3 hours ago, Reavern said:

That seems like one of those statements about the impossibility of proving a negative that you often hear in arguments about religion, which is brilliantly embodied by the Invisible Pink Unicorn. You can't disprove the existence of the Invisible Pink Unicorn because it's invisible. And "believers" in the Invisible Pink Unicorn can't know that it is pink also because it's invisible.

The lack of data about Mon Mothma proves my point; or, at the very least, fails to disprove it.

I mean, those arguments are generally in favor of accepting an unfounded fact (worship, or in this case buffing Mothma) based on a lack of evidence to the contrary. Whereas inaction or further exploration as a default (i.e. what I'm arguing for) is the general philosophy of atheists/skeptics. It's also the philosophy for Armada game balance; this game is relatively "safe" because we have a mountain of useless cards instead of a handful of broken ones.

That's not to say I come down on one side of the issue, because I agree there definitely is room for balance improvement; here are 36 cards that I think are broadly agreed to be terrible, on paper and in practice:

Interdictor Combat Refit, Konstantine, Tagge, Cracken, Leia (commander, sorry not sorry geek19), Titus, Aresko, Gherant, Isard, Goran, Engineering Captain, Navigation Officer, Tactical Expert, Wing Commander, Engineering Team, Cluster Bombs, Redundant Shields, Heavy Turbolaser Turrets, Rapid Reload, Sensor Team, Phylon Q7s, Point Defense Reroute, NK-7s, High Capacity Ion Turbines, Corruptor, Executor, Jyn Erso, Independence, Liberty, Phoenix Home, Redemption, Lancers, Gar Saxon, Gauntlets, YV-666s, and the G-8 Experimental Projector.

We don't have data for them either, but I think you and most people here would agree that these cards fundamentally suck because of how they are written.

In my unproven opinion, Mothma's problems stem from the meta, not the way her card is written. Ignoring the fact there's a whole pile of vaguely redeemable stuff like Paragon or Lira Wessex between Mothma and this list, changing a commander to drag an archetype up from the depths is putting the cart before the horse. It locks the archetype to that commander and limits design space.

Plus, we should be fixing those terrible upgrades anyway, and doing so would almost certainly have resounding effects on the meta. For example, what if cluster bombs could trigger against any attacker (maybe with a range restriction, or damage suffered individually like SCBTs)? CR90s or MC30s might field a lot of copies in a single list, which is terrifying for the dominant Starhawk/ISD/SSD points fortress archetype centered around 1-2 ships. Boom, MSU is cool again, and so is Mothma.

Basically, we shouldn't "redeem" a diamond in the rough when redeeming garbage potentially serves the same purpose with increased flexibility.

14 minutes ago, The Jabbawookie said:

That's not to say I come down on one side of the issue, because I agree there definitely is room for balance improvement; here are 36 cards that I think are broadly agreed to be terrible, on paper and in practice:

Interdictor Combat Refit, Konstantine, Tagge, Cracken, Leia (commander, sorry not sorry geek19), Titus, Aresko, Gherant, Isard, Goran, Engineering Captain, Navigation Officer, Tactical Expert, Wing Commander, Engineering Team, Cluster Bombs, Redundant Shields, Heavy Turbolaser Turrets, Rapid Reload, Sensor Team, Phylon Q7s, Point Defense Reroute, NK-7s, High Capacity Ion Turbines, Corruptor, Executor, Jyn Erso, Independence, Liberty, Phoenix Home, Redemption, Lancers, Gar Saxon, Gauntlets, YV-666s, and the G-8 Experimental Projector.

We don't have data for them either, but I think you and most people here would agree that these cards fundamentally suck because of how they are written.

Some of those cards are great

1 minute ago, Ginkapo said:

Some of those cards are great

In case there was any doubt, I now bear the Contrarian Seal of Approval.

3 hours ago, LTD said:

The Jabbawookie doesn't exist.

No hyperbole.

Since you've mentioned me by name, you've confirmed my existence as, at minimum, an abstract concept.

Like the Invisible Pink Unicorn, mentioned above. Which I know about because YOU KEEP QUOTING.

Only snowflakes use the Ignore List.

(Someone do me a favour and quote this post. Thx!)

1 hour ago, The Jabbawookie said:

I mean, those arguments are generally in favor of accepting an unfounded fact (worship, or in this case buffing Mothma) based on a lack of evidence to the contrary. Whereas inaction or further exploration as a default (i.e. what I'm arguing for) is the general philosophy of atheists/skeptics. It's also the philosophy for Armada game balance; this game is relatively "safe" because we have a mountain of useless cards instead of a handful of broken ones.

No, you said that there's a lack of statistical evidence to support my case that Mon Mothma should be updated/buffed because of the Wave 8 changes to Armada. I replied that you can't use the lack of evidence to prove or disprove a point. That's why the religious argument ends in a stalemate because you can't definitely prove that something that doesn't exist doesn't exist. The point of the Invisible Pink Unicorn is the absurdity of faith.

However, this isn't a matter of faith. The Mon Mothma Commander card exists, and there's a small percentage of players who have used Mon Mothma in years past. If there were current statistics of a greater number of players using Mon Mothma and performing poorly in CP, that would be evidence that Mon Mothma is a poor Commander and would benefit from a buff. Whereas if there were statistics of players using MM and performing average or better, that would be evidence that MM is fine the way she is. However, there is a distinct lack of evidence. The logical conclusion is that MM is so ineffective that players never/rarely use her in CP; therefore, the lack of evidence is the "proof".

Believe me, I'm not happy about this and I'd prefer if there was a preponderance of statistical evidence to support my case -- or refuting it. The uncertainty is most frustrating.

Regardless, I think we can both agree that if Mon Mothma's ability was updated to cancel 2 dice at long range, that would be a buff that would make MM significantly better -- at the risk of making her OP'd. So the hypothetical effect can play-tested and proven, but the justification cannot be proven because of the current lack of evidence.

I suppose this could be remedied by a broad play-testing regimen comparing the battle performance of the existing Mon Mothma Commander compared to the proposed Buffed Mon Mothma Commander. I'd gladly participate.

In fact, because I'm primarily an Imperial player, I have every incentive to prove that the Buffed Mon Mothma can be beaten. The last thing I would want is to make an unbeatable Rebel Commander. That's why I'm open to Mon Mothma being buffed in another way, such as the Reeva Demesne-inspired suggestion. That could be a reasonable compromise, but I'd prefer to test the "MM's Evades cancel 2 dice at long range" idea first, because that idea is logically consistent with how Evades work now in Wave 8.

1 hour ago, The Jabbawookie said:

I mean, those arguments are generally in favor of accepting an unfounded fact (worship, or in this case buffing Mothma) based on a lack of evidence to the contrary. Whereas inaction or further exploration as a default (i.e. what I'm arguing for) is the general philosophy of atheists/skeptics. It's also the philosophy for Armada game balance; this game is relatively "safe" because we have a mountain of useless cards instead of a handful of broken ones.

That's not to say I come down on one side of the issue, because I agree there definitely is room for balance improvement; here are 36 cards that I think are broadly agreed to be terrible, on paper and in practice:

Interdictor Combat Refit, Konstantine, Tagge, Cracken, Leia (commander, sorry not sorry geek19), Titus, Aresko, Gherant, Isard, Goran, Engineering Captain, Navigation Officer, Tactical Expert, Wing Commander, Engineering Team, Cluster Bombs, Redundant Shields, Heavy Turbolaser Turrets, Rapid Reload, Sensor Team, Phylon Q7s, Point Defense Reroute, NK-7s, High Capacity Ion Turbines, Corruptor, Executor, Jyn Erso, Independence, Liberty, Phoenix Home, Redemption, Lancers, Gar Saxon, Gauntlets, YV-666s, and the G-8 Experimental Projector.

We don't have data for them either, but I think you and most people here would agree that these cards fundamentally suck because of how they are written.

In my unproven opinion, Mothma's problems stem from the meta, not the way her card is written. Ignoring the fact there's a whole pile of vaguely redeemable stuff like Paragon or Lira Wessex between Mothma and this list, changing a commander to drag an archetype up from the depths is putting the cart before the horse. It locks the archetype to that commander and limits design space.

Plus, we should be fixing those terrible upgrades anyway, and doing so would almost certainly have resounding effects on the meta. For example, what if cluster bombs could trigger against any attacker (maybe with a range restriction, or damage suffered individually like SCBTs)? CR90s or MC30s might field a lot of copies in a single list, which is terrifying for the dominant Starhawk/ISD/SSD points fortress archetype centered around 1-2 ships. Boom, MSU is cool again, and so is Mothma.

Basically, we shouldn't "redeem" a diamond in the rough when redeeming garbage potentially serves the same purpose with increased flexibility.

I broadly disagree with some of your choices of cards, but I think you'd disagree with my choice of terrible cards.

But looking at your list it seems that most of them are from earlier waves and as the game has evolved they've been left behind. That seems to particularly be the case for the Imperial rogues, which are - not great (particularly Gauntlets, what were they thinking?) - but also the early wave ship titles. The Fleet Command made a number of cards largely redundant.

Some of those are redeemable, some not. The AFMk2 is suddenly seeing play thanks to the salvo token. Who would have thought that? A month or so ago there was a discussion about the Combat Refit Interdictor and the sort-of-agreed-conclusion was that a ship title that added a weapon team and/or an extra ability/die would redeem it. I had a thought last night that an experimental retrofit that created a grav well next to your Interdictor, so you took a face-down damage card and any ship at close range took a face-up one, might be fun. Make it combat retrofit only and there's a reason for running the combat refit.

So some cards bring some ships back in to use. However that doesn't seem to work with commanders as much.

Where am I going with this? Certain commanders benefit from certain ships (Piett has a very small range of fleets he fits in, for example), so more ships of the kind that benefit certain commanders would be good. A rebel command-2 medium base with two evades would be ideal for Mothma, for example. Armada has been fairly unloved compared to X-Wing for the last couple of years, and the GCW fleets aren't likely to get larger any time soon thanks to this whole obsession everyone except me has with getting Jar Jar Binks on to a spaceship. (No, the whole Jedi vs Trade Federation thing is a yawnfest for me).

The other thing that occurs is that commanders who are less popular are those whose benefits are harder to quantify. How do you judge whether or not Tagge was brilliant in an objective sense? You can look at Romodi and quickly work out how many extra dice you rolled in a game, but you can't do that for Ozzel, Tagge etc.

Basically I'm saying Armada needs more ships, not fannying around with commanders based upon a vague feeling of lack of balance. People are awful at calculating balance.

Correlation doesnt equal causation.

Motti loses players over time. Not because he is weak but because he is unexciting to play.

Are we going to declare that Rieekan needs a buff due to a severe decline in play?

How about a fleet title:

If your commander is Mon Mothma, during the spend defence tokens step, when you spend an evade token, exhaust a card of this type on another friendly ship at close-medium range to cancel an extra dice. (7)

7 hours ago, The Jabbawookie said:

Interdictor Combat Refit, Konstantine, Tagge, Cracken, Leia (commander, sorry not sorry geek19), Titus, Aresko, Gherant, Isard, Goran, Engineering Captain, Navigation Officer, Tactical Expert, Wing Commander, Engineering Team, Cluster Bombs, Redundant Shields, Heavy Turbolaser Turrets, Rapid Reload, Sensor Team, Phylon Q7s, Point Defense Reroute, NK-7s, High Capacity Ion Turbines, Corruptor, Executor, Jyn Erso, Independence, Liberty, Phoenix Home, Redemption, Lancers, Gar Saxon, Gauntlets, YV-666s, and the G-8 Experimental Projector.

Im just happy to be seen

On 6/15/2020 at 3:48 AM, flatpackhamster said:

Armada has been fairly unloved compared to X-Wing for the last couple of years, and the GCW fleets aren't likely to get larger any time soon thanks to this whole obsession everyone except me has with getting Jar Jar Binks on to a spaceship. (No, the whole Jedi vs Trade Federation thing is a yawnfest for me).

The other thing that occurs is that commanders who are less popular are those whose benefits are harder to quantify. How do you judge whether or not Tagge was brilliant in an objective sense? You can look at Romodi and quickly work out how many extra dice you rolled in a game, but you can't do that for Ozzel, Tagge etc.

Basically I'm saying Armada needs more ships, not fannying around with commanders based upon a vague feeling of lack of balance. People are awful at calculating balance.

I completely agree that Armada has been neglected by Asmodee and there's been distinct lack of new content compared to X-Wing and Legion. Unfortunately, whenever I've pointed out that fact people on this forum have lined up claiming that they're "happy" about Armada's lack of content in recent years. 🙄

To say that I'm eager for Clone Wars Armada would be an understatement. Not because I'm a Prequel Trilogy fanboy but because I want new Armada content, and the Clone Wars should keep Armada alive and kicking for a few more years.

I sincerely hope that the upcoming Clone Wars Armada waves will include some new GCW expansions, because I want more ships (and squadrons) too. However, the well seems to be running dry... mainly because Disney foolishly threw out the EU when they brought Jar-Jar Abrams onboard to make the Disney Debacle Trilogy, and there seems to be an aversion to mining Legends for Armada content. Because there are dozens of Legends ships and squadrons that could have been released for Armada in the past 2 1/2 years, but haven't been, and I doubt expect that to change when the Clone Wars waves begin. Unless Disney-Star Wars introduces new GCW and Post-Empire/NR ships and starfighters in The Mandalorian and the other Disney+ Star Wars series in development, or FFG creates new Imperial and Rebel ships, similar to what they did in Wave 8, I doubt there will be many GCW ships released in the next few years.

So if the future of GCW Armada looks bleak, why not look to the past for hope?

There are dozens of upgrade cards, most of which were released early in Armada's life cycle, that are rarely ever used either because their abilities aren't useful or they're over-priced. I understand that's natural for any game because the META evolves over time as new content is released, which takes the game in unforeseen directions and renders certain things obsolete. Rather than keeping those under-used/obsolete content, why not update and revise it so it's useful? I'd estimate that between the 2nd versions of ships, ace/unique squadrons, under-powered Commanders, and rarely used Upgrade cards, somewhere between 1/4 and 1/3 of Armada content could be revised and updated to the benefit of the game.

I acknowledge that it's difficult for players to judge how changes could effect Armada on a macro level, and the possibility exists to upset the META. That's why play-testing is vital. Extensive play-testing -- not just a few Armada players experimenting with homebrewed ships and cards, but hundreds of experienced Armada players.

FFG recently announced the X-Wing Solo Play Open Alpha. If FFG can do that, why can't they develop an "Armada 2.0" Open Alpha? Perhaps they could choose 10-20 Ship/Commander/Upgrade cards and post the Alpha revisions in Print-&-Play format, and let the Armada community test them out. They obviously wouldn't be permitted in Organized Play; the 2.0 Alpha would be kept separate as it developed. Alpha Testers could post their Battle Reports on the forum and submit feedback to FFG. After several months, FFG could release a new batch of revised cards, and tweaks/fixes to the first batch. And over the course of a year or more, the 2.0 Alpha could proceed to a Beta, perhaps with Organized Play events for competitive testing, and when it's ready, FFG could publish Armada 2.0, which would include the Alpha revisions as well as the Errata from the past 5 years. Then we'd all proceed from the 2.0 milestone, similar to what happened with X-Wing Second Edition.