15 minutes ago, Khyros said:

With, no. Against, Yes.

Well, that's something, anyway.

Quote

Why do I believe what I do? Because I've been playing this game for 5 years now, and I've seen plenty of stuff that's far worse than this, I'd be surprised if this was actually top 10.

Where would it need to fall in order for you to stop being wrong about nearly everything you say against it? Top five? Top three? Worst ever?

Quote

And I get annoyed when people call it a NPE to play against a list that beats theirs without taking a look at why it beats theirs and instead just complaining that it's OP and a NPE and nerfhammer away!

Who, exactly, has done this? Don't be afraid to name names. Who -- exactly -- has (1) called the list an NPE and (2) failed to take a look at why it's beaten them?

Quote

The only "errata" (cough *nerf*) that seems to have actually been a positive experience for the game was the change to Whisper.

... How can you say stuff like this and expect anybody to take you seriously?

Quote

starting 20 threads a day about the same NPE you had this one time against this guy that just picked up the game and rolled perfect and smoked you,

So your contention is that every person who thinks that the Ghost-Fenn is bad for the game only thinks that because (1) they got beaten, (2) by a new player, (3) using the list, (4) who "rolled perfect"?

... How can you say stuff like this and expect anybody to take you seriously?

Quote

bloated game, making it less accessible to newer players, which will eventually be its downfall.

So your contention is that changing the game makes it a worse for new players than facing, say, Triple-Scounts or Nymranda or Ghost-Fenn?

... How can you say stuff like this and expect anybody to take you seriously?

Bacon and sausage country gravy on biscuits is amazing. With a side of porg of course.

8 minutes ago, Khyros said:

Why do I believe what I do? Because I've been playing this game for 5 years now, and I've seen plenty of stuff that's far worse than this, I'd be surprised if this was actually top 10

Then you'd quite simply be wrong as the data does not back that up. That data says, in its given meta at the time, Ghost/Fenn is the 4th best list in the game, ever. And that's after only being around for a couple months, there's no reason to think it won't continue climbing. What's above it you may ask...?

• Parattanni - Nerfed
• Triple Jumps - Nerfed
• Final Form (Miranda/Nym with Genius Trajectory simulator) - Nerfed

Palp aces should probably be up there as well but it gets split into multiple archetypes between the Fel versions and the defender versions. And it actually took some skill to play so there were a lot of people dragging it down.

3 minutes ago, Jeff Wilder said:

1) Where would it need to fall in order for you to stop being wrong about nearly everything you say against it? Top five? Top three? Worst ever?

2) Who, exactly, has done this? Don't be afraid to name names. Who -- exactly -- has (1) called the list an NPE and (2) failed to take a look at why it's beaten them?

... How can you say stuff like this and expect anybody to take you seriously?

3) So your contention is that every person who thinks that the Ghost-Fenn is bad for the game only thinks that because (1) they got beaten, (2) by a new player, (3) using the list, (4) who "rolled perfect"?

... How can you say stuff like this and expect anybody to take you seriously?

4) So your contention is that changing the game makes it a worse for new players than facing, say, Triple-Scounts or Nymranda or Ghost-Fenn?

... How can you say stuff like this and expect anybody to take you seriously?

1) Given my statement regarding Whisper, I would say that it would have to be at least #2 (with Whisper being #1) since I don't think any of the other changes were warranted.

2&3) I don't need to look further than the first post in this topic, seeing as that's what this topic is about.

21 hours ago, Estarriol said:

Seriously. Faced a player who’s been playing a month, he net listed a Maulzra.I didn’t stand a chance. This makes me look back at the era of triple Torpedo boats fondly. ****. Nerf this absolute bulls hit npe bollox.

3) Well, if you want to delve into my comment deeper, I said that previously it was just complaining. Now apparently FFG is taking it as an indication when people complain, and don't seem to take it into context.

4) Absolutely. No one should be introducing new players to the game with top tier meta lists, regardless of whether its Fat Han, JM15k, Nymranda, Ghost-Fenn, Parattanni, Dengaroo, etc. If you're introducing a new player to the game, your goal should be to make it an enjoyable experience so they keep coming back. So the dominance of any top list doesn't matter when introducing new players. On the flip side, when a new player buys a new JM5k, and spends all evening thinking about cool lists he wants to play and how exciting it is to have a new ship, he's heartbroken when he shows up to the store to play just to discover that his new toy has been neutered so hard it wasn't worth spending $30 to buy, his joy and excitement evaporate. This is not good for the game.

2 hours ago, Khyros said:

I have to disagree with a few of these points, or at least disagree in that it's any worse than all of the other metas we've had over the last 5 years.

1) Okay, Fat Han used to be 62 points and you'd get 0 points for it. This brought about a rule change, but then let's talk about the 49 point Corran Horns or the 48 point Mirandas that'll net you 0 points. At least you get a good chunk of the Ghost.

2) I don't see where you're getting this at all. Can you elaborate a bit? The best that I can tell is that you assume every single round you'll be doing 5 damage via a 4 dice primary and TLT, so therefore it's not even worth bringing a 5hp ship to the table. Except that it really doesn't. Yes, it can consistently put out 3-4 damage on low agility ships... But fly something with 2+ agility and that damage drastically drops, especially if you're smart about your positioning and hide behind a rock. Yeah yeah yeah, PS11 boost may ruin that - I still don't see why people don't just kill the defenseless Fenn first. But regardless, a really good counter is a well flown swarm, and they only have 3hp (or 4 if you're going with a Z95). All of those defensive things that mitigate the ghost's damage are completely overwhelmed. If it's Kanan, he can only affect one shot. Hotcop can do a second, and Fenn a 3rd. Which means you get 4 guys plowing their dice into a totally defensively Ghost. Ouch. Also, calling out autothrusters is kinda BS... it's a SUPER HARD COUNTER, that for some reason no one flies anymore. Just as much as you're complaining about the uphill fight when you see that, the same Ghost player is feeling the same way when he sees AT.

3) Whee, perfect information boost at a high PS? Nothing to see here, Fel has been doing it since W2. And he doesn't require a 27pt squad mate who then has to somehow stay at R1-2 of a large boosting ship while doing a green maneuver to clear his own stress. Super repeatable, right? Or at least super exploitable.

4) You mean you haven't been relying on passive mods? I fully agree with your statement that they suck. But I'm pretty sure that a ton of the meta has been dominated by passive (or at least free action) mods for a ton of time. There's something super stupid against playing Dengar w/ K4 and Expertise, knowing that no matter what you do, he's got 2 (basically) fully modified shots at you every turn. This started back in W2 with Fel's free focus, but continued in W4 with predator, and has just gotten worse from there. I agree this is a problem, but it's not specific to this ship or this list.

5) Yup, it's subjective. And I can fill a paragraph with lists that aren't fun for me to fly against. But the worst thing is to have to play against the same list 6 times in a row at a tourney. We're at a point in the meta where this really isn't the case, so I'm not going to complain about any of the lists being not fun to play against. The best that I can tell, most people that complain about lists complain about what it prevents them from doing. Pre-nerf Whisper the complaint was that it didn't matter what they did, Whisper would just decloak and run away (same complaint regarding Fel/Inq today). Biggs was that it prevented them from shooting at who they wanted to shoot at. Kanan was that it prevented them from doing damage. Manaroo was that it prevented them from preventing actions. K4/Expertise same thing. Though I suppose some of the complaints were still of the "this is too good" side of things, such as Palp and JM15k.

My main criteria for whether a list is bad for the game or not is based on "if you removed the list, what lists would return to competitive play?" And I really can't think of any archetype being suppressed by this list right now. I would normally say your low agility ships since it eats them for lunch, but those are all of the place right now... So Jeff (or anyone else), what is this list type preventing from being competitive?

It's really hard against 2 ship lists with 1 agility that rely on highly modded shots and can tank bomb damage reasonably well. So counters Nym / Miranda / Dengar / RAC which is a good thing right?

1 minute ago, Makaze said:

Then you'd quite simply be wrong as the data does not back that up. That data says, in its given meta at the time, Ghost/Fenn is the 4th best list in the game, ever. And that's after only being around for a couple months, there's no reason to think it won't continue climbing. What's above it you may ask...?

• Parattanni - Nerfed
• Triple Jumps - Nerfed
• Final Form (Miranda/Nym with Genius Trajectory simulator) - Nerfed

Palp aces should probably be up there as well but it gets split into multiple archetypes between the Fel versions and the defender versions. And it actually took some skill to play so there were a lot of people dragging it down.

Source?

2 hours ago, Khyros said:

3) Whee, perfect information boost at a high PS? Nothing to see here, Fel has been doing it since W2. And he doesn't require a 27pt squad mate who then has to somehow stay at R1-2 of a large boosting ship while doing a green maneuver to clear his own stress. Super repeatable, right? Or at least super exploitable.

This is nothing like Fel. With Fel he was boosting at PS9, at best. This is at PS11. Fel couldn't boost off a rock. He couldn't boost if he was bumping. He also was giving up some other token or positioning to do it. Plus he only got one 3 or 4 dice attack with that boost. With the ghost it's likely boosting out of your arc, or into a better position for him where he is tossing a highly accurate 4/5 dice from a primary and then following up with a hyper accurate TLT attack at the end of the round. It's not really like Fel at all in that regard.

Just now, Khyros said:

Source?

Metawing which is pulling in all the listjuggler data which has the lists for all major events for the games entire history

Set the filters to pull in data from all time, not just recent. You can muck about with it to only count regionals/system opens or only look at swiss ranks or cut ranks. But all those variations still have it within the top 10 and sometimes pop it up to 3rd. The above list is using the default settings counting all tourneys and both pre and post cut. There hasn't been a nationals or worlds since it popped up and those are heavily weighted so I expect it will be ranked higher in a couple months.

37 minutes ago, viedit said:

First line of card. You cannot attack ships outside of your firing arc.

Lol. Ooh that. I forgot that part of the card.

1 minute ago, Makaze said:

Metawing which is pulling in all the listjuggler data which has the lists for all major events for the games entire history

Set the filters to pull in data from all time, not just recent. You can muck about with it to only count regionals/system opens or only look at swiss ranks or cut ranks. But all those variations still have it within the top 10 and sometimes pop it up to 3rd. The above list is using the default settings counting all tourneys and both pre and post cut. There hasn't been a nationals or worlds since it popped up and those are heavily weighted so I expect it will be ranked higher in a couple months.

IIRC, metawing was part of MJ's thesis and really only started collecting serious data the past 2 years (even though it goes back 3+ years, it took awhile to catch on and establish a database), which correlates why the dominant lists of the past 2 years are all the top lists. So to get an accurate estimate, you'd have to account for the population variances. And the fact that they all got nerfed is exactly my point - FFG is much more open to shuffling up the meta by errataing things to keep it fresh, which is not the way it should be done. If that's how they want to conduct it, then they should have a rotating list of eligible ships/upgrades - at least that way there would be a rationale to why all of a sudden a ship that was previously dominant just disappeared. Or, we can move the meta ourselves like we used to by counter building for a dominant list, until people started counter building for the counter build. And obviously FFG can assist with new releases that help shake things up - because that's how they should be shaking it up, not by massive nerfs.

7 minutes ago, viedit said:

This is nothing like Fel. With Fel he was boosting at PS9, at best. This is at PS11. Fel couldn't boost off a rock. He couldn't boost if he was bumping. He also was giving up some other token or positioning to do it. Plus he only got one 3 or 4 dice attack with that boost. With the ghost it's likely boosting out of your arc, or into a better position for him where he is tossing a highly accurate 4/5 dice from a primary and then following up with a hyper accurate TLT attack at the end of the round. It's not really like Fel at all in that regard.

Are you expecting a 33pt ship to be as powerful as a 73pt ship?

I don't think I've ever seen an even moderately competent Fel player land on a rock, but regardless, the same can be said about Fenn - he can't run over a rock or get bumped, else he can't coordinate to give the boost.

And yes, Fel's giving up his 2nd focus token to do it. He's not giving up positioning - he can boost and barrel roll. But Fenn is giving up his only action to do that, leaving him with nothing. It's almost like he's easy pickings to kill.

And yes, it's PS9 not PS11. But back during Fel's domination, PS9 was as high as anyone ever really went, so in his own environment they were comparable. It also doesn't require a coordinate action from a 27pt deadweight 2 attack support ship. Which means that it can be done from anywhere on the board.

Perhaps Fat Han would have been a better analogy, seeing as he was boosting at the same "perfect information" PS9 that Fel was, was only boosting, was giving up his action to boost (Typically Evade), had other ways to mitigate damage (C3PO), had multiple opportunities to do damage (Gunner), had passive modifiers (Pred or Ability), was a large base, was a heavy point sink... The big difference is that Han was a standalone ship, while the Ghost requires Fenn to get those benefits... The difference being in the support team. Don't take this as me saying that Fel or Fat Han are (or ever were) a bigger issue. Both were very dominant lists and massively influenced the game for a long period of time, but neither required hard errata changes to kill either of them. They fell out of favor in the meta due to FFG's new releases giving players tools to handle them, coupled with a naturally evolving meta play.

2 minutes ago, Khyros said:

IIRC, metawing was part of MJ's thesis and really only started collecting serious data the past 2 years (even though it goes back 3+ years, it took awhile to catch on and establish a database), which correlates why the dominant lists of the past 2 years are all the top lists. So to get an accurate estimate, you'd have to account for the population variances. And the fact that they all got nerfed is exactly my point - FFG is much more open to shuffling up the meta by errataing things to keep it fresh, which is not the way it should be done. If that's how they want to conduct it, then they should have a rotating list of eligible ships/upgrades - at least that way there would be a rationale to why all of a sudden a ship that was previously dominant just disappeared. Or, we can move the meta ourselves like we used to by counter building for a dominant list, until people started counter building for the counter build. And obviously FFG can assist with new releases that help shake things up - because that's how they should be shaking it up, not by massive nerfs.

The data for major events has been backfilled all the way to worlds 2014. So yes there are not a lot of store champs in that far back but that's also doesn't really matter since it weights large events more heavily and is looking at win percents/ranks not just sheer number of games won. So what you're asking for in terms of compensating for differences in the underlying data collection is already happening. But even for the sake of argument it was a bit lower it would have to drop all the way to 13th place to be below a list that hasn't been regarded as too good and subsequently nerfed.

As for the rest I see we've made an unsubtle segue from "It's fine, lots of stuff beats it, it's not that great" to a maybe tangential at best complaint about how FFG does errata?

1 hour ago, Makaze said:

The data for major events has been backfilled all the way to worlds 2014. So yes there are not a lot of store champs in that far back but that's also doesn't really matter since it weights large events more heavily and is looking at win percents/ranks not just sheer number of games won. So what you're asking for in terms of compensating for differences in the underlying data collection is already happening. But even for the sake of argument it was a bit lower it would have to drop all the way to 13th place to be below a list that hasn't been regarded as too good and subsequently nerfed.

As for the rest I see we've made an unsubtle segue from "It's fine, lots of stuff beats it, it's not that great" to a maybe tangential at best complaint about how FFG does errata?

Perhaps. I still maintain that it's fine, lots of stuff beats it (never said that it wasn't good though). And yes, I've segued when Jeff asked why I was defending it so vehemently to "because FFG has been errataing stuff based on how loud people are complaining." Without that underlying reason, I have no purpose in defending a list that I don't use.

KFP - Kashyyyk Fried Porg. Is soo yummy.

1 hour ago, Khyros said:

I don't think I've ever seen an even moderately competent Fel player land on a rock, but regardless, the same can be said about Fenn - he can't run over a rock or get bumped, else he can't coordinate to give the boost.

Thats the point though, if Fel lands on a rock, he's dead. If the ghost nips a rock, he gives zero *****, because then Rau comes along and coordinates the boost to him, and he boosts off the rock. Obstacles only prevent you from taking actions during your activation phase, last I checked.

30 minutes ago, JasonCole said:

Thats the point though, if Fel lands on a rock, he's dead. If the ghost nips a rock, he gives zero *****, because then Rau comes along and coordinates the boost to him, and he boosts off the rock. Obstacles only prevent you from taking actions during your activation phase, last I checked.

Then you do what I did. block Fenn and/or stick your ship in a place that prevents the ghost from boosting off. Then blast the **** out of it.

8 hours ago, SirCormac said:

However, there are alternatives to fighting, as Obi-wan taught us. I created an Xwing gaming group of about a dozen people and I put on tournaments for them every few months, but I always throw in a wrinkle to mess with listbuilding, and we all have a blast. The core of the game is good. The upgrades are fun. Make your own fun. If official tournaments are toxic, make your own fun!

That's awesome to hear! I'm all about people just playing the game the way they want. Play the way that's fun.

53 minutes ago, heychadwick said:

That's awesome to hear! I'm all about people just playing the game the way they want. Play the way that's fun.

Yep! Can't wait till GenCon and all of your cool events!

I've just come off the back of a Objective based tournament. The rules are floating around the forums here somewhere...

Anyway, they made for excellent games because they forced continued close engagement. Bad news for all TLTs and the Dash I happened to be running. The rewards are huge enough that not playing to the objectives is kind of an auto-loss.

Kanan/Fenn loves standard 100/6 play for reasons we all know, but if this format is shaken up - even a little bit (say, to 90 or 110 point games) he becomes almost garbage. If there was any way whatsoever to gain points from controlling an area of space, then Kanan/Fenn is nerfed, but there isn't. If the asteroid count was doubled with no placement resrictions then it is nerfed. FFG's tournament scene is fixed on 100/6 deathmatches, which ultimately stales the game.

16 hours ago, Fuzzywookie said:

KFP - Kashyyyk Fried Porg. Is soo yummy.

In the French speaking parts of Canada it's PFK. I hear they're adding Porg to the menu some time in the near future.

What's the exact list we are talking about here, by the way?

Can somebody please link it?

This Thread just starts with somebody mentioning a net-listed "Maulzra", which seems to be some kind of Ghost list. Probably featuring Fenn Rau.

Can somebody please post the list here or show a link to Meta Wing?

Please ignore my last post.

I have just found it myself.

http://meta-wing.com/ship_combos/6597?

On 2/23/2018 at 3:00 PM, Khyros said:

Are you expecting a 33pt ship to be as powerful as a 73pt ship?

Powerful? Maybe no, but an Interceptor being able to outfly and outmaneuver a brick of a ghost? H**l yes; it shouldn’t even be close.

Rejoice! The latest mutation of the cancer has fenn with stressbot to counter the counter.