8 minutes ago, geek19 said:

My counter to that argument is that it's unfun/boring/whatever as well to play against Demolisher at all, or Yavaris getting to unload B wings into me. Why don't we nerf THOSE?

Reductio ad absurdum, of course.

My counter argument is it's my opinion. If you don't agree with it, you can write about it in your blog and plug it everywhere.

6 minutes ago, xanderf said:

Well, personally, *I* find it un-fun to play against Rebels when they bring more than 200 pts against my 400 pt fleet. We should change that rule, too. (Since we are, apparently, arbitrarily deciding on what is 'fun' or not based on personal opinions, rather than on any kind of objective data such as win rates/balance/meta - and obviously nobody can have differences of opinion on what is 'fun' or not, so this should be easy to do!)

Same goes for you.

These are my subjective feelings on the matter and I'm not deciding what is fun for anyone here. Clearly no one knows how to ******* read.

On 10/25/2017 at 1:56 PM, Undeadguy said:

And now people will come and refute my OPINION on how the game is perfect.

4 minutes ago, Darth Sanguis said:

I told you man. Everything is full circle now.

Just like the forums. The quarterly FAQ debate is at an end.

49 minutes ago, geek19 said:

My counter to that argument is that it's unfun/boring/whatever as well to play against Demolisher at all, or Yavaris getting to unload B wings into me. Why don't we nerf THOSE?

Reductio ad absurdum, of course.

Well, Demo WAS nerfed

And Yav is just stupid good and really deserves a swing with the nerf-bat

(it's also WAY over-represented in rebel squad builds)

46 minutes ago, Undeadguy said:

My counter argument is it's my opinion. If you don't agree with it, you can write about it in your blog and plug it everywhere.

Same goes for you.

These are my subjective feelings on the matter and I'm not deciding what is fun for anyone here. Clearly no one knows how to ******* read.

Saying "I don't have fun playing lists that do this" is an opinion, and you are perfectly entitled to that.

What you said, though, was "I don't have fun playing lists that do this, and the game should be changed so that nobody else can do it either" ...surely, you understand that is going to get a reaction, as it's more than an opinion.

I think this thread needs a hug.

Isn’t it called ‘We’re all fine here?’

27 minutes ago, xanderf said:

Saying "I don't have fun playing lists that do this" is an opinion, and you are perfectly entitled to that.

What you said, though, was "I don't have fun playing lists that do this, and the game should be changed so that nobody else can do it either" ...surely, you understand that is going to get a reaction, as it's more than an opinion.

Actually they are both opinions. I'm not treating them as facts, nor am I saying the game is entirely broken because of ET rams.

Ramming as a mechanic is just clunky. It's been discussed before how FFG really missed on a neat interaction when you run into another ship. ET Ram just makes a clunky interaction unbearable because you can do 2 points of damage without attacking. Because of that, I think ET should exhaust when you overlap a ship. I don't care about the stats. I don't care if you like it or not. I don't like it and that's literally all the reason I need to want for it to change. Not like this is a brand new concept. People have asked for changes in the past before and this is the exact reaction that I anticipated. You get a bunch of people who think that game is perfect and tell everyone else how the game shouldn't be changed because of your POV.

It's not like FFG will change ET because I said it on the forums. And they don't accept unsolicited advice on their games. It's unlikely the mechanic and interaction will change and I've already accepted that.

Just now, durandal343 said:

I think this thread needs a hug.

Isn’t it called ‘We’re all fine here?’

Don't touch me. I bite.

55 minutes ago, Green Knight said:

And Yav is just stupid good and really deserves a swing with the nerf-bat

(it's also WAY over-represented in rebel squad builds)

Does that mean Yavaris needs a nerf, or just that rebels need an alternative? Or both at once?

8 hours ago, Truthiness said:

Except there is no empirical evidence to suggest it's broken. ET ramming isn't even close to prominent. It never was. Rhymer was. He was in every single Imperial squadron list. The only reason to change it is you dislike it. Just because you dislike it, doesn't mean it shouldn't be allowed. It me, it thematically represents a ship gunning its engines just before impact.

The hilarious part of this is I'm not doing CRambos anymore because they're too inefficient. I'm still doing ETs, but I'm doing it with TRC90s. TRCs shoot ships, ETs take care of flotillas, maybe finish off the last couple points of damage on a big ship, and most importantly give me absurd speed, flexibility, and manueverability with Madine. I don't bring RBDs. I'm also the only idiot crazy enough to be doing this. Nobody else is using this. You why? Because it doesn't need fixing.

Rhymer is, sorry, was broken because he was "always" in Imperial squad builds.

So what about Yavaris? I mean your metric of always being taken can be applied here no?

4 hours ago, TheEasternKing said:

Rhymer is, sorry, was broken because he was "always" in Imperial squad builds.

So what about Yavaris? I mean your metric of always being taken can be applied here no?

I was actually wondering about this and I will agree that it IS pretty strong. Not all Rebel squadron builds (hashtag not all Rebels) take it, @JJs Juggernaut and his Worlds build didn't have it, for instance. The question is whether or not it's warping the meta, and I honestly don't know.

There's always refutations whenever I postulate that Nebulons are decent, especially the Salvation. What it comes down to, though, is that if you have the option of 3 Red and 2 blue (concentrate fire on QBTs) where crits count double vs 3 red, and then 4 or 6 blue/black dice, which one is stronger? Yes, they have to be in range of you. That's not a difficult thing to do, realistically, thanks to FCT and Flight Commander. I think we can all agree that all dice being equal, one giant shot of 10 dice isnt as good as 5 individual shots of 2 dice. Yavaris > Salvation, though I swear Salvation is good TOO.

If you nerf it, though, what do Rebels do for squadrons? I mean, yes, rebuild, obviously, but Gallant Haven is a bunker more than a pusher, Independence is a launcher more than a pusher (man, I miss running it. I haven't done that in a while) and the Pelta CAN, but to get ALMOST equal firepower out of it, you have to put Expanded Hangar Bays AND take 4 total B-wings (and you're still down a B-wing attack, even if you have Raymus and a token for a total of 5 of them). That doesn't kill ISDs nearly as well as Yavaris. Yes, it might be trading itself for the ISD, but that's a trade any Rebel will make (side note: it's also SIGNIFICANTLY MORE points heavy, which is why you don't see it).

The other issue is that it isn't that Yavaris itself is broken; it's Yavaris and Norra near 3 B-wings (or Wedge and Dutch repeated, of course). Here's 6 chances at 3-4 potential damage, with BCC and Toryn rerolls (because of course you have those nearby) pretty much almost guaranteeing 12 damage min! You'd be crazy NOT to! It's a rickety Rube Goldberg machine that stumbles (but doesnt fall) if Toryn or the BCC die, but those things are really just helping the 3 (really 6) B-wing attacks, which means you need to kill Yavaris. It's not the strongest chassis, but it'll take out a LOT before it goes. Yeah, i invested ~150-odd points into this combo. This combo that can basically be anywhere and attack anything, it's really just tied to being Medium from Yavaris and maybe 3 from Toryn/5 from the BCC. It's in a lot of trouble when Yavaris goes down, of course, which is why Yav gets protected so much. But a Demolisher rolling up on Yav and/or ABT can evaporate it, as does repeated fire into it.

The other issue I run into is how you would go about nerfing it; if you say "no tokens" then what happens with Leia? Does she fake work because its a fake token? I don't know if you want to start a "no norra and yav in the same list" policy, as that just seems kinda crazy specific to me. "only works on single dice bomber attacks" could work, but then why do i ever take B-wings? HOW do I ever take them successfully? Theoretically you say something like "you can have one squadron give up an attack to have another attack again" so here comes my B-wings and Z95s list, woooooooo pbbbbbt.

Rebels in general have some "auto-include" titles that are already beating Demolisher in terms of taken-ness. When's the last time you saw a (non-Mothma) Foresight? Or a CR90 title that wasn't Jaina's Light (i have dumb other Raddus plans, but that's me)? I can joke about how much I hate Demolisher, but you ever see a titled VSD? The TITLES may be auto-includes, but i don't know if the ships are; as has been mentioned, Rhymer was in EVERY bomber list. Rieekan was the entire top 8 or so at one point. Is Yavaris in every top Rebel list? Not necessarily (Hi Ackbar, Cracken, I see you over there). Is it in a majority? Oh, yes, i can't disagree with you there. I just don't know what you DO about that.... but luckily, I'm not the Armada game designer.

I can see Vader Boarding Team carving the nameplate off it next wave, but is that enough? And you got into close range of it with a Raider or an ISD, Vader carved its name off, and it didnt DIE? Not to be mean, but how badly did you roll? (Or its under Rieekan, of course)

Followup to my last post: Based on the following

Is the issue Yavaris or still Rieekan Yavaris?

On 10/27/2017 at 10:43 PM, geek19 said:

When's the last time you saw a (non-Mothma) Foresight

but but but.... I use it all the time with sato....

On 10/27/2017 at 9:27 PM, geek19 said:

Followup to my last post: Based on the following

Is the issue Yavaris or still Rieekan Yavaris?

I see five Yavaris lists there, three with Rieekan and two with Dodonna. So, probably not Rieekan so much as just that it's good with Rebel bombers, which... duh.

Out of... what, 30 or so lists? That doesn't really seem like much of an issue to me, particularly coming off of having been a dominant list (and thus likely to have a number of people still playing it just because it's what they're most comfortable with).

16 minutes ago, Ardaedhel said:

I see five Yavaris lists there, three with Rieekan and two with Dodonna. So, probably not Rieekan so much as just that it's good with Rebel bombers, which... duh.

Out of... what, 30 or so lists? That doesn't really seem like much of an issue to me, particularly coming off of having been a dominant list (and thus likely to have a number of people still playing it just because it's what they're most comfortable with).

Out of 13 Rebel lists - almost half. And what seems like 100% of rebel bomber lists. Not at "nerf" levels, but "Rebels need an alternative" levels...?

(Of course, they might indirectly or directly tweak some part of the Yavaris setup to make room for said alternative)

5 minutes ago, svelok said:

Out of 13 Rebel lists - almost half. And what seems like 100% of rebel bomber lists. Not at "nerf" levels, but "Rebels need an alternative" levels...?

(Of course, they might indirectly or directly tweak some part of the Yavaris setup to make room for said alternative)

By that same token, Ackbar is in a bunch of MC80 lists. Does he need a nerf? (I might actually be inclined to say yes, as he's sorta restricting Rebel design space now).

I DO agree that a viable alternative would be nice though, but @JJs Juggernaut did prove one exists. It may not be in that same form anymore, but it's still a thing.

1 minute ago, geek19 said:

By that same token, Ackbar is in a bunch of MC80 lists. Does he need a nerf? (I might actually be inclined to say yes, as he's sorta restricting Rebel design space now).

I DO agree that a viable alternative would be nice though, but @JJs Juggernaut did prove one exists. It may not be in that same form anymore, but it's still a thing.

Ackbar is very expensive at 38 points and restrictive though to side arcs. Though I kinda get what your saying with the Rebel Design space. Same thing was happening to Rieekan too.

23 minutes ago, geek19 said:

By that same token, Ackbar is in a bunch of MC80 lists. Does he need a nerf? (I might actually be inclined to say yes, as he's sorta restricting Rebel design space now).

Probably, yeah.

I'll be specific and say that what I mean by "nerf" isn't strictly "an errata that makes it worse", but could simply be a new ship/squadron/upgrade that shifts the meta, or any other indirect change. Ex; Yavaris pairs better with B-Wings and aces than with Y-Wings and generics, so anything that pushes the Rebel meta towards the latter would see fewer of the ship fielded. Errata like we got for Rieekan, Rhymer, et.al., is only necessary in extreme cases, imo - where a particular imbalance has been stubborn to squash or is ridiculously omnipresent.

Ackbar MC80s seem to be showing up at top tables despite a pretty high degree of list variety (from MC80+5 flotillas to two MC80s, bid for 2nd with strategic to no squadrons, etc), so it probably is a good candidate for some sort of adjustment - it doesn't seem like there's an interplay of various pieces working in tandem to elevate it, like you mentioned with Yavaris up-thread. It's just a bit too good of a beatstick, seems like.

3 minutes ago, svelok said:

It's just a bit too good of a beatstick, seems like.

The only point I want to make (and I'm not dismissing your argument, mind you) is that without the data from the rest of the tournament, we can't really know how prevalent Yavaris is AND whether it is too good. Whether it's good isn't in doubt, but whether it's so good (OG Rhymer, Rieekan) that it's warping the meta is something FFG determines. We can all have bias based on our opponents in a tournament or 2 or 3, but we'd really need to look at a large overall picture to see if something is warping things or not.

Right now, based off a different discussion or two, I agree with you on the "needing viable alternatives" but I don't think it needs a nerf, Ackbar or Yavaris.

32 minutes ago, svelok said:

Out of 13 Rebel lists - almost half. And what seems like 100% of rebel bomber lists. Not at "nerf" levels, but "Rebels need an alternative" levels...?

5/13 = 38%. That's not really that close to half. And that's all of the Yavaris lists in the top two, not Rieekan Yavaris. Which means almost 2/3 of Rebel lists did not bring Yavaris at all, and over 3/4 didn't take Rieekan with it... Indicates to me that we do have an alternative.

I'm not opposed to more options for rebel bomber builds, mind you (I'm all for more variety)--I just don't know that even Yavaris is particularly too prevalent right now.

I personally suspect that there are other rebel squadron builds out there that were eclipsed by the Rieekan Ace Holes up to this point that might start seeing more table time now... But that's nothing but speculation.

50 minutes ago, geek19 said:

Right now, based off a different discussion or two, I agree with you on the "needing viable alternatives" but I don't think it needs a nerf, Ackbar or Yavaris.

43 minutes ago, Ardaedhel said:

I personally suspect that there are other rebel squadron builds out there that were eclipsed by the Rieekan Ace Holes up to this point that might start seeing more table time now... But that's nothing but speculation.

I am a card-carrying member of the "wait and see approach" to balancing group, so no disagreements here.

I am perfectly happy waiting for regionals/nationals/worlds season to end, and/or for the Wave VII meta adjustment, before advocating for any changes.

2 hours ago, geek19 said:

By that same token, Ackbar is in a bunch of MC80 lists. Does he need a nerf? (I might actually be inclined to say yes, as he's sorta restricting Rebel design space now).

I know you and I have talked about this before, but the adding a straight-up 2 red dice to side arc attacks presents extreme possible balance problems for Rebel ships in a world where Ackbar exists (even though I grant he is expensive). It is going to really constrain Rebel ship design space as one of the first questions posed is always going to be "does Ackbar break this like crazy?" I would've much preferred a less expensive cost and some kind of side arcs reroll ability so it scaled more or less to the ship (being better on more expensive ships with larger batteries).

More immediately relevant to the topic, I don't think Ackbar is worthy of a nerf or errata but I can see FFG eventually giving him one when they're tired of having to always consider whether Ackbar and some new ship they came up with would break the game or not (or God forbid they misfire and Ackbar spamming new "cheapo Rebel red dice side arcs ship" becomes the new meta). I can't think of any other commander that would merit even half as much design-space concern and that just has to be tiring, one would think. Right?

17 hours ago, Snipafist said:

I know you and I have talked about this before, but the adding a straight-up 2 red dice to side arc attacks presents extreme possible balance problems for Rebel ships in a world where Ackbar exists (even though I grant he is expensive). It is going to really constrain Rebel ship design space as one of the first questions posed is always going to be "does Ackbar break this like crazy?" I would've much preferred a less expensive cost and some kind of side arcs reroll ability so it scaled more or less to the ship (being better on more expensive ships with larger batteries).

More immediately relevant to the topic, I don't think Ackbar is worthy of a nerf or errata but I can see FFG eventually giving him one when they're tired of having to always consider whether Ackbar and some new ship they came up with would break the game or not (or God forbid they misfire and Ackbar spamming new "cheapo Rebel red dice side arcs ship" becomes the new meta). I can't think of any other commander that would merit even half as much design-space concern and that just has to be tiring, one would think. Right?

They could always limit him based on ship size? I think that might be a good option.

1 minute ago, TallGiraffe said:

They could always limit him based on ship size? I think that might be a good option.

I don't think so, as MC30s would be caught in the blast radius if you disallowed his effect on small-based ships. Plus I don't think he's particularly busted on CR90s, either. Basically he's okay-ish now but he presents potential problems for future releases. Can you imagine FFG giving Rebels something like an Arquitens? With Ackbar around, I sure can't.

Just now, Snipafist said:

I don't think so, as MC30s would be caught in the blast radius if you disallowed his effect on small-based ships. Plus I don't think he's particularly busted on CR90s, either. Basically he's okay-ish now but he presents potential problems for future releases. Can you imagine FFG giving Rebels something like an Arquitens? With Ackbar around, I sure can't.

The only thing I see it is no weapon teams on alot of future ships with decent side arcs.