please DO nerf harpoons

By Vontoothskie, in X-Wing

Personal favourites? My favourite three are the T-65 X-wing, TIE Defender and Protectorate Starfighter. Only the X-wing gets a really significant buff, which is totally in line with its Defender equivalent and very reasonable (few green maneuvers- none at speed 3 - mean an inherent vulnerability to stress).

Note that the YT-2400 one is a title , meaning no Outrider with it, meaning an essentially arc-based fighter.

I just spam them out to illustrate how easy it is to brainstorm fixes - and it'd only take a game or two to figure out if they're really broken, or just pre-nerf NyManda broken, who a large amount of people argue very heatedly was totally not OP. So long as one list is made Op by FFG, they might as well make everything from waves 1-6 that everyone actually recognises OP as well.

Syndrome Incredibles  - When Everything is OP Nothing is

Heck, you could double the hull and shield values of the T-65 and it still wouldn't be as good as Poe, let alone Nym/Miranda...

9 hours ago, Astech said:

Heck, you could double the hull and shield values of the T-65 and it still wouldn't be as good as Poe, let alone Nym/Miranda...

6 Hull 4 shield agi 2, IA, choice of mech. Sounds pretty good to me. Wedge, BB-8, PTL, EU, or go VI if you absolutely need that PS 11. I’m pretty sure he could stay around long enough to put the hurt on a list.

9 minutes ago, GrimmyV said:

6 Hull 4 shield agi 2, IA, choice of mech. Sounds pretty good to me. Wedge, BB-8, PTL, EU, or go VI if you absolutely need that PS 11. I’m pretty sure he could stay around long enough to put the hurt on a list.

Heh, Wes Janson, VI, FAA, IA with ten hp? Sign me up!

12 minutes ago, GrimmyV said:

6 Hull 4 shield agi 2, IA , choice of mech. Sounds pretty good to me. Wedge , BB-8 , PTL , EU , or go VI if you absolutely need that PS 11. I’m pretty sure he could stay around long enough to put the hurt on a list.

2 minutes ago, SabineKey said:

Heh, Wes Janson, VI, FAA, IA with ten hp? Sign me up!

Well, NyManda will do 7-8 damage right off the bad, and laugh at your piddly 3-die attacks. Next turn you take two TLTs and a ship is dead. That's not even factoring bombs into the equation. Nu,Nu,Nu + QD will probably wipe one off the board on the first turn, taking 4-5 damage in return.

A single stress token ruins their maneuverability, and two stress takes them out of the game.

But that's not really the point. The suggestion of doubling two of the X-wing's stats isn't met with cries of "OP", it's met with eagerness. Because the power creep has become so bad that it wouldn't even be a problem.

In one of the earlier VASSAL tournaments, Combat Retrofit (Transport expansion) was available as a mod for X-wings. (It wasn't enough.)

14 minutes ago, Astech said:

Well, NyManda will do 7-8 damage right off the bad, and laugh at your piddly 3-die attacks. Next turn you take two TLTs and a ship is dead. That's not even factoring bombs into the equation. Nu,Nu,Nu + QD will probably wipe one off the board on the first turn, taking 4-5 damage in return.

A single stress token ruins their maneuverability, and two stress takes them out of the game.

But that's not really the point. The suggestion of doubling two of the X-wing's stats isn't met with cries of "OP", it's met with eagerness. Because the power creep has become so bad that it wouldn't even be a problem.

I think you are ignoring what else could be in the list with the t-65. Properly built, someone like Wes with the likes of Poe and Finn can be a big thorn in the side of ordinance users, making those turn one deletions unlikely. Yeah, Wes is likely to die, but that doesn't mean he can't be of good use. And that's even with standard T-65.

i didn't call "OP" on a double health T-65 because it's a ridiculous idea that wouldn't happen. Even so, I thought that your declaration of it still being useless was reaching.

51 minutes ago, SabineKey said:

I think you are ignoring what else could be in the list with the t-65. Properly built, someone like Wes with the likes of Poe and Finn can be a big thorn in the side of ordinance users, making those turn one deletions unlikely. Yeah, Wes is likely to die, but that doesn't mean he can't be of good use. And that's even with standard T-65.

i didn't call "OP" on a double health T-65 because it's a ridiculous idea that wouldn't happen. Even so, I thought that your declaration of it still being useless was reaching.

I don't think you can fit Wes, Poe and Rey/Finn into a list, but I get the gist. The thing is that you're trying to build hard counters to ordinance, which means you'll get slapped around by bombs, Kylo and jousters like 4 x Wookies.

Even if it did happen, the T-65 is simply a worse tank/ace than Poe, due to the lack of the crucial arc-dodging boost. It's not truly 'useless', but it's probably not the best choice either.

2 minutes ago, Astech said:

I don't think you can fit Wes, Poe and Rey/Finn into a list, but I get the gist. The thing is that you're trying to build hard counters to ordinance, which means you'll get slapped around by bombs, Kylo and jousters like 4 x Wookies.

Even if it did happen, the T-65 is simply a worse tank/ace than Poe, due to the lack of the crucial arc-dodging boost. It's not truly 'useless', but it's probably not the best choice either.

Whoops, sorry! I meant Fenn Rau, not Finn. There was actually a case of that list making it to the top 16(maybe 8?) of an Australian regional. I was actually considering taking the list to a recent regional, but decided against it due to style.

I agree that it's not the best choice to go with, but I do think it's total dead weight.

1 hour ago, Astech said:

Well, NyManda will do 7-8 damage right off the bad, and laugh at your piddly 3-die attacks. Next turn you take two TLTs and a ship is dead. That's not even factoring bombs into the equation. Nu,Nu,Nu + QD will probably wipe one off the board on the first turn, taking 4-5 damage in return.

A single stress token ruins their maneuverability, and two stress takes them out of the game.

But that's not really the point. The suggestion of doubling two of the X-wing's stats isn't met with cries of "OP", it's met with eagerness. Because the power creep has become so bad that it wouldn't even be a problem.

Well, one of NyManda isn't getting a missile off because VI Wes will strip a lock at PS 10, which will get Miranda no matter Initiative or possibly Nym.

Edited by kris40k
40 minutes ago, kris40k said:

Well, one of NyManda isn't getting a missile off because VI Wes will strip a lock at PS 10, which will get Miranda no matter Initiative or possibly Nym.

Then pair him with a VI/Black One Poe, and you can potentially strip both target locks.

3 hours ago, Jeff Wilder said:

In one of the earlier VASSAL tournaments, Combat Retrofit (Transport expansion) was available as a mod for X-wings. (It wasn't enough.)

Making X-wings 10 points more expensive for 3 more HP doesn’t sound like a good idea,

hey where’s that title we’ve been expecting for 5 years and counting?! Kyrhaxz/Vaksai got a great title that would be more than welcome on the T-65. At this point I can only guess that FFG hates that ship.

three mod slots and -2 to both astromechs and torps as well as ept on ps 4+ would be a great start. And the title is -1 squad points. And I’m guessing even this wouldn’t be enough, and definitely not close to OP.

2 hours ago, kris40k said:

Well, one of NyManda isn't getting a missile off because VI Wes will strip a lock at PS 10, which will get Miranda no matter Initiative or possibly Nym.

1 hour ago, SabineKey said:

Then pair him with a VI / Black One Poe , and you can potentially strip both target locks.

Now that your squad is geared specifically against ordinance, you'll lose to jousters like quad wookies and tanks like Kanan+Fenn. A double health X-wing is still an X-wing, which typically means single modded shots and no repositioning, so quite lousy at best.

Heck, the list might not even damage Kanan/Fenn, despite the T-65 buff.

6 minutes ago, GrimmyV said:

Making X-wings 10 points more expensive for 3 more HP doesn’t sound like a good idea,

I believe they were making it a free option, which would be pretty good, but not enough.

16 minutes ago, Astech said:

Now that your squad is geared specifically against ordinance, you'll lose to jousters like quad wookies and tanks like Kanan+Fenn. A double health X-wing is still an X-wing, which typically means single modded shots and no repositioning, so quite lousy at best.

Heck, the list might not even damage Kanan/Fenn, despite the T-65 buff.

I believe they were making it a free option, which would be pretty good, but not enough.

Flight Assist Astromech actually does a pretty good job with repositioning. Not great range control, but good for keeping things in arc. Wes can help strip away all of Kanan's focuses so that he's got nothing for Rey (depending on the build). Dice modding can be helped by a build of Fenn Rau which uses M9-G8 and Weapons Engineer. That means he can lock either Poe or Wes and give them a mini predator while also locking the Ghost and getting it to reroll hits. That's on top of what ever token denial Fenn can get up to and we're dealing with a regenning Poe. Not a great match up, but not as hopeless as you paint it to be.

I kinda want to see if Ghost Fenn is really actually as NPE and unforgiving as nymMiranda TSGenius and Dengaroo and 3 Scouts... but at the same time I really don't think its even worth the waste of 1.5 hours of my life to know this.

8 minutes ago, SabineKey said:

Flight Assist Astromech actually does a pretty good job with repositioning. Not great range control, but good for keeping things in arc. Wes can help strip away all of Kanan 's focuses so that he's got nothing for Rey (depending on the build). Dice modding can be helped by a build of Fenn Rau which uses M9-G8 and Weapons Engineer . That means he can lock either Poe or Wes and give them a mini predator while also locking the Ghost and getting it to reroll hits. That's on top of what ever token denial Fenn can get up to and we're dealing with a regenning Poe . Not a great match up, but not as hopeless as you paint it to be.

Kanan's Fenn can strip Poe's focus, so he's going to die in two turns - 1 primary and two sets of TLTs. After that you have a single ship that can damage Kanan - Wes. Wes can do at most 2 damage a turn (4 hits - SJ - Evade token). Additionally, Kanan's ability to spend focus triggers before Wes strips it, so if Fenn coordinates Wes can do 1 damage maximum . In comparison to Kanan's 3-4 damage a turn using Maul

It might not be hopeless, but it's about as close as it can get while being a game. Sort of like literally anything against Triple Scouts back in the day.

6 minutes ago, Blail Blerg said:

I kinda want to see if Ghost Fenn is really actually as NPE and unforgiving as nymMiranda TSGenius and Dengaroo and 3 Scouts... but at the same time I really don't think its even worth the waste of 1.5 hours of my life to know this.

Well... If your opponent is practicing for some event and wants to play against hard counters you could probably whip something fun up. But if your list isn't explicitly prepared for the matchup then it's as bad an NPE as Fair Ship Rebels 2.

13 minutes ago, Astech said:

Kanan's Fenn can strip Poe's focus, so he's going to die in two turns - 1 primary and two sets of TLTs. After that you have a single ship that can damage Kanan - Wes. Wes can do at most 2 damage a turn (4 hits - SJ - Evade token). Additionally, Kanan's ability to spend focus triggers before Wes strips it, so if Fenn coordinates Wes can do 1 damage maximum . In comparison to Kanan's 3-4 damage a turn using Maul

It might not be hopeless, but it's about as close as it can get while being a game. Sort of like literally anything against Triple Scouts back in the day.

Well... If your opponent is practicing for some event and wants to play against hard counters you could probably whip something fun up. But if your list isn't explicitly prepared for the matchup then it's as bad an NPE as Fair Ship Rebels 2.

You obviously never saw a good Imperial player play against triple scouts back in the day. These guys used the rule of 11 to go from outside of range 3 into range 1 and beat the snot out of the scouts. And that was back in the Deadeye days. Triple Jumps could be tough, but they were not unbeatable. Same with Kanan/Fenn.

4 minutes ago, SabineKey said:

You obviously never saw a good Imperial player play against triple scouts back in the day. These guys used the rule of 11 to go from outside of range 3 into range 1 and beat the snot out of the scouts. And that was back in the Deadeye days. Triple Jumps could be tough, but they were not unbeatable. Same with Kanan / Fenn .

Yes, because the good triple scouts players always flew the three scouts in a line against aces, never one behind for the juicy range 2 shot if they try getting into range 1, and ready to block in the next round while the other two segnors loop behind and fire their torpedoes. Of course not.

Assuming equal player skill, triple jumps were unbeatable. That was why the JM5K got... 5 nerfs? I've lost track now. Palp Aces - and specifically Carnor - had a very slim chance if the Palp player was able to out-guess the blocks turn after turn after turn, but barring that it's game over in maybe 4 combat rounds.

By comparison, Kanan/Fenn is definitely not unbeatable with equally skilled players. The doughnut hole is incredibly easy to exploit for double-reposition aces, and there's the obvious vulnerability to tokenless mods, stress, ion and even tractor control. None of these things worked against triple JM5Ks.

39 minutes ago, Astech said:

Well... If your opponent is practicing for some event and wants to play against hard counters you could probably whip something fun up. But if your list isn't explicitly prepared for the matchup then it's as bad an NPE as Fair Ship Rebels 2.

I see. Anyone else want to support or deny this?

Compared to Dengaroo, Dengar Nym, Miranda Nym pre-nerf, 3 Scouts. How bad is Kanan Fenn?

1 hour ago, Astech said:

Yes, because the good triple scouts players always flew the three scouts in a line against aces, never one behind for the juicy range 2 shot if they try getting into range 1, and ready to block in the next round while the other two segnors loop behind and fire their torpedoes. Of course not.

Assuming equal player skill, triple jumps were unbeatable. That was why the JM5K got... 5 nerfs? I've lost track now. Palp Aces - and specifically Carnor - had a very slim chance if the Palp player was able to out-guess the blocks turn after turn after turn, but barring that it's game over in maybe 4 combat rounds.

By comparison, Kanan/Fenn is definitely not unbeatable with equally skilled players. The doughnut hole is incredibly easy to exploit for double-reposition aces, and there's the obvious vulnerability to tokenless mods, stress, ion and even tractor control. None of these things worked against triple JM5Ks.

A quick search of list juggler entries between March and October of 2016 turn up 3 tournaments confirmed to have triple scouts played, but not near the top slot. Skipped ahead, found one in April. Even skipped to September, the month before the Deadeye nerf and found that the Nova Open was won by a TIE Swarm. The nearest recorded triple scouts? 18th place. There are a couple in the top 16 that are not filled in, so could have been triple scouts, but the highest the list could be is third.

For a list you claim was unbeatable, I'm finding a lot of evidence of people beating it.

Edit: Link to Nova Open 2016 List Juggler entry if you want to see for yourself. http://lists.starwarsclubhouse.com/get_tourney_details?tourney_id=2051

edit 2: upon further examination of the Nova Open, I have found that they the scoring is based on Swiss and that they only recorded the top 16, so I'm not sure who the ultimate winner was. However, only one blank list won in the top 16 cut (which may or may not have been triple Scouts) and he had a 4-2 record going into the cut.

Edited by SabineKey
49 minutes ago, SabineKey said:

You obviously never saw a good Imperial player play against triple scouts back in the day. These guys used the rule of 11 to go from outside of range 3 into range 1 and beat the snot out of the scouts.

If they were using the Rule of 11, they were playing against bad players. You would never come straight at highly maneuverable ships like Aces, if you want a R3 (R2 at worst) shot.

4 minutes ago, Jeff Wilder said:

If they were using the Rule of 11, they were playing against bad players. You would never come straight at highly maneuverable ships like Aces, if you want a R3 (R2 at worst) shot.

*shrugs* That's how things started in my area. Things changed up on both sides as everyone learned counter moves, and counter-counter moves.

It was not my intent to say that was the only way Torp Scouts fell. Merely pointing out one way they were handled. Other ways came up, as you can see if you would like to check the link I posted to Nova Open 2016. There is also even more examples of tournaments where the Triple Scouts lost in the end during the time of their Deadeye reign, if you want to check the 2016 Listjuggler logs.

49 minutes ago, Blail Blerg said:

I see. Anyone else want to support or deny this?

Compared to Dengaroo, Dengar Nym, Miranda Nym pre-nerf, 3 Scouts. How bad is Kanan Fenn?


It's not anywhere near as bad as Triple Scouts, Dengaroo, or Palp Aces/X7s. I'm not sure that means it doesn't warrant a nerf, but it's not fair to put in in the same "Pantheon of BS" that has hallowed spots for Dengaroo, Triple Scouts, and Palp Aces/X7s of the Wave 8-9 meta. All of those lists were far more degenerative and harder to beat.

While it's sporting some newer elements, I don't find Ghost/Fenn a whole lot harder or different than classic Biggs/Kanan was.

Edited by AllWingsStandyingBy
3 hours ago, Astech said:

Yes, because the good triple scouts players always flew the three scouts in a line against aces, never one behind for the juicy range 2 shot if they try getting into range 1

Shortsighted.
You make is sound like an imperial ace would be bothered by merely a single 4 hits attack. The expected damage is between 0.17 and 0.37.
Baiting out those one by one torpedoes twas basically the winning condition of the imperial ace player, once the scout were out of torpedos those two dice attacks had little chances to deal any damage.

On 2/8/2018 at 3:52 AM, SEApocalypse said:

Hurray, make your personal favorites OP again ^_^
We had this discussion before, you even agreed on some of those listings being ridiculously unbalanced and in need for some restrictions like that YT-2400 Title.

Yet you keep posting this. Again and again and again, expanding on the OP Buffs. Cute. Not that I would disagree with all, but discussing them seems pointless. :)=

what are you talking about here? are you saying that you think everything in wave 1 through 6 is overpowered? it seems like your responding to a totally different topic

6 hours ago, SabineKey said:

A quick search of list juggler entries between March and October of 2016 turn up 3 tournaments confirmed to have triple scouts played, but not near the top slot. Skipped ahead, found one in April. Even skipped to September, the month before the Deadeye nerf and found that the Nova Open was won by a TIE Swarm. The nearest recorded triple scouts? 18th place. There are a couple in the top 16 that are not filled in, so could have been triple scouts, but the highest the list could be is third.

For a list you claim was unbeatable, I'm finding a lot of evidence of people beating it.

Edit: Link to Nova Open 2016 List Juggler entry if you want to see for yourself. http://lists.starwarsclubhouse.com/get_tourney_details?tourney_id=2051

edit 2: upon further examination of the Nova Open, I have found that they the scoring is based on Swiss and that they only recorded the top 16, so I'm not sure who the ultimate winner was. However, only one blank list won in the top 16 cut (which may or may not have been triple Scouts) and he had a 4-2 record going into the cut.

I should clarify here. The list wasn't universally unbeatable. What was unbeatable was the unmatched firepower, hull/shield durability and maneuverability. The only thing it wasn't best at was being a token stacking ace (which was Dengaroo, essentially). That mean that between players of equal, sufficiently high skill the triple torp boat player would come out on top a statistically anomalous amount of time. Anomalous enough to have a huge advantage in tournament play against opponents of equal skill. It was also such a niche, unique list that hard-countering it left you open to defeat by even tier 4 lists.

Of course, not all players are of equal skill, so Triple Jumps are beaten by Palp Aces, Biggs and even jank piloted by brilliant players.

4 hours ago, SEApocalypse said:

Shortsighted.
You make is sound like an imperial ace would be bothered by merely a single 4 hits attack. The expected damage is between 0.17 and 0.37.
Baiting out those one by one torpedoes twas basically the winning condition of the imperial ace player, once the scout were out of torpedos those two dice attacks had little chances to deal any damage.

I calculate the odds as even lower than that for the torp shot. The advantages are as follows:

The ace in question is at R2 of one ship and R1 of two ships, probably all in arc given the "boost to range 1 strategy". The proton torp - powered by R4 agromech and guidance chips - has about a 14% chance of hitting a focus,evade + palp AGI 4 Interceptor, which would be more or less game right there with a crit going through.

But what's more important is that it has a 52% chance of creating a tokenless defender. So the R1 primaries have a truly excellent chance of going through. 85% for each in-arc shot, 47% for each out of arc R1 shot. In other words, boosting into R1 will get that ace killed on average dice rolls, so not a good plan unless you're Carnor.

1 hour ago, Vontoothskie said:

what are you talking about here? are you saying that you think everything in wave 1 through 6 is overpowered? it seems like your responding to a totally different topic

Pretty much. It's a response to a series of topics I posted a while back. I had a 1-minute fix for every ship and upgrade I considered underpowered. We had differences of opinion.