On 7/31/2020 at 1:25 PM, meffo said:

coordinate one of the ships? when you coordinate, you measure to any friendly ships, then choose a friendly ship. but the point of hondo seems to be you can choose friendly or enemy ships, as long as the ships you choose are friendly to each other, no?

should we just play this as it seems intended? should we expect (or at least hope for) an update to the RR on coordinate? or an official clarification on how hondo's ability works?

The way I see it Hondo is just choosing the ships and which one gets what, but we could say that the one of the two ships (selected by Hondo) is doing the coordinating and then receives the jam. Its like he's selling you the opportunity to help your ally but then he jams your ship in the process while your not looking.

1 hour ago, SILENT FURY said:

The way I see it Hondo is just choosing the ships and which one gets what, but we could say that the one of the two ships (selected by Hondo) is doing the coordinating and then receives the jam. Its like he's selling you the opportunity to help your ally but then he jams your ship in the process while your not looking.

more like hes playing both sides. Selling beneficial information to one side (coordinate) then to the other thats used against you (jam). lol It fits him.

It would be fun to coordinate an enemy ship to boost it into an arc o barrel roll it to a bad position or switching it off with a Reload, Slam, Cloak or even stressing one with a linked action.

If we could do that then Hondo will be quite expensive...and fun.

For certain definitions of fun. I personally am glad that he cannot.

12 minutes ago, theBitterFig said:

For certain definitions of fun. I personally am glad that he cannot.

So definitely Hondo can't coordinate enemy ships?

9 minutes ago, Cpdio said:

So definitely Hondo can't coordinate enemy ships?

you don't coordinate an action, you coordinate a ship. when a ship is coordinated, that ship performs an action. if it's possible to use hondo on enemy ships, the enemy chooses which action to perform when it's coordinated, then a ship friendly to that ship is jammed.

On 8/6/2020 at 8:52 PM, SILENT FURY said:

The way I see it Hondo is just choosing the ships and which one gets what, but we could say that the one of the two ships (selected by Hondo) is doing the coordinating and then receives the jam. Its like he's selling you the opportunity to help your ally but then he jams your ship in the process while your not looking.

that's not what happens at all, though. the ship carrying hondo is the ship that performs both the coordinate and the jam.

that actually made me think, though. as the rules are written right now, hondo's ability is not just breaking the rules by letting you coordinate an enemy ship, but also by jamming a friendly ship. currently, the jam action only allows you to jam enemy ships.

3 minutes ago, meffo said:

that's not what happens at all, though. the ship carrying hondo is the ship that performs both the coordinate and th

Wait, so the opponent chooses the action given by Hondo's "coordinate"? I'm sorry but it makes no sense to me. At least for me for just reading the card. I know the way I think it works looks like super broken but reading the comments above I can see there is no general consensus about how it really works either xD.

Anyhow, even if it works like you said, it would be fun to "coordinate" a stressed ship just to give the jam to other or the other way around.

15 minutes ago, Cpdio said:

Wait, so the opponent chooses the action given by Hondo's "coordinate"? I'm sorry but it makes no sense to me. At least for me for just reading the card. I know the way I think it works looks like super broken but reading the comments above I can see there is no general consensus about how it really works either xD.

Anyhow, even if it works like you said, it would be fun to "coordinate" a stressed ship just to give the jam to other or the other way around.

that's how coordinate works, yeah. the coordinating ship doesn't get to choose an action, that's up to the coordinated ship.

i think hondo will work best by coordinating a stressed enemy, yeah. on the other hand, that would basically work as a conditional range 1-3 jam action, which is obviously good, but not over powered by any stretch of the imagination.

being able to coordinate friendly ships at range 3 is also useful, but you'd still have to jam as well. not amazing, but interesting.

51 minutes ago, Cpdio said:

So definitely Hondo can't coordinate enemy ships?

He can coordinate them, but he can't pick their action.

To me, that's what makes him so cool. Is it worth giving Enemy A an extra action, to jam Enemy B? Picking the spots where giving an opportunity to Enemy A won't matter seems pretty fun and interesting.

Flipside is true for using him on your own ships. Can my Friend M safely be jammed, if it means Friend N gets to perform an extra action?

That balance of one ship loses an action, one ship gains one, where it's superficially balanced and equal in one sense, but that the flow of the game means that a canny player can pick the opportunities to benefit.

39 minutes ago, Cpdio said:

Wait, so the opponent chooses the action given by Hondo's "coordinate"? I'm sorry but it makes no sense to me. At least for me for just reading the card. I know the way I think it works looks like super broken but reading the comments above I can see there is no general consensus about how it really works either xD.

How I read the Coordinate rules is that "the chosen ship performs 1 action" means that that ship decides the action. The rule doesn't say "choose an action for the chosen ship to perform."

Contrast the tractor rules: (RR v110, p. 20, Tractor)

• The first time a ship becomes tractored each round, the player whose effect applied the tractor token may choose one of the following effects:
  • Perform a barrel roll using the [1 Straight] maneuver template. The player applying the effect selects the direction of the barrel roll and the ship’s final position.
  • Perform a boost using the [1 Straight] maneuver template.

Here, it's clear that the person doing the 'tractoring' gets to choose, not the recipient ship. There's nothing in the coordinate rule which, to my eyes, means that the player doing the coordinating chooses anything other than the ship. Coordinate grants the chosen ship the opportunity to perform an action. It can use it and do something, or it can do nothing. The decision belongs to the chosen ship ship.

3 hours ago, meffo said:

that actually made me think, though. as the rules are written right now, hondo's ability is not just breaking the rules by letting you coordinate an enemy ship, but also by jamming a friendly ship. currently, the jam action only allows you to jam enemy ships.

I feel like this is an important point, and a good catch, that was quickly glossed over.

I've seen a few people claiming Hondo can't work as intended because you cannot coordinate enemies. But given that you also cannot jam allies, how do they think Hondo works? Clearly the regular targeting steps of both effects are being skipped and Hondo chooses those targets by his rules text, and then the effect continues to its final step of "that ship gets a jam token" and "that [other] ship gets to take an action".

I would also add that there are be effects that enhance Jam in the same way that some effects enhance Coordinate, though they're probably mostly useless range enhancements, or only work with a Jam Action. But maybe something would let you jam another ship or add another token.

4 hours ago, Cpdio said:

It would be fun to coordinate an enemy ship to boost it into an arc o barrel roll it to a bad position or switching it off with a Reload, Slam, Cloak or even stressing one with a linked action.

If we could do that then Hondo will be quite expensive...and fun.

3 hours ago, theBitterFig said:

For certain definitions of fun. I personally am glad that he cannot.

I covered this earlier, but suffice it to say I'm strongly with theBitterFig here. It looks initially neat and exciting to be able to force an enemy to do those things, but as soon as you're on the other side of the table having those things done to you, it switches to feeling really, really bad. Any ship with the wrong action(s) available risks a hard shutdown, and that's really unfun for that player!

• reload, cloak: unable to attack this round
• red action: easy stress from long range
  • combinable with other effects in this list, if those actions are red
  • if you stress the foe before they activate, and they reveal a read maneuver, they're further harmed by having to do a white 2 straight instead of the k-turn etc they'd planned
• rotate: lose arc on target
• roll/boost: force them into a bad position

(Worth noting that SLAM is surprisingly safe, since it's so sharply restricted in when it can be used.)

Embittered forum users and throwaway jokes aside, FFG isn't stupid; this sort of ability would have raised red flags aplenty if it could do the above. But as theBitterFig, meffo, I, and others have been arguing, thankfully Hondo lacks the language needed to let him make that choice for the enemy. Instead the ship taking the action keeps its autonomy and makes its own choices.

We're all driven to excitedly chase a rules interpretation that seems interesting, sometimes even if it seems too good to be true -- that's the same drive that leads us to fun, quirky shenanigans that are legit. But after calming down and examining things in more detail, often things that are too good to be true are just that -- not true. A more sober analysis of Hondo tells us neither the RAW nor RAI lead to god-tier power. He's not Snoke or Palpatine after overdosing on glitterstim and death sticks, he's just a guy with a neat ability.

Thanks!

I see now, i mean yeah the way i thought it was it would generate a fair amount of rant.

Anyway the ability to coordinate (and fail) a stressed ship and give an annoying jam to another sounds good enough for the points cost to come.

Also Scum have an historically lack of a support ship that can coordinate (except for the escape ship). So Hondo may help with that need.

great summary, @Wazat . i see now that my biggest concern is somewhat already answered, since it would be impossible to use hondo's ability if you couldn't jam friendly ships or coordinate enemies.

The Jamming enemy ships is a great point. As I said, it seems intended for Hondo to work that way, he's just poorly worded.

Tho im still not convinced you can successfully coordinate a stressed ship, but thats a different debate really.

16 hours ago, Cpdio said:

Also Scum have an historically lack of a support ship that can coordinate (except for the escape ship). So Hondo may help with that need.

This is true, and ive complained about that before, but man does this cost to use. Not only do you have to Jam your own ship to do it, but you have to have at least 3 ships to pull it off. Not sure this is really going to help that much in the grand scheme of things.

3 hours ago, Lyianx said:

This is true, and ive complained about that before, but man does this cost to use. Not only do you have to Jam your own ship to do it, but you have to have at least 3 ships to pull it off. Not sure this is really going to help that much in the grand scheme of things.

I'm stuck in between thinking Hondo is OP and thinking Hondo is just ok. He gives white coordinate to any crew carrier in any faction, so that seems strong despite the jam. But like you said, you'd need at least 3 ship in your list, or 2 ship left in the enemy list. His worth drops considerably the further the game goes along.

1 hour ago, 5050Saint said:

I'm stuck in between thinking Hondo is OP and thinking Hondo is just ok. He gives white coordinate to any crew carrier in any faction, so that seems strong despite the jam. But like you said, you'd need at least 3 ship in your list, or 2 ship left in the enemy list. His worth drops considerably the further the game goes along.

He seems like he's going to be wicked strong in epic, though. Coordinate a winger in a flight where the action won't really accomplish anything, jam the enemy huge ship to get rid of their needed Lock for big hardpoint weapons, or their Reinforce token. Flipside: a jam on winger #3 in your flight probably doesn't matter, but coordinating an extra action to a huge ship might be vital.

Wait... can we coordinate huge ships in 2e... I don't even recall.

48 minutes ago, theBitterFig said:

Wait... can we coordinate huge ships in 2e... I don't even recall.

The rules don't say we cannot. (I double checked just to make sure).

24 minutes ago, Hiemfire said:

The rules don't say we cannot. (I double checked just to make sure).

Thankfully not. Otherwise it would give a distinct advantage for coordinate action heavy factions, which Scum is not one of.

3 minutes ago, Lyianx said:

Thankfully not. Otherwise it would give a distinct advantage for coordinate action heavy factions , which Scum is not one of.

How would not being able to coordinate huge ships do so?

8 minutes ago, Hiemfire said:

How would not being able to coordinate huge ships do so?

I completely misread your post.

I guess they didnt carry over that rule from 1E. That kind of sucks for Scum then, doesnt it. Rebels will get alot out of their huge ships due to this.

1 minute ago, Lyianx said:

I completely misread your post.

Happens.

1 minute ago, Lyianx said:

That kind of sucks for Scum then, doesnt it.

Kinda? No more than in Extended really. The C-ROC does add a second ship with the full ability to perform the Coordinate action (Sqd Ldr x is a very neutered version, maybe on Dace it can have a bit of value, but **** that is getting expensive even if you don't mind ******* over his maneuver options to perform the action) to S&V's hangar in casual Standard format and Epic games.

3 minutes ago, Hiemfire said:

Happens.

Kinda? No more than in Extended really. The C-ROC does add a second ship with the full ability to perform the Coordinate action (Sqd Ldr x is a very neutered version, maybe on Dace it can have a bit of value, but **** that is getting expensive even if you don't mind ******* over his maneuver options to perform the action) to S&V's hangar in casual Standard format and Epic games.

Haha yea. It also doenst help that Scum *only* have the C-roc as a huge ship (ie a small huge ship). Maybe if they got a larger 'raider sized' one it would help.

2 minutes ago, Lyianx said:

Haha yea. It also doenst help that Scum *only* have the C-roc as a huge ship (ie a small huge ship). Maybe if they got a larger 'raider sized' one it would help.

Maybe? C-ROC isn't bad but if the way the S&V Standard ships (FFG's term for Small-Large based ships) are set up relative to the other factions is any indication a S&V corvette will either be an up gunned freighter or an under gunned capital ship that leans stupidly heavy into limited pilot/title abilities to get value out of the chassis.

I'm sick of the cookie cutter "loose group of grey area mavericks" that FFG keeps ******* stamping on S&V ships.

I was a bit confused by the back and forth so I did some looking... From what I can tell, you can indeed coordinate huge ships. I can't find anything in coordinate or huge ship rules that excludes huge ships. Right?

Squad Leader in Epic may be the single time it's worth fielding Angled Deflectors, simply to be able to coordinate Reinforce onto a huge buddy that needs it. Shove Both onto Palob or Dace or Tansarii Point Veteran and have them follow behind your huge ship.

In fact, putting that combo plus Tactical Officer on Jan Ors is probably worth it for Rebels since she comes automatically taped to every CR90 I field. Granted that spikes her cost to 62 points, but I might as well spend her action reinforcing that huge ship, and I couldn't field another coordinator for just 21 points.

I'm still kinda hostile to Angled Deflectors on principle, but maybe I can swallow my contempt for this one edge case.

As for Hondo... I agree it is handy that he can be shoved into any crew ship in the fleet and be coordinating the huge ship or anyone else who needs it. There's generally going to be some scrub in range that can handle the jam, which means Hondo can make the best use of that coordinate on a ship that needs it. Like wise being able to jam the huge ship from long range, and coordinating some scrub in return...

I wonder if that means Hondo will cost something like 9 - 14 points. I mean, that's Force User and Sloane cost range, so maybe not? Still, it has lots of potential, and FFG has to price it for its strongest utility, not the common case.

44 minutes ago, Wazat said:

I wonder if that means Hondo will cost something like 9 - 14 points. I mean, that's Force User and Sloane cost range, so maybe not?

I see that price range as the rough area he'll fall in cost wise, though I lean more towards 11-14 than the lower end of the range you outlined. His ability is powerful, even with its inherent limits, and his faction agnosticism will add a bit.

Sort of along the lines of a hypothetical "Where would Sloane land price range wise if she could be taken by the Resistance?". Even without great carriers for her (I see all the crew carrier options as decent hypothetical options for her if not really great), the power combos in that faction that would love her rerolls would up her cost. FO instead of Resistance as an example? Thanni with Sloane and Phasma? Ouch.