5 minutes ago, docForsaken said:

I get it/don't get it. 99% of folks are just going to use the new points. Don't publish errata with the wrong points? I'm going to have to get little stickers to put the real values on or something

For whatever reason they've taken a "this is competitive only" approach. (Most likely to avoid stock destruction and/or litigation at this point).

It's what were stuck with. When the uproar gets too loud expect a possible change to pdf front sleeves while requiring the original card be available to prove it's authenticity.

3 hours ago, DwainDibbly said:

Plenty of players have tried to make the T47 work though. Players have likewise tried to counter sniper spam. These are two issues that I do not believe are due to group think, they're due to balance issues. The amount of imbalance might be small, but it exists. I mean even the game designers have not been able to come up with a good reason to keep the T47 at a high price and neither has anyone in the player base. That is a strong indicator that there's a balance problem.

All of which is beside the point, because FFG have stated they're doing a point change to balance the game e.g

They've said the units cannot compete at the same level as other units. i.e they are not balanced enough.

They specifically called out the lack of use of the special forces, while simultaneously saying they’re good options, just underused.

2 hours ago, Caimheul1313 said:

Where has it ever been said by FFG that these changes are "temporary?" The articles stats they will be releasing points changes once a year, not that any of them have a set expiration date.

Balance is also called out as a reason for the changes by the designer of the game. When competitive play is constantly the same lists/units, that's because competitive players have found those units to be the most effective.

Well, they repeatedly stated that it’s a yearly adjustment. So, in the article and in the videos FFG puts out (FFG Live).

Alex and Eddy both stated that they wanted to see a wider variety in competitive play.

Now, you can say it’s balance behind the temporary tournament only points change, but the stated reason was actually commonality. Strike teams were, statistically too common, and other special forces too rare.

I agree the actual errata were balance oriented; the points aren’t, they are just there to incentivize the least commonly used units/upgrades and to very slightly disincentivize the most common.

2 hours ago, docForsaken said:

I get it/don't get it. 99% of folks are just going to use the new points. Don't publish errata with the wrong points? I'm going to have to get little stickers to put the real values on or something

While this is true, in my experience most players are using a list builder, not the cards, to build their list anyway.

To me it is a total non-issue.

13 hours ago, JediPartisan said:

Yeah, I do wish they would put out a text only version.

Removing that stupid grey background on the pages would make it printer friendly. This is hardly difficult to do, but something they are incapable of doing for some unfathomable reason. If they are not going to issue new cards then an easy to print replacement on a pdf would be nice as well.

With ffg when they errata something that change is final and will be like that for the rest of the game. If something changes points it could change again later down the track. As more stuff gets released they may need to shift things points wise to open up design space. Hopefully the future adjustments are as good as this one.

7 hours ago, Derrault said:

Well, they repeatedly stated that it’s a yearly adjustment. So, in the article and in the videos FFG puts out (FFG Live).

Alex and Eddy both stated that they wanted to see a wider variety in competitive play.

I think people are really taking FFGs statement of annual point changes and running totally in the wrong direction with it as far as "temporary" goes.

The fact points _could_ change again in a years time does not make the current points temporary. Since there is no requirement for FFG to change any of the points at all. They are just setting expectations so that people know IF the current round of point changes doesn't balance all the units sufficiently or IF it causes new problems, then they are prepared to do another batch (hopefully smaller) of point changes.

They're also saying that their aim is to do that no more than annually to reduce the issues point changes cause for a community.

What they are not saying is that the current set of point changes are temporary and if no problems are found over the next year, well darn it we're just going to change all the points anyway because this batch was just temporary.

Semantics aside, hopefully most people understand what FFG mean and what they are trying to achieve.

Quote

Now, you can say it’s balance behind the temporary tournament only points change, but the stated reason was actually commonality. Strike teams were, statistically too common, and other special forces too rare.

I agree the actual errata were balance oriented; the points aren’t, they are just there to incentivize the least commonly used units/upgrades and to very slightly disincentivize the most common.

You are correct in that they want to see a variety of units been played however the reason for _why_ we don't already see that is because the game is not quite balanced enough for some units and by fixing that balance they will achieve their goal of a wider variety of units.

If FFG identify that too many players have bought and are playing snipers then there are two possible scenarios at play for fixing that with a point change. In what I'd like to think is the scenario most people on here will attribute to FFG:

The game is unbalanced, some units are not getting played competitively due to that, you make point tweaks to make those units a little more competitive and if you do a good job, you achieve a wider variety of units being played.

Here's the other scenario that assumes the game is already balanced as you seem to believe and that the points changes are not here to balance the game but only to change variety. In that case FFG have decided to deliberately unbalance the game in order to favour another set of units. The result will be players now go out and buy a whole new set of units to play in competition as the game is unbalanced and favours those units. That does not improve variety, it just changes which small set of units people are playing and in a years time, the evil FFG will once more have to change points to favour another set of units as the game will be stagnant with the same lists being played. Everyone will have to go out and buy those instead. Why? Because the unbalanced game will strongly favour a small set of units being played and FFG want people to play something else, lets pick a new unit to unbalance and make the go-to selection for competitive play. It'll help with sales too!

One of those seems rather scummy to me and a great way to kill off a community and a game. The other seems like the kind of thing a company wanting to produce a fair game with a lot of units people can enjoy playing without been at a disadvantage would do. Which do you think it is?

tl;dr FFG and the community want to see a wide variety of units played casually and competitively. The way you achieve that is by having well balanced units that can compete with each other whilst remaining unique, that is the intention behind their points change. The "annual" comment is just reserving the right to make further tweaks to refine balance or fix mistakes if it's needed (and it's highly likely it will be).

11 minutes ago, DwainDibbly said:

I think people are really taking FFGs statement of annual point changes and running totally in the wrong direction with it as far as "temporary" goes.

The fact points _could_ change again in a years time does not make the current points temporary. Since there is no requirement for FFG to change any of the points at all. They are just setting expectations so that people know IF the current round of point changes doesn't balance all the units sufficiently or IF it causes new problems, then they are prepared to do another batch (hopefully smaller) of point changes.

They're also saying that their aim is to do that no more than annually to reduce the issues point changes cause for a community.

What they are not saying is that the current set of point changes are temporary and if no problems are found over the next year, well darn it we're just going to change all the points anyway because this batch was just temporary.

Semantics aside, hopefully most people understand what FFG mean and what they are trying to achieve.

You are correct in that they want to see a variety of units been played however the reason for _why_ we don't already see that is because the game is not quite balanced enough for some units and by fixing that balance they will achieve their goal of a wider variety of units.

If FFG identify that too many players have bought and are playing snipers then there are two possible scenarios at play for fixing that with a point change. In what I'd like to think is the scenario most people on here will attribute to FFG:

The game is unbalanced, some units are not getting played competitively due to that, you make point tweaks to make those units a little more competitive and if you do a good job, you achieve a wider variety of units being played.

Here's the other scenario that assumes the game is already balanced as you seem to believe and that the points changes are not here to balance the game but only to change variety. In that case FFG have decided to deliberately unbalance the game in order to favour another set of units. The result will be players now go out and buy a whole new set of units to play in competition as the game is unbalanced and favours those units. That does not improve variety, it just changes which small set of units people are playing and in a years time, the evil FFG will once more have to change points to favour another set of units as the game will be stagnant with the same lists being played. Everyone will have to go out and buy those instead. Why? Because the unbalanced game will strongly favour a small set of units being played and FFG want people to play something else, lets pick a new unit to unbalance and make the go-to selection for competitive play. It'll help with sales too!

One of those seems rather scummy to me and a great way to kill off a community and a game. The other seems like the kind of thing a company wanting to produce a fair game with a lot of units people can enjoy playing without been at a disadvantage would do. Which do you think it is?

You have raised some thought provoking ideas. I do not believe FFG would be deliberately malicious...although remembering years such as 2020, Year of the Dewback sounds pretty amusing. I wonder if 2019 will be remembered as year of the sniper or the year the force balanced.

10 minutes ago, GhengisharnIV said:

You have raised some thought provoking ideas. I do not believe FFG would be deliberately malicious...although remembering years such as 2020, Year of the Dewback sounds pretty amusing. I wonder if 2019 will be remembered as year of the sniper or the year the force balanced.

I think any company has the potential to be malicious, but I agree, I see no reason to attribute these point changes to malice.

As a community we've all discussed and known for almost a year that some units are under (or over) performing despite everyone's best attempts to use them. These point changes are impacting those same units, which strongly suggests FFG are trying to bring balance to the forces 😜

That said, humans are, well, human. Mistakes will happen, play testing might not show up issues that wider scale play does and the "year of the <insert unit>" is a very real possibility. Perhaps FFG have been too aggressive with some point reductions and those units will now see too much play, pushing out other commonly played units. A shift in lists rather than a widening of variety. Hopefully not, but history of wargaming and video gaming shows balance is a tricky subject to reach without multiple course corrections.

So I do not believe this will be the last point change we see, FFG with their "annual" statement likewise expect they'll have to continue to make (hopefully minor) course corrections as the game progresses.

Changing topic slightly, there is a "year of the <unit>" that isn't all bad though. Even in a balanced game a unit can appear over powered and dominate competition, right up until the first person realises how to counter it. Those "year of"'s are great.

5 hours ago, Empire On Ice said:

Removing that stupid grey background on the pages would make it printer friendly. This is hardly difficult to do, but something they are incapable of doing for some unfathomable reason. If they are not going to issue new cards then an easy to print replacement on a pdf would be nice as well.

They can't organize it in a sensible fashion, so a white background is impossible.

How hard is Rules -> Keywords? Instead we get 1/2 Rules -> Keywords + 1/2 Rules

1 hour ago, GreatMazinkaiser said:

They can't organize it in a sensible fashion, so a white background is impossible.

How hard is Rules -> Keywords? Instead we get 1/2 Rules -> Keywords + 1/2 Rules

How is it not organized in a sensible fashion? It's a basic overview of the game mechanics, then game terms in alphabetical order? Even if you have an issue finding something just by flipping through, there's a glossary. I'm legitimately confused about how it could be better.

12 hours ago, Ophion said:

Its friday here!

Unless you're just barely on the other side of the International date line, it wasn't Friday when this was released.

10 hours ago, Ralgon said:

For whatever reason they've taken a "this is competitive only" approach. (Most likely to avoid stock destruction and/or litigation at this point).

It's what were stuck with. When the uproar gets too loud expect a possible change to pdf front sleeves while requiring the original card be available to prove it's authenticity.

It's mostly following GW's suite. GW has had a lot of success with its 3 ways to play marketing, and part of that is that marketing errata as "competitive only" helps appease the casual crowd. And, to be perfectly honest, while these changes improve the game at all levels of play, none of them are really crucial to having a fun time with the game. If you're not pushing the competitive edge or really following changes to the game beyond what shows up on the shelves of you FLGS; playing without the "competitive only" rules isn't going to really hurt anybody.

19 hours ago, azeronbloodmoone said:

they have always been worth as it gives crit 2 to the entire unit. but now its more of a incentive to bring them

false the damage per point was awful, and the entire unit already had surge to hit, it was not even close to worth it. imo it was the second worse heavy weapon in the game at the time.

5 hours ago, Tirion said:

false the damage per point was awful, and the entire unit already had surge to hit, it was not even close to worth it. imo it was the second worse heavy weapon in the game at the time.

Was the T7 the first?

Thought the Fleets damage per point was bad too.

@DwainDibbly
"As a community we've all discussed and known for almost a year that some units are under (or over) performing despite everyone's best attempts to use them. These point changes are impacting those same units, which strongly suggests FFG are trying to bring balance to the forces"

This uses a false premise;

What we know is exactly what was cited by FFG, the representation of entrants at tournament play was uneven, actual performance data is virtually non-existent precisely because the lists have been so homogenous.

You can't compare different units on the tournament tables if they're basically all strike teams. The points changes should serve to prod players away from strike teams and into something else, allowing for actual evaluation.

@Tirion
"false the damage per point was awful, and the entire unit already had surge to hit, it was not even close to worth it. imo it was the second worse heavy weapon in the game at the time."

Output on the CM is 1.5 (31 points, base extra mini 12 points; effective addition of +19 points), same as the Z-6 (22 points, base mini 10 points; effective addition +12 points);

For +7 points after discounting the base extra mini you also get Critical 2 (3.5 points per critical) which provides the unit a better chance of cutting through cover/dodge/armor.

i.e. A full rebel trooper unit deals .625 crits, add a z-6 and it goes up to 1.375 crits
rebel veterans also deal .625 crits, but adding a CM raises the total up to 2.25 crits

So, yes, it's worth it (also, if you add in the Mark II medium blaster, you have critical 4; and damage upticks to 3.25 crits;)

10 hours ago, DwainDibbly said:

I think people are really taking FFGs statement of annual point changes and running totally in the wrong direction with it as far as "temporary" goes.

Totally agree with this. In fact I'm not sure why people have said they are temporary? To my knowledge there is nothing official that says the changes are temporary.

They said they would review it annually and change as needed to balance the game. To interpret that as a temporary change seems crazy to me!

2 hours ago, Derrault said:

This uses a false premise;

What we know is exactly what was cited by FFG, the representation of entrants at tournament play was uneven, actual performance data is virtually non-existent precisely because the lists have been so homogenous.

You can't compare different units on the tournament tables if they're basically all strike teams. The points changes should serve to prod players away from strike teams and into something else, allowing for actual evaluation.

I really cannot understand why you have a such a problem with the idea that FFG have released a point change to further balance the game? The goal of balancing a game is to allow a wide variety of units to compete with each other. This will allow the possibility for a wider variety to fielded in casual and competitive play.

If your take away from FFG's post and what was said in the live stream is that the game is already balanced and that they intend to unbalance it via point changes (there's no other interpretation if you insist the game was already balanced yet they're making point changes regardless) to push players into using different lists in competitions for "variety". If that's still your opinion after reading my earlier posts, then, I guess there's not much more to discuss. Our interpretation is just poles apart and we're only going to waste each others time continuing.

2 hours ago, Ghost Dancer said:

Totally agree with this. In fact I'm not sure why people have said they are temporary? To my knowledge there is nothing official that says the changes are temporary.

They said they would review it annually and change as needed to balance the game. To interpret that as a temporary change seems crazy to me!

Annual changes = temporary. So....

34 minutes ago, DwainDibbly said:

I really cannot understand why you have a such a problem with the idea that FFG have released a point change to further balance the game? The goal of balancing a game is to allow a wide variety of units to compete with each other. This will allow the possibility for a wider variety to fielded in casual and competitive play.

If your take away from FFG's post and what was said in the live stream is that the game is already balanced and that they intend to unbalance it via point changes (there's no other interpretation if you insist the game was already balanced yet they're making point changes regardless) to push players into using different lists in competitions for "variety". If that's still your opinion after reading my earlier posts, then, I guess there's not much more to discuss. Our interpretation is just poles apart and we're only going to waste each others time continuing.

I have a problem with you conflating your unsupported opinion with the available facts.

It’s misleading and will only serve to confuse others who don’t read the reasons or watch the Live stream.

The fact is that there was low variety in tournament play, so they’re moving point values on that to encourage variety. Maybe that’s an imbalance, and maybe it’s balancing player moods against desired outcomes.

52 minutes ago, DwainDibbly said:

I really cannot understand why you have a such a problem with the idea that FFG have released a point change to further balance the game? The goal of balancing a game is to allow a wide variety of units to compete with each other. This will allow the possibility for a wider variety to fielded in casual and competitive play.

If your take away from FFG's post and what was said in the live stream is that the game is already balanced and that they intend to unbalance it via point changes (there's no other interpretation if you insist the game was already balanced yet they're making point changes regardless) to push players into using different lists in competitions for "variety". If that's still your opinion after reading my earlier posts, then, I guess there's not much more to discuss. Our interpretation is just poles apart and we're only going to waste each others time continuing.

There are different ways of balancing things. For your average home player 10-20 points here or there on your main units are neither here nor there, you play for fun , and most games are decided by players missteps. You build an army to beat your buddy who likes playing his AT ST so you play with anti-armour next time he ditches the armour and you find your anti-armor army doesn't do so well so next time you hedge your bets. Competition level where you are trying to build to a point where you try to plan an all armies you expect to meet. You might not have all bases covered but you do your best. In this rock paper scissors world an upgrade that costs 10 pts might not be "efficient" but at 5 points it's worth getting.

So while rebel veterans with a CM093 might see use at home games when it costs 31 points for the heavy it's never seeing the light of day in a serious competition list where the efficiency gunline is rebel troopers with z6s and sniper units. Where the amount of dmg output per unit is greater on the veterans, the z6 is more efficient as it's DMG output is greater per point spent

So balancing units for homeplay is actually down to what's fun for you (and a mathematical formula based on the units abilities) and for competition play efficiency plays a factor and a 160 it unit doesn't pull the same weight as 3 z6 units but with its upgrades cost the same. So it has got to make it up other ways.

10 minutes ago, Derrault said:

Annual changes = temporary. So....

I have a problem with you conflating your unsupported opinion with the available facts.

It’s misleading and will only serve to confuse others who don’t read the reasons or watch the Live stream.

The fact is that there was low variety in tournament play, so they’re moving point values on that to encourage variety. Maybe that’s an imbalance, and maybe it’s balancing player moods against desired outcomes.

Annual changes =/= current changes go away after a year.

Annual changes means new changes in a year, which may or may not include changes to things that have already been changed.

If the ONLY problem was low variety in tournament play, not unbalanced units, then the more effective way of ensure variation is hard caps on numbers of specific units/cards, rather than changing points costs.

9 minutes ago, Caimheul1313 said:

Annual changes =/= current changes go away after a year.

Annual changes means new changes in a year, which may or may not include changes to things that have already been changed.

If the ONLY problem was low variety in tournament play, not unbalanced units, then the more effective way of ensure variation is hard caps on numbers of specific units/cards, rather than changing points costs.

That would be less fun, and making changes that lead to more fun is a basic tenet of game design.

41 minutes ago, Derrault said:

That would be less fun, and making changes that lead to more fun is a basic tenet of game design.

There are those who are called “fun loving”. But we abhor fun, it is not our way.

4 hours ago, Derrault said:

@DwainDibbly
"As a community we've all discussed and known for almost a year that some units are under (or over) performing despite everyone's best attempts to use them. These point changes are impacting those same units, which strongly suggests FFG are trying to bring balance to the forces"

This uses a false premise;

What we know is exactly what was cited by FFG, the representation of entrants at tournament play was uneven, actual performance data is virtually non-existent precisely because the lists have been so homogenous.

You can't compare different units on the tournament tables if they're basically all strike teams. The points changes should serve to prod players away from strike teams and into something else, allowing for actual evaluation.

@Tirion
"false the damage per point was awful, and the entire unit already had surge to hit, it was not even close to worth it. imo it was the second worse heavy weapon in the game at the time."

Output on the CM is 1.5 (31 points, base extra mini 12 points; effective addition of +19 points), same as the Z-6 (22 points, base mini 10 points; effective addition +12 points);

For +7 points after discounting the base extra mini you also get Critical 2 (3.5 points per critical) which provides the unit a better chance of cutting through cover/dodge/armor.

i.e. A full rebel trooper unit deals .625 crits, add a z-6 and it goes up to 1.375 crits
rebel veterans also deal .625 crits, but adding a CM raises the total up to 2.25 crits

So, yes, it's worth it (also, if you add in the Mark II medium blaster, you have critical 4; and damage upticks to 3.25 crits;)

well if we're adding on the mkII let's add it in to the z6 as well

4 hours ago, TallGiraffe said:

Was the T7 the first?

Thought the Fleets damage per point was bad too.

fleets dpp is great.

2 minutes ago, Tirion said:

well if we're adding on the mkII let's add it in to the z6 as well

Sure, but to get the MKII on a z6 squad you do have to pay for both the z6 AND the Rebel trooper unit AND the MKII AND the veterans....whereas the Vet heavy + MKII can skip out on the Trooper+z6