1 hour ago, Skitch_ said:

Is it just me or do these feel like the Scummiest ships in the game right now? And they aren't even in Scum. Whenever I open my app I keep wanting to go to Scum first to look them up but then remember they are in CIS which seems like it has more scummy shenanigans than Scum.

Also, why is Gravitic Deflection a talent? It seems like it should be a modification. Did the Geonosians have some sort of gravity manipulating abilities inherent to the species or something? (I haven't seen Clone Wars so I'm not up on the fluff when it comes to this faction). Maybe FFG just didn't want the Nantex to have a mod slot.

I am a Scum player. I play these because they are the more Scum than Scum is. The tractor was built in to the hull of the ship and interestingly they had a shied generator as well which unfortunately didn’t make it in to the game.

Ensnare as a talent might be some Ace pilots using the ships tractor array in creative ways that other pilots could not. The pilots could also be controlled by smells through a mask they wear. There is an extremely interesting video on YouTube about the ship.

3 hours ago, heychadwick said:

Soontir Fel has the weakness of "block him". The Nantex has a similar weakness. It's called "shoot him at R2-3". If the Nantex is not within R1 of an enemy, it gets 1 Boost or BR and can't pass off the Tractor token. He will be at 2-3 green dice with a single Focus token.

Sure, just be at r2-3 of the ship that's got every move bar a 1-straight and gets a free reposition. Why didn't any of us think of that?

You sound like the fools who used to say "just don't be in front of the Trajectory Sim."

Just a note after playing against it twice last night:
As long as multiple-Ensnare lists are a thing, Multiple Vipers are unlikely to be a thing.

With 2 Nantex with Ensnare and the rather strong 5 Straight or 3 Turn - Self Tractor Sling into passing off that tractor and Curve Tractor a Viper, I had a very very bad time.
Hilarious.... but bad. There was nothing I could do but watch a Viper get deleted each turn or made irrelevant for multiple turns.
You can't use Rocks to your advantage as you might normally do, because you will be at a bigger disadvantage if/when they catch you.
The kicker was that he wasn't even using Sun Fac... it could have been worse.

I feel that you are going to have to be exceptionally good at range control on that initial engagement and/or make the correct 50-50 call (are they going to jump hard and fast, or stay slow for one more turn?) if you intend to fly Vipers against them. Maybe spread a Really Wide net to catch something at R2/3 of everything and just accept that you are going to lose at least one if you don't get it right. Possibly sell out just to eliminate a Nantex off the bat... which I feel might work, but you run the risk of having the rest of the forces walking over you.
You can try to position your ships in such a way that you can't get tractored away in an odd manner.... but that leaves them open to being easy targets anyway.
If you can find a way in to their blind spot, you have a turn or two with which to claw your way back into it.

Advanced Sensors might be useful to get into a position that the Nantex might otherwise not be able to get to... but that leaves you tokenless. A Viper without tokens is a sad Viper.

I am going to try and work something out, I feel that there might be work arounds.... but I am not sure.

1 hour ago, It’s One Of Ours said:

I’m already well aware of the calculations. It was a rhetorical request. And you severely underestimate the ability to pull a bullseye when you have a tractor reposition and can tractor reposition your target ship.

No, the issue with blocking is not an “attitude thing”. It’s not even that he can’t be blocked, because in reality he can be. The issue is that it doesn’t penalize him at all, and he can still reposition and throw a tractor at the ship he hit, while getting benefits to do so.

People hate seeing several quad jumpers for a reason (or at least used to), but they need an action to tractor something that had to be in their front arc, at range 1. Ensnare allows the Nantex to tractor something in any of it’s side or front arcs, regardless of whether it can take an action or not, after it repositioned itself via tractor. And it’s more survivable, faster, has a better dial, arguably better attack dice situation, and higher intiative (34 pts for an I3 with talent vs 32 for a Jakku Gunrunner).

Bluntly put, the damned thing shouldn’t be able to take a tractor token and rotate it’s arc if it didn’t fully compete a maneuver. It’s not about “hurr it requires different strategy to play against”, because playing against it would still be interesting and different without hurting the overall performance of the ship.

It does seem like it should have some sort of trade-off.

12 hours ago, MasterShake2 said:

I feel like I'm trying to tell everyone the Soylent Green is people...screw it, taste it for yourself and see, but don't say you weren't warned...

I prefer the original recipe: soy beans and lentils.

4 minutes ago, theBitterFig said:

I prefer the original recipe: soy beans and lentils.

hmmm...might need to swap recipies

On 9/16/2019 at 2:47 AM, Alarum said:

”frustrating” was the overwhelming response.

Like a lot of ships in the "highly mobile aces" category of ships, the fun one player is having with Nantex fighters is inversely proportional to the fun the other player is having.

Either one player is having a helluva lot fun as they dance around and tractor their hapless, miserable opponent
-or-
The opponent is gleefully one-shotting the frail little bugs of the miserable nantex player.



It's a weird design dynamic that was kept from 1.0, curiously enough.


But yea, the BUGs are basically all the NPE of TIE Phantoms AND Quadjumper Tugs rolled into one convenient, cheap ship... sooooo....

1 hour ago, AllWingsStandyingBy said:

Either one player is having a helluva lot fun as they dance around and tractor their hapless, miserable opponent
-or-
The opponent is gleefully one-shotting the frail little bugs of the miserable nantex player.



It's a weird design dynamic that was kept from 1.0, curiously enough.

These kinds of plays actually make the game the most like star wars though.

There's always that ace villain pilot that's dominating the fights and watching all the no name heroes getting blown up and then there's the top heroes blowing up all the no name villains.

Then the eventual show down between the main hero and main villain.

I honestly love this aspect of the game. I hope the aces never go away.

I think they did them just right in the game. Highly fun to play but at a big cost to your list but really hurts if you lose them too quickly.

6 hours ago, Vespid1311 said:

Just a note after playing against it twice last night:
As long as multiple-Ensnare lists are a thing, Multiple Vipers are unlikely to be a thing.

Hmm...

I'm not sure exactly what I would do. The big problem with Starvipers - compared to anyone else - is that because of microthrusters, a barrel roll generally means you can be rolled into a position where you don't have a shot. Normally, tractor tokens can't turn a ship, just slide it.

Packing torpedoes is an option, I guess - with all their barrel rolling, knife fighting capability laid by, Starvipers can fly low and slow very efficiently and pack torpedoes rather than the missiles most ships of their ilk carry. Having a torpedo as insurance against something even more dangerous in a knife fight than they are might be a good idea.

I'm not going to presume to tell people how to manoeuvre Starvipers against Nantex; I'm not good enough with the continuously pinwheeling snowflakes, and I know they're weird enough to fly that making suggestions without the experience to back it up is pointless at best.

The one thing I'll say is that as a rule, weird as it sounds, aiming for the side arc of the Nantex where the arc currently is is a good idea. Where the arc currently is is a viable firing arc for the primary weapon but it's a blind spot for the pinpoint tractor array because you can't generate a tractor token without rotating*, and whilst it may get a range 1 shot, you should get a range 1 shot too and your primary weapon is probably better. Note that this rule doesn't apply if the arc is forward as it can sideslip and point the arc 'back' to the side to cover the same spots, but Nantex seem to engage out the side the majority of the time.

Other than that...I've actually seen a scum player use a quadjumper to frustrate a Nantex; tractoring his own ship before it activated; you can apply a tractor token to it with ensnare but it can't be repositioned again. Obviously that's not the best plan against Chertek or Sun Fac, who have abilities which trigger off attacking tractored targets, but it allowed Guri to skin dance a rock without worrying about getting slammed into it by a pinpoint tractor array and subsequently get a range 1 shot into a Nantex's tail end.

8 hours ago, Skitch_ said:

Also, why is Gravitic Deflection a talent? It seems like it should be a modification. Did the Geonosians have some sort of gravity manipulating abilities inherent to the species or something? (I haven't seen Clone Wars so I'm not up on the fluff when it comes to this faction). Maybe FFG just didn't want the Nantex to have a mod slot.

Mostly so that for 'basic' pilots Ensnare and Gravetic Deflection is an either-or prospect, I suspect. Both are 'dirty tricks using the pinpoint tractor array in wierd ways' but don't represent a new bit of kit on the ship.

The tractor array is mostly for grabbing stuff to throw the Nantex around (much like the tractor beam asteroid slingshots players of the X-wing computer game might remember pulling off); using it to tractor an enemy ship, or an incoming missile, requires a lot more finesse - hence ship-specific talent.

* before someone says it, yes, obviously multiple Nantex co-operating can. But then dodging multiple firing arcs of normal ships is also a whole 'nother problem.

14 hours ago, It’s One Of Ours said:

That’s if it’s eager to reposition while out in open space. The more likely event is that (like most turreted ships) it won’t try to tractor-reposition or rotate turret because the turret is positioned for initial engagement. And it’s not going to be in R1. So it Focuses or Evades, and just uses it’s raw dial speed until it can lunge forward (with a 5-straight).

Hence we’re looking 3 to 4 green dice, with a Focus or Evade token. Probably Evade.

Addendum: Also “shoot them at range -X-” isn’t really a weakness, because that’s every ship’s weakness in this game. That’s like saying a B-Wing’s weakness is that it has hull points and can be blowed up.

I disagree that every ship's weakness is being at R2-3. Look at a B-wing. It can tank all day long and wants to just Trade shots with someone. Some ships can take being shot at and some suffer more for it.

The Nantex suffers under sustained fire. You get enough shots at it and its rolling green dice like everyone else and only had 1 action to help it. It's just a Tie Fighter with Hull Upgrade. Spread out your ships and you can kill a Nantex in one round (or seriously cripple it).

The Nantex does big things when it gets in close against other ships. If you are flying in formation or with just a few ships, it will be hard to get a shot on it. If you spread out your ships and try to get greater arcs of fire, you can beat it. If you only have 3 High Aces, you will have a hard time, which is OK in my book.

10 hours ago, DR4CO said:

Sure, just be at r2-3 of the ship that's got every move bar a 1-straight and gets a free reposition. Why didn't any of us think of that?

You sound like the fools who used to say "just don't be in front of the Trajectory Sim."

Your response sounds like those fools who lack understanding the game and inability to think about the game beyond 1v1 situations. This is a game about nuance.

Remember the Rule of 11? Take time to consider your approach. Don't just let him rush in while you move forward like an idiot. There are a lot if ways to ensure you get shots in on the approach.

Don't fly in formation. Alternate your approach in so you get shots at different ranges. Also, read @Biophysical 's blog article about different approaches. If you come at the enemy from a wide net, you can certainly get shots without the Nantex dodging arcs. Many people are so stuck on the idea of clumping their ships together that they can't fathom deploying all spread out.

The more ships you have, the better off you will be. More shots means a better chance for his green dice failing. He should only get 1 Focus/Evade.

All this is pretty rudimentary. Next time try being less insulting in your response.

On 9/17/2019 at 11:55 AM, DR4CO said:

My kingdom for an angry react...

Buddy, if this were true, we'd be embracing this ship, given we can take the initiative 6 pilot FFG gave it and play our move-last-and-wreck-face ace game with it.

But we're not, because unlike the people apologising for this ship, we're not idiots blinded by the sugar-high of how invincible it makes you feel and can recognise how BS this stupid thing is.

So take your sanctimonious crap and get lost.

I was going to respond to this pretty much what Kleeg005 said about Jedi...then add Jedi with Sense. You know how awesome it is that if they have lower Int ships than you you are going to be blocked, or if they have higher int ships than you, they can avoid your arc. Jedi dont even need to focus, can Boost & Barrel Roll, use 1-2 force for defense mods, then add in R2 Shenanigans. Jedi go down to focus fire, just like these bugs do. I have found the saltiness in your replies rather amusing. It's a game, either adjust and keep playing, or don't. The only thing FFG will change in these ships will possibly be the cost. If they make it cheaper, that would be hilarious.

On 9/17/2019 at 10:41 PM, Squark said:

I think you're misunderstanding some of the complaints.

To be very, very clear, the Nantex is itself an Ace. It's a fragile, high initiative ship that relies on mobility. But the Nantex breaks some of the traditional Ace rules; The Nantex can't really be blocked. That's an incredible advantage for an Ace; Blocking is one of the oldest and best strategies against aces. So the complaint is less, "This new ship kills my Aces," and more "This new Ace is fantastic against other Aces, but 4 ship builds and swarms can't counter it the usual way." Hence the complaints from 4 ship builds and swarm players.

Now, it's possible some of the other eccentricities of the ship will balance it out in time. But I think you're mischaracterizing the complaints about the ship.

I cannot wait to hear what people say about Vonreggs TIE/ba, it flies in a much different way than normal ships, it requires a fair amount of pre planning. Try it out on @Sandrem 's fly casual app. Makes you think. Vonregg can make you easier to hit, or less potent when you shoot. Cannot wait for the moaning at Christmas time...

15 hours ago, Kleeg005 said:

THIS is my major beef with ******* Jedi. Double reposition with mods at high initiative. *IF* you can even get them in arc, *MAYBE* you can hit them. Meanwhile, the other ships in the list are ******* you up from those perfect flanking positions. You don't like Sun Fac with Ensnare? Nowhere near as bad as Jedi. Sun Fac can be one-shotted, just like any other four-hull ship. You ain't touching a ******* Jedi.

#triggered Sorry. Sorry.

AMEN! If a Jedi gets into a sticky situation, it's a 5 straight, boost away, focus, then regen with R2 and spend a turn or 2 regenning force, ready to re engage . Jedi can be painful, but there has been a lot less moaning about them.

13 hours ago, It’s One Of Ours said:

I’m already well aware of the calculations. It was a rhetorical request. And you severely underestimate the ability to pull a bullseye when you have a tractor reposition and can tractor reposition your target ship.

No, the issue with blocking is not an “attitude thing”. It’s not even that he can’t be blocked, because in reality he can be. The issue is that it doesn’t penalize him at all, and he can still reposition and throw a tractor at the ship he hit, while getting benefits to do so.

People hate seeing several quad jumpers for a reason (or at least used to), but they need an action to tractor something that had to be in their front arc, at range 1. Ensnare allows the Nantex to tractor something in any of it’s side or front arcs, regardless of whether it can take an action or not, after it repositioned itself via tractor. And it’s more survivable, faster, has a better dial, arguably better attack dice situation, and higher intiative (34 pts for an I3 with talent vs 32 for a Jakku Gunrunner).

Bluntly put, the damned thing shouldn’t be able to take a tractor token and rotate it’s arc if it didn’t fully compete a maneuver. It’s not about “hurr it requires different strategy to play against”, because playing against it would still be interesting and different without hurting the overall performance of the ship.

I played against 3 Gun runners and Asajj at the Australian System Open with Kylo, Blackout and Scorch. If I let it, it could have screwed me over with tractoring craziness. The Gun Runners are Int 1, nothing I could do to stop them from doing their thing, except fly in a way to he didn't expect. At that stage he was 3-0, wasn't a scrub and I was 2-1, I came at him in a way he didn't expect and won. You fly against a Nantek like it's any other ship, you are going to lose. It is not any other ship. Protorps/concussion missiles, shooting at long range from a few ships etc, cannot tell you the amount of Soontirs I have killed at range 3 from shooting at him with 2-3 ships. Sun is going to be worth 40 points (generally) if you get 2 damage through, that's the same as 2 grappling strut droids completely destroyed.

This is not meant to be inflammatory, but if you can't adjust your thinking to engage at longer ranges, then that's not the fault of the Nantek. If you're worried about tractoring on rocks, take gas clouds. If they have taken rocks, place them at 2/2 from the corners to make them irrelevant. There are so many things people can do at turn 0 instead of, **** things beat me, must be OP AF.

3 minutes ago, Archangelspiv said:

I cannot wait to hear what people say about Vonreggs TIE/ba, it flies in a much different way than normal ships, it requires a fair amount of pre planning. Try it out on @Sandrem 's fly casual app.

I didn't realise the TIE baron had been added. Thanks for the heads-up.

5 minutes ago, Archangelspiv said:

I played against 3 Gun runners and Asajj at the Australian System Open with Kylo, Blackout and Scorch. If I let it, it could have screwed me over with tractoring craziness. The Gun Runners are Int 1, nothing I could do to stop them from doing their thing, except fly in a way to he didn't expect. At that stage he was 3-0, wasn't a scrub and I was 2-1, I came at him in a way he didn't expect and won.

Sounds like an interesting game. Would you care to offer the quick highlights?

6 minutes ago, Archangelspiv said:

If you're worried about tractoring on rocks, take gas clouds. If they have taken rocks, place them at 2/2 from the corners to make them irrelevant.

Or do your best to. You won't be able to do this if your opponent takes their first rock and plonks it in the centre. But if you can keep the rocks separated that's almost as good. As a final thought; if fielding vultures consider (even more than you otherwise would) pre-emptively parking on a rock. Yes, you can be tractored off , but that doesn't hurt you anywhere nearly as much as being tractored on .

There is an argument for making your first 'pick' be the biggest available gas cloud at 3/3 from a corner to create a 'clear zone' in that corner to fight in...

2 minutes ago, Magnus Grendel said:

I didn't realise the TIE baron had been added. Thanks for the heads-up.

Sounds like an interesting game. Would you care to offer the quick highlights?

Or do your best to. You won't be able to do this if your opponent takes their first rock and plonks it in the centre. But if you can keep the rocks separated that's almost as good. As a final thought; if fielding vultures consider (even more than you otherwise would) pre-emptively parking on a rock. Yes, you can be tractored off , but that doesn't hurt you anywhere nearly as much as being tractored on .

There is an argument for making your first 'pick' be the biggest available gas cloud at 3/3 from a corner to create a 'clear zone' in that corner to fight in...

This may be Heresy, but I'm happier with gas clouds than rocks with Nantex. More protection from long range, you can repo through them with no penalty and fly through them and still get your relevant actions I.e. Ship ability with taking damage.

I think asteroids are a greed play if you have more than 1 Nantex because, by the time you're tractoring enemies, your already at your ideal range.

@Magnus Grendel , firstly I have to say, my opponent was an absolute gentleman, great guy. I think his name was Jirah, but I may have that wrong.

All his other opponents had tried to kill Assaj first, whereas I left her to last. I used my ships and rocks so he couldn’t reverse out and get me from behind. It was frustrating for him in that I used my silencers to kill a gun runner at a time, where his 2 die attacks were doing nothing and he couldn’t land hits with the Shadow Caster to tractor me. He said I was the first person to go after the Runners first. I was lucky that we have a guy at our local FLGS who loves Runners, I knew how devastating they can be.

He flew well, did what he needed to do, but tractor targets are predictable, you can set a dial knowing that you are probably going to be in x position when you move. I could probably go into more detail if you wanted, but I have to be awake in 5 hours now 😳

11 minutes ago, MasterShake2 said:

This may be Heresy, but I'm happier with gas clouds than rocks with Nantex. More protection from long range, you can repo through them with no penalty and fly through them and still get your relevant actions I.e. Ship ability with taking damage.

I think asteroids are a greed play if you have more than 1 Nantex because, by the time you're tractoring enemies, your already at your ideal range.

Rocks stop them shooting at all. Can give 2 damage if you’re lucky and are larger to cover more area.

Just now, Archangelspiv said:

Rocks stop them shooting at all. Can give 2 damage if you’re lucky and are larger to cover more area.

So, let me be more clear:

I'm saying that "by the time you are applying tractor tokens and moving people onto rocks, you already have a massive advantage just by virtue of how good the Nantex is at close range, therefore, I would rather have clouds to help me get to that close range"

1 minute ago, MasterShake2 said:

So, let me be more clear:

I'm saying that "by the time you are applying tractor tokens and moving people onto rocks, you already have a massive advantage just by virtue of how good the Nantex is at close range, therefore, I would rather have clouds to help me get to that close range"

I fully understand what you’re saying, and in a 1v1 game you’re right. But it’s not 1v1. IMO I would rather rocks to try and break up their attacks on my 4HP ships.

Maybe it’s my local meta, but Jedi love gas clouds more than anyone.

19 minutes ago, MasterShake2 said:

This may be Heresy, but I'm happier with gas clouds than rocks with Nantex. More protection from long range, you can repo through them with no penalty and fly through them and still get your relevant actions I.e. Ship ability with taking damage.

I think asteroids are a greed play if you have more than 1 Nantex because, by the time you're tractoring enemies, your already at your ideal range.

I think I'm more of a Rock-man, but Gas looks really nice. You'll have a lot of movement tricks, and the dice bonuses are pretty nice. Maybe even Trick Shot (I keep thinking Trick Shot might be OK...), so that you'll have a chance to push return damage.

Just now, Archangelspiv said:

I fully understand what you’re saying, and in a 1v1 game you’re right. But it’s not 1v1. IMO I would rather rocks to try and break up their attacks on my 4HP ships.

Maybe it’s my local meta, but Jedi love gas clouds more than anyone.

Nantex can repo through gas clouds and fly through them while still having a lot of actions, Nantex love them A LOT more than Jedi

9 minutes ago, MasterShake2 said:

Nantex can repo through gas clouds and fly through them while still having a lot of actions, Nantex love them A LOT more than Jedi

Then I would like to buy your die. Obviously your no mods is working wonders for you.

Finally got a few games in with and against various bug lists.

Ensnare to 40 points or this ship straight ruins the first 2.0 X-Wing Worlds.

Having a bug or two completely dominate a top table on live stream while their opponent spends the last 4 turns with zero agency is a terrible, terrible look. The ship is fun. Ensnare is a nightmare. Not fun to play with or against. After the first round of fire.

14 minutes ago, Archangelspiv said:

Then I would like to buy your die. Obviously your no mods is working wonders for you.

If I'm hiding behind a cloud at long range, I have a mod, in fact I have multiple mods. If I jump to R1, I'm getting shot by maybe `1 ship if that, in which case, mods are not relevant because dice are not being rolled. If I tractor myself to repo through a cloud, I still have mods because I didn't execute a maneuver going through it. Why does everyone think a Nantex is always chilling on no tokens?

50 minutes ago, Archangelspiv said:

All his other opponents had tried to kill Assaj first, whereas I left her to last. I used my ships and rocks so he couldn’t reverse out and get me from behind. It was frustrating for him in that I used my silencers to kill a gun runner at a time, where his 2 die attacks were doing nothing and he couldn’t land hits with the Shadow Caster to tractor me. He said I was the first person to go after the Runners first. I was lucky that we have a guy at our local FLGS who loves Runners, I knew how devastating they can be.

Thanks. An interesting matchup - and there's a good chance I'd have fallen into a similar trap. Assaj Ventress is big, dangerous, tough and force-laden so it's tempting to try and take her out first. But I can see why that might be the wrong thing to do.

37 minutes ago, MasterShake2 said:

Nantex can repo through gas clouds and fly through them while still having a lot of actions, Nantex love them A LOT more than Jedi

Indeed. Because the 'boost' is actually a tractor, you can boost onto (or off) a rock - which can catch people off guard. Strikers with Adaptive Ailerons can skin-dance debris (move on, blue move off, action) and catch people off guard in the same way.

In this case it's move, pinpoint tractor array, boost, hopefully poke your nose out the other side of the gas cloud (because if you don't you're firing a primary-2 through a gas cloud and as such can probably bugger off back to the hive for all the good you're going to do....) and then take your action; you don't lose your action for being at range 0 of an obstacle or other ship in the perform action step, but for colliding whilst executing your manoeuvre .

It's exactly the same reason a Nantex bumping another ship but then rolling 'off' will still not get an action, but in reverse.

27 minutes ago, Archangelspiv said:

Then I would like to buy your die. Obviously your no mods is working wonders for you.

I dunno. Depends on the pilots - obviously focus is out the window, but with Gravetic Deflection and/or Chertek's pilot ability, it's not quite unmodified, even if you fly through it.

I'd still prefer not hitting the things at all, though; with a decent dial and the ability to slew the primary-2, you shouldn't often have to fly through an obstacle - whatever it is.

1 hour ago, Archangelspiv said:

There are so many things people can do at turn 0 instead of, **** things beat me, must be OP AF.

I've seen numerous comments about them being frustrating or NPE, but has anyone actually claimed they're OP yet?