If Vader does become a menace (or anything with FCS), it does counter him a bit. He'll want to keep his TLs on stuff, and Jamming makes that difficult.
What's the point of jamming beam in 2.0?
thats actually really, really annoying to hear that Jam action is R1 only and the tokens dont stick around.
Yes token stacking isnt as easy but its still pretty common for the beefier pilots.
That makes 2 abilities in this game that have been designed intentionally to be bad - ion being the other. Hey FFG, how about rather than intentionally designing something to be rancid just to get it in the game in some sense of proper flavor you design it in a way thats good even if its a bit out of context?
Reaper probably wont ever use his Jam action now due to the R1 problem alone. I'm fine with it removing, but thats near impossible to assign and not get blasted in the process AND it doesnt stick around to reward you risking your support ship
4 minutes ago, ficklegreendice said:Oh yeah, pretty much 0 reason to take the cannon
The action is okay because ships don't always have a relevant repositioning actions or any repositioning actions at all
It's probably better than just a focus if you're concetrating fire on a high priority target. Stuff like the VCX or Decimator (poor Cheri) will hate your guts
But most ships only have 1 of the three actions that grant green tokens (focus/calculate). Very few ships have reinforce, very few ships have evade. In most cases, it just means:
From one of the best actions in the game, Jam now turned into one of the worst, and fails as the primary reason people wanted to include it in their lists (Deny ordnance)...
FFG really dropped the ball on this one. With Jam being available on most support type ships, it could have been an interesting control option. But now it is just a useless blot of paint on the cards...
Especially with the new mechanics introduced, Jam could have been so much fun. If it gets too strong, you can always just increase the point cost to balance it.... But they went too careful with it, and no amount of points reduction will make this cannon worth while.
Consider this:
If Jam tokens stay, and that is too strong... FFG has all the tools to make that work. Make all Jam related cards and pilots more expensive if it gets out of hand.
If Jam tokens go away, and it is too weak... What can FFG do? They won't change the rule, because it fits nicely with their freshly reworked cardboard rules. If its round, it goes away. They can include target locks, but that feels like inelegant design, something I feel they are reluctant to do. This mechanic is DOA, and there is nothing to do about it.
3 minutes ago, GreenDragoon said:That's very dishonest of you.
Denying a reinforce is huge. Denying a focus or evade to an expensive high agility ship is also huge. Way more important than "wasting" an action on a minor, cheap ship.
Eh... Removing a reinforce is fine, but VERY situational. How many ships have it? 5-6?
Denying a focus on a high agility ship. Think about it. Let's say you have 3 gunboats with Jamming beams equipped, going against Soontir Fel and his friends. How many gunboats do you think you can keep on Soontir consistently?
And how many of those range 1-2 attacks will hit Soontir's tokened up defense?
Because IF you manage to get Soontir in arc with more than 1 of your most likely 3 ships
And IF you manage to hit Soontir, despite probably not having double mods on your offense
Then you can remove 1 of his tokens, IF he didn't use it.
That's a lot of IF-s, and nothing that any other cannon can't do. The fact that it does stack is kinda irrelevant, because you will almost never hit something with more than 2 tokens. Which they are spending on the attack anyway... WHich they would do with any other cannon.
8 minutes ago, Jo Jo said:If Vader does become a menace (or anything with FCS), it does counter him a bit. He'll want to keep his TLs on stuff, and Jamming makes that difficult.
IT DOESN'T!!!
37 minutes ago, Commander Kaine said:How many gunboats do you think you can keep on Soontir consistently?
And how many of those range 1-2 attacks will hit Soontir's tokened up defense?
An entirely irrelevant amount considering I specifically quoted you talking about actions, which are always working and will always deny a token.
44 minutes ago, Commander Kaine said:IT DOESN'T!!!
It doesn't what?
Just now, Jo Jo said:
It doesn't what?
Jam doesn't remove Locks anymore. Like I've said in this thread before...
News to me... Was that something the developers said?
Okay... Nevermind Jam is worthless as a cannon at least.
Edited by Jo JoRunning Jamming beam on a higher PS ship may end up being a waste, I agree. However, you can get multiple jam tokens with the 2.0 version AND you can run them on a list that generally uses several lower initiative pilots who are all at the same level.
Other posts have said it, but it bears repeating: token stacking is rare(er) in 2.0 and several abilities rely on having a focus or an evade (or a calculate). Picture shooting Han Solo with one of your 4 gunboats. If you get more than 1 hit in your roll, he is going to get a jam. That jam will eat his evade token and the other 3 of your ships will be able to hammer him down with (less) fear of him using his ship title to constantly re-roll.
since it doesnt stick around jamming beam HAS to be on a high ps or it does completely nothing since it doesnt affect Tlocks nor stick around.
If jam tokens stuck around, a low PS could capitalize on a higher PS probably being out of tokens at that point in time.
1 minute ago, Vineheart01 said:since it doesnt stick around jamming beam HAS to be on a high ps or it does completely nothing since it doesnt affect Tlocks nor stick around.
Don‘t forget that ‚high ps‘ means ‚high ps compared to the rest of your list‘ primarily, and ‚high ps compared to all ships‘ secondarily
yes it is better if a token is removed before it can be used offensively. But I see its value in tearing down defense anyway, and here it shuts down several upgrades.
For example C3PO at 12 points is useless if his calculate is stripped away. We‘ve seen plenty examples already.
I‘m not saying the beam is good, but it can become an actual choice in a certain meta
1 minute ago, GreenDragoon said:Don‘t forget that ‚high ps‘ means ‚high ps compared to the rest of your list‘ primarily, and ‚high ps compared to all ships‘ secondarily
yes it is better if a token is removed before it can be used offensively. But I see its value in tearing down defense anyway, and here it shuts down several upgrades.
For example C3PO at 12 points is useless if his calculate is stripped away. We‘ve seen plenty examples already.
I‘m not saying the beam is good, but it can become an actual choice in a certain meta
We have seen how that works out with Assault missiles.
Not good.
7 minutes ago, Commander Kaine said:We have seen how that works out with Assault missiles.
Not good.
Are you thinking of Homing missiles?
If so, that‘s yet again very dishonest. Removing an evade once for 5 points after getting a TL to set up the shot tells you how removing one or MORE focus, evade, reinforce or calculate tokens repeatedly for most likely less points without requiring a TL? Ok.
1 minute ago, GreenDragoon said:Are you thinking of Homing missiles?
If so, that‘s yet again very dishonest. Removing an evade once for 5 points after getting a TL to set up the shot tells you how removing one or MORE focus, evade, reinforce or calculate tokens repeatedly for most likely less points without requiring a TL? Ok.
No. I'm thinking of Assault missiles
As in, an upgrade that is extremely situational.
Just now, Commander Kaine said:No. I'm thinking of Assault missiles
As in, an upgrade that is extremely situational.
Oh, and I though I‘m giving you the benefit of doubt there.
So you are not only deliberately ignoring the fact that assault missiles had many other problems while harpoons were famously credited with burying swarms for good, meaning that the ‚highly situational‘ can actually do exactly the job, you also really answered to „if the situational situations occur with more frequency“ (depends on meta) with saying „it‘s situational“?!
The only reason i considered Jamming Beam to be remotely useful in 1.0 was the potential to future-lock a ship out of a token, since by the time the PS1-3 ship got to attack the target probably had none and it stuck around, making the next turn a bit of a panic for them.
Using it to try and strip existing tokens....just attack them normally theyre going to burn the tokens regardless. Regular attack might burn both focus/evade while a jam would only clear one, since they'd just let it hit them due to no damage anyway if they needed both to evade it.
Tractor atleast has future problems if theres more things that can hit you and it can potentially move you around (large are not immune to it now) so even a tractor beam is vastly better than jam because it might burn both tokens too.
Really not liking that jams dont stick around. I feel like thats the sole reason its not going to be used much if at all.
An upgrade that has certain uses in certain metas/situations.
In competitive, you equip upgrades that you make use of all the time. Even Autothrusters were useful even when not facing turrets.
This, however? Only if you face a squad like this, and your squad is like that, and the moon and Jupiter align, and...
Won't be used in competitive.
I think the devs have restricted these things to cinematic and alternative modes where they will be equipped for free or have alternative rules.
They have explicitly said "We don't want a game where ions are good." I bet they put Jam and Tractor in the same bag.
I guess they know what they are doing, but it kills one inside a little bit to know already that they have totally given up on these cool weapons even on the yet unreleased second edition of the game. It's hard to feel excited about the new U-wing or lambda having a Jam action, or the new tractor or jamming beams when you already know that they are, most of the time, absolutely useless.
Just now, GreenDragoon said:Oh, and I though I‘m giving you the benefit of doubt there.
So you are not only deliberately ignoring the fact that assault missiles had many other problems while harpoons were famously credited with burying swarms for good, meaning that the ‚highly situational‘ can actually do exactly the job, you also really answered to „if the situational situations occur with more frequency“ (depends on meta) with saying „it‘s situational“?!
And I'm being dishonest here?
Harpoons didn't bury swarms, by the time they arrived the swarms were dead already.
And of the two missiles, Harpoons had more problems than Assaults.
Harpoons were undercosted, dealt unavoidable damage, kept locks, and did AOE. Equating Harpoons with Assault missiles is as dishonest as comparing prenerf jumpmasters with outer rim smugglers. They are not even in the same league.
In the current rules for ion, yes i agree with them you do NOT want a game where ions are good.
So change the ion rule. 2.0 is the perfect chance to do that. Restrict them to blue maneuvers rather than a 1fwd, have it overload shields or something (shield damage only), but dont just let it rot and print useless material for it if you acknowledge that it could easily be OP as crud.
Make ions an inhibitor, not a disabler
12 hours ago, Boom Owl said:Also a smarter person than me once said "You want Jam to be bad".
They were right.
They clearly don't eat a lot of toast.
Has this been pointed out yet: a jamming beam attack on a reinforced ship does not get the number of jam tokens reduced by the reinforce token.
Jamming beam: “Attack: If this attack hits, all hit/crit results inflict jam tokens instead of damage.”
Reinforce: A reinforce token reduces damage taken by one, to a minimum of 1 damage.
Since Jamming Beam results inflict jam tokens instead of damage, and reinforce tokens only reduce damage, Reinforce is especially weak against Jamming Beam attacks.
12 hours ago, Boom Owl said:Also a smarter person than me once said "You want Jam to be bad".
I think Jam should be as good as what it costs to apply.
If you spend an action to apply Jam, then the simplest thing would be that it takes away the effect of an action the other player would do. That was okay in 1.0, when jam tokens stayed between rounds.
If you spend an attack and perhaps some tokens to hit with a jamming beam, then it should have an effect at least as potent as dealing the equivalent amount of damage.
Or am I being illogical here?
3 minutes ago, J1mBob said:Has this been pointed out yet: a jamming beam attack on a reinforced ship does not get the number of jam tokens reduced by the reinforce token.
Jamming beam: “Attack: If this attack hits, all hit/crit results inflict jam tokens instead of damage.”
Reinforce: A reinforce token reduces damage taken by one, to a minimum of 1 damage.
Since Jamming Beam results inflict jam tokens instead of damage, and reinforce tokens only reduce damage, Reinforce is especially weak against Jamming Beam attacks.
this is a fair point since reinforce is more common in 2.0
A decimator would get rather pissed at a jamming beam user, since he literally cannot avoid it
9 minutes ago, Commander Kaine said:And I'm being dishonest here?
Harpoons didn't bury swarms, by the time they arrived the swarms were dead already.And of the two missiles, Harpoons had more problems than Assaults.
Harpoons were undercosted, dealt unavoidable damage, kept locks, and did AOE. Equating Harpoons with Assault missiles is as dishonest as comparing prenerf jumpmasters with outer rim smugglers. They are not even in the same league.
So you have two examples, one overcosted, one undercosted. And one is somehow correct as example despite never being viable at all?!
My entire point was that you cherrypicked and that‘s invalidating your point. Of course me cherrypicking the other extreme is the same, but that was the intention so you might realize what you‘re doing.
The jamming beam might be viable in a meta where the targeted tokens and upgrades are more prevalent. Your horribly chosen example of assault missiles does not change that.
Just now, Azrapse said:I think Jam should be as good as what it costs to apply.
If you spend an action to apply Jam, then the simplest thing would be that it takes away the effect of an action the other player would do. That was okay in 1.0, when jam tokens stayed between rounds.If you spend an attack and perhaps some tokens to hit with a jamming beam, then it should have an effect at least as potent as dealing the equivalent amount of damage.
Or am I being illogical here?
No I don't think you are.
As others have said they are worthless on low initiative support ships because aces will have already used tokens then, and using it on an ace with an ability could be a total waste.