80 pt range is harder to get a read on. All of it is really. I don't know how any of this works. A 20-30ish pt gap seems like its at least worth looking at as a potential issue.

Are point differences like this supposed to be meaningful? How would the answers change if we used Ties/Vultures? Do points matter as a point of comparison between ships or sets of ships? Where are points? Summon new points?

Happy Monday everyone.

my own take on this is that aces seem genuinely hard to price. Like take Blackout for example, I think you have to be doing something very wrong to lose with blackout vs two X-Wings and nothing else on the board. That being said, X-Wings feel underpriced at 31 points and Blackout feels overpriced at 80 points. Like there's fundamentally this weird skew where even an appropriately priced ace will absolutely wreck an equal value of low-init low-repo chonkers in an endgame scenario like this.

Immediate takeaway: aces are fundamentally hard to balance

Some musings based on that: aces kinda break the way the game's arc-based guessing game system works, but in a way they also define it. A good first step to mitigating the damage they cause to the game would be to limit them (i.e. prevent people from taking a full 200 points worth of aces as a list).

29 minutes ago, gennataos said:

When I see stuff like that, I wonder who is voting for what and if they read the full thing.

usually, it seems that people's assumptions are each specifically in random enough directions that they mostly cancel out en masse

it does seem that there's probably a tendency to imagine the strongest common build for each pilot, its also surprisingly hard to maintain a consistent mental model for player skill (its very easy to imagine different outcomes in the same situation, between both players are mediocre and both players are very good, because of lower/high marginal skill impact for either side)

Can’t we kinda assume pilots aren’t worth the same at every stage of the game? It’s not a thing you can build into the rules, but Soontir is worth a lot when you have ~80 points against him and isn’t great when you have ~200 points against him. He gets better as he is alive the later a game goes.

The poll is kinda asking for end-game values of aces against beef, which is different than whole game worth. I’m still not convinced enough games even get to what first edition considered “late game”. I seem to be running out of time mid game a lot, so these aces should be priced like a flanker/distraction, rather than a closer.

Edit: not trying to defend aces. I prefer jank>swarms>beef>aces, in that order.

Edit 2: I also acknowledge initiative killing token stacking jousters are unfun, so “aces” shouldn’t get priced well enough to be in that category, which is where some of them are.

Double posting because nothing matters:

We saw this with first edition epic: Named pilots were such a waste. In aces high, you’d have a hard time convincing me to use a generic. “Aces”, arc dodgers, init killers are all better the fewer points that are on the board, whether it is alternate format or game stage based.

12 hours ago, AEIllingworth said:

Can’t we kinda assume pilots aren’t worth the same at every stage of the game? It’s not a thing you can build into the rules, but Soontir is worth a lot when you have ~80 points against him and isn’t great when you have ~200 points against him. He gets better as he is alive the later a game goes.

The poll is kinda asking for end-game values of aces against beef, which is different than whole game worth. I’m still not convinced enough games even get to what first edition considered “late game”. I seem to be running out of time mid game a lot, so these aces should be priced like a flanker/distraction, rather than a closer.

Edit: not trying to defend aces. I prefer jank>swarms>beef>aces, in that order.

Edit 2: I also acknowledge initiative killing token stacking jousters are unfun, so “aces” shouldn’t get priced well enough to be in that category, which is where some of them are.

I completely agree that the value of any ship sorta varies during phases of the game. Points are not a precise thing.

I do still wonder though if there is on some level a range where totals are meaningful.

If one ship can consistently solo 2-3 other ships and there is a 20-30pt difference in the totals does that matter at all?

I don’t necessarily have an answer. Obviously we can build lists that make the gap less relevant. Also it seems necessary to mention that the Ace in these comparisons is never alone in the early game either. So it works both ways I guess.

Main question remains, if a 55ish pt ace can solo 80 pts of generics reliably is it a problem? Or is it something we can just toss up to points are messy and complicated?

11 minutes ago, Boom Owl said:

I completely agree that the value of any ship sorta varies during phases of the game. Points are not a precise thing.

I do still wonder though if there is on some level a range where totals are meaningful.

If one ship can consistently solo 2-3 other ships and there is a 20-30pt difference in the totals does that matter at all?

I don’t necessarily have an answer. Obviously we can build lists that make the gap less relevant. Also it seems necessary to mention that the Ace in these comparisons is never alone in the early game either. So it works both ways I guess.

Main question remains, if a 55ish pt ace can solo 80 pts of generics reliably is it a problem? Or is it something we can just toss up to points are messy and complicated?

The concept of “solo” also should be examined a bit. Do we mean finish them off, or score half points on something to be ahead on points and then not die? Soontir + bid can often be worth more than 1.5 x-wings, and two arcs isn’t really enough to corral him.

(not trying to harp on Soontir, just a good easy example)

2 hours ago, AEIllingworth said:

The concept of “solo” also should be examined a bit. Do we mean finish them off, or score half points on something to be ahead on points and then not die?

I assumed it was pretty much who would get destroyed. No consideration for points in my mind, just who would be left standing after the bout.

Extremely few games of 2.0 reach endgame. That's right. Very few. I'd argue about 10%. Most games end with a draw with signficant material on the board for both sides, most especially when it comes to "bulk/bulk+Ace" archetypes which have become horrifyingly common. Most games fall within 9-10 rounds of play only.

Boom Owl's concept is really broken and is asking for bias. Yes, Soontir will kill 2Xwings if that's all he's up against and there's plenty of time. No, soontir most of the time won't do that if he's at 200 pts and up against a full squad of 5X. There's some serious brain-warping to avoid thinking about all those times (which count!) where the Soontir player simply makes a mistake and eats it in the first few rounds.

This whole anti-ace thing is getting really inane.

All things considered, I'd call this the best X-Wing we've ever had.

If we never got another points update, I'd be sad that some secondary weapons aren't more viable, but generally, they're not completely unplayable.

Aces and generics are both decent.

Movie characters are generally creme of the crop.

TIE/ln are worse than TIE/fos...but isn't that thematic anyway?

Luke t65 is a better team player (easier to build diverse squads around) than Poe t70... Which is also perfectly thematic.

Boba is a nasty good center piece.

Jedi are cheaters.

Droids are so good in groups.

Everybody's got something.

@Bucknife I agree.

Also gud gif.

But also yea

Nerf Aces

bespin cloud car?

• chad orange paint scheme
• unique sculpt
• iconic, OT movie-canon ship
• big enough to make sense in game (wouldn't even be the smallest model)
• not canonically unarmed like several 2.0 ships that made it in anyways
• tie striker made it in despite being atmospheric
• cloud car flew in space in current canon one time in a comic either way
• swarm ship with boost?
• possibly red boost?
• but no barrel roll?
• or red barrel roll?
• gunner slot?
• funky dial?
• probably scum?
• look at this bad ***:

• this could be you:

21 minutes ago, svelok said:

bespin cloud car?

• chad orange paint scheme
• unique sculpt
• iconic, OT movie-canon ship
• big enough to make sense in game (wouldn't even be the smallest model)
• not canonically unarmed like several 2.0 ships that made it in anyways
• tie striker made it in despite being atmospheric
• cloud car flew in space in current canon one time in a comic either way
• swarm ship with boost?
• possibly red boost?
• but no barrel roll?
• or red barrel roll?
• gunner slot?
• funky dial?
• probably scum?
• look at this bad ***:

• this could be you:

Oh you mean the clown car.

Pretty sure that ship blew up insanely fast in Battlefront 1 EA. Was cool to fly but man it's hull felt like it was made of paper.

Totally 1 hull.

1 minute ago, KiraYamatoSF said:

Pretty sure that ship blew up insanely fast in Battlefront 1 EA. Was cool to fly but man it's hull felt like it was made of paper.

Totally 1 hull.

2/3/2/1, let's go

24 minutes ago, svelok said:

• swarm ship with boost?
• possibly red boost?
• but no barrel roll?
• or red barrel roll?

I really want something like this.

Cloud Car, clone Z-95. Something. There'd be such a different feel to a swarmer with access to boost, even red boost.

Is a blue cloud car faster than an orange cloud car?

34 minutes ago, Boom Owl said:

Is a blue cloud car faster than an orange cloud car?

Uh, what does that have to do with RZ-2 A-wings?!

44 minutes ago, Boom Owl said:

Is a blue cloud car faster than an orange cloud car?

Orkish red makes it go fasta...

6 hours ago, theBitterFig said:

a swarmer with access to boost

RZ-1 misses it by juuuust a little.

Would probably feel like an N-1 without full throttle, torps, or sensors...

6 hours ago, theBitterFig said:

even red boost.

...just wait for the Droid Tri-fighter...

6 hours ago, svelok said:

2/3/2/1, let's go

Lobot: A Star Wars X-Wing Story.

I5 jus' because.

9 minutes ago, Bucknife said:

Lobot: A Star Wars X-Wing Story.

I5 jus' because.

The cyborg with no big boy words to say.

2 hours ago, ClassicalMoser said:

RZ-1 misses it by juuuust a little.

Would probably feel like an N-1 without full throttle, torps, or sensors...

Maybe, but if it's 23 points instead of 33 points, that goes a long way.

2 hours ago, Bucknife said:

...just wait for the Droid Tri-fighter...

I always had that pegged more as an Interceptor type.

3/3/3 sorta statline (at least in bullseye for the red dice...), blue hard turns (well, all the droids have blue hards... maybe both the 1 and the 3...), both Roll and Boost link to Calc, maybe keep networked calculations.

A multi-dot limited pilot, let's say "Wolfpack Hunter" which has a bonus if no friendly ships *other* than Wolfpack Hunters are within range 1-2... No longer quite a Lone Wolf, but a little clique of Interceptors that wants to hang out together. That'd be kinda sweet.