Honestly, it won't be perfect but it'll be better than 1e.

The best part of declarations like this is that "balanced" doesn't even have a particularly useful working definition in games like this, so we can all just claim it is or isn't depending on our agendas after launch!

As @Brunas says, what matters is that the game is fun and that the squads that are strong are fun to play and play against. That's as good a definition of "balanced" as anything to be honest.

1 minute ago, punkUser said:

The best part of declarations like this is that "balanced" doesn't even have a particularly useful working definition in games like this

Good point. One definition of balance is that all pilots, upgrades, and squads of the same points value are equally useful. That would actually be quite boring in practice, I think; "I spent weeks tweaking this list!" would be exactly 50/50 vs. "I literally shuffled my cards!"

I can agree with @Oprah Smash that things won’t be perfect. Nothing is perfect. But @Brunas put it best. If it’s got the feel and the core, imperfections in balance can be made up for and addressed faster than in 1E.

3 minutes ago, Incard said:

Good point. One definition of balance is that all pilots, upgrades, and squads of the same points value are equally useful. That would actually be quite boring in practice, I think; "I spent weeks tweaking this list!" would be exactly 50/50 vs. "I literally shuffl    ed my cards!"

Right there are both trivial ways to achieve that (i.e. only mirror matches, only one ship and no upgrades in the game, etc) and it's basically impossible and I'd argue undesirable in any game that goes for any kind of rock-paper-scissors type effects. I think most people would agree that if every squad created by shuffling cards together and assigning them randomly until you hit 100 points was equally viable that would actually be categorically *less* fun.

So generally there's some aspect of people wanting a "varied" meta with some number (usually not even a huge number) of viable builds, some counter play and counter builds and so on. But that's a lot of hand waving and not really something you can judge or optimize against until after the fact anyways, so operationally I think just aiming for the stronger lists being actually fun to play and play against is a great goal

57 minutes ago, Oprah Smash said:

Im not upset or salty I just think everyone should have realistic expectations going into 2nd edition.

0% is not realistic. I put a realistic estimate of balance at about 25-35%.

What % of pilots are currently absolute crap? 60? 80? Perfect balance is impossible. A mistake that requires immediate nerfing is fairly likely. An overall immense improvement is nearly guaranteed.

Balanced is best viewed on a gradient. It's going to be very hard if not impossible for any game to be completely balanced. In 1E, I'd say the balance is... 3 out of 10? It could easily be les balanced. However, I'd expect 2E to go up to 7/10 balance. Would that be perfect? Naw. Would that be a lot better? Yes.

I'm ok with it as long as actual cool ships are imbalanced like the Falcon, Ghost, Interceptors or classic TIE swarms; instead of space toilet seats dominating for years on end hahaha.

1 hour ago, punkUser said:

Right there are both trivial ways to achieve that (i.e. only mirror matches, only one ship and no upgrades in the game, etc) and it's basically impossible and I'd argue undesirable in any game that goes for any kind of rock-paper-scissors type effects. I think most people would agree that if every squad created by shuffling cards together and assigning them randomly until you hit 100 points was equally viable that would actually be categorically *less* fun.

So generally there's some aspect of people wanting a "varied" meta with some number (usually not even a huge number) of viable builds, some counter play and counter builds and so on. But that's a lot of hand waving and not really something you can judge or optimize against until after the fact anyways, so operationally I think just aiming for the stronger lists being actually fun to play and play against is a great goal

You can have pilots and upgrades be "balanced" but still have some that are good against others, which are good against others, etc. The problem is when one subset is better than EVERYTHING else

People have weird ideas of what is "balanced"

Nothing is ever perfect. Perfection is a child's idea of what "good" is.

There will always be imbalances, but as long as the gap between pieces isn't insurmountable, then the game will be balanced

Besides, the only way you do worse than 1.0 is if you take inspiration from GW

17 minutes ago, ficklegreendice said:

People have weird ideas of what is "balanced"

Nothing is ever perfect. Perfection is a child's idea of what "good" is.

There will always be imbalances, but as long as the gap between pieces isn't insurmountable, then the game will be balanced

Besides, the only way you do worse than 1.0 is if you take inspiration from GW

I think the goal really should be 200 points of sensibly built lists should have a puncher's chance at even meta favorites, and that got a little out of control by the last few waves of 1.0. I think FFG realizes this, and I think the answer is pricing and upgrades, both of which can be adjusted through the app. I'm still waiting for more information before I jump in, but their design decisions seem really sound this time around, and that app is going to be a godsend for a game that historically had to wait at least 2 waves for balance adjustments.

From the limited gameplay we've seen so far, I think they are in a really good position to keep things healthy from a balance perspective.

I hope no one expected it to be balanced.

With many expecting an imbalance (what ever that means), what does everyone prefer with ships that are out of balance. Do we want them too strong and need to be nerfed, or do we want them too weak and have the costs reduce and get a buff?

While I'm not a fan of the overpowered combos, those will be the ships that will most likely get the attention, while weaker ships that aren't destroying the meta might be ignored.

When it comes to faction balance, I'm just hoping with them trying to create faction identities, they can balance the factions to have multiple ships and strategies that are viable competitively. There most certainly will be a few lists, or one faction that is generally better, but hopefully not meta defining.

9 hours ago, Incard said:

Good point. One definition of balance is that all pilots, upgrades, and squads of the same points value are equally useful. That would actually be quite boring in practice, I think; "I spent weeks tweaking this list!" would be exactly 50/50 vs. "I literally shuffled my cards!"

That’s the paradox of competitive game design. You want it to be pretty balanced, so that lots of options are viable, but you actually don’t want it to be perfectly balanced, because if all decisions have the exact same value, then no decisions matter and the game isn’t interesting.

8 hours ago, ficklegreendice said:

People have weird ideas of what is "balanced"

Nothing is ever perfect. Perfection is a child's idea of what "good" is.

There will always be imbalances, but as long as the gap between pieces isn't insurmountable, then the game will be balanced

Besides which, FFG have taken a certain amount of pragmatism into the game design by removing all the squad building rules (points cost and available slots) from the printed media, meaning that they only need to get it 'about right' because the game is designed to have points and upgrade options added and removed dynamically without either needing to repeatedly errata what a bit of printed card actually says, or to introduce cards with a negative points cost whose sole purpose is to grant other slots to ships which should have had them from the get-go.

No game will ever be perfectly balanced. But no game element can be fundamentally broken without failure of three things; its cost, its availability and its game effect. Since 2e is designed such that any ship can increase its cost two-fold, sprout system and cannon slots, or whatever, purely at the click of a .pdf update, I would argue we have a better chance of 'problem children' being addressed quickly and decisively.

The idea of squad-building being 'tweaked' on a per-event basis for themed events sounds good, too.

I think hoping that FFG will release more balanced content is unrealistic. 1.0 was designed to the design team's best ability, and 2.0 has the same design team. What I do think is realistic to hope is that:

- the core mechanics will be better designed

- issues will be corrected faster

I think there is a 100% chance of this statement being true. I also expect the power levels to come together much closer, though, with hopefully no s-tier, tier 3 lists being no insta-losses against tier 1, and tier 2 being the largest group. And no matter how imbalanced the game is, at least it will play fine thanks to the new design philosophy of maneuvers matter.

2 hours ago, LordBlades said:

I think hoping that FFG will release more balanced content is unrealistic. 1.0 was designed to the design team's best ability, and 2.0 has the same design team. What I do think is realistic to hope is that:

- the core mechanics will be better designed

- issues will be corrected faster

Lol no it wasn't

1.0 was designed with a FAR more limited shelf life in mind, which is why we got the bum-**** stupid turret rules

They could not have forseen how popular the game would become and said as much in the 2.0 faq

Plus, if the core mechanics are better designed, issues corrected faster, and ffg is indeed staffed by human beings capable of learning things, then it's reasonable to expect a more balanced experience

2 hours ago, LordBlades said:

I think hoping that FFG will release more balanced content is unrealistic. 1.0 was designed to the design team's best ability, and 2.0 has the same design team. What I do think is realistic to hope is that:

- the core mechanics will be better designed

- issues will be corrected faster

I think the core rules changes and the new philosophy behind ship design and abilities will allow them to achieve balance more often and more easily. While no designers are perfect, I think what we saw as 1.0 progressed was the designers trying to operate within the restrictions set down by the initial design. By altering those restrictions we should be able to get better balance going forward even with the same design team. All this depends on them sticking to their core principles, of course.

10 minutes ago, ficklegreendice said:

Lol no it wasn't

1.0 was designed with a FAR more limited shelf life in mind, which is why we got the bum-**** stupid turret rules

They could not have forsern how popular the game would become and said as much in the 2.0 faq

Plus, if the core mechanics are better designed, issues corrected faster, and ffg is indeed staffed by human beings capable of learning things, then it's reasonable to expect a more balanced experience

What I meant that, last couple of waves aside (as they might have included 2.0 test elements), the guys designing X-wing genuinely thought stuff like Jumpmasters, Miranda, TLT, Lowhrick, Harpoon, Trajectory Simulator etc. were good additions to the game. Nobody gets smarter overnight.

13 hours ago, jagsba said:

no! only balance matters! not fun!

...but 2.0 was the Chosen One!!!!

6 minutes ago, LordBlades said:

What I meant that, last couple of waves aside (as they might have included 2.0 test elements), the guys designing X-wing genuinely thought stuff like Jumpmasters, Miranda, TLT, Lowhrick, Harpoon, Trajectory Simulator etc. were good additions to the game. Nobody gets smarter overnight.

More than a night has passed since the release of the last broken thing. More than enough time to learn

More importantly, just a glance at the new changes shows how much better it is than 1.0. they showcase a real understanding of how things got so borked and the extensive measures the designers are taking against them.

Therefore, cautious optimism is reasonable

Besides, designing a more balanced game than 1.0 isn't hard. The bar is pretty low

5 minutes ago, ficklegreendice said:

More than a night has passed since the release of the last broken thing. More than enough time to learn

More importantly, just a glance at the new changes shows how much better it is than 1.0. they showcase a real understanding of how things got so borked and the extensive measures the designers are taking against them.

Therefore, cautious optimism is reasonable

Besides, designing a more balanced game than 1.0 isn't hard. The bar is pretty low

Since wave 7 (Miranda and TLT), almost every wave and ace pack had something which ended up being considered broken by significant parts of the community, up to the last pure 1.0 wave which brought Fenn Rau and Maul crew. If they didn't improve significantly during the last half of 1.0, I have a hard time thinking they will between end of 1.0 and 2.0.

That being said, I'm also cautiously optimistic. What we've seen so far includes many things that look better than 1.0 and none that look significantly worse.