https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2018/2/22/cracking-the-metagame/

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A string of results at recent Regional Championships, System Open Series events, and other tournaments have demonstrated the huge metagame impact of squadrons featuring the Ghost and Fenn Rau in the Sheathipede-class Shuttle.

As Top 8 player Andrew Bunn noted, the players in Portland were well aware of this fact. "People either brought the list itself, or something they thought had a good chance of beating it. That's why you see so much Expertise showing up in the lists in the cut—including my list."

Yeah, no kidding FFG.... I did the basic math on PS11 Fenn+HSCP in about 10 minutes before we recorded the S&V episode to talk about it the first time, and concluded that even without using any of his PS11 shenanigans his jousting efficiency is still >100%. News flash... when a ship has best in class jousting efficiency coupled with PS9+ reposition, it makes most everything else obsolete. We generally call this "power creep", and it keeps happening.

I haven't done the exact Ghost + Maul/Ezra math yet. I think I know what the answer is going to be. ;-)

Welcome to X-Wing.

As I said elsewhere:

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But if you remove the oppressive Ghost there's only going to be another oppressive list taking over, that's just where the game is now after all the layers and layers of untested designs have piled on top of each other.

Either you roll back 2 years of wave design through FAQing something every five weeks, or at some point you just draw the line and say "yeah, it's oppressive, but it's the least oppressive option we realistically have so we'll stick here".

Oppressive things wave 5 have largely all been turrets, Palp aces and x7s being largely the only exceptions

Ffg is far too generous to turrets, not giving enough drawback to their infinite coverage and leading to monstrously efficient and far easier to play ships

Every action independent modifier should be confined to firing arcs. As is, they don't matter enough

From our man @Vorpal Sword , back in 2015...

https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/185879-twin-laser-turrets-why-theyre-scary-and-how-you-can-fight-back/

FFG is lenient to Turrets, but they increase the cost appropriately for those ships in my opinion.

I'm not an advocate, I hate TLT's and prefer dog fighting to just keep going straight forward and shooting blindly with turrets.

But with that said, it is a valid mechanic. I assume it's easier to play for sure.

It seems much harder to fly 3/4 health ships with no shields and live and die by your dial.

Where the crap comes in to me, is the fascination with bombs, especially mechanics like trajectory simulator and advanced sensors, at ps 10.

So I'll just barrel roll and shoot a bomb at range 5, and then turn away and do TLT. That part is ridiculous.

But I love the game, so I'll come up with a list to ram the havoc, or drop it's ps, so I can give it a demoralizing death that the rebel scum deserves.

5 minutes ago, ficklegreendice said:

Oppressive things wave 5 have largely all been turrets, Palp aces and x7s being largely the only exceptions

Apart from Triple Scouts (which had turrets but it wasn't the turrets that made them scary), or Palp Aces, or Commonwealth Defenders, or Dengaroo (which had a big turret but worked hard to maintain arc and use torpedoes), or Telgar (again, major use of torpedoes and arcs), or Paratanni, or Fair Ship Rebels...

14 minutes ago, FTS Gecko said:

From our man @Vorpal Sword , back in 2015...

https://community.fantasyflightgames.com/topic/185879-twin-laser-turrets-why-theyre-scary-and-how-you-can-fight-back/

I respect Vorpal's perspective and am glad he is doing proofreading for FFG now. However in regards to game balance I'll stand by my original prediction at the time, that TLT was going to push out all the low PS generics on the basis of cost efficiency. I also stand by my original prediction of the TIE Defender (before the dial was spoiled), that the generics were far too expensive to be competitive; he strongly held the opposing view at the time, defending the playtesting process of which he was a part of.

You are kidding yourself if you don't believe torp scout fully modded turret plus monster blocking didn't make them far better than they would have been otherwise

Same thing with dengaroo. Even if you went for manaroo, ie NEVER TRIGGERING DENGAR. his turret still ruined you

Saying torpscouts were arclocked is incredibly silly. The fact that they were fully modded pwts with ridiculous manueverability added immeasurably to their consistent competitive performance

I still remember the days of DEADEYE r4 aggro, where the torps were brutal but where I still butchered nonthruster aces with fully modified two dice primaries. All it took was a bump or 4lom, but either way the opponent couldn't do ****

So, was this whole article an excuse to make a pun about Krakow and Cracking the Metagame? I think it might be...

6 minutes ago, Stay On The Leader said:

Can you point to where I said that, please? Or better yet... don't bother trying to self-justify your point of view.

You literally said the turrets didn't make them scary, which is nonsense because it formed a big part of their competitive viability

Misinformed claims like this is only going to perpetuate an environment dominated by thing + turret, such as the bomb meta we just came out of

The "thing" changed, and yet turrets remain

Game could definitely do with trying to balance out their coverage with reduced efficiency and make arced ships more significant without having to drown them in mods

And then errating said mods away

Seriously, you'd think ffg would have learned by now, yet here we still are

1 minute ago, ficklegreendice said:

You literally said the turrets didn't make them scary, which is nonsense because it formed a big part of their competitive viability

Oh right. Because they've still got their turrets and I don't see them around much any more.

But you carry on deluding yourself that it's all about turrets.

3 minutes ago, Stay On The Leader said:

Oh right. Because they've still got their turrets and I don't see them around much any more.

But you carry on deluding yourself that it's all about turrets.

Torp removal hit after manaroo and zuckuss nerfs, then was followed up on by removing torps AND mech AND limiting mindlink.

Without easy access to full action independent mods, they got replaced with simply better turrets

Hence our transition into Miranda nym, Miranda dash and now le ghost while arced craziness like Biggs blobs got gutted

7 of 8 lists with 9 HP ships. Only one 4 HP ace out of 25 ships.

Not much of a mystery to crack. It's pretty much a high HP or go home meta. 4 or less HP aces are gone. That's why I'm playing that alternate format objectives for the foreseeable future provided my friends are willing. Played two games yesterday and it was infinitely more entertaining. Felt 1,000 times more like Star Wars. Beat a Poe list twice because when Poe needs to do things other than just point and shoot he turns out to be a bit of a liability because he can't play the objective correctly. TLT, bombs and Harpoons easily countered by a scenario. Regen not that big a deal because when ships run, stuff's getting done by the opposing list. 75 minutes and it just works better. These guys are definitely breaking ground and hope they continue with it.

http://nationaltabletopgaming.org/tournament-resources

Its really consistent what leads to balance issues in X-Wing:

• Lots of HP or Defense
• Lots of Upgrade Options
• Turret

If a ship has only 2 of those things its balanced and completely fine.

If it has all 3 of those things it leads to serious issues with the game every single time.

Once one ship can do EVERYTHING X-Wing stops being fun immediately. Always.

The Hyperspace Qualifier winner (Tom Wiggin) is a great guy, tho I do wish I would have asked the TOs if I could pass the ticket to him if I'd won the final match (I feel like my list had the advantage over his list). We were both 5-0, but due to the fact it is highly unlikely I could make the event I conceded to him.

There were a lot of Wookies on the top tables of Hyperspace with Tom's standard 3 Wookie build, his round 4 opponent had a Wookie (Lowhhrick I believe), my round 4 opponent's 4 KDefenders w/ Commandos and I had a trio of Wookies w/ Tacticians and Courier Droids as well as Ezra Sheathipede w/ R3A2/Snap Shot/Hera crew.

So that's 11 Auzituks out of 13 ships on the top 2 tables in the Hyperspace Qualifier.

Isn't it more exciting that the meta keeps changing as the scales balance back and forth? I know (beyond the initial design) there's nothing elegant about the Ghost with TLT and it hurts the hearts of purist players.

From a business standpoint, it's in FFG's best interest to keep changing things around with new releases to make new ships/cards popular and make old, re-printed ships/cards popular. We'll likely see this happen next (finally) with the T-65. Personally, I like that (at some point) most of the ships become new again, most of the cards find a use. This is always going to lead to "power creep." Just look at the sheer number of ships and cards.

I think if you're a player who fell in love with a certain ship, list, or play style, the game will continue to disappoint and you'll always be looking for the past arc-dodging glory of the early days and simpler times. I think this meta seems to have a balance more than some in the past in the sense that a lot of different lists are placing and seem viable. Yes, it all centers around being able to beat Ghost/Fenn, but some list is always going to emerge as the best and easiest thing to run. That said, I'd predict some FAQ change to Ghost/Fenn before the new X-wings hit tables - just something small like the Nym/Genius thing that takes it down one peg. Be careful what you wish for, however, because Ghost/Fenn and counters have suppressed the power of bombs and harpoons for the moment. Sometimes, the tiniest correction (again Nym Genius for example) changes the whole meta.

I've been out of the game for a very, very long time.

It's been wild returning to the game to find out what's happened, and I mean that in a very Dead Space sense, like I've walked in and there's writing on the walls in what looks like human blood. Biggs is... dead? Space Toilet 5000 isn't the best ship anymore? Weird. And there's a T-65 fix on the horizon??!

Back in the day I was very against "functional errata", but having seen it's effects on curbing triple jumps, which would have warped the game permenantly if they'd left them unchanged, I'm now fully convinced they should be heavy handed and fast with the errata-hammer. I remember back in the day TLT was still far and away the best turret, and probably the best secondary weapon, and everyone was calling the sky falling then.

The game needs to be scaled back in terms of power, and "nerf-by-errata" is the best way to go about that. Ships that can fully modify attack and defense whilst bumped AND stressed would've been unthinkable back in wave 4-5, and I think the game was better for it. Swing the nerf bat already.

Live Free, Don't Join.

Only two lists made up solely of ships with less than 180 degrees of arc coverage.

2 hours ago, Boom Owl said:

Its really consistent what leads to balance issues in X-Wing:

• Lots of HP or Defense
• Lots of Upgrade Options
• Turret

If a ship has only 2 of those things its balanced and completely fine.

If it has all 3 of those things it leads to serious issues with the game every single time.

Once one ship can do EVERYTHING X-Wing stops being fun immediately. Always.

You, sir/madam, deserve an award for summing balance issues up succinctly. Thank you.

2 hours ago, Boom Owl said:

Its really consistent what leads to balance issues in X-Wing:

• Lots of HP or Defense
• Lots of Upgrade Options
• Turret

If a ship has only 2 of those things its balanced and completely fine.

If it has all 3 of those things it leads to serious issues with the game every single time.

Once one ship can do EVERYTHING X-Wing stops being fun immediately. Always.

The Ghost of Fat Han.

2 hours ago, dadocollin said:

From a business standpoint, it's in FFG's best interest to keep changing things around with new releases to make new ships/cards popular and make old, re-printed ships/cards popular. We'll likely see this happen next (finally) with the T-65. Personally, I like that (at some point) most of the ships become new again, most of the cards find a use. This is always going to lead to "power creep." Just look at the sheer number of ships and cards.

Just give me EPT Horton and I’ll be happy! We had to wait 12 waves for GUNBOAT and 14(?) waves for the real X-wing fix. How long for Horton? How long for Squints? B-wings?

5 hours ago, Boom Owl said:

Its really consistent what leads to balance issues in X-Wing:

• Lots of HP or Defense
• Lots of Upgrade Options
• Turret

If a ship has only 2 of those things its balanced and completely fine.

If it has all 3 of those things it leads to serious issues with the game every single time.

Once one ship can do EVERYTHING X-Wing stops being fun immediately. Always.

Too good dial qualifies as well, I'd say.

The JM5K dial was part of the JM5K problem. And we definitely have dial creep as well. Latest example is the TIE shhhh. At least, and fortunately, they were conservative with its costing. (I fully expect however the appearance of a really broken Tech and System combo, which with the TIE shhh's sick dial will break the game)

6 hours ago, MajorJuggler said:

https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2018/2/22/cracking-the-metagame/

Yeah, no kidding FFG.... I did the basic math on PS11 Fenn+HSCP in about 10 minutes before we recorded the S&V episode to talk about it the first time, and concluded that even without using any of his PS11 shenanigans his jousting efficiency is still >100%. News flash... when a ship has best in class jousting efficiency coupled with PS9+ reposition, it makes most everything else obsolete. We generally call this "power creep", and it keeps happening.

I haven't done the exact Ghost + Maul/Ezra math yet. I think I know what the answer is going to be. ;-)

You’re a lot more polite about it than me!

8 hours ago, MajorJuggler said:

https://www.fantasyflightgames.com/en/news/2018/2/22/cracking-the-metagame/

Yeah, no kidding FFG.... I did the basic math on PS11 Fenn+HSCP in about 10 minutes before we recorded the S&V episode to talk about it the first time, and concluded that even without using any of his PS11 shenanigans his jousting efficiency is still >100%. News flash... when a ship has best in class jousting efficiency coupled with PS9+ reposition, it makes most everything else obsolete. We generally call this "power creep", and it keeps happening.

I haven't done the exact Ghost + Maul/Ezra math yet. I think I know what the answer is going to be. ;-)

Yeah. I really wish they had never done any of this.

I don't like the huge mass of upgrades and danger zones on the Ghost.

Ezra Maul was already looking kinda bonkers.

PS11 Coordinate for 21 points? What the heck. Rebels never needed this in the first place, they already have tons of ways to get actions. And really, PS11 Coordinate??

The only way I think it would be healthy to give Rebels coordinate at all would have been to hard cap Fenn at PS7 with no EPT slot at all.

--

Thanks for making it very plain that this is mathematically ridiculous on top of the PS11 coordinate.

7 hours ago, Stay On The Leader said:

Apart from Triple Scouts (which had turrets but it wasn't the turrets that made them scary), or Palp Aces, or Commonwealth Defenders, or Dengaroo (which had a big turret but worked hard to maintain arc and use torpedoes), or Telgar (again, major use of torpedoes and arcs), or Paratanni, or Fair Ship Rebels...

"oppressive" was the keyword I think you missed. palp aces is fun to play against and is easy to shut down if you can nail the lambda, even if its powerful. discounting turrets on dengar list is absurd, and any jumpmaster list relies on the turrets if they're outmaneuvered. the turret bs factor is that even if your opponent flies badly, they can still win simply because where they are doesnt matter as long as they dont bump.

fairship rebels, however, was strait awful