I could see Veteran Instincts coming back with three changes:

1) It only works in the Activation Phase. You can move before Vader, but you won't shoot before him. Alternately, it can be used in either Activation and Combat Phases, but the effect only lasts for the duration of the phase.

2) It has charges that must be spent at the start of the phase and cannot be recharged, so there's now a strategic decision of when the best time is to use it. The charge mechanic could also allow you to have that one turn of power where you use it in both Activation and Combat phases, but at the cost of burning out your charges faster.

3) The cost increases based on the Initiative level of the pilot equipping it. This means that, yes, Wedge can use it to activate at I7, but he's going to pay 10 points for the ability instead of the 4 points that Biggs might pay to activate at I4.

20 minutes ago, PhantomFO said:

I could see Veteran Instincts coming back with three changes:

1) It only works in the Activation Phase. You can move before Vader, but you won't shoot before him. Alternately, it can be used in either Activation and Combat Phases, but the effect only lasts for the duration of the phase.

2) It has charges that must be spent at the start of the phase and cannot be recharged, so there's now a strategic decision of when the best time is to use it. The charge mechanic could also allow you to have that one turn of power where you use it in both Activation and Combat phases, but at the cost of burning out your charges faster.

3) The cost increases based on the Initiative level of the pilot equipping it. This means that, yes, Wedge can use it to activate at I7, but he's going to pay 10 points for the ability instead of the 4 points that Biggs might pay to activate at I4.

What if they made Veteran Instincts a non-limited only?

Most I5's are undercosted. The RZ-2 I5's are hilariously undercosted. Most of the issues here go away if FFG keeps pumping up the price point on the I5 and I6 pilots until the I4 finds some breathing room. Pair this with the idea that unused points are ceded to the opponent at the beginning of the game and deep bids would become pretty rare. As a low initiative swarm player, I love the 20 point bid but it is a symptom of a fundamental design problem that needs to be addressed sooner or later.

I'm concerned that any version of Veteran Instincts comes in because then it just becomes an arms race again. But, the idea of a charge-based upgrade is intriguing. I would go with something like this:

At the beginning of the activation phase, you may spend one charge.

If you do, activate at initiative 6 instead of your standard initiative this phase.

1 charge or two? Single or double dot?

I'm just paroting someone else idea, but this is the one that made the more sense in my opinion :

Generic ships are often overcosted by 3-4 points, sometimes more, because of reasoning like : oh being able to put 6 generic of those on the field would be problematic, because of threat saturation / compound effect / etc, so we'll price them at a way that you can only bring one or 2 less that that. However this ends up making a stat line that is out of touch by juuuuuust a tiny bit, but adding +1 to a stat or adding a slot would create over powerfull combo.

To fix this, use LIMITED DOT. They have this amazing design space, and they don't dare use it to it's fullest potential.

For example : generic t-65 x 5 would be too powerfull because it would be almost impossible to kill 1 or 2 before the whole list shoot you down, even without dice mods. Price them cheap like they're supposed to be, but put 4 limited dot on them! It's the same system that games like warmachine uses, where they understood that it's hard to perfectly price an option in a game, and that sometimes something that is... not so good alone, can be really good in huge numbers! (Looking at you, upsilons!)

And this way, you could have for example, Generic Initiative 5 ships or even I6, without ability, that can fill a design space that doesn't exist right now! Elite Generic swarm!

And it can allow generics to become more viable again with price cut and help topple the I5 saturation!

7 hours ago, It’s One Of Ours said:

Guri came out nicely in v2, keeping her Initiative of 5.

She's equivalent of an I 10 now. They doubled her init.

7 hours ago, It’s One Of Ours said:

The first time I pulled a lateral position shift with a Daredevil Dalan Oberos, while maintaining his facing, it blew my opponent’s mind.

Oooo. Advanced sensors Daredevil boost into a 1-3 straight rotating after the maneuver, or optionally use a 1 or 2 bank in place of the straight for an angling in of his arc... That looks like fun. 😈