I really like flying reapers without it. I find the ailerons a bit fiddly and the stress shuts it down. You can coordinate every turn and slow-roll, the two things Lambdas have the most trouble with. Then if you need to bugger out of there, do white actions instead!

20 hours ago, theBitterFig said:

Except a red Coordinate shuts off Maketh Tua, which shuts off RAC's passive mods.

Any coordinate action from RAC is taking an action away from your biggest, probably most expensive ship and passing it to a smaller, weaker ship. That's not a good strategy, and taking a tactical officer means you're spending points and a crew slot committing to that strategy. At 2pts you could argue that the tac officer was cheap enough that it wasn't a big investment, but back then the deci only had two crew slots. I'd much rather put something important in a crew slot than bring a backup plan tac officer.

The red coordinate isn't good, especially in combo with Tua or Dauntless, but it is sufficient for that one round in a tournament where you NEED to barrel roll vader or whoever out of a killbox, even at the cost of RAC mods.

1 hour ago, gadwag said:

Any coordinate action from RAC is taking an action away from your biggest, probably most expensive ship and passing it to a smaller, weaker ship. That's not a good strategy, and taking a tactical officer means you're spending points and a crew slot committing to that strategy. At 2pts you could argue that the tac officer was cheap enough that it wasn't a big investment, but back then the deci only had two crew slots. I'd much rather put something important in a crew slot than bring a backup plan tac officer.

The red coordinate isn't good, especially in combo with Tua or Dauntless, but it is sufficient for that one round in a tournament where you NEED to barrel roll vader or whoever out of a killbox, even at the cost of RAC mods.

RAC with Lock & Reinforce (from Tua); Maarek Stele with Lock: 4.895 hits expected between both attacks. http://xwing.gateofstorms.net/2/multi/?d=AAAAAAAAAAAA&a1=MwAQAAgAAAAA&a2=MwAAAAAAAAAA

RAC with Reinforce; Maarek Stele with Focus & Lock: 4.891 hits expected. http://xwing.gateofstorms.net/2/multi/?d=AAAAAAAAAAAA&a1=MQAQAAgAAAAA&a2=MwgAAAAAAAAA

It's essentially the same. But there are plenty of cases where it can work out better for Maarek to get two actions, rather than RAC get two actions. Maybe Maarek is a range band closer. Maybe shields are down on the enemy and you value Maarek's crit-picking ability. Maybe Maarek is in danger, and you want him to not-die (dead ships do less damage than any other kind of ship). Just because RAC is more expensive than Maarek, it doesn't necessarily follow that his actions are more valuable. Indeed, only having Tua's reinforce is frequently enough for RAC to be meaningful, and you might be able to really leverage Maarek. Maybe Maarek got blocked, and doesn't have a locked target to shoot. Maybe Maarek killed his target last turn, and really wants to Tallon Roll this round, but still wants a 3-dice attack.

I keep using Maarek because of a list I've got running through my head.

Maarek with Marksmanship and FCS. Grand Inquisitor with FCS. RAC with Trick Shot, Tua, Hull Upgrade. There's 8 points to play with at the moment. From experience, Maarek with coordinate support is f'ing amazing. Other options all just seem less flexible than Tactical Officer.

Will it always be the pick? No. But Init 5 Coordiante can be amazingly potent in the right situation, and Tactical Officer seems like a price worth at least considering, to keep RAC well-functioning. I'm sure some turns the 6 points of TacOff will be wasted. I'd rather that than the 7 points of Tua and the pilot ability of RAC going to waste.

I'll totally concede that Tactical Officer on RAC isn't a stapled-on upgrade. However, I think there's times when it's a completely reasonable choice.

5 hours ago, theBitterFig said:

(     dead   ships do less damage than any other kind of ship) 

Fascinating observation! 🙂

6 hours ago, theBitterFig said:

I keep using Maarek because of a list I've got running through my head. 

Maarek really likes coordinate, so I get where you're coming from. Personally, I'd rather pair RAC with something that doesn't rely on his coordinate action

I probably wouldn't bother on a lot of ships now.

Tac Officer seems too costly for a U-wing now. I think I'd rather adv. sensors at that point and coord before a blue move. Now at least, AS has more utility for its cost e.g. AS focus before a 0 stop etc. That being said, a normal red coord isn't a huge deal for a U-wing. As much as I think TacO is overpriced now, I do like to think we'll see more experimentation with other rebel crew because of it.

Vizier just got a lot more valuable. Tac wasn't great on the Deci anyway, so no huge loss there. Lambda doesn't need it.

Resistance now has plenty of ways to get around a red coordinate. First Order doesn't need it, Scum mostly don't need it as much, but also don't have a lot of ships that can coordinate. The escape craft will probably still get use out of it like others have said. Republic only have a purple coordinate from Palp which takes up the crew seat, same for CIS with the addition of DBS-32C for an even better option anyway.

It is objectively overpriced in my opinion, but its no longer an auto include on the ships that benefit from it most which is probably a good thing, and the other ships will just keep on keeping on.

I crafted a rebel list, swapping the U-wing (Cassian) + Tac Officer for AP5 and Jake:

12 hours ago, ClassicalMoser said:

I really like flying reapers without it. I find the ailerons a bit fiddly and the stress shuts it down. You can coordinate every turn and slow-roll, the two things Lambdas have the most trouble with. Then if you need to bugger out of there, do white actions instead!

The key thing with TO there though, is that you can still red coord with it. So slow roll in with the red, drop a white coord and sloop or Ailerons away into a 3 bank and come round again.

The blue moves are really obvious, so I only like having the Reaper stressed on the turns before engagement or, necessarily, following a sloop or hard turn to keep guns on target. Blue move into a kill zone is an easy way to lose them.

TO does an awful lot to keep the Reaper mobile and unpredictable, while also handing a key action off on a crucial turn. Empire has many ships that become super powered with a well timed coord and split. Being able to choose that moment, turn by turn, is key.

So, for me, it's more about having the option. 2pt for as powerful an option as that was a no brainer. At 6, you do kinda want to make do without it. Which you obviously can, but more options is always better

5 hours ago, gadwag said:

Maarek really likes coordinate, so I get where you're coming from. Personally, I'd rather pair RAC with something that doesn't rely on his coordinate action

Fair enough. I still think that RAC (still fairly strong with only a Reinforce) is in a decent position to leverage a white coordinate in a lot situations, but also only a white and not red coordinate.

4 hours ago, Cuz05 said:

The key thing with TO there though, is that you can still red coord with it. So slow roll in with the red, drop a white coord and sloop or Ailerons away into a 3 bank and come round again.

The blue moves are really obvious, so I only like having the Reaper stressed on the turns before engagement or, necessarily, following a sloop or hard turn to keep guns on target. Blue move into a kill zone is an easy way to lose them.

TO does an awful lot to keep the Reaper mobile and unpredictable, while also handing a key action off on a crucial turn. Empire has many ships that become super powered with a well timed coord and split. Being able to choose that moment, turn by turn, is key.

So, for me, it's more about having the option. 2pt for as powerful an option as that was a no brainer. At 6, you do kinda want to make do without it. Which you obviously can, but more options is always better

I will definitely say that at a 4 pts difference, AS has become much more appealing on the U-Wing than before, and the Sheathipede will probably be seeing more play as well.

I think they overnerfed it. I always took it on my U-Wings if I didn't need the space for something else, but at 6 points, I will rarely if ever take it anymore. I think 4 points would have put it in the sweet spot. And seriously, did they need to nerf EVERY aspect of Beef?

The big thing for me is the price comparison in Rebels - with both Leia and Tactical Officer at 6 points, I know which one I'll be making room for first. With access to a very strong white Coordinate ability on AP-5, I suspect we may see Rebel lists that rely heavily on Coordinate move across to the Sheathipede instead.

I think Tac Officer probably was too cheap at 2 points - I was taking it on basically anything that could take it - but I think 3 or 4 points would probably have been a better place for it than jumping straight up to 6.

I plan on trying Tac Officer with a Resistance Transport on this list:

Cova Nell (38)
Pattern Analyzer (5)
Jamming Beam (0)
Korr Sella (6)
Tactical Officer (6)

Ship total: 55 Half Points: 28 Threshold: 4

Temmin Wexley (54)
Composure (1)
Integrated S-Foils (0)
Jamming Beam (0)

Ship total: 55 Half Points: 28 Threshold: 4

Black Squadron Ace (T-70) (49)
Integrated S-Foils (0)

Ship total: 49 Half Points: 25 Threshold: 4

Greer Sonnel (36)
Heroic (1)
Advanced Optics (4)

Ship total: 41 Half Points: 21 Threshold: 2


Total: 200

View in Yet Another Squad Builder 2.0: https://raithos.github.io/?f=Resistance&d=v8ZsZ200Z351XW206W12WW245W61WWY297X115WWW175WWW12Y256XWWW175WWWY270X172WWW186&sn=Resistance 4 Scouts&obs=

20 hours ago, MikeEvans said:

And seriously, did they need to nerf EVERY aspect of Beef?

But they didn't though. They nerfed:

• Cassian

• Ten and Braylen

• Wedge

• Leia

• Tactical Officer

They didn't nerf Selfless, Biggs, any of the generics, Jake, Magva, Thane, etc. There are still lots of excellent and beefy 4-ship rebel builds out there, but now you have to make a decision or two about which named pilots you want. Before you didn't have to choose because you could just have them all, which is kind of stupid. Drop just one named pilot to a generic and everything still fits. They definitely didn't over-nerf beef.

Maybe they over-nerfed Tactical Officer. I agree that 4 probably would have been nicer. Still, it will be cool to have a season where you need to either really invest in that white coordinate (Sheathipede, Lambda, Vizier, or pay through the nose for that crew) or learn to deal with the stress. It makes decisions a little more interesting, which is really the point of the point changes after all, isn't it?

I'm thinking that both Tac Officer and Leia at 6 makes Leia a no- brainer choice. Since they tweaked her many times and set her to 6 pts, they could have uped TacOff to 4 to differentiate them in terms of cost.

Something similar happens in empire with Ciena Ree now costing 6pts too.

36 minutes ago, ClassicalMoser said:

But they didn't though.

I was being mostly hyperbolic. But they did nerf every pilot and just about every upgrade in my favorite version of beef, so cut me a little bellyachin' slack!

Eh

a.) The nerf was necessary

b.) The nerf isn't actually big on any individual element

Yeah, it's across the board so you can't take everything at once anymore but...that's the actual, literal point of the nerfs!

Have a feeling a lot of people will adjust by simply bringing Garven or some such. Jake could work, too

No.