On 10/6/2018 at 5:54 PM, Da_Brown_Bomber said:

back in wave 1-3 the ship choices were amazing becuase we were tired of just flying ties and xwings. 2.0 gives you the ships to build with. the EPTs are really gravy on top. At first the falcon didnt seem playable at competitive level - too many points in one ship wasnt going to work or was it? . with the addition of Awings, Intercepters, Slave1 and Falcon things became more interesting and then with wave3 adding hawk, B-Wing,Bomber and Lambda it really felt like the game was hitting its straps. imo this was the best time to be playing.

This doesn't match my memory or experience of events at all, and I played in a ton of tournaments back then. It wasn't until Wave 4 when the TIE Phantom dropped that you really saw the meta start to move away from anything other than Howl-Swarms. The only thing that had any competitive success outside of the TIE Swarm was the occasional BBXX list. Falcons, HWKs, Interceptors, Firesprays, Falcons, Lambdas, and TIE Bombers were all hot garbage, and aside from Biggs and Howlrunner + PS6 Friend (Dark Curse/Backstabber), uniques and EPTs simply weren't being run with any competitive success.

For instance, check out the 2013 Gencon Final (at the time, the biggest X-Wing tournament the world had ever seen): Jacob P's Howl-Swarm wrecks James N's XXX list in about four rounds. While it was impressive three unique X's made it to the final table, it's worth noting the (*): James played against Rebels along his whole final path to the top table. Imp vs Imp and Reb vs Reb matches in cut rounds were so common, that some people even speculated that FFGOP had paired Reb vs Reb and Imp vs Imp in order to ensure a Reb vs Imp final round. The tournament system was pretty different back then, and FFG wasn't using the sort of software that we all know and love now, pairings were sort of black box that went up after every round (and who can track their own SOS?), plus Modified Wins and Ties were mucking waters.

Now, by Gencon 2014 when FFG had given us things like the TIE Phantom and the Predator EPT, you saw a lot more variety at the top tables of the NA Championships, because players had finally been given the sorts of weapons against generic swarms they had been begging for during the first three waves.




NOTE: As the anecdotal disclaimer: in the first few waves, small local events certainly saw a lot of a variety. The game was new, it was not nearly as solved, and the online analysis of meta was harder to find. New and excited players wanted to fly their favorite ships or the new ships. Very few people yet owned 7-8 TIE Fighters, and a lot of folks didn't want to buy that many. So, you saw variety being brought to the table. That said, at the large events, the TIE Swarm was dominating, and in localities with competent TIE Swarm players they were running the tables.

5 minutes ago, AllWingsStandyingBy said:

Yea, Juke is basically an auto-include on Defenders and Phantoms at the moment.

Other than that, I don't find myself using any EPTs, and when I do it's typically just throwing Trick Shot onto a pilot because why not? I remember when everyone was worried that Force Users not having access to EPTs was gonna be a huge opportunity cost, but really it seems like Force Users haven't missed out on anything.

Juke is blatantly overpowered on ships that receive free evade tokens like the Defender and Phantom. I'm not sure if its the pilot or the EPT, but one part of Rexlar Brah + Juke needs to be hiked up in points. It gets to the point where the pilot with Juke doesn't have to make meaningful decisions to get their mods and that reminds me too much of 1.0's problems.

I felt the same way. But it occurs to me that most of these are intended to be accents to a pilot where in first edition sometimes the pilot ability was the accent to the upgrade. Like old Soontirs ability was a bonus for using the upgrade PTL, where it should be like it is now that crack shot is a bonus to Soontir. Also they so far seem to be mostly small tweaks to performance for low cost, have a few extra points? Throw on a 'shot' ability, or make a action easier, or make an action double.

20 minutes ago, ThinkingB said:

Juke is blatantly overpowered on ships that receive free evade tokens like the Defender and Phantom. I'm not sure if its the pilot or the EPT, but one part of Rexlar Brah + Juke needs to be hiked up in points. It gets to the point where the pilot with Juke doesn't have to make meaningful decisions to get their mods and that reminds me too much of 1.0's problems.

Rexler Brath certainly seems underpriced. There aren't many ships where the Init 5 ship is lower cost than either of the Init 4s. For him to be the same cost as either Countess Ryad or maybe Colonel Vessery would make sense to me. But a lot of that is just because Vessery doesn't really have good partners to set up Target Locks for him to use to get double-mods.

On 10/6/2018 at 5:48 AM, Cuz05 said:

I'd be tempted to say they're mostly all strong but situational....

Considering they're all pretty cheap compared to 1.0, I'm very happy with them.

I do miss Expertise, not that I want that OP nonsense back, but if it would just passively convert 1 eye to a hit I'd consider it in a couple of my builds. Like for 2 or 3pt on Lt Kestal for e.g.

Slap Fanatical on Omega Leader, callsign "Midnight" when the FO drops. After you lose your 1 shield, you basically have that passive modification by itself. That is huge when you are holding your lock on a target to negate mods and when you can only generate 1 token a turn, obviously for defense. Or.... attach Advanced Optics and "fanatical" to Omega Leader, then when you feel really agressive, so long as you have a single paint on your 2 dice and no shields, you are guaranteed 2 hits on the target. Even a 3 agi ship will begin to bleed to that rather swiftly.

On 10/6/2018 at 1:27 PM, Dasharr said:

You know what I like about this? Non-EPT pilots are actually worth flying now, where in 1.0 (barring a handful of special cases like Lothal+Fenn with an even crazier combo backing them) they weren't.

Add to that the fact that PTL (1.0 linked actions with no personality and hogging up the ept slot) is gone, whilst almost every ship has some kind of efficiency or trick built into it, non-ept pilots become even more viable. Heck, Redline was known to be crazy action efficient and powerful before the invitational, whose winning list involved him. And Soontir took a free Ruthless just so that the list could be event-legal!

49 minutes ago, player3010587 said:

Slap Fanatical on Omega Leader, callsign "Midnight" when the FO drops. After you lose your 1 shield, you basically have that passive modification by itself. That is huge when you are holding your lock on a target to negate mods and when you can only generate 1 token a turn, obviously for defense. Or.... attach Advanced Optics and "fanatical" to Omega Leader, then when you feel really agressive, so long as you have a single paint on your 2 dice and no shields, you are guaranteed 2 hits on the target. Even a 3 agi ship will begin to bleed to that rather swiftly.

I'd forgotten about Fanatical. That combo looks incredibly mean. Cost will be very interesting, we don't know this yet, do we? Could be prohibitive on a lower I ship.

Might give me a reason to crash Kestal through a rock on turn 1 and hope for the best

15 minutes ago, Cuz05 said:

I'd forgotten about Fanatical. That combo looks incredibly mean. Cost will be very interesting, we don't know this yet, do we? Could be prohibitive on a lower I ship.

Might give me a reason to crash Kestal through a rock on turn 1 and hope for the best

Fanatical is the First Order's exclusive EPT. Just like Ruthless, Fearless, or Selfless, although it does not have the "ess" in it. What I wish Kestal could take is Saturation Salvo for her barrage rockets, but curse that missing reload requirement!

7 minutes ago, player3010587 said:

Fanatical is the First Order's exclusive EPT. Just like Ruthless, Fearless, or Selfless, although it does not have the "ess" in it. What I wish Kestal could take is Saturation Salvo for her barrage rockets, but curse that missing reload requirement!

Ah, FO only ofc, missed that. Might have to convert my black ships after all...

I think Kestal just really loves Jonas. I just really don't wanna go that route ?

Fanaticalness?

On 10/6/2018 at 3:37 AM, Da_Brown_Bomber said:

Is it just me or are the pilot Talents in 2.0 mostly underwhelming?

This is not an in depth analysis but more my impressions of the current selection of talents.

IMHO these are how I'd rate the current talents.

Strong = crackshot, trickshot, debris gambit, predator, elusive, fearless, juke, outmanever, lone wolf.

Playable but situational = fearless, swarm tactics, marksmanship, ruthless, selfless.

Weak = expert handling, composure, daredevil, intimidation, saturation salvo.

Thank goodness they are.

There are less talents in second edition yet somehow we have more choices. Not having 5epts being the only things worth taking sucked.

As for your power list, it's really sad you feel that way as all thise weak cards are good on the right ship. Expert handling is almost an auto include fir me on y-wing or arcs.

Yay 2.0

5 minutes ago, Icelom said:

Thank goodness they are.

There are less talents in second edition yet somehow we have more choices. Not having 5eots being the only things worth taking sucked.

As for your power list, it's really sad you feel that way as all thise weak cards are good on the right ship. Expert handling is almost an auto include fir me on y-wing or arcs.

Yay 2.0

dont feel sad. im rating the upgrades based on how useful they are in my own squads. Others will rate them differently. Even expert handing has its uses and is really good on a specific ship... just not on the ones I am choosing to fly.

weak could be too strong a word here... more like less useful/too situational for my tastes

if we all liked the same faction/ships/upgrades we'd all be flying the same stuff. In general id say FFG has done a good job balancing the power level of talents. i just don't particularly like some of them.

27 minutes ago, Cuz05 said:

Ah, FO only ofc, missed that. Might have to convert my black ships after all...

I think Kestal just really loves Jonas. I just really don't wanna go that route ?

Fanaticalness?

But imagine the power of Saturation Salvo! 1 charge off a rocket is meaningless, and with the pilot ability outright cancelling some results and the rerolls messing up the others, it is basically going to be autodamage!

3 minutes ago, player3010587 said:

But imagine the power of Saturation Salvo! 1 charge off a rocket is meaningless, and with the pilot ability outright cancelling some results and the rerolls messing up the others, it is basically going to be autodamage!

As long as she hits!

On 10/6/2018 at 3:26 AM, Da_Brown_Bomber said:

scum player here also have little use for Juke. 2.0 nerfed the evade action and target lock actions for some ships.

Palob with Juke is entertaining, at least!

On 10/6/2018 at 6:26 AM, Da_Brown_Bomber said:

scum player here also have little use for Juke. 2.0 nerfed the evade action and target lock actions for some ships.

Juke has come in handy while using both IG and Boba .... So for me, it has been great on my SCUM ships ;)

On 10/6/2018 at 5:37 AM, Da_Brown_Bomber said:

Weak = expert handling, composure, daredevil, intimidation, saturation salvo.

Expert handling came in handy with Dengar. I tried him out yesterday and it held out till the last round, but the barrel rolling was perfect in many situations.

5 hours ago, nj3478 said:

Expert handling came in handy with Dengar. I tried him out yesterday and it held out till the last round, but the barrel rolling was perfect in many situations.

not usable on the firespray but it already has decent repositioning with boost built in. there are just a limited number of ships that can use expert handling. and its quite pricey (as it should be) on large base ships.

depends what you like to fly. Dengar is maybe the only jumpmaster pilot that will see significant play in 2.0. Thats my opinion anyway.

22 hours ago, Cuz05 said:

Ah, FO only ofc, missed that. Might have to convert my black ships after all...

I think Kestal just really loves Jonas. I just really don't wanna go that route ?

Fanaticalness?

For help with kestal:

Jonus

Jendon

Palpatine

Ruthless

I really like Kestal and she's been doing very well with ruthless, ICT, and barrage rockets

I'd say upgrades in general are kind of underwhelming except for some specific types of upgrades. Torpedoes, missiles, devices have interesting options. Scum has neat gunner and crew options. For the most part, though, I'm more willing to leave ships with few upgrades because most aren't compelling to me.