34 minutes ago, svelok said:

Past the first engage, at higher initiative, you also have the additional information of:

1. Am I being shot at this turn, or can I lock without risk of missing the defensive focus?
2. Will the target I am locking be in my arc by the time I shoot, or will I be missing the flexibility of focusing?

In the case of the first one, I absolutely agree that Focus is so much more valuable if you’re not sure if you’re going to get shot at. But that value drops off for ships with only 1 Agility (like Y-Wings or B-Wings). Unless you’re at Range 3 and through an obstacle that doesn’t rhyme with Fas Gloud, you don’t lose much on the defense by Target Locking.

And in the case of #2, that “will they be in the path to get shot” is part of the reason to go with Target Locks. Unless you’re the Moldy Crow, Focus tokens go away in the End Phase.

Why no scaling? Mostly because it doesn't really provide much of a benefit to make it cheaper at lower initiative.

Personally, I'm generally down on Init scaling,

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Also, Locks only really have meaningful Initiative differences with ordnance attacks . Any ship which uses Ordnance attacks already has a Lock action, no ship without a Lock action uses ordnance, so it doesn't matter.

Targeting Computer Soontir doesn't seem like such a boogeyman next to Predator Soontir. He's better if he has bullseye, and is safe from enemy arcs, without having to reposition for it - but that's not typical.

If the safe bullseye needs one reposition action, TC Soontir only gets his full-mod attack if he locks and then autothrusters a boost or BR, leaving him stressed. Predator Soontir only has to do the repo, which gets him only a single reroll but leaves him unstressed. It's far from clear which is better.

If the safe bullseye needs both boost and barrel roll, TC Soontir can't get his double mod at all. Predator Soontir can get the Focus + 1 reroll shot if he's willing to take the stress. Advantage Predator Soontir.

That's all assuming it's possible to get a bullseye position safe from enemy fire. If there's an an enemy fire arc there, Predator Soontir can potentially get Evade/Focus/reroll which TC Soontir can't.

Strategically, TC gives him options to bank a lock from a safe position to exploit it later, but that permits counterplay to prevent it, whereas Predator is more tactically flexible turn-by-turn. There's also the fact that TC costs 1 more than Predator - with Soontir that means a smaller bid that could be a big deal in any given matchup.

It's also possible to have both TC and Predator, but then there's redundancy in having two different upgrades giving different ways to do the same job (offensive rerolls), and the total cost eats deeply into a bid and packs a lot of points into a very fragile frame.

As others have said, the card has such a marginal effect that's barely worth the 3 points FFG are asking us to spend now. Initiative is actually not what is required to make the card good; you need the action economy to make actually using the action worthwhile (ie. if you can't easily combine it with a Focus, you're better off just Focusing). Spending any amount of points just in case you get a chance to set up a lock during an off turn is simply a bad decision.

To demonstrate, let's go through ship-by-ship on the possible candidates and see how many want it:

1. Attack Shuttle: Composure Sabine has the action economy, but low initiative can make it a risky proposition and she'll just as often want to Evade or Roll rather than TL. Plus her squad needs to have 3 points spare. Other pilots would have much better ways to spend points (including not spending the points). MAYBE
2. Sheathipede: support ship, generally Coordinating, and if not would prefer Focus for defence. NO
3. Auzituck: always wants to Reinforce. NO
4. TIE Fighter: again, maybe Composure Sabine, but worth even less than on her Shuttle version. Other pilots are a hard pass. Very weak MAYBE
5. Lambda: could take Passive instead. Also, could just take ST-321 instead. NO
6. TIE Interceptor: Soontir might like it, but has to seriously weigh up its value vs just taking Predator, while others suffer from lack of action economy. MAYBE
7. TIE Reaper: allows synergy with Tarkin or Jendon, but Vermeil in particular is happier Focusing and the others will be afraid of giving away additional points. MAYBE
8. TIE Fighter: Night Beast technically has the action economy, but are you really spending 3 points on an upgrade for your TIE Fighter? NO , you're not.
9. TIE Phantom: could take Passive instead, but they can do other shenanigans with the System slot so there are possibilities. MAYBE
10. Escape Craft: see Sheathipede. NO
11. Mining Guild TIE: see TIE Fighter, only without the marginal justification of Night Beast. NO
12. Quadjumper: wants to Tractor instead. Also tends to get nuked immediately, so upgrades tend to just give away points to the opponent. NO
13. Resistance Pod: doesn't have the action economy, and has access to Heroic and Optics instead. NO

So that's not even a single YES, a whole bunch of NO, and only five MAYBES: Soontir, Phantoms, Sabine x2, and Reapers who need the synergy. Given all that, I'd not only say that TC is far too niche to benefit from initiative scaling, but it's arguably overcosted at 3.

EDIT: Also, as to the notion of using it to make cheap spotters for Vessery, this seems bad in light of the Empire already having quality ships that have the Lock action already, such as Vader, Inquisitors, Gunboats, etc.

EDIT EDIT: Adjusted Phantoms.

Writing it off for the phantom is ignoring that the phantom really wants to use that system slot for basically anything else. Fcs becomes and option, collision detector and AS are already both strong. Whisper is among the best use cases alongside soontir.

1 minute ago, thespaceinvader said:

Writing it off for the phantom is ignoring that the phantom really wants to use that system slot for basically anything else. Fcs becomes and option, collision detector and AS are already both strong. Whisper is among the best use cases alongside soontir.

Fair; we shall change that.

yeah. what is this even good for other than Soontir? Whisper wants a hull instead.