8 hours ago, Darth Meanie said:

My favorite ship (Squint) has been dead for pretty much the entire game, so my only real gripe about ordnance is that Proton Torpedoes are junk and of course, lore wise, I want them to not be junk.

I'm not concerned about the meta at all, I was just curious what some opinions might be.

Mostly, I got the answer I wanted: when I kit out a single ship to be "effective," these days 40 points is the going rate. About double what it used to be, I 'spect.

Not really. For the star ships it's going to be 40ish (Poe, Qd, Miranda, etc), but there are a number of useful ships in the sub 30 range that might not win a game on their own, but are integral to success (Jess Pava, Omega Leader and Gunboats off the top of my head).

12 minutes ago, Stay On The Leader said:

Alpha strikes work well at high points costs as you can hurl 100pts of ship at one ships defences and overwhelm them. As points limits drop that ratio of focusing offense onto a single point becomes manageable for the defender.

I'm not convinced it's true. Two high PS aces with Harpoons would be able to kill one of the opponent ships in 1-1.5 rounds (i.e. PS kill it early round 2) and losing a ship would matter more in a 90pts game.

45 minutes ago, PT106 said:

I'm not convinced it's true. Two high PS aces with Harpoons would be able to kill one of the opponent ships in 1-1.5 rounds (i.e. PS kill it early round 2) and losing a ship would matter more in a 90pts game.

But the likelihood of it happening drops faster the importance of it happening increases. You can bring your alpha squad but the more % of your points are invested in that alpha the less effective you are outside it, where other players who adapt to the reduced points cost by just dropping to cheaper generic ships should do better.

B-Wings are better at 90pt games than at 100pt games, for example. Your 8 hull lasts longer with less focused incoming fire so you can extract more offensive value. The game has seen vastly increased dice mod efficiency within a 100pt squad which has pushed out a lot of ships that can't compete and just PS die without adding value. Reducing points value forces the upgrade-heavy players to abandon or compromise on their efficiency, re-balancing the importance of stat lines vs upgrade options back towards what it once was.

8 hours ago, Marinealver said:

I wish they would errata TLT to be ineffective against reinforced sections. I know now with the "Aztec" wookie gunship it is there but such rules will put emphasis on getting on the non reinforced side.

I haven’t had enough tea yet this year to understand what you’re actually asking for....confused.

3 hours ago, MasterShake2 said:

Not really. For the star ships it's going to be 40ish (Poe, Qd, Miranda, etc), but there are a number of useful ships in the sub 30 range that might not win a game on their own, but are integral to success (Jess Pava, Omega Leader and Gunboats off the top of my head).

Yeah, OK, fine, there is a range. But if I build a 40 point primary I'm probably not overloading one ship with too many upgrades.

4 hours ago, FTS Gecko said:

...well, to be fair the year is only around 36 hours old where we are, so give it time

You beat me to it. Thank goodness there is a lot more time for someone to be more stoopid than me in 2018.

5 hours ago, Stay On The Leader said:

This is literally the most idiotic comment I've read all year. WTF is this even supposed to mean?

It means what I said up above in line 1. Thanks for all the help, you're a real sweetie.

2 minutes ago, Darth Meanie said:

Yeah, OK, fine, there is a range. But if I build a 40 point primary I'm probably not overloading one ship with too many upgrades.

...I think the issue you're having with a lot of the replies here is probably down to the concept of limiting yourself to a certain points range.

Maybe try not to think about it as a case of "how many upgrades can I fit in at or around 40 points" but instead "what upgrades do I need to take to make this pilot as effective as possible"? I'm not saying never the twain shall meet, but generally restricting your build options by imposing an artificial points limit isn't the best bad idea.

Take Miranda, for example (no, please, take her, dear God, take her) - you can quite easily fill every slot on her and it won't be a bad thing, because she can be a very difficult fortress to take down and you're not giving up half points if she ends the game on one health. So there's no point thinking "right, what can I put of Miranda for 40 points" when you can instead think "how do I keep her threat level up and alive for the endgame" instead.

I used to do a similar thing myself with "modular lists" - i.e., I can take two 20 point Cartel Marauders and a Mangler Scyk, then I've got 40 points left for a Scum ace or YV-666. It ended up being frustrating, because you always found yourself needing just a couple of points more for the upgrades you really wanted or needed. Filler's called filler for a reason, build your pilots the best you can, then fit support ships in around them.

30 minutes ago, Darth Meanie said:

You beat me to it. Thank goodness there is a lot more time for someone to be more stoopid than me in 2018.

That was the joke.

On the plus side you've now got the top two slots sewn up, not just one.

55 minutes ago, FTS Gecko said:

...I think the issue you're having with a lot of the replies here is probably down to the concept of limiting yourself to a certain points range.

I think the issue I'm having is I accidentally said this:

16 hours ago, Darth Meanie said:

So, assuming a well-tricked out ship is 40 points these days, is 100 points a silly cap??

and so now I'm getting the DON'T YOU DARE TOUCH MY META beat down.

14 minutes ago, Darth Meanie said:

I think the issue I'm having is I accidentally said this:

and so now I'm getting the DON'T YOU DARE TOUCH MY META beat down.

You're getting the "what the fudgecicle are you even talking about, who thinks like this?" beatdown.

6 hours ago, FTS Gecko said:

...well, to be fair the year is only around 36 hours old where we are, so give it time

Hold my beer.

53 minutes ago, Darth Meanie said:

I think the issue I'm having is I accidentally said this:

and so now I'm getting the DON'T YOU DARE TOUCH MY META beat down.

More like...

You: So 40 points!

Everyone else: Well, it's more complicated than that, there's a wide variety of viable cost ranges and ships counts. If you look at...

You: Let me stop you right there, I heard someone say 40 points

Everyone else: You said that

You: Whatever, someone said it and that's what's important. So 40 points it is, glad I was right all along!

Everyone else: Ummmmm...

20 minutes ago, Makaze said:

More like...

You: So 40 points!

Everyone else: Well, it's more complicated than that, there's a wide variety of viable cost ranges and ships counts. If you look at...

You: Let me stop you right there, I heard someone say 40 points

Everyone else: You said that

You: Whatever, someone said it and that's what's important. So 40 points it is, glad I was right all along!

Everyone else: Ummmmm...

Or, maybe from my POV:

Me: So 40 points isn't a bad build size.

Everyone else: Well, it's more complicated than that, there's a wide variety of viable cost ranges and ships counts. If you look at...

Me: Yeah, but at 40 points I'm not doing something atypical in list building.

Everyone else: Listen, you not making this nearly complicated enough. Once you factor in all the list archetypes, waves of meta, evolution of the game blah blah blah

Me: So 40 points it is, cuz I really just wanted a simplistic answer.

Everyone else: What a moron.

Yeah, at this point I'm pretty sorry I asked.

That's something we can all agree on.

3 hours ago, clanofwolves said:

I haven’t had enough tea yet this year to understand what you’re actually asking for....confused.

Yeah you are probably right, there is no way to errata TLT to be ineffective against reinforce. If only reinforce was cancel 1 damage instead of add 1 evade. Works the same but against ion and TLT it negates the cancel all and deal 1 damage. The work around is simple attack the side not reinforced or use something other than TLT.

You: 40 points

Me: anywhere from 14 to 63 points

You: so 40 points

Me: no

13 minutes ago, thespaceinvader said:

You: 40 points

Me: anywhere from 14 to 63 points

You: so 40 points

Me: no

(14 + 15 +16 +17 +18 +19 +20 +21 +22 +23 +24+ 25 + 26 + 27 + 28 + 29 + 30 + 31 +32 + 33 +34 +35 + 36 + 37 +38 + 39 + 40 + 41 +42 + 43 + 44 + 45 + 46 + 47 + 48 +49 + 50 +51 + 52 + 53 + 54 + 55 + 56 + 57 +58 + 59 + 60 +61 + 62 + 63) / 49 = 39.28571428571429.

So, let's say 40 points.

2 hours ago, Darth Meanie said:

Me: I really just wanted a simplistic answer.

Everyone else: What a moron.

You basically got what you asked for.

My answer to a tragically toxic thread- there’s no 100 point cap in Epic. Play more Epic, and concerns over viable ships for a 100 point list are gone, and so is the annoying argument over what ship or upgrade is OP in the current meta. You enjoy Epic. Play Epic.

Thats my solution to the quandary of not enjoying a game nearly as much with 2-3 ships per side.

(Disclosure- I play Epic by preference, so some bias may be present in this post.)

22 minutes ago, Darth Meanie said:

(14 + 15 +16 +17 +18 +19 +20 +21 +22 +23 +24+ 25 + 26 + 27 + 28 + 29 + 30 + 31 +32 + 33 +34 +35 + 36 + 37 +38 + 39 + 40 + 41 +42 + 43 + 44 + 45 + 46 + 47 + 48 +49 + 50 +51 + 52 + 53 + 54 + 55 + 56 + 57 +58 + 59 + 60 +61 + 62 + 63) / 49 = 39.28571428571429.

So, let's say 40 points.

Let's not.

27 minutes ago, Darth Meanie said:

(14 + 15 +16 +17 +18 +19 +20 +21 +22 +23 +24+ 25 + 26 + 27 + 28 + 29 + 30 + 31 +32 + 33 +34 +35 + 36 + 37 +38 + 39 + 40 + 41 +42 + 43 + 44 + 45 + 46 + 47 + 48 +49 + 50 +51 + 52 + 53 + 54 + 55 + 56 + 57 +58 + 59 + 60 +61 + 62 + 63) / 49 = 39.28571428571429.

So, let's say 40 points.

This thread is hilarious

I choose to believe that everyone is goofing around and having fun with each other.

1 hour ago, MarekMandalore said:

My answer to a tragically toxic thread- there’s no 100 point cap in Epic. Play more Epic, and concerns over viable ships for a 100 point list are gone, and so is the annoying argument over what ship or upgrade is OP in the current meta. You enjoy Epic. Play Epic.

Thats my solution to the quandary of not enjoying a game nearly as much with 2-3 ships per side.

(Disclosure- I play Epic by preference, so some bias may be present in this post.)

Ironically, the reason I started this thread is that I am playing Epic , but right now the players are new so they want to keep the lists small--100 points--as they learn the game. So, for me, I'm stuck building a small list, despite having a dozen ships in total in play on game night.

OTOH, for me, the fun part has been having only 3-4 ships to worry about, so I have been able to explore the aces a bit more over the generics. I put together an Echo list, and Echo came out over 40 points. Seemed a lot for one little starfighter. I wondered it this was typical. Then, this thread happened.

At least @GreenDragoon was entertained.

Out of interest, why didn't you actually ask that question? If you'd asked whether it's normal for a Phantom ac to cost 40 points, we'd probably have said 'sure, it's a little on the high side of normal, but it's by no means unheard of'.

22 hours ago, thespaceinvader said:

Yup.

The game is fine at 100 points.

If you want more ships, you have to have worse ships. That's how it's always been.

If you're concerned that the balance is towards lower ship counts, blame harpoons and other autodamage for killing swarms.

On 1/1/2018 at 6:22 PM, Darth Meanie said:

So, I have been playing now with some new players, and while we play teams (so 200 points per side), we each bring 100 point lists.

As an EpicWinger, I'm not used to being so constrained, point-wise

I'm pretty sure XWM is down to a 2-3 ship-per-list meta. So, my question (finally) is what is the average point-build for a single ship these days?

I'm guessing it's gotta be in the 40-50 point range.

And, thus, I begin to ruminate if 100 points is getting a little too restrictive. . .

i dont know anyone who likes 100 points. we do 120 for small game and 150 for large. we also banned toilet seats and certain ordinance, which helps the game a lot. too many ships just dont work against alpha strike bull for it to be a healthy part of the game, so removing that lets swarms back in and makes for some stupid-fun games. Boba fett plus tie swarm versus Tugboat n scyks pals? yeah, do it! with missiles off the table you can actually play a hawk or b-wing ace, and at 150 points the range is between 3 aces and 12 swarmlings... lot of variety

2 hours ago, thespaceinvader said:

Out of interest, why didn't you actually ask that question? If you'd asked whether it's normal for a Phantom ac to cost 40 points, we'd probably have said 'sure, it's a little on the high side of normal, but it's by no means unheard of'.

Because I fly a lot of stuff. Like, usually, never the same thing twice. Thus, it would not have answered my question, because I'm not just curious about a Phantom build--that's just the one that got me thinking. What I want to know is, when listbuilding, is 40 points cray cray for a StarViper? A vaksai? Any PS 9 Ace with all the fixings?

I think of 50 points as something large base sized and 25 points for the little guys. Obviously, that's outmoded.

When I'm building for Epic, I want my full-tricked-out, mid-level EPT generics to fall out at 20-25 points, 33 max for a Glaive Defender. When I spend more, it's usually on a large ship. So 40+ points seems like a ton to spend on a handful of hull and shields.

I was pretty satisfied with the first couple answers, but then I felt attacked and got aggressive-defensive. My apologies.

1 hour ago, Vontoothskie said:

i dont know anyone who likes 100 points. we do 120 for small game and 150 for large. we also banned toilet seats and certain ordinance, which helps the game a lot. too many ships just dont work against alpha strike bull for it to be a healthy part of the game , so removing that lets swarms back in and makes for some stupid-fun games. Boba fett plus tie swarm versus Tugboat n scyks pals? yeah, do it! with missiles off the table you can actually play a hawk or b-wing ace, and at 150 points the range is between 3 aces and 12 swarmlings... lot of variety

IMHO, the problem is we went from this:

to these:

Half the cost, fully modifiable 5 dice (without requiring 2 actions and the perfect maneuver to get you at R1) that really aren't that hard to set up with the right maneuver or the right chassis.

Chips didn't break ordnance (as I've seen some claim); the ordnance broke ordnance.

I like that missiles are torpedoes are a thing, and I think that alpha strikes should have a place in the game, but in a couple waves we went from "That's Impossible" to "All Too Easy."