Edit

So.. I left the meta and the game a couple of months (maybe even a year now) when I consistently saw nothing but Contracted Scouts at the top tables.

I come back now and I'm pretty much seeing the same stuff.. with fat ships with low-action, high-efficiency attacks and auto-damage in the form of bombs. The FAQ to Empire basically made previously competitive builds non-existent or unrealiable compared to Scum meta-equivalents, and Rebels are pretty much just piggy-backing off Scum strats. Meanwhile, swarms are nowhere to be found because they just get bombed/autoblastered to death, or have to play a very dice-determined game chasing around kiting bombers the entire time.

As a returning, competitive player, maybe this isn't the best time to be coming back to the game.. I mean, FFS, no one questioned Contacted Scouts being 25 points? SMH.

On 8/28/2017 at 0:59 PM, Cerve said:

Dunno, I'm seeing a lot of empire in the SC topic :-/ I think that Empire is finally rising, Empire players are discovering some nice building.

funny how people keep saying that since the FAQ yet Imperials keep dropping.

14 hours ago, Thormind said:

funny how people keep saying that since the FAQ yet Imperials keep dropping.

What's really funny is Scum Aces is still to come. We're not even at rock bottom yet! FFG's pullin' out the jackhammer and isn't going to be happy until we hit magma.

5 minutes ago, Scumwing Apologist said:

What's really funny is Scum Aces is still to come. We're not even at rock bottom yet! FFG's pullin' out the jackhammer and isn't going to be happy until we hit magma.

Scum superiority won't be fixed by giving them rubbish ships; the reason you see Jumpmaster, Fang and Shadow more than anyship is because those are their good options.

Giving them more good options improves variation; vus improving the overall health of the "meta"

13 minutes ago, the1hodgy said:

Scum superiority won't be fixed by giving them rubbish ships; the reason you see Jumpmaster, Fang and Shadow more than anyship is because those are their good options.

Giving them more good options improves variation; vus improving the overall health of the "meta"

It gives Scum variety. That's it. So then you can choose from multiple Tier I lists- everyone else gets screwed. The game is no fun when 1 faction has all the best of all the various archetypes.

3 minutes ago, Scumwing Apologist said:

It gives Scum variety. That's it. So then you can choose from multiple Tier I lists- everyone else gets screwed. The game is no fun when 1 faction has all the best of all the various archetypes.

leave then. if you're not having fun. vote with your feet. What i did with Warhammer

18 minutes ago, the1hodgy said:

Scum superiority won't be fixed by giving them rubbish ships; the reason you see Jumpmaster, Fang and Shadow more than anyship is because those are their good options.

Giving them more good options improves variation; vus improving the overall health of the "meta"

The problem is those ships are better than anything Imperials have access to. So are Miranda, Biggs, Lowrisk, Nym, Dash, etc. It's not scum superiority anymore. Rebels are actually getting even worst than scum. It's really just Imperials inferiority. What upset me is without the Palp/X7 nerfs Imperial would still be behinf but at least the factions wouldnt be that far from each others. At the moment they are completly out of the meta.

How long is it going to take them to realize that it was too much? Cant they just roll it back until they find a fix to the faction problems??

28 minutes ago, the1hodgy said:

Scum superiority won't be fixed by giving them rubbish ships; the reason you see Jumpmaster, Fang and Shadow more than anyship is because those are their good options.

Giving them more good options improves variation; vus improving the overall health of the "meta"

I cannot describe how wrong this is with polite words. I see this argument a lot: "They're not overpowered, they're just the best ships available!" How in the **** do you not see that they are both?
But Thormind explains it pretty well, though.

3 minutes ago, Thormind said:

The problem is those ships are better than anything Imperials have access to. So are Miranda, Biggs, Lowrisk, Nym, Dash, etc. It's not scum superiority anymore. Rebels are actually getting even worst than scum. It's really just Imperials inferiority. What upset me is without the Palp/X7 nerfs Imperial would still be behinf but at least the factions wouldnt be that far from each others. At the moment they are completly out of the meta.

How long is it going to take them to realize that it was too much? Cant they just roll it back until they find a fix to the faction problems??

At this point, they need to escalate and introduce power creep to make factions viable (i.e. give Imperials something to bring to a competitive event), because as it's been stated before - they're are not going to eliminate their little cash cows from the field.

13 minutes ago, the1hodgy said:

leave then. if you're not having fun. vote with your feet. What i did with Warhammer

Don't tell me what to do. You're not my real mom.

14 minutes ago, Scumwing Apologist said:

Don't tell me what to do. You're not my real mom.

Sorry, couldn't resist.

1 hour ago, Scumwing Apologist said:

What's really funny is Scum Aces is still to come. We're not even at rock bottom yet! FFG's pullin' out the jackhammer and isn't going to be happy until we hit magma.

Improving 2 ships which almost never saw competitive play. The verdict is still out if it actually is enough to help the Kihraxz. Cause you invest more points into the chassis. But at least the Vaksai gives the potential for a 4 or 5 ship swarm which has no dial creep. Everything which helps non-large non-Protectorate Scum small bases I appreciate cause these ships are weak when seen from a competitive 100/6 point of view. And as said above more variety is good for the game.

1 hour ago, Thormind said:

Rebels are actually getting even worst than scum.

How? How could that possibly be true? All they have as new options are Autituck and Nym. ScumNym is worse, so Nym can't count towards 'worst than scum'. And the Auzituck allows a single build. Everything else was there during the reign of scum, too, so it can't contribute to 'worst than scum'

8 minutes ago, Managarmr said:

And as said above more variety is good for the Scum faction.

Fixed that.

Random b*tch: Why does Scum get a Sabine? I don't get the logic. And they have the gull to release it in the same pack as the PS 10 MONSTER that is now on every single table in the game.

He takes what should be a 50% chance to hit on each red bomb dice rolled and turns it into a 75% chance of hitting with each dice... Anyone want to defend this decision?

6 minutes ago, Rinzler in a Tie said:

Random b*tch: Why does Scum get a Sabine? I don't get the logic. And they have the gull to release it in the same pack as the PS 10 MONSTER that is now on every single table in the game.

He takes what should be a 50% chance to hit on each red bomb dice rolled and turns it into a 75% chance of hitting with each dice... Anyone want to defend this decision?

sabine is infinitely superior to cad bane...

Sabine is 1 auto damage, no roll no nothing in addition to the bomb. Works with ALL bombs
Cad Bane is 1 instance of rerolling up to 2 dice, making THAT bomb hit more reliably but not do extra damage. Only works with die rolling bombs

Cad Bane doesnt work on all bombs. Its once per round to make a 50-50 shot a 75-25 shot. It often doesnt even do jack, i still use him though for the bomb slot

1 minute ago, Vineheart01 said:

sabine is infinitely superior to cad bane...

Sabine is 1 auto damage, no roll no nothing in addition to the bomb. Works with ALL bombs
Cad Bane is 1 instance of rerolling up to 2 dice, making THAT bomb hit more reliably but not do extra damage. Only works with die rolling bombs

Cad Bane doesnt work on all bombs. Its once per round to make a 50-50 shot a 75-25 shot. It often doesnt even do jack, i still use him though for the bomb slot

What's your point? I didn't say that Sabine wasn't better. I'm saying the faction didn't need more autodamage and increased efficiency - OR MORE UPGRADE SLOTS.
Without counting I would wager a lot that they have more upgrade slots than either of the other factions, especially now with Guns for Hire.

Wave 13: Death Star. 50pts

22 minutes ago, Stay On The Leader said:

Wave 13: Death Star. 50pts

Yeah... and the faction?

Rebel and Scum only

4 minutes ago, Stay On The Leader said:

Wave 13: Death Star. 50pts

Death Star Targeting Beacon
Tech Upgrade. Imperial Only.

Immediately after all obstacles have been placed, place one Death Star Targeting Beacon token in the same way that obstacles are placed.
At the end of the Combat phase, if one or more enemy ship is within range 1 of this token, all ships within range 1 of this token roll five attack dice and suffer one damage per [boom] and [kaboom].
Then remove this token.

16 points

5 minutes ago, GreenDragoon said:

Yeah... and the faction?

Rebel and Scum only

Sabine's Death Star

18 hours ago, HERO said:

So.. I left the meta and the game a couple of months (maybe even a year now) when I consistently saw nothing but Contracted Scouts at the top tables.

I come back now and I'm pretty much seeing the same stuff.. with fat ships with low-action, high-efficiency attacks and auto-damage in the form of bombs. The FAQ to Empire basically made previously competitive builds non-existent or unrealiable compared to Scum meta-equivalents, and Rebels are pretty much just piggy-backing off Scum strats. Meanwhile, swarms are nowhere to be found because they just get bombed/autoblastered to death, or have to play a very dice-determined game chasing around kiting bombers the entire time.

As a returning, competitive player, maybe this isn't the best time to be coming back to the game.. I mean, FFS, no one questioned Contacted Scouts being 25 points? SMH.

If you don't like turrets and/or don't want to play a damage assignment minigame with rebels, then yeah this isn't really the meta for you, at least if you are looking at high level competition (and it's not for me either -- I hate this meta). That said, locally speaking, things can be more diverse and I've managed success with lists like those in the in the 20-30 range on meta analyzer with Imperial lists that don't have turrets.

As to your last question, I remember in an interview a designer mentioned making a last minute change to lower the points cost because of a comparison to the outer rim smuggler. So, I think that it would have been questioned if there had been time to do so and a lot of former playtesters have mentioned in various places that they raised other concerns about the Scout, so I think that people did question things, but ultimately were ignored.

Unfortunately, I don't think they're design choices for the most recent wave and or the next really show that they are interested in even remotely dialing back those mechanics.

45 minutes ago, defkhan1 said:

Sabine's Death Star

Can't wait to boost or barrel roll before moving with that guy.

At least Sabine's Death Star Would see play. The Imperial version would have a mandatory title that says 'If this ship is hit by Proton Torpedoes, destroy it.' Sabine's version would probably buff FSR again.

5 hours ago, Rinzler in a Tie said:

I cannot describe how wrong this is with polite words. I see this argument a lot: "They're not overpowered, they're just the best ships available!" How in the **** do you not see that they are both?
But Thormind explains it pretty well, though.

At this point, they need to escalate and introduce power creep to make factions viable (i.e. give Imperials something to bring to a competitive event), because as it's been stated before - they're are not going to eliminate their little cash cows from the field.

I agree but it will probably take more than 1 powerful ship to get the Imperial back in the game (unless it's something like a JMK xpac with crazy upgrades and OP ship...). Rebels/Scums have OP shipS and many unique upgrades to make them even better. Imperials lack both.