Hi everybody,

what do you think about doubling the points avaliable for listbuilding from 200 to 400 as well as the cost of all ships?

i feel that now in some cases is difficoult to balance ship's points just becouse there is not enugh space...

expecially between 20 and 35 points.

thanks

33 minutes ago, Manolox said:

Hi everybody,

what do you think about doubling the points avaliable for listbuilding from 200 to 400 as well as the cost of all ships?

i feel that now in some cases is difficoult to balance ship's points just becouse there is not enugh space...

expecially between 20 and 35 points.

thanks

I am sorry you feel it is difficult to balance ships points due to lack of space, but then cheer up my friend! because balancing ships is not your problem, that is FFGs problem - and they are getting better and better at it. Furthermore, between 20 and 35 points there are 15points that is alot, so no thanks.

Or just introduce half point increments on the handful of cases where it seems necessary?

Computers and PDFs can handle it. Can us silly meatbags?

I don't like it, mostly because 400 point games is such an... unpretty number. Multiply by 2.5 to get 500 point games? By 5 to get 1000 point games?

I mean, it wouldn't be terrible, but I don't really think it's necessary.

Nah. I think 200 is a good balance between granularity and easy math for list-building.

The problem with some ships like droids isn’t balancing the points, it’s balancing the whole concept of very cheap ships in the game.

Only thing I would look at would be very cheap upgrades like Heroic, Crack Shot or Struts* sometimes one point is too cheap and two is too many.

(*I think Struts should be free and Vultures should go up to compensate.)

Sounds fine. Do we play with 12 half asteroids too?

I remember thinking 200 points would be hard, if everything was x2 or even 2.5 i dont think it would be a real issue and maybe even beneficial.

Also it could be done after a 1 or 2 years when some fridge cases had been identified where Half Points changes would be useful.

The number space isn’t the problem. Collapsing every ship, upgrade, and pilot into a single dimension will never work cleanly.

17 hours ago, Manolox said:

Hi everybody,

what do you think about doubling the points avaliable for listbuilding.

So you are asking if we are ready for X-Wing 3rd edition? Because that's what they did from 1st to 2nd. And you were right, it made balancing a bit easier but more importantly, they built in a way to change point cost of things that turn out to be too powerful or under used.

15 hours ago, gamblertuba said:

Or just introduce half point increments on the handful of cases where it seems necessary?

If they were going to do 1/2 points, I wish they would have just stayed with 100 points.

It was nice that a 25 point ship was 25% of my list.

A 73 point ship now actually requires me to think.

We literally just did this. We haven't even added that much to the game since they did. Let's keep running this for a few years.

If you want to change a numbers thing, change the dice mechanics would be my vote.

X-Wing TMG third edition

2 000 point squadrons. TIE/LN can be 227 points an X-Wing 403 points supernatural reflexes can scale from 59 points up to 294 points. Points are scored buy the 1/4 ship.

In all seriousness though I think 200 points is fine as is. 100 was definitely too cramped looking back on it. 200 gives us plenty of space I think.

I don't think that finer granularity will solve the main issues in point costs. Some upgrades, for instance, possibly being a little too good for 1 point and not quite good enough for 2, are a small issue because if that's the only problem with them, it's a sub-1-point miscosting. Compare with recurring issues such as:

1 - Upgrades that are vary vastly in effectivess between different ships or pilots because of synergies. The classic case here is Juke, which is now costed for it's best-case scenario (TIE Phantom spam) making it mediocre-to-terrible on almost anything else.

2 - Breakpoints against spam. For example, T-65 X-Wings cost 41 points and not lower simply because 40 would allow for 5 of them which would (apparently) be a little too good, despite the craft not actually being worth as much as 41.

3 - Overcosting vs NPE. Some cards are costed high because they can be frustrating to face, so it's better for FFG to err on the side of overcosting than undercosting them. For instance like half of the scum faction in the first set of points for 2.0 where a single list could stack debuffs like tractoring and stress and token-theft.

4 - Playtesting and human error. Playtesting never matches the test of the whole playerbase trying to break stuff, so new cards can be costed badly thanks to unforeseen interactions. See the triple Upsilon list that got an emergency nerf.

These various cases have caused some very significant point changes in 2.0's lifetime already. So fractional differences aren't worth changing the numerical scale to account for, because they're "white noise" in the data compared to bigger issues.

1 hour ago, Dasharr said:

The classic case here is Juke, which is now costed for it's best-case scenario (TIE Phantom spam) making it mediocre-to-terrible on almost anything else.

VERY strong disagree. Juke is an extremely powerful card, easily worth a point more than Outmaneuver. It lets you use a token for a real effect without spending it. If anything it’s only kinda weak on low-I ships, but I still get great use out of it on Wulf, Saw, and Vermeil. It’s a phenomenal card, accurately priced. Free evades only make it better, but that’s costed separately.

1 hour ago, Dasharr said:

Breakpoints against spam. For example, T-65 X-Wings cost 41 points and not lower simply because 40 would allow for 5 of them which would (apparently) be a little too good, despite the craft not actually being worth as much as 41.

Disagree again. Ships are good in synergy before they’re ever good in spam. Spam being too good isn’t the first sign something is underpriced, but rather overwhelming evidence that it’s significantly underpriced.

Aside from force multipliers, breakpoints basically don’t matter, period.

1 hour ago, Dasharr said:

Overcosting vs NPE. Some cards are costed high because they can be frustrating to face, so it's better for FFG to err on the side of overcosting than undercosting them. For instance like half of the scum faction in the first set of points for 2.0 where a single list could stack debuffs like tractoring and stress and token-theft.

Agree that this is the main weakness of points-based rebalances: “does not work as intended.”

These things are good candidates for errata and rules updates (as long as they don’t throw us a stupid timing queue pile of legalese...).

1 hour ago, Dasharr said:

See the triple Upsilon list that got an emergency nerf.

Another excellent case for errata. Dormitz always should have been small base only.

nonsense.

The error threshold of balancing can be near plusminus10-15 points. That completely out ranges one point error.

9 hours ago, ClassicalMoser said:

Disagree again. Ships are good in synergy before they’re ever good in spam. Spam being too good isn’t the first sign something is underpriced, but rather overwhelming evidence that it’s significantly underpriced.

Aside from force multipliers, breakpoints basically don’t matter, period.

Yet even if so. Ffg has the break points in mind with pricing ships. The break point has absolutely no effect when building with other ships around it. Just about spams.

13 hours ago, ClassicalMoser said:

VERY strong disagree. Juke is an extremely powerful card, easily worth a point more than Outmaneuver. It lets you use a token for a real effect without spending it. If anything it’s only kinda weak on low-I ships, but I still get great use out of it on Wulf, Saw, and Vermeil. It’s a phenomenal card, accurately priced. Free evades only make it better, but that’s costed separately.

Disagree again. Ships are good in synergy before they’re ever good in spam. Spam being too good isn’t the first sign something is underpriced, but rather overwhelming evidence that it’s significantly underpriced.

Aside from force multipliers, breakpoints basically don’t matter, period.

Agree that this is the main weakness of points-based rebalances: “does not work as intended.”

These things are good candidates for errata and rules updates (as long as they don’t throw us a stupid timing queue pile of legalese...).

Another excellent case for errata. Dormitz always should have been small base only.

Juke: disagree with your disagree. A single Juke is so easily undone by a focus spend, if not the lower cost of a calculate or force spend. Even the focus spend is a cost that many ships, a lot of the time, a prepared to pay on defence to prevent damage anyway. In my experience there are two general use-cases where Juke stands out. One is in multiples, where successive shots turn it into a chargeless, any-arc Crackshot. This is the application that the cost increase addresses. The other is free-evade-generating platforms (Phantom/Defender/Naboo) where the evade isn't at the cost of an action to mod the attack directly. This is the application that cost struggles to account for without added complexity of scaling cost. You may have had success, but meta-wing shows all the top 6 pilots with Juke are entirely the free-evade ships I named above, with the only other successful results including Juke were a solitary placing each on a Laetin and a Soontir.

Spam: some things are inherently self-synergistic (like the 4 Juke Phantoms back when that fit in 200 - see above for my opinion on massed Juke) or even the controversial 4 Starvipers, where their unique movement capabilities work best in a pure squad.

Welcome to X-wing TMG, where the points are made up and the rules don't matter

10 hours ago, Dasharr said:

A single Juke is so easily undone by a focus spend, if not the lower cost of a calculate or force spend. Even the focus spend is a cost that many ships, a lot of the time, a prepared to pay on defence to prevent damage anyway.

But if they don’t have it, it’s like a non-bullseye crack shot you can use over and over and over. And there are great ways to drain tokens and mods. Even if they have it now you’re weakening their attack.

Take Vermeil with Vader: he already has a near-guaranteed 2-3 hits after Vader focus-strips, even without an action. The only significant way for him to increase damage is defensive reduction. Juke works perfectly for this. He’s slightly fragile, but not that expensive for such a potent threat.

Sure, it’s not good on everything, and it shouldn’t be. Neither is daredevil or saturation or intimidation. But Juke is good on a lot of things, and not just things that get free evades. That will typically be it’s best use but isn’t strictly. If you have Jyn in a high-I rebel squad, there’s great use for it. Leevan Tenza wouldn’t want anything else. TIE aggressors or even S-Foil B-Wings would love it as it works on both attacks.

I think its price is right to within a point or two: it’s mainly held back by the availability and prices of what it works well with, other than the obvious stygium array and full throttle.

Edit:

Get this — Juke Gina! Fly her with R4 Dutch and either link the evades or use Cassian/Jyn and Juke double-tap on both.

Gina attacks with Juke and FCS, then spends it for ion with Juke. Then Dutch attacks with Juke, then VTG ion cannon with Juke. And that combo is probably just 110-130, leaving room for a stacked crew ship (if you go the Jyn route, maybe Wulff) or else an endgame piece. Seems really solid either way.

Increasing the points has always happened in games as expansions come out the game companies find they dont have the space between the values to add something a little different. They also increase the value of upgrades. You end up with the same ship and upgrades being the same % of the fleet, but with more expansion room between ships. I remember when Star fleet Battles did it years ago, they did the same thing with X-wing 1 vs x-Wing 2.