25 minutes ago, kris40k said:

I don't want to drag the thread off-topic but to answer this question:

In game terms, it certainly does matter if its Biggs soaking up the damage. While you are correct in the assumption that the idea is to kill points, what matters is that in most games (barring the occasional 100-0 tabling) is that you are trading ships/points. You are destroying their ships and they are destroying yours. What is important, and what can determine the outcome of a game, is what ships did you trade for what you take from them at the beginning of the game. Biggs allows your opponent the ability to destroy the most dangerous parts of your list while you must first destroy the least dangerous part of his. This sets the scene for the rest of the game and can win it in the first trade. Give the ability to stack defensive abilities on Biggs, and you start to warp the meta, and other lists must be able to deal with this boogeyman (ex. FRS) to be considered competitive in case it rears its face during a tournament.

Edit: Oh, and what really has started to "break things" is that the FRS list not only takes away target choice from a player via Biggs, its that it also takes away the ability to focus your fire by spreading damage, and can break the idea of trading ships, as damage is spread out amongst the enemies ships by their choice, allowing them to prevent losing anything at all in the initial trade.

I understand about spreading damage around but we're talking about some less than agile ship's that are tethered to Biggs for protection. Control your first firing approach to limit the amount of damage that Biggs can soak up. I assume we're talking about Biggs, Pava, Lowrick and Rex, correct? One of the things I see at games in the FLGS is the lack of patient play in the initial approach. Sort of like cleaning a really dirty toilet. Get in and get it done. It's either they go for a straightforward joust or a headlong rush to flank. I'm guilty of it too at times. There's not a lot of maneuvering initially.

With everyone tied to Biggs, you're also tied to the least maneuverable ship. There's no wheeling about to face a flanker. That's why I don't see Biggs as "meta warping". A pain to be sure but not Babba Yaga.

1 hour ago, FlyingAnchors said:

so for 6 waves people cry " make secondary weapons good!" And now that secondaries are good, we need to remove them from the game?!

Don't give people what they want, give them what they need.

47 minutes ago, kris40k said:

I don't want to drag the thread off-topic but to answer this question:

In game terms, it certainly does matter if its Biggs soaking up the damage. While you are correct in the assumption that the idea is to kill points, what matters is that in most games (barring the occasional 100-0 tabling) is that you are trading ships/points. You are destroying their ships and they are destroying yours. What is important, and what can determine the outcome of a game, is what ships did you trade for what you take from them at the beginning of the game. Biggs allows your opponent the ability to destroy the most dangerous parts of your list while you must first destroy the least dangerous part of his. This sets the scene for the rest of the game and can win it in the first trade. Give the ability to stack defensive abilities on Biggs, and you start to warp the meta, and other lists must be able to deal with this boogeyman (ex. FRS) to be considered competitive in case it rears its face during a tournament.

Edit: Oh, and what really has started to "break things" is that the FRS list not only takes away target choice from a player via Biggs, its that it also takes away the ability to focus your fire by spreading damage, and can break the idea of trading ships, as damage is spread out amongst the enemies ships by their choice, allowing them to prevent losing anything at all in the initial trade.

I would argue Biggs is more precisely Rebel faction warping. I believe it's been said several times (or many more?) by the designers that he has to be taken into consideration for anything Rebels. So, from Day 1, the entire Rebel faction has been designed with Biggs in mind. A change to Biggs could have a devastating impact on the entire Rebel faction.

I agree that Biggs is a problem, but he's a really tough problem for the designers to solve.

2 hours ago, gennataos said:

I agree that Biggs is a problem, but he's a really tough problem for the designers to solve.

Nonsense, errata him to once per round, or only attackers at range one, or only attackers he has locked, or one of a myriad of other changes to make him less of an issue. Nerf biggs and the issue goes away, why they refuse to do this is baffling.

3 minutes ago, HolySorcerer said:

Nonsense, errata him to once per round, or only attackers at range one, or only attackers he has locked, or one of a myriad of other changes to make him less of an issue. Nerf biggs and the issue goes away, why they refuse to do this is baffling.

Whilst this is true, the hard part lies in adjusting the entire Rebel faction to balance them when Biggs works differently. At least, that's what I think the designers don't want to have to do.

2 hours ago, Stoneface said:

I understand about spreading damage around but we're talking about some less than agile ship's that are tethered to Biggs for protection. Control your first firing approach to limit the amount of damage that Biggs can soak up. I assume we're talking about Biggs, Pava, Lowrick and Rex, correct? One of the things I see at games in the FLGS is the lack of patient play in the initial approach. Sort of like cleaning a really dirty toilet. Get in and get it done. It's either they go for a straightforward joust or a headlong rush to flank. I'm guilty of it too at times. There's not a lot of maneuvering initially.

With everyone tied to Biggs, you're also tied to the least maneuverable ship. There's no wheeling about to face a flanker. That's why I don't see Biggs as "meta warping". A pain to be sure but not Babba Yaga.

FSR2 doesn't ever have to engage you if it doesn't want to. It's perfectly fine with fortressing in the corner and waiting to win on the 11 dice Final Salvo. The list is actually pretty terrible at killing anything but it doesn't really care. Either they Final Salvo on the 11 dice or they kill a single ship and run the game to time with all ships still left on the board by spreading damage across the whole list. It's a list that wins by abusing the 75 min format. The only reason it doesn't see that more success is because bombs are a pretty decent counter to it. Meanwhile Kanan/Biggs is seeing quite a resurgence since the multiple TLT attacks are a great counter to Nym and Miranda, it has enough HP to deal with bombs, and it absolutely dumpsters RAClo.

7 minutes ago, defkhan1 said:

FSR2 doesn't ever have to engage you if it doesn't want to. It's perfectly fine with fortressing in the corner and waiting to win on the 11 dice Final Salvo. The list is actually pretty terrible at killing anything but it doesn't really care. Either they Final Salvo on the 11 dice or they kill a single ship and run the game to time with all ships still left on the board by spreading damage across the whole list. It's a list that wins by abusing the 75 min format. The only reason it doesn't see that more success is because bombs are a pretty decent counter to it. Meanwhile Kanan/Biggs is seeing quite a resurgence since the multiple TLT attacks are a great counter to Nym and Miranda, it has enough HP to deal with bombs, and it absolutely dumpsters RAClo.

Never thought about fortressing. While a legal maneuver it's kind of sucky as a game tactic. I'd actually like to see that in action.

1 hour ago, defkhan1 said:

FSR2 doesn't ever have to engage you if it doesn't want to...Meanwhile Kanan/Biggs is seeing quite a resurgence since the multiple TLT attacks are a great counter to...and it absolutely dumpsters RAClo.

Ain't this just wonderful excrement smeared all over the mat. If you don't like the Super-Biggs-FR2 because it's a NPE, Fly Super-Biggs-Kanan-TLT to deal with it, that's not game bending or a NPE is it!?!

Good gravy.....uggggggg. Great game mechanic FFG. "Oh, you need to shoot through my large lumbering ship clogging up most of your ship's viewport and attack that spidery T-65 at range three behind it because, well, because it's fantastically thematic and fun! Then, I'll get my four TLT shots in and melt one of your ships. So go ahead, roll your 3 red dice." I'll just shake my head and put my ships back in their foam and say, "No mate, you can play someone else who actually hates his life. I want to have fun with my down-time. Cheers."

14 hours ago, TheHumanHydra said:

Frank: “The other thought I had was about how just the sheer number of people we have in OP. It’s, uh, not that many. We have way more game lines that are competitive that we need to keep tournament environments viable for than we actually have people in the Organized Play department. So, keep that in mind whenever you’re being like, ‘where’s all the other X-Wing [stuff?],’ because it’s just like, there aren’t enough people to really manage all the games.”

That last quote was really telling for me. It's been said in this thread already, but I think it's becoming clear that the X-Wing line* is understaffed. I think that player complaints ranging from unbalanced releases to the lack of a campaign box to even the infrequent articles all suggest this. For this reason, I think we can feel a lot of sympathy for Frank, Max, and Alex.

I'd like to stop, and redirect this thread to talk about this quote, which @TheHumanHydra pointed out. I think he's right, in addition to other problems, X-Wing seems under-staffed and under-supported.

What boggles my mind about this is: WHY.

WHY IS THE BIGGEST MINIATURES GAME IN THE WORLD STAFFED BY 3 GUYS WHO ARE HAVING TO SPLIT THEIR TIME BETWEEN OTHER GAMES??? WHAT THE F-WORD IS FFG DOING THAT THEY CAN'T SUPPORT THE BIGGEST MINIATURES GAME IN THE WORLD WITH A PROPER GAME BALANCE STAFF???

This seems nuts to me. NO WAY is GW staffing Warhammer 40,000 with 3 people- there's WAY too much content coming out of that place for it to be that small. So the question remains, WTF is FFG thinking to have such a pathetic excuse for a staff on THE BIGGEST MINIATURES GAME IN THE WORLD?

Its such a popular game. I feel bad for the Devs in some regards for how much work they're likely doing.

But...they aren't doing a lot of work.

At least for this game. Or if they are then it's misused or heroicly inefficient labor.

Everybody with a job does a lot of work. I mean ...if I could just tell my customers that after a year and a half I still can't do anything in a timely manner ....well....

A guy who is currently flying boshek on a hawk is designing this game now.

Maybe he's a nice guy. He probably is.and I'm trying not to trash the fella personally. But come on.

Maybe his rpg games are great and that's what he should be doing. But this probably isn't really the game for him to be building.

2 hours ago, Favoritism Flight Games said:

THE BIGGEST MINIATURES GAME IN THE WORLD?

Since when? Yes, X-Wing outperformed 40k in the US in retail channels. That does not capture the rest of the world and it does not capture internet purchases directly from GW.

17 hours ago, Veldrin said:

Came with great hope...

Left with a bad taste.

Excellent attempt by you Scum and Villainy guys, but we knew the tough questions couldn’t be asked or wouldn’t be answered.

It appears X-Wing is in passionate (the designers’) yet less than capable (FFG corporate model) hands.

I’m not even sure they are passionate about it at this time. Really all I hear is “we know it’s not perfect and never will be for all these reasons... so keep expecting much of the same”.

Passionate designers could work within the frame given to improve the game.

Passionate designers would not pass the buck buck up the ladder.

Passionate designers wouldnt contradict themselves selves so often in the game that they are “passionate” about.

It appears they like their jobs enough. It appears that they know things are wrong with the game. It appears like they might have been saying what we want to hear until this point.

As of Q1 2017?

1 hour ago, mxlm said:

Since when? Yes, X-Wing outperformed 40k in the US in retail channels. That does not capture the rest of the world and it does not capture internet purchases directly from GW.

https://icv2.com/articles/markets/view/38061/top-5-non-collectible-miniature-games-spring-2017

My biggest take-away from the interview is that they seem to be more focused on letting the game play out and just trying to maintain a reasonable variety of competitive options, regardless of whether that includes the more iconic ships that people might want to see. Basically, trying to keep it around the minimum level of balance necessary for a game to stay stable over time.

It's probably not what most people wanted to hear, but I understand where they are coming from at least and don't hold it against them, and it probably gives us a better idea of what to expect. Time to get on that community rebalance project :^)

19 hours ago, Velvetelvis said:

He didn't give the resistance bomber a crew slot...so...it...couldn't...take... Sabine.

Holy crap. I can’t believe I didn’t piece this together yet.

They made a ship that should obviously have crew, NOT have crew, because if they did, it could take one upgrade card that they were scared made it too strong.

The scary part? They were probably right. Sabine should not be on this ship.

The SCARIER part? They didn’t simply say “ya, let’s fix Sabine”.

The SCARIEST part? We have no idea what other design decisions this type of thinking impacted.

Which means we are at the point where their bad design decisions are now forcing them to make unthematic decisions to combat those bad decisions.

In short- they would rather design around their errors and give us a poorer product than attack those errors directly.

And yes, I do realize this may be piecing a puzzle together with only one piece, but man, it sure felt like this was what I heard. Or maybe it’s just what my mind is telling me what I did... my satisfaction with the game certainly is at an all time low, that’s for sure, so I’m not sure I can trust anything I believe anymore.

On 10/17/2017 at 9:22 AM, Kelvan said:

No my hope is dead on that.

I actually had a conversation on this. I don't think he'd be playable with the EPT for free at the same point cost nowadays.

I find your lack of faith ..............

@Kelvan if Horton had a free ept and could take Bomblets (via removing 'limited' on bomb loadout) would he be good?

Actually he would be pretty good if he could just get SLAM....

1 hour ago, Kdubb said:

The scary part? They were probably right. Sabine should not be on this ship.

The SCARIER part? They didn’t simply say “ya, let’s fix Sabine”.

Nor did they think "Sabine affects friendly bomb tokens regardless of the ship she's on.", which makes very little sense to me. Unless there is a Sabine nerf in the pipeline or they just don't know the game very well. The second option could well be the scariest part or equally as scary as your other conclusions.

11 hours ago, Gilarius said:

Whilst this is true, the hard part lies in adjusting the entire Rebel faction to balance them when Biggs works differently. At least, that's what I think the designers don't want to have to do.

Exactly. I mean the y-wings and b-wings would almost need an auto update to 2 agility. The t-65 maybe 3 agility, or 1 more hull or something.

2 hours ago, AngryAlbatross said:

@Kelvan if Horton had a free ept and could take Bomblets (via removing 'limited' on bomb loadout) would he be good?

Actually he would be pretty good if he could just get SLAM....

It would just be Miranda with predator at range 2-3. And she's doing well with out the old elite slot. I feel hortons strength likes in either alpha strike torps or tlt at medium- long range because he basically gets a free target lock re-roll.

i mean epts are good, and if it doesn't involve everyone's favorite astromech, which one would you take, also which astromech would you take instead? Does a free ept benefit Horton , and to what extent? Only reason I'm asking this is because we have two examples of strong ships (Miranda and nym) and one doesn't have an elite, and the other people are suggesting he lose his elite status. Other than just bumping Horton to ps 10, what other elite would he be worth running?

13 hours ago, ScummyRebel said:

I'd accept the first 3, but bomblet isn't bad.

It's the combination of the Scurrg chassis, the dial, and all of the upgrade slots on Nym. He'd be much less dastardly when you yank any one thing from him.

As soon as you remove Bomblet from Nym, he's nowhere near as powerful as he is now. I can tell you from experience he goes from A-grade to just being kinda meh. Don't take my word for it, go run Nym without bomblet and see if you still feel the same way.

Bomblet should have (at very least) been a dual-sided card. You drop it one turn, and it has to recharge the next turn.

13 hours ago, FlyingAnchors said:

so for 6 waves people cry " make secondary weapons good!" And now that secondaries are good, we need to remove them from the game?!

(Bombs definitely need to be toned down though)

There's a Goldilocks zone. You don't want secondary weapons to be binder fodder, like they were in the earlier waves, but you don't want them to dominate the game, like I'd argue they are now.

Bombs, Ordnance and Turrets should be a part of the game, but currently they are the game.

9 hours ago, Gilarius said:

Whilst this is true, the hard part lies in adjusting the entire Rebel faction to balance them when Biggs works differently. At least, that's what I think the designers don't want to have to do.

First of all, nobody is saying remove Biggs from the game entirely. All he needs is his ability toned down so that it's not utterly game-warping. Here's my example of a Biggs change:

• Biggs Darklighter:
• When a friendly ship at Range 1 is hit by an attack, you may suffer 1 of the uncancelled hit or critical results instead of the target ship.

Basically a better Draw their Fire. Biggs can protect your soft heavy-hitter, but your opponent still has options. You can approach him like normal and just focus Biggs down then move on to the ship he's protecting, or you can try and snipe the ship he's protecting knowing Biggs will split up that damage.

Also, I play plenty of lists that make use of K-wings, ARCs, Y-wings, and Ghosts, without bringing Biggs. The idea that you need Biggs to play the rebel faction is just not true.

9 hours ago, Stoneface said:

Never thought about fortressing. While a legal maneuver it's kind of sucky as a game tactic. I'd actually like to see that in action.

Against the FSR 2.0 you're really against the clock. I've seen good players approach it carefully, utterly outmanoeuvre it, and then still lose because they ran out of time and failed to kill enough/anything.

7 hours ago, Kelvan said:

Its such a popular game. I feel bad for the Devs in some regards for how much work they're likely doing.

To be clear, I think they do a pretty good job, especially as it seems they're just criminally understaffed. Plus it's just innately difficult trying to keep a bunch of obsessive nerds happy.

6 hours ago, Rakky Wistol said:

I’m not even sure they are passionate about it at this time. Really all I hear is “we know it’s not perfect and never will be for all these reasons... so keep expecting much of the same”.

Passionate designers could work within the frame given to improve the game.

Passionate designers would not pass the buck buck up the ladder.

Passionate designers wouldnt contradict themselves selves so often in the game that they are “passionate” about.

It appears they like their jobs enough. It appears that they know things are wrong with the game. It appears like they might have been saying what we want to hear until this point.

I just believe Max is the currently the only full time X-wing developer, while Alex and Frank are just there giving support or advice or working on the infrastructure or something. The credits in the latest expansion packs seem to imply this at least. Most if not all of them now list "Developed by Max Brooke, with Alex Davy and Frank Brooks"
So I guess Alex and Frank have moved on to other responsibilities while they still are somehow involved with X-wing to required a "with" in the credits.

They are involved in many different games, so it's not strange that they cannot micromanage X-wing as much as they did in the past.

From the interview, I also felt that Davy was feeling a bit bitter about the previous FAQ (the one with Palpatine nerf) being so much requested and then so much despised when the meta changed again after some new ships were released.
It could perfectly be that they aren't wanting to change anything with a new FAQ, that will be pointless or undone with the release of Guns for hire, wave XII and wave XIII, that are at the doorstep.

I’m floored at the amazing pitiful level of understanding the devs have regarding rules interactions and impact. Awesome models, clever game, and I get that competitive gamers will almost always grasp a game better than its designers, but man... sophisticated game theory this is not, or at least not anymore.

I get the distinct feeling that they’ve never even looked at something like echolocation for a ship and have no appreciation for how PS differences of 1 radically effect a unit.

Sad. But suddenly so much makes sense.

19 minutes ago, Lobokai said:

I’m floored at the amazing pitiful level of understanding the devs have regarding rules interactions and impact. Awesome models, clever game, and I get that competitive gamers will almost always grasp a game better than its designers, but man... sophisticated game theory this is not, or at least not anymore.

I get the distinct feeling that they’ve never even looked at something like echolocation for a ship and have no appreciation for how PS differences of 1 radically effect a unit.

Sad. But suddenly so much makes sense.

I think you're being unduly harsh in your criticism of the developers. My take on the interview was they no longer have the time to devote to the game because of other commitments that were forced upon them.

I have no knowledge of the time frame that they're slave to but considering the frequency of releases I imagine they've pulled many long nights. I also got the impression that they weren't happy about the situation that was probably forced upon them.

Adding new content and trying to keep it fresh and different enough is no easy task considering how big X-wing is.

You're right about a one PS level making a big difference but that's been true from day one. There are a lot of strong builds that "PS killed" just by facing the wrong opponent. That's a game mechanic that can be considered flawed, for lack of a better word. Especially when coupled with post maneuver relocation.

I don't have answers to the problems X-wing has concerning balanced play. I don't know if there are good solutions. I do know that a lot of suggestions brought up on the forums are pretty bad. They are a self-serving attempt to make "X" good again rather than truly trying to balance the game.