1 hour ago, Caimheul1313 said:

Every keyword has a cost. Adding Pierce would likely increase the cost of the Harpoon since it is guarenteed damage. Removing the damage requirement would be the better way of making it more reliable in my opinion.

You don't seem to understand that it's already bad. Adding Pierce 1 would add no extra cost since it's already bad. It's already bad. The point is to make it better for its points, because it's already bad. Please stop talking about how they would "have to" increase its cost when they clearly don't, because it's already bad. It would be more effective for the same cost, which is literally the point, because it's already bad. I'm not sure if you realize how already bad it is, but the answer is QUITE.

I totally agree with the last part though, the only real reason it does damage is because it was working within the rules as they were at the time and maybe they knew it needed some sort of damage boost. However, it would need a substantial buff if you took away its ability to deal even that one puny damage. I agree with @Khobai that they both need to be free and equally good, so you're adding interesting choices.

6 hours ago, arnoldrew said:

You don't seem to understand that it's already bad. Adding Pierce 1 would add no extra cost since it's already bad. It's already bad. The point is to make it better for its points, because it's already bad. Please stop talking about how they would "have to" increase its cost when they clearly don't, because it's already bad. It would be more effective for the same cost, which is literally the point, because it's already bad. I'm not sure if you realize how already bad it is, but the answer is QUITE.

I totally agree with the last part though, the only real reason it does damage is because it was working within the rules as they were at the time and maybe they knew it needed some sort of damage boost. However, it would need a substantial buff if you took away its ability to deal even that one puny damage. I agree with @Khobai that they both need to be free and equally good, so you're adding interesting choices.

I am well aware that the weapons and the airspeeder in general is bad. And a big part of the reason the Harpoon is bad is because it has to inflict damage in order to trigger any of the effects, and that the effects are only relevant against vehicles in a game that is primarily focused on infantry. In every game I have played, dedicated weapons are "bad" at doing something outside of their dedicated roll: Bazookas are bad against infantry, rifles are bad against tanks. In Legion, Ion is bad against biological troopers, and the Airspeeder is bad against troopers in general. We seem to be in agreement that the Airspeeder also fails to be "good" against vehicles for the points cost.

Ion is bad for the following reasons: the weapons predominantly exhaust, making them expensive in action economy as well as points, it only works on vehicles and droids, and there are significantly better options for all-rounder lists that can do a similar job. FFG has thus far not made any significant changes to the mechanics of Ion to improve those weapons against all targets, I don't see why they would do that here for the Harpoon.
Honestly, if they took away the ability to do damage, focusing the harpoon solely on the anti-vehicle repositioning then it should just be free. This serves to give the Airspeeder a guaranteed way to make at least partial use of Arsenal, while keeping the option of switching the harpoon gun out for the ground buzzer.

Pierce 1 I don't think is enough to significantly improve the harpoon, and in general game designers assign a points cost to various game effects and when adding the game effect adds some number of points. So the perception would be (by both the game dev and potentially the player base) that 3 points is very cheap for what amounts to (against a unit in the open with no dodge tokens, etc, etc) a guaranteed wound. I agree that the harpoon should be cheaper/better, but disagree that Pierce 1 is the best way to accomplish that.

3 hours ago, Khobai said:

If you can actually land a harpoon on an enemy vehicle you should get rewarded for it. otherwise the harpoon is pointless.

yeah because the airspeeder with pierce on its harpoon would really be a credible threat lmao.

the purpose of adding pierce on the harpoon is so the ONE dice it rolls doesnt just bounce off a defense save.

I would not be opposed to increasing the damage on the harpoon to two dice either instead of giving it pierce. But either way the harpoon needs to be more reliable.

The harpoon is supposed to be pointless. Not every weapon in the game needs to be "OMG, so good!" It's utility tool that Luke figured out how to use as a weapon against a single vehicle. Naturally, to be thematic, it was brought into the game, but it doesn't need to be an equally good weapon to other options either.

If you need to have the harpoon be effective, do as Caimheul said, and give it wording that allows it to have the effect even if the harpoon is blocked. Damage isn't the goal (and guaranteed damage is the point of Pierce), turning the vehicle is.

And no, Pierce 1 on a snow speeder probably isn't going to make it the end all and be all of a Rebel list. However, it's just another example of Rebels getting Pierce. By my quick count, hey already have at least 16 examples of it already, compared to 6 for the Empire, 4 for the Republic, and 3 for the CIS. Do they really need one more, especially if the stated purpose of the weapon in question isn't to punch through armor/defensive saves?

I disagree. If something exists in the game it should be useful.

Having something exist for the sake of not being used is not only pointless but its stupid as well.

Saying something like "the harpoon is supposed to be bad" is an absurd statement.

6 hours ago, Caimheul1313 said:

Pierce 1 I don't think is enough to significantly improve the harpoon, and in general game designers assign a points cost to various game effects and when adding the game effect adds some number of points. So the perception would be (by both the game dev and potentially the player base) that 3 points is very cheap for what amounts to (against a unit in the open with no dodge tokens, etc, etc) a guaranteed wound. I agree that the harpoon should be cheaper/better, but disagree that Pierce 1 is the best way to accomplish that.

Youre not wrong. Which is why I also think the rear weapons should should be free and the airspeeder needs surge to crit. That helps the main gun as well.

The harpoon should also have a more useful utility ability as well because pivoting a vehicle is crap. Giving it scatter and immobilize would be fine I think.

Both of the rear weapons on the airspeeder should be free because thats preferable to decreasing the base cost of the airspeeder. Because if you just decrease the base cost of the airspeeder people will run it naked without the rear weapons. Making the rear weapons free incentivizes their use. But in order to make both rear weapons free you have to buff the harpoon to be at the same level as the ground buzzer. That way choosing between the harpoon or ground buzzer is an actual choice.

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Except you aren't targeting 'debris' unless every planet has magnetic rocks just lying around. It's a magnetic harpoon, using a strong magnet to attach itself, not a shaped point

why cant debris be magnetic? why does debris have to be a rock?

4 minutes ago, Khobai said:

I disagree. If something exists in the game it should be useful.

Having something exist for the sake of not being used is not only pointless but its stupid as well.

Youre not wrong. Which is why I also think the harpoon should be free and the airspeeder needs surge to crit. That helps the main gun as well.

The harpoon should have a more useful utility ability as well because pivoting a vehicle is crap.

If you think pivoting is crap, then you really should read the rules for Immobilize tokens. All they do is reduce the maximum speed of the unit, not prevent it from taking a move action. And if you are in range to use the Harpoon, then frequently the vehicle will just aim and fire at the Airspeeder and any other unit in Range.
Pivoting can be very good, since pivoting a Speeder vehicle can destroy the vehicle if it is too close to the board edge. As units with Speeder (when they are included) are frequently used as flankers, that can be very strong. At the very least it costs the vehicle an Action, and with action economy a significant element of the meta, reducing your opponent's number of actions is good.

2 minutes ago, Caimheul1313 said:

If you think pivoting is crap, then you really should read the rules for Immobilize tokens. All they do is reduce the maximum speed of the unit, not prevent it from taking a move action.

yes but a pivot + immobilize is still better than just a pivot

pivoting is bad. immobilizing is bad. they are both bad. But pivoting AND immobilizing combined together are still less bad than one or the other individually.

Just now, Khobai said:

yes but a pivot + immobilize is still better than just a pivot

How? Your opponent is most likely to pivot the vehicle back to the facing they wanted, then take the attack action. The Immobilized Token then falls off at the end of the activation having had no effect.
It also makes the pivot LESS likely for the Speeder to end up off the board, since the Compulsory move is now slower.

speeders getting compulsory moved off the board by the harpoon is so cornercase and unlikely to happen that I dont even consider it a possibility. Your opponent literally has to be blind for that to happen. its so easily avoidable by just not putting your speeders near the edge when theres an airspeeder in harpoon range.

also a unit whos speed is reduced to 0 by immobilize tokens CANT pivot. so if you hit an occupier tank and pivot it, because immobilize reduced its speed to 0, it cant pivot.

you could also give harpoon immobilize 2. I never said it had to be immobilize 1. that would prevent speed 2 vehicles from being able to pivot as well.

it is very useful so I dont know what you mean.

pivot is bad. immobilize is bad. but the combination of pivot and immobilize X can synergize together to be less bad. you can potentially take a vehicle out of the game for a turn if it relies on front fixed weapons.

8 minutes ago, Khobai said:

speeders getting compulsory moved off the board by the harpoon is so cornercase and unlikely to happen that I dont even consider it a possibility. Your opponent literally has to be blind for that to happen. its so easily avoidable by just not putting your speeders near the edge when theres an airspeeder in harpoon range.

also a unit whos speed is reduced to 0 by immobilize tokens CANT pivot. so if you hit an occupier tank and pivot it, because immobilize reduced its speed to 0, it cant pivot.

you could also give harpoon immobilize 2. I never said it had to be immobilize 1. that would prevent speed 2 vehicles from being able to pivot as well.

it is very useful so I dont know what you mean.

So it essentially becomes the target vehicle spends it's next turn taking an dodge and a standby action. The Standby token will give the vehicle a chance to pivot before their next turn since the Immobilize tokens will fall off at the end of the activation, not the end of the turn.
Immobilize 2 and Pivot is almost equivalent to Ion 2... Which is likely a bit too far the other way to be a potential change.

I dont think immobilize 2 is uncalled for. Considering how impressive of a feat hitting a vehicle with a harpoon actually is.

10 hours ago, Khobai said:

speeders getting compulsory moved off the board by the harpoon is so cornercase and unlikely to happen that I dont even consider it a possibility. Your opponent literally has to be blind for that to happen. its so easily avoidable by just not putting your speeders near the edge when theres an airspeeder in harpoon range.

also a unit whos speed is reduced to 0 by immobilize tokens CANT pivot. so if you hit an occupier tank and pivot it, because immobilize reduced its speed to 0, it cant pivot.

you could also give harpoon immobilize 2. I never said it had to be immobilize 1. that would prevent speed 2 vehicles from being able to pivot as well.

it is very useful so I dont know what you mean.

pivot is bad. immobilize is bad. but the combination of pivot and immobilize X can synergize together to be less bad. you can potentially take a vehicle out of the game for a turn if it relies on front fixed weapons.

You can pivot with speed 0.

If you couldn't, the FD cannon would be stuck in one position.

5 hours ago, costi said:

You can pivot with speed 0.

If you couldn't, the FD cannon would be stuck in one position.

Not with an Immobilize token though: " A unit whose maximum speed is 0 and has at least one immobilize token cannot perform moves of any kind. "

These are the units that spring to mind as needing a boost or a nerf. Either via a points adjustment or a change to their unit card. I’ve included the kind of adjustments to points I think would be needed (assuming a purely points based approach to fixing things is adopted).

Commander Vader* -20 points (maybe even -25 points. Speed one, whilst thematic, is crippling on the tabletop and having no ranged attack on his unit card means often using up a valuable force upgrade slot to equip safer throw)

Dewback -10 points (and -5 points for its weapons)

Han Solo -15 points

Tauntaun Riders +5 or maybe +10 points

All Strike Teams** +5 points

General Grievous -10 points

Droidekas -20 points

B2s -2 points per model

AAT +5 points

Captain Rex +5 points

R2-D2 +5 points

*Vader could use some kind of boost beyond a points reduction. I think giving him surge to defence would be fitting and provide a welcome buff to his general durability.

**It may be better to limit the numbers of Strike Teams that can be taken by tying them to a parent specialist unit rather than adjusting their points.

Clones sharing Standby tokens needs to be looked at and possibly even disallowed.

32 minutes ago, Shrike said:

These are the units that spring to mind as needing a boost or a nerf. Either via a points adjustment or a change to their unit card. I’ve included the kind of adjustments to points I think would be needed (assuming a purely points based approach to fixing things is adopted).

Commander Vader* -20 points (maybe even -25 points. Speed one, whilst thematic, is crippling on the tabletop and having no ranged attack on his unit card means often using up a valuable force upgrade slot to equip safer throw)

Dewback -10 points (and -5 points for its weapons)

Han Solo -15 points

Tauntaun Riders +5 or maybe +10 points

All Strike Teams** +5 points

General Grievous -10 points

Droidekas -20 points

B2s -2 points per model

AAT +5 points

Captain Rex +5 points

R2-D2 +5 points

*Vader could use some kind of boost beyond a points reduction. I think giving him surge to defence would be fitting and provide a welcome buff to his general durability.

**It may be better to limit the numbers of Strike Teams that can be taken by tying them to a parent specialist unit rather than adjusting their points.

Clones sharing Standby tokens needs to be looked at and possibly even disallowed.

I'll agree with most of this except:

Dewbacks - might need an even bigger change to be worthwhile.

Aat- its good but I don't think it needs a point increase right now.

I'm skeptical about changing the points on b2s as well.

1 hour ago, Shrike said:

General Grievous -10 point

This one genuinely surprised me.

IMO scale is one of the most powerful keywords in the game right now. Being able to pop a unit out from behind LoS blocking terrain to capture objectives or hold units hostage is pretty good. Especially if that unit gets a free attack after moving.

Just last week I ran Grievous from the far flanks of deployment to intercept the enemy's hostage round 2

All of this to say, I don't think he's too expensive at all. He just has a very niche effective play style.

Are we talking just units or upgrades too? Because i think some upgrades are AGGRESSIVEly changing list building and TACTICS lol.

To be fair, some units (most of them belonging to the first waves) needs something more then just a point reduction to be viable. I woudn't play Han even at 90-100 points.

@Shrike

Grevious and b2s won't be changed. Grevious is actually one of the best saber users in the game and is very competitive so there's no way he will get a points cut, and b2s are going to probably see some play once the tac droid is out. I'd expect very few changes to CIS because they are so well designed and internally balanced compared to the other factions.

1 hour ago, Ringmaster80 said:

Are we talking just units or upgrades too? Because i think some upgrades are AGGRESSIVEly changing list building and TACTICS lol.

To be fair, some units (most of them belonging to the first waves) needs something more then just a point reduction to be viable. I woudn't play Han even at 90-100 points.

Totally agree that there are lots of units that could do with being revisited, particularly from the first waves. Unfortunately I doubt FFG will want to revise too many unit cards at this stage. I suspect we'll have to wait for a second edition for a deeper refresh of many units. That said hopefully improving a couple of iconic early releases like Han and commander Vader might be something FFG would consider though.

2 hours ago, KarlVonCarstein said:

I'll agree with most of this except:

Dewbacks - might need an even bigger change to be worthwhile.

Aat- its good but I don't think it needs a point increase right now.

I'm skeptical about changing the points on b2s as well.

Yeah, Dewbacks might need a bigger reduction in points to be worth it.

I definitely think B2s need something. I know that the upcoming Tactical Droid can be added to the unit to make it more usable but I think it would be good if the B2s themselves were better.

3 hours ago, Shrike said:

5 hours ago, KarlVonCarstein said:

I'm skeptical about changing the points on b2s as well.

Yeah, Dewbacks might need a bigger reduction in points to be worth it.

I definitely think B2s need something. I know that the upcoming Tactical Droid can be added to the unit to make it more usable but I think it would be good if the B2s themselves were better.

B2s are about in the middle. If FFG said that they would say a lot of small changes on a ton of units then I would say a few points drop to see how they do. If FFG goes only a few big changes then B2s I would say don't touch them. Droidekars need a lot more love and taking just 1 B2 in a list seems good.

3 hours ago, Shrike said:

5 hours ago, Ringmaster80 said:

To be fair, some units (most of them belonging to the first waves) needs something more then just a point reduction to be viable. I woudn't play Han even at 90-100 points.

Totally agree that there are lots of units that could do with being revisited, particularly from the first waves. Unfortunately I doubt FFG will want to revise too many unit cards at this stage. I suspect we'll have to wait for a second edition for a deeper refresh of many units. That said hopefully improving a couple of iconic early releases like Han and commander Vader might be something FFG would consider though.

I really really hope that the point changes is mainly to fix the first waves (and bring GAR down a little lol). If not then what is the point of the point changes? Just let the power creep control the meta in tournaments at that point and let me end the suffering of my poor airspeeder!!!

They don't have a lot of bad first wave units.............. I mean they are really bad units, but they surprisingly don't have that many.

• Rebels: both heavies, Han, fleets, wookies, and maybe pathfinders. The heavies/Han are the big issues in the room that I will throw down if they are not in the point changes.
• Empire: dewbacks, scoute units, and Vader................... Maybe a few points down on the heavies?
• Hopefully strike teams will either be nurfed or FFG comes out and tells us they like the way people are using them. I don't like them, but I would be okay if FFG said they like the padding.

Sure some unit stay mediocre, but maybe next year?

5 hours ago, Shrike said:

Totally agree that there are lots of units that could do with being revisited, particularly from the first waves. Unfortunately I doubt FFG will want to revise too many unit cards at this stage. I suspect we'll have to wait for a second edition for a deeper refresh of many units. That said hopefully improving a couple of iconic early releases like Han and commander Vader might be something FFG would consider though.

Alternatively, changes to the early units could coincide with the models being re-released in hard plastic, something that FFG has previously indicated is planned.

17 hours ago, Caimheul1313 said:

Alternatively, changes to the early units could coincide with the models being re-released in hard plastic, something that FFG has previously indicated is planned.

I wouldn't mind this if there's an alternative way to get the new rules. I have 5 squads of painted stormtroopers already, I'm really not interested in buying more of them.

@Khobai Briefly continuing this conversation in a more appropriate topic:
Firstly, you seem to think the real world definition of a keyword matters, rather than just being the name of a game rule. If the game effect is thematically appropriate, it doesn't really matter what name is applied.

Secondly, you seem to have a fundamental misunderstanding of how Cover and Dodge work if you think that Dodge with Nimble (so you only get 1 Dodge token back after spending any number of tokens) has a vastly different effect than Cover 1. For sake of argument, let's say that instead of Agile, the Airspeeder has a keyword that gives it some number of Dodge tokens at the beginning of the turn. Without this keyword, the vehicle is easier to hit before it activates since it hasn't received the Dodge token(s) that Agile provides, yet the Compulsory move on Speeder is to represent the unit never coming to a stop. So if we want the Airspeeder to have the same additional defence against all incoming shots the number of Dodge tokens granted at the beginning of the turn is 1. So that means that the Airspeeder can cancel 1 hit per attack roll, which is the same as what happens with Cover 1. The main difference is Cover 1 requires less book keeping . In a game system whose watchword seems to be "simplicity" requiring less book keeping is more desirable from a development standpoint than multiple keywords to get the same effect.

Thirdly, the Airspeeder is describe in canon as being "is like steering a block of wood" by a character that is also in canon as a talented pilot. So it should be less maneuverable than a hover tank. Additionally, the Airspeeder's response to ground fire is show in ESB to just be "fly as fast as possible in a straight line and hope the armour handles anything lucky enough to hit," not "jink out of the way," unlike the hover tank, which is shown to use it's maneuverability to dodge incoming fire.

The airspeeder suffered from several problems

Highly priced despite little impact on objectives or enemy forces

Lacking offensive power for a heavy with the thought that armor was a strong keyword and impact 3 would be needed

Vunerable to grenades despite needing to be close to use arsenal 2 and meme weapons

They fixed all of these except the offensive power and it's mediocre at best. Still a fun unit though.

8 hours ago, Caimheul1313 said:

@Khobai Briefly continuing this conversation in a more appropriate topic:
Firstly, you seem to think the real world definition of a keyword matters, rather than just being the name of a game rule. If the game effect is thematically appropriate, it doesn't really matter what name is applied.

Secondly, you seem to have a fundamental misunderstanding of how Cover and Dodge work if you think that Dodge with Nimble (so you only get 1 Dodge token back after spending any number of tokens) has a vastly different effect than Cover 1. For sake of argument, let's say that instead of Agile, the Airspeeder has a keyword that gives it some number of Dodge tokens at the beginning of the turn. Without this keyword, the vehicle is easier to hit before it activates since it hasn't received the Dodge token(s) that Agile provides, yet the Compulsory move on Speeder is to represent the unit never coming to a stop. So if we want the Airspeeder to have the same additional defence against all incoming shots the number of Dodge tokens granted at the beginning of the turn is 1. So that means that the Airspeeder can cancel 1 hit per attack roll, which is the same as what happens with Cover 1. The main difference is Cover 1 requires less book keeping . In a game system whose watchword seems to be "simplicity" requiring less book keeping is more desirable from a development standpoint than multiple keywords to get the same effect.

Thirdly, the Airspeeder is describe in canon as being "is like steering a block of wood" by a character that is also in canon as a talented pilot. So it should be less maneuverable than a hover tank. Additionally, the Airspeeder's response to ground fire is show in ESB to just be "fly as fast as possible in a straight line and hope the armour handles anything lucky enough to hit," not "jink out of the way," unlike the hover tank, which is shown to use it's maneuverability to dodge incoming fire.

I dont have any fundamental misunderstanding. Dodge has a vastly different effect than Cover 1 when you also have the outmaneuver keyword. Because you can dodge crits. Having the ability to dodge crits is crucial for the airspeeder because of its overall low health and poor armor save.

Furthermore cover is pretty much useless on the airspeeder due to it having armor. The only time cover ever does anything for the airspeeder is when the impact keyword is present and theres exactly one hit in the attack pool. Because if theres more than one hit, cover still only negates one hit, and the other hit(s) gets upgraded to crits from impact.

Cover is a bad keyword for the airspeeder and fails to give it any sort of meaningful defense whatsoever. that is a fact.

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Thirdly, the Airspeeder is describe in canon as being "is like steering a block of wood" by a character that is also in canon as a talented pilot. So it should be less maneuverable than a hover tank.

Nope. The hovertank should definitely not be more agile than the airspeeder. I also dont care if you read it flies like a brick. Because in the movies the airspeeder can be seen dodging incoming fire and circling AT-ATs. If it can circle an AT-AT its turning radius is pretty decent. And the movies are more canon than anything you read.

The airspeeder should absolutely have agile 1, outmaneuver, and possibly even nimble.

What it should not have is cover. Cover makes no sense on the airspeeder at all.