Always thought gas clouds should be ion clouds and should put ions on people passing through on a hit or crit.
Gas cloud changes
11 hours ago, ForceSensitive said:That's what I'm saying, that was the welcome addition to the game for me. There was that cover mechanic.
My only issue with it is that games need hard terrain, too. If players were limited to 1 gas cloud, and no more than 2 rocks or 2 debris, that would create a game board where there is some variety. If it winds up being only cover, only 6 pieces of "low consequence" gas, that gets kinda blah.
I like the way Guild Ball does terrain.
- 4-6 total pieces
- No more than half are "ground"--either rough (slower movement) or fast (extra movement), and no more than 1 fast ground, and it has to be within 6 inches of an edge
- No more than 1 forest. Line of sight can go in or out, but not through.
- I think no more than one... major barrier. I might have that term wrong. It'd be like a building or a huge bolder: a thing that can't be gone over.
- Then there are also smaller obstructions. Benches and small walls and carts or whatever. Stuff you have go "go over" but grants some cover and protection.
Old Gas Clouds as part of a healthy diet? Good. As the only thing? Not so much. With a bit more of a consequence to them, seems better than the status quo.
12 hours ago, ForceSensitive said:It was a good design space to have a light consequence obstacle.
Honestly, I think the penalty was in their plans from the beginning, but the scarcity of strain tokens probably made them decide to hold off a year until those became more available.
The main reason though they needed to get on with that sort of penalty is so the beefier swarms (and just swarms in general) that will be more plentiful after this recent points update didn't get to just keep formation and coast easy street.
11 hours ago, dsul413 said:I figured the primary goal was to ensure you have a shot, and not let your opponent dictate which of their ships is in your arc.
Rocks are always going to screw you. Turn 0 still matters. This definitely helps reduce the double-tap rock though to your point.
I believe that keeping shots on targets will be the primary result of the change, but I believe that with ships like the Nantex and Tugboat floating around, plus any more changes they may have down the pipeline, the ability to drop tractor tokens on opponents ships without requiring any attack or defense rolls was creating a game that was starting to get very unfriendly to new players. As older players, we may be quick to jump on, "Well, don't fly near the edge if there are Nantex/Tugboats on the board!" but we have many, many instances of 20/20 hindsight to fall back on, newer players do not, and don't see that cheese coming.
Honestly, any game mechanic that effectively results in a larger portion of the edge of the map being an unmarked instant death zone isn't very newbie friendly and could result in frustration.
12 hours ago, ForceSensitive said:But it doesn't help the double debris
I also figured the goal was to prevent the double obstacle at least occasionally. But on debris it doesn't do that. It just front loads the consequence, skip a unlikely as it was roll anyway, and maybe you can turn around a little faster? Maybe? But stressed?
You’re talking like the tractor change makes obstacles more punishing somehow. It’s an optional action you can take if it would be helpful, and nothing is different if you don’t.
Also, people are talking as if the gas cloud change has anything to do with the tractor change, but I’m pretty sure they were completely separate decisions. One to fix complaints about clouds, one to mollify everyone who still complains about tractor even after the last nerf. Tractoring people onto gas clouds was never specifically a thing.
41 minutes ago, Cloaker said:Honestly, I think the penalty was in their plans from the beginning, but the scarcity of strain tokens probably made them decide to hold off a year until those became more available.
Where can I get strain tokes without having to buy a ship?
44 minutes ago, kris40k said:As older players, we may be quick to jump on, "Well, don't fly near the edge if there are Nantex/Tugboats on the board!" but we have many, many instances of 20/20 hindsight to fall back on, newer players do not, and don't see that cheese coming.
As I always say in X-Wing, if it's weird kill it first.
17 hours ago, Blail Blerg said:... but NOT crit??? Thematically ok. but rules remembering EW.
Happened to me yesterday with dutchess. Rolled a crit, woo, no strain. Gotta be careful with those ailerons
40 minutes ago, LUZ_TAK said:Where can I get strain tokes without having to buy a ship?
https://xwing-miniatures-second-edition.fandom.com/wiki/Never_Tell_Me_the_Odds_Obstacles_Pack
1 hour ago, Matanui3 said:You’re talking like the tractor change makes obstacles more punishing somehow. It’s an optional action you can take if it would be helpful, and nothing is different if you don’t.
Also, people are talking as if the gas cloud change has anything to do with the tractor change, but I’m pretty sure they were completely separate decisions. One to fix complaints about clouds, one to mollify everyone who still complains about tractor even after the last nerf. Tractoring people onto gas clouds was never specifically a thing.
That's a negative. It's a extremely, extraordinarily small patch to tractors that they made. You've misinterpreted my point. It helps, but asymmetrical to how and when. For preventing that double-obstacle move, it helps. But in the case of debris the only thing it saves you is the second crit roll . Sorry of that was confusing.
I never linked the two changes. Don't know how you got that one either, but hey text based communication sucks lol.
1 hour ago, LUZ_TAK said:Where can I get strain tokes without having to buy a ship?
How do you not have access to strain tokens, but have gas clouds? They come in the same box. Serious question. I'm confused.
18 minutes ago, ForceSensitive said:How do you not have access to strain tokens, but have gas clouds? They come in the same box. Serious question. I'm confused.
Some people sold off their second set of clouds as you get the same ones in both the Republic and CIS (and some people brought multiples of those sets)
So LOTS of people have gotten the new gas clouds cheap but not any of the newer ships/sets with strain. Which was fine as you didn't need them for the clouds till yesterday.
My recommendation
@LUZ_TAK
is to get some acrylic ones from somewhere. Or see if anyone you know has spare cardboard ones.
21 minutes ago, ForceSensitive said:How do you not have access to strain tokens, but have gas clouds? They come in the same box. Serious question. I'm confused.
When the other player brings gas clouds?
I had another player give me some of his extra gas clouds, so I had them before I got strain tokens to go with.
Most players will loan you some strain tokens (or others) if you're out, but then you're dependent on another player for your supplies. And I beleve that's not legal for official tournaments.
Edited by Koing907
34 minutes ago, Koing907 said:And I beleve that's not legal for official tournaments.
Tokens go into a common pool per the tournament regs. Also, reading through the tournament regulations again it looks like people could always make their own strain (and other tokens) since tokens are nonessential components. Just need to make sure what the hand craft token represents is clear and get them okayed with the event's Marshal. I suggest at least trying to match the shape, symbol and color of the token you're trying to make. Less chance of confusion that way.
For reference it is in the Player Materials section, Types of Components, Indicators (Non-Essential) of the tournament regulations PDFs (page 3 of the Text Only pdf).
Links to the pdfs:
Fancy:
Text only:
Edited by HiemfireTxs for the input. I will see if I buy the Never tell me the odds expansion depending the obstacle shapes. I have the obstacles from the blue and black core sets plus some gas clouds. Hope it brings either red core shapes or brand new ones.